When the top 22 teams broke away from the Football League to form the Premier League, 21 were English-owned (Wimbledon was the exception). Now, just over three decades later, there are only three Premier League clubs that are entirely English-owned, with one more that is majority English-owned, two run by Englishmen with minority stakes and one still owned, for a few weeks at least, by a Monaco-based, Anglo-Iranian whose eight-year spell as custodian was generously supported by his Russian-Uzbek patron. That last one — Everton — should become the 10th American majority-owned club in the league by Christmas, while three of those other clubs are on the market, to one extent or another. It is entirely possible that by next November, the 1992 equation will have flipped, with just one English flagship in very international waters. Brentford Brentford’s no-longer secret benefactor Matthew Benham is, in some ways, a throwback to an earlier era. But in others — his profession, in particul
An extraordinary general meeting agreed this month that majority control of Norwich City will pass to Michael Attanasio’s Norfolk Holdings group from Delia Smith and Michael Wynn Jones after their 28 years at the helm. Attanasio, the owner of American baseball team Milwaukee Brewers, first purchased a minority 22% stake from former director Michael Foulger in September 2022, before increasing his shareholder to 40% in April 2024. From March 2025 Attanasio will convert his loans into equity, giving him 85% of the football club. Smith and her husband will retain 10%, while the remaining 5% will be owned by independent shareholders, including the supporters’ group, The Canaries Trust. The board emphasised that this transaction “involved no payment to Delia and Michael”, thus “securing the long-term financial security of the club and an effective and positive transition”. Clearly, Norwich City owe a huge debt of gratitude to the former owners, so it feels only right that they have b