Next season's Premier League will feature 13 clubs with an American shareholder and after dominant season across top three tiers, the "Thanks but no yanks" era has become ancient history
Liverpool's owners with Arne Slot and the Premier League trophy last month.
Liverpool's owners with Arne Slot and the Premier League trophy last month.(Image: Michael Regan/Getty Images/Getty Images For The Premier League)
It is 20 years on from the Glazers’ controversial arrival in Manchester and 15 since the “Thanks but no yanks” campaign at Liverpool.
But now US-backed clubs are coming off the back of an unprecedented season. For American owners, success was always going to shrink the stigma.
The top two in the Premier League, Championship and League One were all at least part-backed by Americans. So too FA Cup winners Crystal Palace, while Chelsea last week secured a first bit of silverware for their great disruptors from across the Atlantic.
But with 65 per cent of next season’s Premier League clubs owned by them and the domino effect extending to more than a quarter of clubs in the EFL, is it the law of averages or have several cracked the code?
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“I don’t know if it’s causation or correlation,” says New York-based David Gandler, the latest arrival having recently completed a majority takeover of Leyton Orient, who then lost the third-tier play-off final to another US-financed team in Charlton.
“But you can see, in the UK, football is life, religion and tradition. It’s very difficult not to get caught up in the excitement. That’s the draw here.”
That is a feeling shared by Tom Wagner’s Knighthead Capital group at Birmingham, which also includes NFL legend Tom Brady, and Wrexham’s Hollywood heroes Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney – League One’s top two.
Tom Brady is involved at Birmingham City.
Tom Brady is involved at Birmingham City.(Image: Getty Images)
Both have concertedly bedded into the communities that sustain their clubs – perhaps realising from the missteps of those who have gone before.
Earlier this season Wagner told the Wall Street Journal that the success is down to “a set of professional sports owners that are taking a very intentional approach to building businesses.”
But another factor for those operating down the pyramid is that, beyond the super rich, they have been priced out of purchasing teams in closed shop leagues at home.
Even for those succeeding there are still tension points off the pitch – not least around the so-called matchday experience and sharp-rising ticket prices at several clubs.
But for those flying high on the grass there are some commonalities. Arsenal and Liverpool are harvesting the rewards of being among the first to embrace data.
Wrexham are on the up yet again.
Wrexham are on the up yet again.(Image: AMA/Getty Images)
And it is no coincidence that their owners have tentacles planted deep in American sports where those analytical models originated.
Crucially they have developed a structure of experts to separate the signal from the noise. As former midfielder Joe Cole said, when evaluating the Clearlake Capital-Todd Boehly stewardship of Chelsea, “the best approach is data-driven, expert-led.”
Another theory is that those with pre-existing backgrounds in American sports that have long worked with salary caps and luxury taxes have been better at adapting to the now more strictly-applied financial fair play rules.
Triumphing on the pitch, however, is yet to translate into making many of these clubs profitable.
Joel Glazer and Avram Glazer
Joel Glazer and Avram Glazer(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Before sealing a third consecutive promotion, Reynolds described investing in Wrexham as “like lighting money on fire except it doesn't keep you warm.”
Which means a crunch point will come. The vast majority are here to make money, whether by taking over distressed assets in the lower leagues and building them up or finding new revenue streams at established giants such as Chelsea.
“For some it’s just diversification of portfolio, for others it’s the allure of sport,” Gandler adds. “But everyone thinks they can win and that’s contagious.”
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