FootBiz newsletter #25: PL meeting primer, Michelle Kang & who is broadcasting the Club World Cup?

And just like that, international football is on the shelf until March.

Feels good, doesn’t it?

Now steel yourself for 48 hours of Premier League politics before the games get back underway on Saturday lunchtime.

In the latest watershed moment for the league (how many watershed moments is too many?) the Associated Party Transactions vote is set to happen tomorrow still AS THINGS STAND. And we say AS THINGS STAND because the feeling is that the Premier League won’t want to risk being defeated, and would be more likely to pull or delay the vote if they aren’t convinced they have 14 of the 20 owners onside.

Or, as Manchester City call it, the ‘tyranny of the majority’.

Anyway, in today’s newsletter we have some news on how the canvassing and horse-trading has gone ahead of that Mayfair meeting as well as some more of the (seemingly) never-ending Club World Cup drama and some news from the US.

Matt will be at the Nobu Hotel for the Premier League meeting tomorrow and will have an analysis piece for premium subscribers straight in your inbox as soon as we have a result.

If you aren’t already a premium member then this is the time. Depending on how consequential the news is, we may well have more over the weekend as the fallout continues. But for now, here’s your Thursday newsletter.

Table of Contents

• Options dwindling

• Villa stand up to PL

• Prem changes Stateside?

• Kang-do attitude

• Pep talk

• Half a billion prize money

• 777 latest

Options dwindling

Britain's biggest sports broadcasters, Sky Sports and the BBC, have no plans to bid for TV rights for the Club World Cup - raising major questions over the reach and visibility the new tournament will obtain in one of FIFA's biggest markets.

The BBC's priority next summer is the women's European Championship, for which they hold joint live rights with ITV, as England prepare to defend the only major trophy the country has won since 1966. As a result ITV Sport are also not planning to bid for the Club World Cup in another setback for FIFA.

Sky Sports have engaged with FIFA's bidding process for the tournament, but their business model is not based on buying one-off tournaments, as their data shows that year-round events play a far bigger role in driving subscriptions. While exceptions are made to this rule of thumb at Sky - they have held live rights for British and Irish Lions tours since 1997 despite showing very little rugby union content during the regular season - they are not prepared to do so for the Club World Cup. 

TNT Sports have shown even less interest, with senior sources at the channel expressing a belief to Footbiz that many of their viewers want a break from club football during the summer. If that is the case Gianni Infantino has not received the memo.

The only concrete bid FIFA have received to date came earlier this from Apple TV, whose opening offer of around $1 billion was comprehensively rejected as it was around 25 per cent of Infantino's valuation. As a result FIFA's options for TV coverage are limited, with the smart money being on them streaming the tournament on their own channels in an arrangement funded by Saudi Arabia.

A mooted $1 billion investment from the PIF into streaming company DAZN would be welcomed by FIFA, as it would present them with another alternative. PIF did deny making a bid, however.

Go deeper: Inside FIFA’s pitch to save the Club World Cup

Villa stand up to PL

Aston Villa owner Nassef Sawiris has taken the unprecedented step of speaking out against the Premier League's plans to amend the competition's Associated Party Transaction rules, which it plans to put to a vote at a meeting in London tomorrow.

In a detailed statement given to the Daily Telegraph Sawiris backed Manchester City's stance in calling for the vote to be postponed until February, when he claimed the Premier League may be able to get the unanimous support of all 20 clubs.

Villa's sympathies towards City were well known, as they have previously clashed with the Premier League over Profit and Sustainability Rules and launched a failed attempt to get the three-year loss limit lifted by £30 million last summer, but for Sawiris to go public was still a surprise. Even City's fight-back against the Premier League has been conducted in private in letters sent to their executive and the other clubs - though many of them have been promptly leaked to the media.

Sawiris' statement was essentially a call for unity, although sources at other clubs have privately described is intervention as unhelpful and naive. The Egyptian businessman argued that the Premier League could get unanimous support for amended APT rules if they vote is delayed, though that seems unrealistic given the events of the last few months.

City abstained when the APT rules were first introduced in October 2021 (with Newcastle voting against), voted against the Premier League when they were amended last February and subsequently brought a legal challenge against them, which was heard by an arbitration panel in the summer. The club are now claiming that the panel's judgement that certain elements of the rules were "unlawful" means that they are all null and void, so it is hard to see City uniting behind the Premier League even if the vote is adjourned.

While an initial verdict in City's defence against 115 charges of financial fair play breaches may have been delivered by February the case will not have been resolved, as an appeal by one party is viewed as inevitable, so the feuding parties will not be reconciled.  

“The idea of the league being unanimous on this now is a fantasy,” said one insider.

Newcastle, Nottingham Forest, Chelsea, Wolves and Everton have all voted against the Premier League on the APT issue in the past, while Crystal Palace have previously abstained, so unanimity is likely to remain elusive despite Sawiris' hopes. 

"In our view, a vote in 90 days on amended terms taking into consideration the tribunal's findings will have a significantly grater chance of securing the unanimous support of 20 Premier League clubs," he told the Telegraph.

"Crucially, a unanimous vote will present a fresh start for an embattled Premier League that began with the failed attempt to launch a Super League in 2021. 

"With the imminent arrival of the Government's independent football regulator it is more important than ever that the Premier League can present itself to the regulator with a united front. In our view, this will be far more easily achieved if the APT vote is held in February and supported unanimously by all clubs."

The Premier League are hopeful that they have done enough to persuade previous rebels Wolves, Everton and Palace to vote in favour, which would give them the 14 votes required to pass the amendments. If that seems unlikely the vote could yet be postponed, as we reported in Tuesday's newsletter.

Go deeper: How Villa went from Championship to Champions League

Prem changes Stateside?

The Premier League may have a new home in the USA after Comcast announced they’d be spinning off their cable networks into a separate company.

Comcast’s decision would move a raft of networks including USA, which carries the majority of Premier League games televised on cable, into a separate company. The Golf Channel is among the others that will also be split off.

With Peacock and the main NBC broadcast network being separated from USA, there are questions over how the new-look companies will air Premier League games but Comcast did say it expects the move to take around a year as they figure out the details.

The most likely solution would be a licensing arrangement or simply putting more games on Peacock as they continue to move viewers over to their streamer.

Kang-do attitude

Michelle Kang is one of the most interesting figures in world football right now, having set up her own multi-club operation within the women’s game after making a lot money in the health industry.

She followed that up this week by making a $30m donation to the US Soccer Federation (USSF) to further women’s soccer, focusing primarily on youth development but also to “fuel professional development for female players, coaches, and referees.”

Kang’s NWSL side Washington Spirit will play in the NWSL Championship game this weekend, but she also owns the London Lionesses and OL Feminin after buying Lyon’s women’s team from John Textor.

Because the USSF has non-profit status, they have a track record of accepting donations from those looking to further soccer in the United States. Hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin stepped in to help the USSF recruit Mauricio Pochettino earlier this year when the hiring of the former Chelsea boss was being held up by salary negotiations and compensation negotiations with his former club.

Pep talk

Pep Guardiola has extended his Manchester City contract by a year, despite key ally Txiki Begiristain leaving the club this summer, and there is no break clause in case the club is relegated over 115 breaches of Premier League rules.

Begiristain will be replaced by Sporting CP director of football Hugo Viana - who many had expected would bring Ruben Amorim with him to replace Guardiola when his contract was up in June.

But the Catalan has put pen to paper on a one-year extension, according to The Athletic, and will help Viana usher in a new era as Amorim looks to topple his former boss after joining Manchester United.

Half a billion prize money

A fairly significant (unreported) detail was tucked away in Matt Lawton’s report about the Club World Cup in The Times on Tuesday night.

Previously, Gianni Infantino and FIFA had promised huge riches would be on offer at the tournament but questions had begun to grow given the commercial struggles and lack of broadcasting deal, subjects we’ve covered a lot on these pages.

Well The Times reports that at a meeting between FIFA and the ECA this week, the figure mentioned was north of £500m to be split between the 32 teams. 

How that will be split is key. If it’s evenly split then you can expect clubs like Manchester City and Real Madrid to send ‘B’ teams or academy kids as Carlo Ancelotti has previously threatened. They could play a handful of friendlies elsewhere, make more money and not further stretch players who are already way too overloaded with games.

If it’s more performance-based distribution, finding the right number to incentivise the big European clubs is going to be key to the success of the tournament. It would damage the credibility of the competition out of the gate if any club didn’t send their first team.

Speaking of which, the main thrust of Lawton’s report is that Costa Rican side Deportivo Alajuelense have lodged a complaint against the two Grupo Pachuca clubs participating, an issue we discussed last week.

Grupo Pachuca still hope to sell León before the deadline, but if they can’t then it seems it will be a fight between a few clubs from CONCACAF who think they have fair claim to qualify for the competition in their stead. With so much revenue at stake, there could be lawsuits.

Remember, it was Mexican side Club America who originally complained about Pachuca and León both qualifying in contravention of FIFA’s rules.

Arguably they’d all have a more justifiable claim than Inter Miami…

777 latest

There’s an incredibly detailed update on the clubs formerly owned by 777 Partners in Norwegian outlet Josimar, which has led the way in reporting on this story from start to finish.

You can read that here. 

A new start for those clubs can’t come soon enough.