MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN GATECRASHES BRITISH FOOTBALL

St James' Park

Mohammed bin Salman : 'Howay the lads!'

Newcastle United are about to become the richest club in world football and with the spending power to match. The majority owner will be Saudi Arabia royal family’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

I WAS eight years old the first time I went to St James' Park to see Newcastle United play. I've been a supporter of the club all my life and, if the truth was known, probably a little obsessive at times. In my defence, it was ex-Liverpool manager Bill Shankly who famously said: 'Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I assure you, it's much more serious than that.' He also said 'The socialism I believe in, is everybody working for the same goal and everybody having a share in the rewards. That’s how I see football, that’s how I see life.'

But these days the values that Bill Shankly espoused back in the 1970s have little to do with the top tier of British football. These days its all about the money, money, money. British football, once a working class sport, has become dominated by capital espousing the values of 'the market'.

Although in New Zealand the focus is usually on the teams jostling for a top four champions league spot, Newcastle United have always been one the wealthiest clubs in the world. It was listed at number 19 in the 2019 Deloitte Football Top 20 World Money League, joining the likes of Barcelona, Manchester City, Real Madrid and Liverpool.

Although on-field success has eluded it in recent years, its huge fan base combined with its financial muscle, has seen the club regularly referred to as the 'sleeping giant' of English football.

But the prospect of the sleeping giant ever waking from its slumbers have looked remote under the ownership of British billionaire Mike Ashley. Ashley made his fortune through Sports Direct, a sporting clothing and goods chain. In 2016 a British parliamentary investigation concluded that Ashley had based his success on a business model that treated its workers 'without dignity or respect'. Some of his work practices were described as coming 'straight out of the Victorian workhouses'.

Ashley bought Newcastle United in 2007 and the sale was initially welcomed by the fans, especially since he talked of returning the Tyneside to its 'glory days'. Ashley even produced a three year plan designed to return the club to the position of being able to compete consistently for a coveted top four position and entry into the Champions League.

Amanda Stavely :  Negotiated the takeover.

But during his thirteen year tenure, Ashley has failed to invest in the team, its sporting academy, its youth teams and in its training facilities. Newcastle United has largely been used as advertising vehicle for Sports Direct, with Ashley happy to allow the club to merely 'tick over'. But that has also seen the club relegated twice during the Ashley era. Although it quickly returned to the premier league, a club as big as Newcastle United, if properly managed, should be consistently competing at the top end of the premier league and not be engaged in relegation dogfights.

Disillusioned and angry fans rightly believed  that nothing would change until Mike Ashley sold up and departed. But that prospect has remained remote and many fans had resigned themselves to more years of mediocrity. But, stunningly, all that is about to change with major ramifications for the future of British football.

With only a few formalities to be completed, a new consortium will soon be announced as the new owners of Newcastle United. The purchase price was 300 million pounds.  Central to the takeover has been PCP Partners headed by Amanda Stavely. She tried to buy the club some two years ago but this time she has  been backed by British real estate billionaires the Reuben brothers and, crucially, by the Saudi Arabia royal family’s Public Investment Fund (PIF). The group is led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and he is believed to control assets worth in the region of $700 billion. PIF will take a eighty percent stake in the club.

Almost overnight, Newcastle United are about to become not only the richest club in Britain but the world. It will have the kind of spending power that even clubs like Manchester City, Real Madrid and Barcelona will not be able to emulate.

But nothing tends to be straightforward when it comes to Newcastle United and supporting the club can be something of a rollercoaster ride. Outrage has been expressed in some quarters that Prince Mohammed bin Salman has essentially gatecrashed British football.

Amnesty International has given voice to that discontent.  In a strongly worded letter to the Premier League it has suggested that it risks becoming a pawn in the Saudi Arabia regime's efforts to rehabilitate its image internationally:

'So long as these questions [about Saudi Arabia's human rights record] remain unaddressed, the Premier League is putting itself at risk of becoming a patsy of those who want to use the glamour and prestige of Premier League football to cover up actions that are deeply immoral, in breach of international law and at odds with the values of the Premier League and the global footballing community.

'The Crown Prince has been using sporting events and personalities as a means of improving the Kingdom's reputation following the grisly murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi - widely believed to have taken place with his approval.'

But the Premier League is in no position to block the sale since it allowed the sale of Manchester City to another Saudi, Sheikh Mansour, in 2008. Britain and Saudi Arabia also have close business ties, including lucrative arms deals. Britain is Saudi Arabia's second largest arms supplier after the US, providing military exports estimated to 10.3 billion pounds over the past decade. The Tory Government has already pointedly said that 'it will not intervene in the Saudi purchase of Newcastle United.'

Also the Premier League's 'Owners and Directors' test is purely a financial assessment with no consideration given to wider political and ethical issues. On this basis, the Saudi PIF takeover passes the test without a problem.

Do Newcastle United fans themselves support the sale? There may be some discomfort that the club is being sold to Mohammed bin Salman but after years of Newcastle United going exactly nowhere, the fans are relishing the prospect of better times ahead. The Newcastle United Supporters Trust recently surveyed their members about the takeover and a massive 97 percent of the 3,400 respondents said that they approved of the sale. It seems that Newcastle United fans are happy to dance with the devil if it means that the drought will be broken and the club begins winning silverware again.

It would be easy to blame the fans for embracing the sale. However  as long as clubs like Newcastle United remain commodities for the world's rich elite to buy and sell, then the top clubs are always going to be owned by people who have have views diametrically opposed to those of the fans.