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Saturday, March 26, 2005

More on possible bidders for club

Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), the American company spending £1 billion to resurrect the Millennium Dome has said that it may buy a Premiership football club as it expands into Europe. Tim Leweike, chief executive of the company, is part-time Londoner who 'has a lot of respect for Charlton.'

AEG is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Anschutz Corporation which owns the London Arena. It is a major investor in sports franchises in the United States with three soccer franchises: Los Angeles Galaxy, Chicago Fire and Colorado Rapids.

The net worth of Philip Anschutz is $5.1 billion, compared with the $3 billion net worth of Roman Abramovich. Anschutz made his money in oil, then added billions by branching into railroads like Union Pacific. Railroad right-of-ways were used for fibre optic networks and the formation of Qwest Communications which accounts for the bulk of his wealth. It is also accounts for the recent plunge in his net wealth from $15 billion to $5 billion.

Moaners are always demanding that the club be taken into the next stage, but it is difficult to see how this can be done with a stadium holding just over 27,000. (Remember that Manchester United earn far more from gate money than from television revenues). Someone like Anschutz might be in a position to make a substantial cash injection that could help to develop the ground and bring in top quality players.

It would, of course, change the nature of the club. But the club has been changing anyway, inevitably becoming more corporate in style in response to the pressures of the Premiership. Moreover, globalisation in football is not going to go away and really big money is likely to come from outside the UK.

Whether anything will come of this remains to be seen.

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