Chelsea and Man Utd in trouble? Crackdown on multi-club models weighed up

Regulators in France are growing increasingly concerned with the state of football and are looking to implement sweeping reforms.

French football has been in a state of turmoil for years. Ligue 1 has had several different naming sponsors recently and a major scandal erupted over the league’s broadcasting rights.

To combat the situation, senator Laurent Lafon launched a months-long investigation into the behind-the-scenes operations of French football to get a clearer picture of where reforms and wholesale changes are necessary.

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This research has now concluded and the findings have been brought before the French Senate. Footmercato reports that the recommendations brought forth in the report have already been ‘unanimously validated,’ paving the way for concrete action in the future.

Among the wide variety of topics identified as problems were those of foreign investors and multi-club ownership.

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17 clubs in the top two divisions of French football are part of multi-club ownership networks and it has been found that they often play second fiddle to larger clubs in other countries.

Among the most well-known of these sides are, of course, INEOS-backed Nice (Man Utd), BlueCo-owned Strasbourg (Chelsea) and ESTAC Troyes, who have been struggling massively despite belonging to City Football Group (Man City).

However, the report insists that France can’t implement changes on this particular matter alone. Since multi-club models are international organisations, they need to be discussed at the international level.

“Clubs that are owned by families or individual owners are easy prey for investment funds. We have to be extremely vigilant and that is why we draw attention to this and ask the State and the French Football Federation to become more involved,” Lafont said.

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“Several times, the subject of multi-ownership came up in the discussion. Several clubs have expressed their concern to us about the proliferation of multi-ownership, even club presidents,” rapporteur Michel Savin explained.

“They are also concerned about this phenomenon that is growing in scale. This recommendation is rather to tell the Federation and the League to put all their weight into the discussions at the European level because it cannot be resolved at the level of the national territory alone.”

The whole point of the report is to “emphasise solidarity and redistribution while guaranteeing fair and attractive competitions up to the highest level.” It remains to be seen what impact – if any – this investigation will have on the future of multi-club models.