Exclusive: CVC Capital Partners nearing external investment for $14bn Global Sport Group Sport Business Six Nations investors CVC Capital Partners is close to securing external investment in its $14bn Global Sport Group, which is expected to trigger a wave of new sporting acquisitions at the start of next year. GSG, which is chaired by former EE chief executive Marc Allera, was formed earlier this year to run CVC’s existing [...]
Serie A overseas game cancellation is early Christmas present, say football fans Sport Business Football fans’ groups across the world have celebrated the cancellation of plans to export a Serie A match between AC Milan and Como overseas just weeks before the fixture. Milan and Como had been due to fly halfway around the world to play in Perth, Australia, on 8 February, in what would have been a [...]
LaLiga boosts Premier League fight with record media rights deals Sport Business Spain’s LaLiga has cemented its position as the closest challenger to the Premier League after announcing record domestic media rights deals worth more than £5bn. The figure for the 2027-32 cycle represents a nine per cent increase on the current contracts and, when combined with international broadcast deals, gives the rights a total value of [...]
Barcelona hint at a return to Camp Nou for Messi November 12, 2025 Lionel Messi could be the star draw at the Camp Nou one last time with the former Barcelona player invited to return to Spain for a tribute match. The 37-year-old is currently the man of the moment at Major League Soccer club Inter Miami FC having left Europe in 2023 after 19 seasons on the [...]
Atletico Madrid valued at £2.2bn after Apollo Global Management acquisition November 10, 2025 LaLiga club Atletico Madrid has been valued at around £2.2bn after Apollo Global Management purchased a majority stake in the Spanish team. Chief executive Miguel Angel Gil Marin and president Enrique Cerezo will continue in post but the acquisition represents the latest private equity push into European football. It is understood that the US fund [...]
Real Madrid to turn Santiago Bernabeu stadium into money-spinning Winter Wonderland October 31, 2025 Real Madrid have hit on a novel way to maintain their status as the world’s richest football club: turning their Santiago Bernabeu stadium into a festive theme park over Christmas. From 24-31 December, during a two-week break in LaLiga’s schedule, the Spanish giants will transform the 84,000-seater arena into “a family-friendly experience filled with dazzling [...]
LaLiga’s overseas game project not dead, insists Tebas October 22, 2025 Spanish football chief Javier Tebas insists LaLiga will “keep trying” to stage games overseas after being forced to shelve a planned fixture between Barcelona and Villarreal in Miami in December. The controversial move looked set to go ahead when European governing body Uefa “reluctantly” granted permission earlier this month but LaLiga announced it had pulled [...]
Here’s what the NFL can teach football about global expansion October 16, 2025 It had taken me 18 years and 40 missed opportunities in London before I got round to seeing my first NFL game in the flesh on Sunday: an attritional contest edged by the Denver Broncos at a packed Tottenham Hotspur Stadium that looked for all intents and purposes as though it had been flown from [...]
Burnley owners vow to run Espanyol separately after £113m takeover October 9, 2025 Burnley’s owners insist they will run Espanyol independently after completing a takeover of the Barcelona-based LaLiga club. Velocity Sports Partners, the investment arm of Burnley owner ALK Capital, confirmed today it has acquired Espanyol from Chinese businessman Chen Yansheng’s Rastar Group in a deal reported to be worth €130m (£113m). “Football has always belonged to [...]
Overseas games risk breaking football, Uefa tells Spanish and Italian leagues October 8, 2025 Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin has aimed a shot across the bows of Spanish and Italian football chiefs, warning that taking domestic league games overseas risks “breaking” the sport. The European governing body this week “reluctantly” gave its permission for LaLiga and Serie A to export league games to the US and Australia this season but [...]