gjohnson Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 On 15/10/2024 at 11:06, TRon said: Said this many times now, but what motive is there to invest in the area for the Saudis if they are not allowed to invest in a winning team which they can be associated with? I always said that for them to do that it would have to be a vanity project, and if you aren't allowed to be winners, then you can understand why it then just becomes an investment. In which case why would you spend a boatload of money on city projects you don't get a return from? I think we were intended as a vanity project ala Qatar/PSG originally, but the obstacles weren't expected. So either we're a slow burn profile raising exercise, or a step to make profit. They could probably get double what they paid for us by selling now, but given the lack of rumour/whispers/garbage on that it doesn't appear likely so implies that it could be seen as long term low risk investment. Kind of like the suspect financial advisors always go for....shove your pension into a high risk strategy and you could be a millionaire next week or broke the week after, compared to low risk...you might only make a tenner a month but you won't lose Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLC Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/20/newcastle-utd-takeover-mohammed-bin-salman-whatsapp/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloGeordio Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Anything about a new RW? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miggys First Goal Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Howay, get it pasted for us non-Tories. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
JLC Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Newcastle Utd takeover was controlled by Mohammed bin Salman, leaked WhatsApps suggest Messages from businesswoman Amanda Staveley claim Saudi Crown Prince pulled strings behind the scenes of controversial deal 29 Gordon Rayner Associate Editor 20 October 2024 5:00pm BST Gordon Rayner Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, personally controlled the takeover of Newcastle United by the state’s sovereign wealth fund, leaked WhatsApp messages seen by The Telegraph suggest. The messages from Amanda Staveley, who brokered the club’s sale by tycoon Mike Ashley to the Gulf Kingdom’s trillion-dollar Public Investment Fund (PIF), raise questions over guarantees made to the Premier League to secure the deal. The cache of WhatsApps suggest the Crown Prince, who is Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, was signing off key decisions. At one point, Ms Staveley warns the sellers that “the Crown Prince is losing patience”, and when the deal hit trouble, she said the governor of PIF was “trying to…convince the Crown Prince not to pull out”. The messages shed new light on the extent of political involvement in the takeover. Ms Staveley enlisted the help of the Saudi ambassador to the UK to rescue the deal, saying on Aug 6, 2020: “The UK Saudi ambassador spoke to the Crown Prince this morning.” Later that month, she sent another message that read: “We need to update the Saudi Ambassador at 4pm as he needs to update the Crown Prince.” In April 2021, Boris Johnson, then prime minister, said his government “was not involved at any point in the takeover talks on the sale of Newcastle” in a written parliamentary answer. However, Ms Staveley was in direct contact with Lord Grimstone, then the minister for investment, and told the sellers of the club that the minister “pushed behind the scenes and made it very clear that their preference is for the deal to go ahead”. The Premier League initially blocked the sale of Newcastle United to a consortium led by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund over concerns that the club would in reality be controlled by the Saudi state. Via lawyers, Ms Staveley said she only ever referenced the Crown Prince in his capacity as chairman of PIF. To suggest that her messages cast doubt on whether the assurances about independence from the Saudi state have been adhered to subsequently “is as illogical as it is misconceived,” she added. The sale eventually went through after the Premier League was given “legally binding assurances” that the Public Investment Fund (PIF) - which now owns 80 per cent of the club - was separate from the Saudi state. Newcastle United supporters celebrate outside St James' Park after the sale of the club to a Saudi-led consortium was confirmed Newcastle United supporters celebrate outside St James’ Park after the sale of the club to PIF was confirmed The sale was highly controversial because of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record. A CIA report concluded that the Crown Prince was responsible for ordering the 2018 murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi dissident and Washington Post journalist, which was still fresh when the takeover was first proposed. Foreign states are not banned from owning Premier League clubs under its own rules, but the Saudi state was accused of illegally pirating the League’s games on a state-run channel, which presented a barrier to ownership. The Premier League eventually removed its objections after being convinced that PIF would be acting independently of the Saudi state in the running of Newcastle United. While the Crown Prince is chairman of PIF, the Premier League said at the time it had “received legally binding assurances that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will not control Newcastle United Football Club”. Ms Staveley said at the time of the takeover that PIF was “an autonomous commercially driven investment fund”. ‘Repercussions’ The non-executive chairman of Newcastle United is Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of PIF, but the WhatsApp messages suggest it was the Crown Prince who had the ultimate say over the purchase. On March 3, 2020, Ms Staveley told the Ashley camp: “The Crown Prince is losing patience – I need to assure him we will get there.” On July 29 that same year, she messaged Mr Ashley’s team to say: “HE [His excellency Yasir Al-Rumayyan] is trying to hang on to the deal and convince the Crown Prince not to pull out.” But in October 2020, Ms Staveley had WhatsApped Mr Ashley’s team to say: “No10 can’t get any further involved than what they have done to date. Gerry [Lord Grimstone] said that they pushed behind the scenes and made it very clear that their preference is for the deal to go ahead, they are obviously very aware of the damage this has caused and the repercussions for future investments.” The £305 million sale of Newcastle United went ahead in October 2021, with PIF owning 80 per cent of the club, Ms Staveley’s PCP Capital Partners owning 10 per cent and the property developers David and Simon Reuben owning 10 per cent. Earlier this year, Ms Staveley, who had become the public face of Newcastle United, left the club after selling her shares. Ms Staveley became the public face of Newcastle United, running the club with her husband Mehrdad Ghodoussi, right Amanda Staveley became the public face of Newcastle United, running the club with her husband Mehrdad Ghodoussi, right Lord Grimstone told The Telegraph that he kept abreast of large potential investments into the UK in his former role as investment minister, particularly those such as Newcastle United, which was in the public domain and “attracting a great deal of public interest”. He added: “I made it very clear to Mr Hoffman that my only role was to facilitate the passing of ideas between the PIF and Premier League and that in no way did I seek to prejudice the Premier League’s complete autonomy in this matter.” The Premier League declined to comment. A spokesman for PIF said: “In October 2021, following a lengthy investigation, the Premier League announced that the sale of Newcastle United Football Club had completed following the receipt of assurances that the government of Saudi Arabia would not control the Club. “The facts and circumstances that underpin those assurances, as confirmed at the time to the Premier League, remain unchanged.” Ms Staveley said she was “entirely confident” that the assurances had been adhered to. ‘The Crown Prince is losing patience’: Messages reveal how faltering deal came close to collapse In the vexed history of football club takeovers, few have been as controversial as the purchase of Newcastle United by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund. Initially delayed by Premier League concerns that club would be controlled by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia itself, the deal eventually went through after “legally binding assurances” were given that this was not the case. Leaked messages obtained by The Telegraph, however, have thrown that statement into doubt by revealing how closely involved Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, the Saudi prime minister and de facto ruler, was in the progress of the deal. The Crown Prince, known by his initials MbS, is the man accused of ordering the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi dissident journalist who was strangled and dismembered by an assassination team in Turkey in 2018. While Premier League clubs and fans were troubled by the possibility of one of England’s biggest football clubs being controlled by a foreign government with one of the world’s worst human rights records, the British government took the opposite view. Eager to keep a strategic and economic ally happy, ministers in Boris Johnson’s government worked behind the scenes to make the deal happen. They have always maintained that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) would operate independently of the Saudi government in running Newcastle, but WhatsApp messages sent by the woman who negotiated the deal show that the Crown Prince was regularly updated as to the progress of the deal. News of Saudi Arabian interest in buying Newcastle United first emerged in March 2020 when it was reported that Amanda Staveley, who had previously been involved in the sale of Manchester City to an Abu Dhabi-based wealth fund, had approached the North East club as part of a group that also included Saudi Arabia’s PIF and the property billionaires Simon and David Reuben. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
SUPERTOON Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 I for one, am shocked. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stifler Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 (edited) Leak came from Ashley’s team, surprise fucking surprise, always, and forever a cunt. Anyway, does it matter? There wasn’t, and I still think no rules preventing a nation state from owning a club. We already know number 10 were involved with it. Edited October 20 by Stifler Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
HaydnNUFC Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Non story. The hold up was about TV piracy and only ever was. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
KetsbaiaIsBald Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 4 minutes ago, Stifler said: Leak came from Ashley’s team, surprise fucking surprise, always, and forever a cunt. why now though? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heron Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 (edited) Seems a whole load of bluster designed to further unsettle NUFC to me tbh. Edited October 20 by Heron Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloGeordio Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Just now, KetsbaiaIsBald said: why now though? He got free pies for a quiet Sunday “exclusive” Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stifler Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Just now, KetsbaiaIsBald said: why now though? Just to be a cunt. Also possibly because she is rumoured to be facilitating investment into Spurs, so it casts a shadow over her. I honestly can’t wait until Ashley buys another club to focus on being a cunt too. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keegans Export Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 6 minutes ago, Stifler said: Leak came from Ashley’s team, surprise fucking surprise, always, and forever a cunt. Anyway, does it matter? There wasn’t, and I still think no rules preventing a nation state from owning a club. We already know number 10 were involved with it. This is where the "separation" argument is (and always was) flawed. The club is owned by the Saudi PIF. The Chair of the PIF is bin Salman. Of course he would have had a passing interest in the takeover, but how do you prove whether that is in his role as the Chair of the PIF or as the Crown Prince? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hovagod Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Just now, Heron said: Seems a whole load of bluster to further unsettle NUFC to me tbh. Mate, the bloke is a murderer. There’s going to be serious journalists all across the world with stories about him. We need to be big boys and girls about it because the idea that it’s done to unsettle a football club in the north of England is wilfully stupid. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miggys First Goal Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Unfortunately, for as long as PIF own us, this will always be hanging over our heads. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heron Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Football - including NUFC - is absolutely corrupt as fuck and entwined with a whole boatload of other political interests. For NUFC it's been a case of cannot beat 'em, join 'em and 99.9999% of football fans would all want the same for their own clubs and very few would oppose it (in the UK in particular) and they're lying if they said otherwise. No one would give a fuck if the Saudis owned us if they had the wealth of a fiver and a pack of haribo tangfastics. Folk are only arsed to protect their own investments and/or football club(s). No one gave a fuck about NUFC when Ashley was stripping it back and killing it off. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hovagod Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 1 minute ago, Miggys First Goal said: Unfortunately, for as long as PIF own us, this will always be hanging over our heads. Be good if they just fucked off honestly. Everybody on here could get tickets to the match for one thing Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stifler Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 1 minute ago, Keegans Export said: This is where the "separation" argument is (and always was) flawed. The club is owned by the Saudi PIF. The Chair of the PIF is bin Salman. Of course he would have had a passing interest in the takeover, but how do you prove whether that is in his role as the Chair of the PIF or as the Crown Prince? Thing is though, as we found out a few weeks ago due to Man City’s case against the Premier League. There was deliberately no rule preventing state ownership of clubs for 3 years before our takeover (on the expectation/hope a top 6 club got the takeover). The Premier League can kick and fucking scream all they want about separation, there was no rules preventing that, and I believe still isn’t. If there is, then it would actually be against U.K. competition law. MBS could have paid the money out of his private bank account, and registered the company to his palace if he wanted. It means sod all. The separation stuff was just guff from the Premier League to say that they tried to prevent the takeover, and the gullible fans, and press lapped it up. They’ll use this thinking they have caught us falling foul, without coming to the realisation that they fell for the take to pacify them. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heron Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 4 minutes ago, Hovagod said: Mate, the bloke is a murderer. There’s going to be serious journalists all across the world with stories about him. We need to be big boys and girls about it because the idea that it’s done to unsettle a football club in the north of England is wilfully stupid. The article is predominantly in reference to the ownership of Newcastle United and its direct links to MbS. The references to Jamal Khasoggi aren't the main focus of the article. It doesn't tell anyone anything that they don't already know. It is done to shine a light on our ownership and whether or not its legitimate. Not to tell the world MbS is a murderer. Do you really think they're simply trying to bring MbS or the Saudis down with that article? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Collage Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 10 minutes ago, Miggys First Goal said: Unfortunately, for as long as PIF own us, this will always be hanging over our heads. Like a decapitation sword, so to speak Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloGeordio Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 2 minutes ago, Collage said: Like a decapitation sword, so to speak Like the sword of Damocles Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miggys First Goal Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Murderers in charge. Languishing in eighth. Eddie’s shite. Isak can’t score. Season is over already. Should just sell the club back to Ashley. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloGeordio Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 6 minutes ago, Miggys First Goal said: Murderers in charge. Languishing in eighth. Eddie’s shite. Isak can’t score. Season is over already. Should just sell the club back to Ashley. Don’t forget no RW too! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miggys First Goal Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Just now, PauloGeordio said: Don’t forget no RW too! Fucking cunts! Need to get the government on the case ASAP. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PauloGeordio Posted October 20 Share Posted October 20 Just now, Miggys First Goal said: Fucking cunts! Need to get the government on the case ASAP. Anything that helps get us one in January Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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