‘All clubs in top four tiers could be US-owned’

All of the clubs in the Premier League and English Football League could be owned by American investors in the next five to 10 years, according to a football investment expert.

A number of clubs in the top four tiers have either been taken over or received investment from across the Atlantic in the past few years.

Adam Sommerfeld told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Monday Night Club it is a trend he thinks will continue.

“Fourteen of the 20 Premier League teams are LLP [limited liability partnership] minority-owned [by Americans] and at least a third of the EFL are,” Sommerfeld, a sports investment specialist for advisory firm Certus Capital Partners, said.

“I can’t see how all of them won’t have American investment in the next five to 10 years.

“I know what we have in terms of our trend line and our competitors and I’m not aware of a team that hasn’t had a conversation with an American investor in the past few months. Every team is talking to them.”

In 2021, then National League club Wrexham were taken over by American actor Rob McElhenney and Canadian film star Ryan Reynolds.

Since then the duo have helped the side win promotion from the fifth to the third tier of English football, while the club’s profile across the globe has been vastly increased by the Welcome to Wrexham TV documentary.

Sommerfeld said that the relatively low initial investment of between £10-15m to buy a League One or Two club, and the potential to greatly improve its standing, was a “sexy” proposition.

“It gives them the opportunity to prove an investment thesis relatively cost-effectively,” he said.

“These are guys who are super smart, well-financed investors with a lot of ego and bravado and they want to prove that they are up to the challenge of picking up a team in League Two or League One and ‘doing a Wrexham’, getting it through to the Championship and, perhaps ultimately, the Premier League.

“You’d be stunned how many investors we had during Covid who had seen Welcome to Wrexham and Ted Lasso, and said ‘I want to buy a team’.

“The romanticism is a huge part of it. It’s something they [US sports] don’t have with the FA Cup and promotion and relegation. It’s quite sexy and it’s very easy to promote.”

Following the arrival of McElhenney and Reynolds at Wrexham, a number of other celebrities from the world of sports and entertainment have become involved at EFL sides.

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Former NFL defensive end JJ Watt is a minority owner at Burnley while legendary quarterback Tom Brady is similarly involved with League One side Birmingham City.

Hollywood actor Will Ferrell and golfers Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas have a stake in fellow Championship side Leeds United through the club’s owners 49ers Enterprises while rapper A$AP Rocky is believed to be part of an investment group looking to buy League Two outfit Tranmere Rovers.

Sommerfeld believes that American investment is an “extremely good thing” for English football.

“I think these are super-smart investors,” he said.

“The product they produce in the big four sports… If they can bring that entertainment product here, and they have the know-how to commercialise and monetise sports assets, it will be fascinating.

“We’ve had questionable investors before and I don’t think you can say that for these guys. I think they’re extremely good for the game from the top down.”

American lawyer and businessman Rob Couhig spent five years as owner of League One club Wycombe Wanderers before selling up in the summer.

The 75-year-old, whose an attempted takeover of fellow third-tier side Reading fell through in September, oversaw Wycombe’s first ever promotion to the Championship during his time in charge.

Couhig said that he “enjoyed” owning the club but that, no matter how successful the team is, some fans will always question the motives of foreign investment.

“The fans were very kind and welcoming,” he told BBC Radio 5 Live. “One of the things that I found with English football fans, though, is there are about 20% who will just think the worst no matter what.

“We had to get over 75% of the members of the trust to vote for us to take over and we got 97% after we had operated the club for four months.

“Fan engagement is sort of our deal and it didn’t hurt that we were able to put a first-class team on the pitch, but even up until we sold it there were still people who were like ‘why would he want to do this?'”