BILLIONAIRES’

By Walter Finch

THERE may be light at the end of the tunnel for long-suffering malagueños , whose team Malaga FC are four points adrift of safety in the Segunda Division B, and staring another relegation in the face.

It has been reported that the fabulously wealthy company Qatar Sports Investment, owner of big-spending Paris Saint-Germain, has started negotiations to buy the club.

Just last month, a Spanish judge ordered the seizure of club owner Sheikh Abdullah Al-Thani's assets in Spain over a litany of unpaid debts.

They include his shares in Malaga FC and could lead to the forced sale of the club at a knockdown price – after all you’d hardly pay top dollar for an asset that appears to have been run into the ground.

It would end the troubled tenure of Qa tari royal family member Al-Thani,(pic tured below) whose purchase of the Costa del Sol club in 2010 amid grand promises ushered in a new era of foreign ownership in Spanish football.

Traditionally, Span ish clubs have been owned by local busi nessmen or the fans themselves, and the system seemed to work well.

When Al-Thani bought Malaga FC, La Liga was already top of UEFA’s complex coefficient ranking system and Spanish clubs were regularly winning the Europa and Champions League.

But it was hoped that foreign owners might provide further financial firepower and push Spain to even greater heights. However, with English clubs dethroning Spanish clubs in UEFA’s coefficient in 2020, let’s see how successful this era has really been.

Banned

It was just 10 years ago in April that Malaga FC stormed to the Champions League quarter-finals, brushing shoulders with football royalty at Europe’s top table.

They bested Italian titans AC Milan in the group stage, and eased past Portuguese powerhouse Porto in the round of 16. They met their match against German heavyweights Borussia Dortmund in the next round, but it was a tight 3-2 affair. The 2012-13 season had Al-Thani looking like the saviour whose leadership would bring Malaga among La Liga’s second-tier heavyweights (at least equal to Sevilla and Valencia, if below Real and Barca). Unfortunately, financial difficulties including unpaid player wages and transfer fees soon followed on-pitch failure and relegation down,to the Segunda Division. Al-Thani’s ownership of the club came under investigation in 2018. Sufficient wrongdoing was found for the club to be