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£5.3bn deal cited as Kieran Maguire issues verdict on Nassef Sawiris ending Aston Villa investment
The benevolence of a club’s owners can only get you so far in the age of PSR, but Nassef Sawiris has given Aston Villa a platform for success that is the envy of most of their rivals in the Premier League.
Villa have effectively spent the maximum allowable in each Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) assessment window recently, hence their eleventh-hour scramble to get within the threshold last summer.
They have had to taper their spending and use some ingenious accounting sleights of hands to avoid the same fate as Everton and Nottingham Forest, who were both docked points last season.
Among those were the quasi-swap deals that were flavour of the month for clubs struggling with PSR for a brief time in June.
Villa sold Tim Iroegbunam to Everton with Lewis Dobbin heading the other way in a switch which gave both clubs the short-term player trading profits needed to get within the PSR quota.
Compliance was a close run thing, but a little jeopardy under the Premier League’s spending rules was a small price to pay for the return of Champions League football to Villa Park for the first time since the 1980s.
Nassef Sawiris, flanked by co-investors Wes Edens and Atairos, has bankrolled substantial financial losses to get the Midlands club to this point.
Hiring Unai Emery has proved to be a masterstroke and, despite a patchy first third of the season, Villa still have hopes of playing in the Champions League again next season
Villa have an excellent chance of reaching the last-16 in Europe’s premier competition this term too, which would represent a high point in the NSWE era.
But there have been a number of frustrations for Sawiris during his time in B6 too.
He unsuccessfully petitioned the Premier League to raise the PSR allowable loss limit to £135m in the summer, for example.
Incidentally, the loss limit has not been changed since it was introduced over a decade ago despite huge inflation – both within football finance and the wider economy – in that time.
Sawiris also caused a stir when he publicly backed Man City in their campaign to delay a vote on the league’s Associated Party Transaction (APT) Rules in November.
Could the billionaire, who is Egypt’s richest man, finally have had enough with a set of financial controls that many believe are designed to keep the likes of Villa from consistently challenging the elite?
Nassef Sawiris’ potential UK exit and its impact on Aston Villa
Earlier this week, it was reliably reported that Sawiris was considering relocating his business interests in the United Kingdom, prompting handwringing among Villa fans.
Sawiris has already moved his family offices to Abu Dhabi, where his Villa co-investor Wes Edens has a number of business interests.
The 63-year-old is said to be threatening to exit the UK because of what he perceives to be a hostile political and economic environment under Sir Kier Starmer and his incumbent Labour government.
However, as explained by Liverpool University football finance lecturer and industry insider Kieran Maguire, Sawiris’ plans will not negatively impact his project at Villa Park.
“I don’t see Sawiris withdrawing from the UK as having a negative impact on Villa,” Maguire said, speaking exclusively to TBR Football.
“What’s more, I think the UK is effectively going to be known as the 51st state of the US for political and economic reasons during the Trump administration.
“Aston Villa are part of a global product in the Premier League. These days, it generates more money in broadcasting fees from the international market than it does domestically.
“It has a far bigger deferential than any other country when it comes to the sale of TV rights, so I don’t see Villa being disadvantaged by this political decision.
“The club will continue to invest and to grow as much as they can within the constrains of the PSR system in the UK and financial controls that exist within UEFA.”
In the current rights cycle, the Premier League’s international broadcast rights brought in £5.3bn, with that money shared between clubs.
At the last count, Villa’s annual media income was £153m. That figure will have risen when they release their accounts for 2023-24, expected some time before the end of March.
PSR: Does Unai Emery have money to spend this January?
Villa were close to the line in 2023-24 in terms of PSR.
The Premier League will confirm whether it has charged anyone for a breach last season later this month, with Villa hoping to avoid that indignity.
In 2024-25, as an analysis by world-renowned football finance analyst Swiss Ramble suggests, the margins are even tighter.
The 2021-22 financial year, wherein the club posted a modest profit thanks to the record sale of Jack Grealish to Man City, is no longer part of the equation.
Per , the likelihood is that there will be more emphasis on the exit door than new arrivals for Unai Emery and Monchi in the current transfer window.