The Political Economy of Football V2

One time prime minister Harold Macmillan once said of The Wirral ‘funny place, it sticks out, up there.’   I have only been to Tranmere Rovers once, but I was able to park in the road outside and I thought they were a really friendly club. The problem is that they are the third club on Merseyside and it is relatively easy to travel across the Mersey.    The Wirral itself is an odd mixture of deprived and high end housing.    There was once another EFL club at New Brighton:   the once decaying seaside resort is seeing something ofa revival. Tranmere Rovers are set to become the latest English team to come under American ownership, as a bid for the Merseyside club from Ascent Capital Partners is waiting for English Football League (EFL) approval. Current owners former Football Association (FA) chief executive Mark Palios and his wife Nicola bought the club in 2014 but have been trying to sell the League Two side for at least two years. They decli...

A former executive chairman and co-owner of Major League Baseball team the San Diego Padres is set to take a controlling stake in League One club Lincoln City. American Ron Fowler initially bought a minority interest in third-tier Lincoln in April 2024, and he is now poised to replace Arizona-based Harvey Jabara as the majority shareholder if his bid is cleared by the English Football League. Lincoln's board approved a proposal from Fowler to increase his stake - through his company Liquid Investments - to more than 25% on 11 December. Fowler, whose son Andrew is also involved in the club, will take on the position of chairman at LNER Stadium and will "assume responsibility for the funding of the club for the immediate future". The ownership shake-up at Lincoln, who are second in the table, was confirmed as a "future development" in the club's annual accounts covering the 12 months up to June 2025. controlling stake in League One club Lincoln City. Fowler wi...

Alonso’s sacking shows that at Real Madrid, the opinion of only one man ultimately counts: the president. Perez has given up very quickly on new managers before — Rafael Benitez lasted six months during the 2015-16 campaign, and Julen Lopetegui got just 14 games before the axe fell in the autumn of 2018. Alonso has not improved his reputation during his short time as Madrid coach, failing to get the team playing the way he wants. His reserved personality and technocratic approach led to issues with both the dressing room and the boardroom. He may also have regrets about allowing himself to drift away from his own convictions over recent months. Ultimately, the past eight months have served as a reminder of just how unique Madrid is within world sport. Perhaps a ‘project’ manager like Alonso, who came in looking to impose his own ideas about the game, was always doomed to failure. Some around the Bernabeu say that Perez was never convinced about the idea of hiring him, which made ...

Yesterday’s FA Cup result at Old Trafford said something about the relative states of Brighton and Manchester United, one club on an upward trajectory,  the other sinking into a Slough of Despind.  Here are some extracts from the Swiss Ramble’s assessment of Brighton, much more in depth analysis on his Substack page. Tony Bloom outlined the club’s approach, “We want to be a sustainable football club. We will have seasons where we lose a lot of money, as well as some seasons where we make a lot of money. But over time, if we stay in the Premier League, we will be sustainable and we will be profitable.” However, the owner added, “Most of our rivals are not. So it’s really tough to compete with that.” Player sales model Brighton have now made a staggering £351m from player sales in the last four years, which is a dramatic change in approach, e.g. in the previous eight years their profits from this activity were only £29m In the three seasons up to 2023/24, only two clubs ...

While many of us downed tools over the holiday period, the sports stadium building boom continued without a pause and the new year has seen things ramp up.  On Thursday, US-owned Premier League team Leeds United secured planning permission to expand Elland Road to a capacity of 53,000. Earlier in the week, Nottingham Forest — owned by Greek billionaire Evangelos Marinakis — unveiled plans to redevelop the City Ground, with a view to taking capacity there north of 50,000 one day too. Crystal Palace, which announced redevelopment plans for Selhurst Park eight years ago, may soon start putting spades in the ground.   Further down the English football pyramid, Millwall secured a new 999-year lease on its stadium, The Den, which will help clear the way for a potential expansion and upgrade there too. Work to build a new stand at Wrexham is now under way, while Birmingham City’s eye-catching designs are still fresh off the printing press. As the UK economy has sput...

 The New Year may typically be the season of goodwill, but two of football’s biggest clubs chose to swing the axe. Private equity-owned Chelsea sacked head coach Enzo Maresca, while Manchester United ditched Ruben Amorim. The two teams have since slipped from fifth and sixth in the league respectively to seventh and eighth. In the hotly contested race to reach the Champions League, those few places are pivotal for a club’s financial fortunes. Chelsea’s owners chose to hire from within their (small) multi-club operation, bringing in Liam Rosenior from the French club they own, RC Strasbourg. MCOs regularly trade players, but moving a manager within the group will be an experiment worth watching.     United are set to wait until the summer to appoint a permanent replacement for Amorim, with Crystal Palace coach Oliver Glasner among the favourites. The double sacking raises an important question — do head coaches actually make that much of a di...