The Political Economy of Football V2

So much was different at Selhurst Park for this opening home game of the season. Some of it has been enforced, but it begs the question of how much change Palace can withstand and, perhaps more pertinently, how quickly that can shift to familiarity again asks the New York Times ? From kick-off, the atmosphere was different. Gone were the Holmesdale Fanatics and the familiar, repetitive beat of the drum and their repertoire of orchestrated songs, after the group announced it would “stop all organised activity”. Gone are most of the modern add-ons to the Main Stand, a temporary hospitality suite built while the redevelopment of the stadium is ongoing, Selhurst didn’t just look different, but it felt different. The atmosphere ebbed and flowed more naturally but in the difficult moments it missed that orchestrated HF presence when it mattered most. By the fourth City goal, the visible empty seats told their own story. It was impossible for the process of following on from Glasner to...

Lawyers are increasingly the key actors in football clubs, but defamation actions are rare. Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis is suing Crystal Palace for defamation over a banner the London club’s fans held up in August 2025 which depicted him holding a gun to midfielder Morgan Gibbs-White which read: “Mr Marinakis is not involved in blackmail, match-fixing, drug trafficking or corruption.” The FA deemed Palace had not done enough to stop their supporters behaving in an improper, offensive, abusive or provocative way during the 1-1 draw at Selhurst Park. The governing body said in a statement: “The fact that Crystal Palace had a policy to prevent banners being smuggled into the stadium demonstrates that it was aware of the risk.”   The club was fined £50,000. Gibbs-White had come close to leaving Forest to join Tottenham last summer, but instead signed a new contract to stay at Forest. Now Marinakis is seeking damages after filing a defamation claim a...

This week we learnt that Liverpool FC is in talks over a potential stake sale with a consortium backed by money from the Mittal family, but likely to include some US investors. A valuation of more than $6 bn would suggest the bullish thesis — that football clubs remain a good asset appreciation play — is still intact. Meanwhile Leicester City’s Thai owners also see now as a good time to attempt a sale. The club, which won the Premier League a decade ago, dropped into English football’s third tier last season. There are other clubs, including Crystal Palace, looking for investors — or potentially new owners. Is this a sign that the market is heating up again? Does the World Cup alter the equation? To some extent, nothing much has changed. Lots of clubs have been quietly open to offers for some time, but the bids haven’t come. Liverpool itself was in the market not so long ago, and ended up selling a very small stake to a fund with close ties to the existing owners. If any invest...

The US billionaire owners of Crystal Palace are exploring a sale of the south London football club, in what would make it the latest Premier League side to change hands in English football’s top flight. According to people with direct knowledge of the matter, speaking to the Financial Times, the club is working with bankers at Raine Group to handle the process and is open to a variety of options including a full sale. T The people added that other options for securing new capital were also on the table. The club’s current ownership group includes Apollo co-founder Josh Harris, former Blackstone executive David Blitzer and Woody Johnson, a member of the family behind the Johnson & Johnson healthcare empire. The trio are designated as “significant shareholders” alongside British businessman Steve Parish, who has been executive chair of the club since 2010 and is a life-long Palace fan. Harris and Blitzer together control 30 per cent, while Parish has 10 per cent. Johnson, who o...

The authoritative Swiss Ramble swoops like an eagle from his Zurich eyre to review the latest accounts of Crystal Palace.  More detail and analysis are available on his Substack page, but here are some highlights.  Palace’s recent improvement in cup competitions is impressive, but their consistency in the league is also fairly remarkable, especially for a club with relatively limited resources, as they have finished between 10th and 15th thirteen years in a row following promotion to the Premier League in 2012/13 Palace also enjoyed a very successful season off the pitch, as they swung from a £32.9m pre-tax loss to an £8.3m profit, mainly due to a significant increase in profit on player sales from £1.3m to a club record £66.1m. Revenue rose £6.4m (3%) from £190.2m to another club high of £196.6m, though this was more than wiped out by operating expenses, which grew £28.2m (13%) from £210.9m to £239.1m. As a result, the operating loss more than doubled from £20.7m to £42.5...

From his Zurich base the authoritative Swiss Ramble reviews how clubs have done so far in this season’s Uefa competitions.   Much more detail about clubs and calculations can be found on his Substack page. Eight of the top ten in money terms also featured in the top ten of the Deloitte Money League, while another one (Inter) was 11th in the so-called “Rich List”.   The only club that spoiled the strong correlation between money and success on the downside was Manchester United, which highlights the extent of the mismanagement at Old Trafford. His calculations suggest that five clubs have already received more than €90m from the Champions League, namely Bayern Munich €100m, Manchester City €97m, Liverpool €97m, Arsenal €96m and Chelsea €92m.   They are closely followed by Barcelona €89m, Tottenham €84m, Paris Saint-Germain €82m and Real Madrid €81m. Revenue available for distribution in the Europa League is less than a quarter of the Champions League, which has ...

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer presented his  Chinese counterpart President Xi Jinping with a Premier League match ball flown 5,000 miles from London. Tthe UK Prime Minister arrived in Beijing armed with one of the yellow Puma match balls used in Sunday’s Premier League fixture between Arsenal and Manchester United, a game he had attended at the Emirates Stadium.    It wassigned by a number of United pl;ayers. It was reportedly presented to Xi ahead of a formal summit and lunch in the Great Hall of the People, with China’s president widely known to be a Manchester United supporter.  Xi’s affection for Manchester United may have been reasonably well known, but more surprising was the revelation   that he told Starmer he also has a fondness for Arsenal, Manchester City and Crystal Palace. Xi’s last trip to Manchester saw him given a tour of the Etihad Campus by City’s chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak, who has subsequently become a special envoy to China on...

Eight months to the day from delivering the greatest moment in Crystal Palace’s history by winning the FA Cup there seems to be no way back for Oliver Glasner. An abrupt early ending feels like an inevitability. Joy has turned to despair. Frustration has grown. Anger has simmered. Tensions have risen. Another emotional outburst from the Palace manager, to follow an astonishing press conference just over 24 hours earlier, has surely created an intolerable situation after scathing criticism of the club’s hierarchy. Some fans, too, seem to have turned on him, even if there is at least some acknowledgement that his anger comes from being dealt a terrible hand.    Against that, it should be noted that there was a heartfelt article in The Times yesterday by a Palace fan saying that they had lost the best manager they ever had. As full-time came at the Stadium of Light and Palace had suffered a 2-1 defeat to make it 10 games without a win, Glasner walked over to acknowledge the...

Crystal Palace manager Oliver Glasner has confirmed he will leave the club this summer at the end of his contract.  The Austrian’s announcement comes as Manchester City are in the process of finalising an agreement with Palace to sign centre-back Marc Guehi in a package worth £20million ($26.8m) plus bonuses and a sell-on clause. Palace are without a win in nine matches across all competitions, and exited the FA Cup third round to Macclesfield of the National League North on Saturday, but Glasner insisted the timing of his future announcement is coincidental. Palace are currently 13th in the Premier League after 21 rounds of action, and are in the play-off stages of the Conference League, where they play Bosnian side Zrinjski, ahead of the knockout stage. They were unfairly deprived of what should have been a Europa League place by Uefa technicalities. It had seemed clear for some time that the direction of travel was for Glasner to depart at the end of his contract and ...

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...

There still seems to be a niggling frustration at Crystal Palace’s progress, a feeling that the club could go further and faster, and a fear that they could fail to capitalise on an opportunity to build on this unparalleled success. That feeling is partly being fuelled by Glasner himself, who said after a 2-1 defeat by Manchester United last week that he did not feel the club had backed him sufficiently in the summer transfer window. With his contract up at the end of this season, there is doubt over his future. Steve Parish is 15 years into his tenure as Palace chairman and believes the club is in safe hands with his fellow general partners, U.S. businessmen Josh Harris and David Blitzer, whom he considers friends.   Since the summer, that group has also included the New York Jets owner Woody Johnson, who bought the stake previously owned by John Textor as a fourth partner. It did not happen quickly enough to prevent Palace from being denied entry to the ...

The authoritative Swiss Ramble takes a look at the money clubs receive from Uefa competitions even before they have started playing.   There are many factors to consider and the Zurich-based Substack writer has the data to address them.   The message that emerges is once again ‘to them that hath shall be given.’   Of course, arguably the funding was tweaked as one way of discouraging the formation of a Super League. The country that is guaranteed most money from the Champions League this season is England with €326m, followed by the other four members of the “Big Five” leagues, namely Spain €243m, Germany €216m, Italy €180m and France €149m.   There is then a big gap to the Netherlands €75m and Portugal €74m, with the rest of the top ten being made up of Belgium €59m, Greece €32m and Norway €31m. Crystal Palace could earn €22m (£19m) if they manage to win the Conference League, which would be around half of the Europa League.   This is scant c...

Should Palace avoid defeat in both legs of their UEFA Conference League play-off against Norwegian club Fredrikstad, and again on Sunday when they host Nottingham Forest, then they will equal their club record of 13 games unbeaten in all competitions while a top-flight side. Palace have an outstanding starting XI and a manager who has proven not only to be adept at bringing the best out of his team in his system, but also relatively adaptable within that system. With appropriate additions to replace any departures and strengthen the backup options, this Palace side surely could compete for a place in Europe via their league position.    This feels like a club at a crossroads and the fear will be that success is not built upon. The worry is that, if Glasner does not feel he is being sufficiently backed, he might well depart next summer when his contract expires — if not before. It would be a travesty to throw away the chance to push on. As always, some people will ar...

Crystal Palace had lost their appeal to the Court for Arbitration in Sport in Lausanne against demotion from the Europa League:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c1kzzpp04kgo I am yet to read the judgment, but it is what I expected.   This is about the letter of the law rather than justice and fairness. The summary of the decision states: 'The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has dismissed an appeal by Crystal Palace FC (CPFC) against UEFA, Nottingham Forest FC and Olympique Lyonnais (OL) concerning a decision by UEFA to remove CPFC from the UEFA Europa League 2025/2026 due to a breach of UEFA multi club ownership regulations. As a result, CPFC will be admitted to compete in the UEFA Conference League 2025/2026. The appeal sought to annul the decision by the UEFA Club Financial Control Body on 11 July 2025 which found CPFC and OL non-compliant with multi club ownership regulations.   Alongside the annulment of the decision, CPFC requested readmis...

Crystal Palace have obtained correspondence between leading European clubs and their lawyers which they hope will force Uefa to reinstate them to the Europa League. The FA Cup winners have been relegated to Europe’s third-tier competition, the Conference League, because of a breach of strict rules on multi-club ownership relating to John Textor’s stake in Palace and his company’s ownership of Lyon. The French club are also playing in the Europa League this coming season. Textor has now agreed to sell the Palace shares owned by Eagle Football Holdings to US billionaire Woody Johnson in a £160million deal, but Uefa says the club failed to complete a change of ownership before its March 1 deadline. Palace will argue in an appeal hearing at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on August 8 that Nottingham Forest, who are set to take their place in the Europa League, were given until April 29 for the club’s owner, Evangelos Marinakis, to divest himself of his directorship of th...

Common sense would suggest that confirmation of John Textor’s exit from Crystal Palace should resolve the issues around the Premier League club’s connection to French side Lyon. After all, the American investor has now both sold his Palace stake and left all positions of authority at Lyon. Palace are taking their case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), asking the so-called “supreme court” of worldwide athletic endeavour to overturn UEFA’s decision. Palace have also named Nottingham Forest and Lyon in their appeal, as their fellow Premier League side have been elevated from the Conference League to the second-tier Europa League at their expense, while their disputed stablemates from Ligue 1 have been left in the Europa League, as their higher domestic league finish of the two sides trumps winning the FA Cup.  Steve Parish, Palace’s chairman, will not mind which of those clubs CAS demotes, as long as what he views as the “terrible injustice” of his team being removed ...

Crystal Palace have lodged an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against their demotion to the Conference League. A UEFA panel earlier this month recommended that Palace were denied entry to the Europa League, in which they qualified by winning the FA Cup last season, after it found the Premier League side and Ligue 1’s Lyon breached the governing body of European football’s multi-club ownership rules. CAS said Palace’s case “will be an expedited procedure with an operative decision (without grounds) to be rendered on or before 11 August 2025.” However, the qualifying play-off draw for the Conference League, which will include the English participant, takes place a week earlier on August 4. Palace chairman Steve Parish has suggested Forest had played a significant role in the club’s swapping European competitions. “We’re led to believe that’s the issue,” Parish said. “If there wasn’t someone who wanted to get in as a consequence, then there wouldn’t be ...

Crystal Palace being denied entry to this coming season’s Europa League is a “terrible injustice” and a “bad day for football”, the club’s chairman Steve Parish has said. A UEFA panel has recommended that Palace are denied entry to the competition after it found that the club breached the governing body’s rules on multi-club ownership. The south London club are now set to compete in the third-tier Conference League but intend to lodge an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). Nottingham Forest, who finished seventh in the Premier League and originally qualified for the Conference League, could now replace them in the Europa League. UEFA’s rules state that no individual or legal entity can have “control or influence” over more than one club participating in a UEFA club competition, and European football’s governing body must be satisfied that the respective clubs are separate entities to maintain their tournaments’ integrity. Palace’s issue stems from Eagle Footba...

Lyon will remain in Ligue 1 next season after winning their appeal over the relegation imposed upon them by the body which oversees the finances of French football teams, the club confirmed in a statement. The decision means Lyon will maintain their top-flight status, which they have retained since the 1988-89 season. Lyon finished the 2024-25 Ligue 1 campaign in sixth, making the Europa League alongside fifth-place Lille. Their qualification raised uncertainty over Palace’s participation in the European competition next season following their maiden FA Cup triumph, due to multi-club ownership rules — relating to Textor’s Eagle Football’s involvement in both clubs — and Lyon’s superior league placement giving them priority in participating. UEFA had postponed its decision on Palace’s place in the Europa League until after the decision on Lyon’s relegation and there has been no update yet from European football’s governing body. If Palace are barred from the competition, Notting...

The continuing saga of the club's possible exclusion from the Europa League is understandably causing frustration at Crytsal Palace and the club is considering legal action should they be relegated to the Conference League:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c1jww1d3510o The latest delay is caused by Lyon's appeal against their relegation to Ligue 2, Crystal Palace have provided evidence to Uefa aimed at proving that their co-owner John Textor played no role in the appointment of their manager, Oliver Glasner. Textor’s stake in Palace, which was owned via his company, Eagle Football Holdings, and is now the subject of a £160million sale to the US billionaire Woody Johnson, is at the centre of an issue that could yet mean the FA Cup winners are unable to play in the Europa League next season. The extent of Textor’s involvement at Selhurst Park, when he also owned the French club Lyon, is central to Uefa’s concerns and the American businessman is on record talking...