Liverpool Owners in Roma Takeover Bid?

By: Bob | November 12th, 2007

I’ve been sifting through the aftermath of the craziness that went down in Italy this past weekend and I am no closer to understanding any of it. It is all too familiar but entirely unfamiliar to someone who doesn’t live in Italy. And pointless. And sad. Martha and our gang of Serie A bloggers are staying on top of it all. It might seem like an odd time for anyone to be thinking about buying a team in Italy, but that is evidently something that Liverpool’s American owners are considering.

According to those nefarious unnamed sources in Italy, George Gillett and Tom Hicks have been buying up stock in Roma and are trying to convince the current president to sell his shares. The club says that they have are aware of the possible interest of an American investor but that they haven’t been contacted directly.

I find it hard to believe that the rules would allow one person to own both a team in Serie A and the English Premier League. What would happen if Liverpool met Roma in the Champions League, for example? What would prevent one team from loaning a player to another during critical stretches of a season?

It is also worth noting that currently all 20 of the teams in Serie A are owned by Italians. Hicks, who also owns the Texas Rangers and Dallas Stars, may or may not end up with Roma, but you can bet that he won’t be the last foreign money man to make a run at a team in Italy, warts and all.

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Category: Serie A, World Football

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Brian

Brian, I don't think Joe Lewis has a say in either club, both of which are owned through his investment firm, ENIC Sports PLC, with Spurs chairman Daniel Levy. Levy runs the London club, while Petr Doležal, who ever that is, runs Slavia Prague. UEFA apparently sees no conflict of interest in the matter, even when they faced each other in the UEFA Cup.

I can't really see the relationship between the clubs being much different than the Arsenal-KSK Beveren or the Liverpool-MTK Hungária FC player development agreements and in fact is probably less so. For Slavia Prague to be successful they are going to have to be more than just a Tottenham farm side.
Brian P

Joe Lewis, who owns Tottenham, also owns Slavia Prague. (Or rather, he owns them through Tavistock Group.) Spurs have played Slavia in the UEFA Cup recently without anyone seeming too bothered. Brian, what counts as a "UEFA Club" in this case? Is Slavia not one? Or is Lewis shielded from the rule by the buffer of his corporation?
Brian

It's apparently Hicks who is looking to takeover Roma, Gillett is not involved. There's apparently been a rift between the two and their not seeing eye-to-eye on the future of the club and most specifically the new stadium.

One person cannot own two UEFA clubs, so Hicks would have to sell his interest in LFC. Abramovich, though he has massive influence over CSKA Moscow through various investment capacities with the club, doesn't 'officially' own the side.