Everybody Needs Their Own American Billionaire

By: Trent | February 9th, 2007

It’s all the rage! Apparently big clubs in the English Premier League need Yankee white knights to swoop in and save themselves from, um, not being Yank-owned. Or something.

With Randy Lerner buying Aston Villa, and George Gillett Jr. and Tom Hicks snatching up Liverpool, there seems to a trend afoot. And I don’t wish to alarm you, but an American-owned football team is likely to win the Prem this year.

Now comes word that American billionaire Stan Kroenke has his eyes set on Arsenal. Kroenke owns MLS franchise Colorado Rapids, who as we discussed may be changing their name soon. The arrangments sought by the real estate mogul range from a loose partnership between the Gunners and Rapids, to outright partial ownership by Kroenke in the North London club.

Query whether all of this foreign ownership (American and otherwise) will really have much of an effect on English and/or European football. Arsene Wenger has already noted his own concerns, but those worries seem linked more to his club’s competition status rather than to the particulars of foreign ownership. Furthermore, it’s not clear that growing up a supporter of a club translates into better ownership. I doubt that the Glazers even know that ManYoo won the treble aaallllll the way back in 1999. Who knows. I mean, maybe Kroenke is a huge Tony Adams fan. Benefit of the doubt and all that.

UPDATE: Don’t miss this hilarious take on the foreign ownership issue from the Arseblog. The author (Safety; see below in comments) examines the three likely types of foreign investor: Russian oligarch, Oil sheikh and American businessman. Of the latter, he says:

“As for American businessmen, well there are three types. The grifters, the grafters and the kids. You either got to your position in a business by working your way up, or sucking your way up, or your dad stuck you in high chair in the boardroom with a box of crayons (which in some cases might still be used for signing contracts) and said “one day, all this will be yours…try not to fuck it up”. The kid is definitely the worst of the three. In America, it is said, any boy can grow up to be president. So someone tell me how, with that many potential presidents, they ended up with a chimp in charge. It’s not a system that promotes talent, let’s face it. Luckily not all of corporate America thinks nepotism means you’ll get the good old boss again, just in a younger body. They know what you often end up with is a doofus who got all his genes from his mom (and she wasn’t chosen for her brains either).”

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