It’s less than 18 months since Uzbek tycoon Alisher Usmanov relinquished his 30% stake in Arsenal, selling up to the club’s majority shareholder Stan Kroenke in a deal thought to be worth £550m. It was a bitter-sweet moment for Usmanov, who has often publicly stated that Arsenal “could be the best football club in the world”, with a not-so-thinly-veiled dig at Kroenke’s ownership. With Usmanov seemingly having little say in the decision-making at boardroom level, his decision to sell his shares was entirely understandable.
Most Arsenal fans appreciated Usmanov standing up to majority shareholder, Stan Kroenke, with the Uzbek billionaire frustrated at Kroenke’s lack of ambition, stemming from the club’s sale of Robin van Persie to Manchester United. Usmanov’s riches could have been invaluable to help the Gunners cement themselves as a European force, particularly as the 66-year-old is one of only 775 billionaires in Europe, with his wealth built largely through steel and mining operations.
Usmanov to get first dibs on sponsoring Everton’s new stadium
The Gunners faithful will therefore be bitterly disappointed to see Usmanov strengthen his ties with another Premier League club instead. As a long-time business partner of Everton’s majority shareholder Farhad Moshiri, Usmanov has been linked with acquiring a stake in the club himself in recent months. Although that has yet to come to fruition, Usmanov has purchased the naming rights for the Toffees’ exciting new stadium, which will be constructed on Liverpool’s Bramley-Moore Dock by 2023.
Usmanov has paid an initial £30m up front to obtain exclusive naming rights to the new stadium. Usmanov’s USM holding company is already the primary sponsor of Everton’s state-of-the-art Finch Farm training complex and he is keen to pump more money into the Toffees to help them compete in the upper echelons of the English Premier League. Although Usmanov’s £30m down payment gives him exclusivity to pursue naming rights at a fraction of the £20m-a-year sponsorship that Tottenham are reportedly seeking for their new ground, there is the potential for Usmanov to invest in other ways too.
Usmanov still an Arsenal “fan”
In a recent interview with the Financial Times, Usmanov was quizzed on whether he would be prepared to acquire a stake in the Goodison Park club. The Uzbek admitted that while he was “thinking about [his] investment in this club” he could not “reject Arsenal” as a supporter. He reiterated that he “will not leave [Arsenal] as a fan”. Usmanov also said that it is “not obligatory” for him to “participate” in buying shares directly in Everton, with sponsorship potentially the main route for him to go down.
A telecommunications company that Usmanov has shares in has recently secured a signage deal throughout Everton’s Goodison Park home. Megafon, a Russian mobile phone network, is 70% owned by the USM Group, of which Usmanov owns 49%.
It’s left many Everton supporters wondering how much Usmanov is actually pumping into the club via his multiple sponsorship deals. At Everton’s recent AGM hosted at the club, chief executive Denise Barrett-Baxendale reiterated the Toffees’ “long-term vision to establish Everton as an elite club challenging at the very top of domestic and European competitions”. Ms Barrett-Baxendale also added that the financial investment from the likes of Moshiri and Usmanov was part of “a longer-term journey at commitment”.
A quick glance at the English Premier League table shows Everton only two points and one place better off than Arsenal after 26 league games. Being in ninth and tenth position respectively was not what either club planned at the start of the 2019/20 campaign. However, UEFA’s decision to ban Manchester City from European competition for two seasons due to financial irregularities has opened the door for the fifth-placed team to try and qualify for the Champions League this term.
The Toffees and the Gunners find themselves just four and six points behind fifth-placed Tottenham at present and with Spurs suffering an injury crisis in attack. Usmanov could soon watch both of his football interests going head-to-head to snatch fifth place over the likes of Manchester United and Sheffield United.
