Olympique Lyonnais has lost patience. Presented with great fanfare to the French press as the successor to Jean-Michel Aulas at the head of Les Gones, is John Textor playing a nasty trick on the seven-time champions of France? While he has continued to postpone the date of his takeover by the American businessman, the Rhone club put a lot of pressure on him yesterday. Now, Textor has until tomorrow to come forward.
“In view of the progress made in the last 48 hours, the Vendors and OL Groupe have agreed to grant Eagle a final deadline of December 7, 2022 to reach a final agreement. OL Groupe recalls that Eagle Football Holdings LLC, controlled by Mr. John Textor, has made a commitment to its main historical shareholders to acquire 39,201,514 OL Groupe shares. Eagle Football has also undertaken to subscribe, subject to the completion of its acquisitions, to a capital increase reserved for OL Groupe in the amount of €86 million. » A scathing statement intended to finally get things done. Will OL achieve their goals? No one knows yet, but John Textor doesn’t seem that upset.
Main shareholder of the Botafogo club, the American seems more concerned with the idea of doing his little business with the Carioca formation than giving everything to complete the takeover of OL. In recent days, Botafogo was on tour in England where he faced Crystal Palace, a club in which Textor is involved (0-0). On this occasion, the Brazilian training discovered the modern training center of Crystal Palace. A work tool that Textor wants to export to Brazil. “At Crystal Palace, we have put millions of dollars into the youth training center and the main team is across the street with a good structure. But go to the site, you will see that sometimes they train in the youth facilities, it’s so advanced. » A great project to come.
Silent regarding OL, Textor has ambitions in Brazil
In the meantime, Textor must settle his dispute with the FERJ, the football federation of the state of Rio de Janeiro. The reason ? Botafogo and Vasco have joined forces to protest once morest the financial distribution of the TV rights of the carioca championship. Clearly, Flamengo would receive twice as much money (around €3.2m) as the other clubs (Botafogo, Fluminense and Vasco). In the meantime, Textor is already thinking regarding the pre-season as he wants his club to go to the United States in January 2023 to play matches there. A desire to develop his business in Brazil, which he confirmed on November 30 in comments relayed by the site Stove.
“I think a pure football model in itself is very difficult to make work. You know, many teams spend a lot of time, a lot of money, chasing competitive success. I think business models, which focus on the supporters of the team, are more valuable than the team itself. I think there’s a symbiotic relationship between the traditional football business model and some of the newer business models, which we’re seeing in the tech consumer space. I think marriage has the potential to be very lucrative. (…) The English League has the best television contract in the world. They were among the first to really organize themselves properly as a league. I think we do it very well here in Brazil. It’s funny, I think competitively Brazil are ahead of the world in many ways, but in terms of football they are far behind. But I think that’s changing. I knew this product was not intended as a product for entertainment purposes”. Very commercial words, not very in line with the sad people of the round ball. But Textor seems to have a plan for Botafogo. A little less for OL. Unless…