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England denies any involvement in the failure to sell off ‘Newcastle’.
There has been wide speculation that the UK government had a hand in the failure of the selloff of the Newcastle United football club to a Saudi Arabia-led investment group last year. Recently, the British government has denied any involvement and that negotiations for any selloff of businesses are exclusively between the two parties, and it was not involved in any manner. The government urges that it should not be pulled into the issue, though it admits that it has been an actual meeting between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the English Premier League.
The Saudi Arabia-led investment group included the Public Investment Fund (PIF), PCP Capital Partners, and Reuben Brothers, had jointly agreed to buy purchase “Newcastle” from Sports Direct, which is an affiliate of Mike Ashley’s sports department. The deal had been finalized since April 2020 after missing out on the acquisition of Newcastle United last year due to the prolonged validation process of the Premier League.
The group stated that “we are purely an independent trade investor”. The withdrawal from the Newcastle United acquisition was due to the “extended and unpredictable process” of the English Premier League itself, which had previously stated that the Premier League Executive Committee “has conducted and concluded in several deliberations that the legal entity has the prerogative in overseeing the club” if the group decides to move forward and proceed with the deal.
The extended validation and deliberation process, which seems to go on endlessly by the Premier League regarding the dispute on the proposal to take over the Newcastle football club, has created a tremendous amount of dissatisfaction to Ashley, who even attempted to establish an arbitrator to settle the dispute.
The British government itself also strongly denied any involvement in the deal. UK Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport, Mr. Oliver Dowden, said that “it is solely a matter for the Premier League to assess the possibility of taking over a football club under its own vetting process”. The matter was also previously mentioned by the UK Secretary of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office), Mr. James Cleverley, that there had been two virtual meetings between the Department of State and the Premier League regarding the takeover of “Newcastle”.
The agenda regarding the selling-off was mentioned was probably because the British government did not want private companies to exert any influence on the cabinet or any of its officials.
Ashley still hopes to sell off his team as soon as possible and earlier told sports media, Sky Sports, that the club will fight for what it “deserves”.
Recently, there have been reports that the investment group has reverted to the acquisition of Newcastle through independent arbitration litigation with the Premier League. It is speculated that they are likely to succeed and close the deal as soon as possible.
However, in mid-April, Ashley ordered the closure of the club’s retail store at St James’ Park, which resulted in all of the employees being sacked. It is expected that the operation was in accordance with the agreement made with the Saudi Arabia-led investment group, who are about to assume ownership of the business, or it may just be closed to renovate the business to accommodate the new owners.
Source: iQNewsAlert : Story (iqnewsclip.com)
