The CEO of Qatar Investment Authority, the sovereign wealth fund of the Gulf nation, says that they are looking at investing in football clubs but have not yet made up their mind.
With the World Cup in Qatar now over attention has turned to leveraging the success of the competition and pushing ahead with investment plans in sport, with QIA likely to add sporting assets to their $450bn fund over the course of the next 12 to 18 months.
One of those teams that has been rumoured to be in the sights of QIA is Liverpool, with the Reds owners Fenway Sports Group open to offers for the club for both a full takeover and a minority stake depending on the partner.
As things stand there has been no bid lodged for Liverpool Football Club and no high level talks that are close to any kind of conclusion, with sources in the US telling the ECHO that little had changed since November and that there was, as yet, no "real" interest to come forward and engage with FSG around a takeover or investment.
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The Telegraph reported on Monday that formal bids could arrive next month, but as things stand there is not an offer for FSG to consider.
But QIA's interest in investing in football has not been a secret, and on the back of Qatar 2022 and it positioning them at the centre of the footballing universe for a month, the pursuit of investment opportunities will be ramped up in 2023.
Speaking to Bloomberg at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Mansoor bin Ebrahim Al-Mahmoud, QIA's CEO said: "Football, the clubs and the sport is becoming very commercialised in a way, especially now fans are looking into this as an experience, so they would like to and experience and entertain themselves.
"At the same time digitalisation is becoming very important for this. So, the business model of these institutions is becoming very commercialised and very investment friendly. You will not be surprised if we invest in this.
"We have not made our mind yet but this is a very commercially driven decision that we go through. And again, sports is becoming a very important theme as well, people are engaged more in a sport and digitalisation is making it more attractive to investors."
With both Liverpool and Manchester United open to offers there is the rare chance to acquire two of football's biggest assets, two clubs with enormous fan bases that have touch points across the globe. Tottenham Hotspur are also understood to be open to offers of investment.
Speaking to the ECHO on Monday, Professor Simon Chadwick, Professor of Sport and Geopolitical Economy at SKEMA Business School in Paris stated his belief that Liverpool, a port city that has just gained freeport status from the UK Government that open them up to more international markets through exemption from the usual tax and customs rules, could be more appealing to the likes of Qatar, who along with the likes of Saudi Arabia have been aggressively pursuing the advancement of their port strategies to diversify income and avoid the total reliance on oil and gas.
"Liverpool is at the edge of Europe, it is a trade hub and a port city and people in Riyadh, Doha and Abu Dhabi will see that," he said.
"Britain is open for business and the Government, like they did with the PIF (Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund) deal for Newcastle when Boris Johnson was PM, will be encouraging this to happen.
"With PIF, the Tories needed it to happen. They didn't want the Saudis to become disaffected as it had the potential for subsequent contracts that were in place to fall through. Johnson was mindful of the 'red wall' seats and enabling the PIF deal to go through kept them in with some kind of chance in those areas.
"It is much less about managing reputation and these aren't trophy assets, they are strategic ones. Nothing will get done without the say-so of the governments of these countries giving it the green light.
"Owning such assets as Liverpool also provides them with an element of security. Say if Qatar arrive on Merseyside then it will give the UK a reason to care about relations with Qatar and provides the Qataris with an anchor. That could help when it comes to trade deals or when it comes to matters of Qatari national security."
FSG have a valuation of $4bn on the Reds - although it is likely that some partners whose investment in the Liverpool owners has not had the time to mature as they were expecting, would want to see a sale go above that price.
Should FSG ultimately receive a bid in the coming months from someone like the QIA, a state backed wealth fund, then any deal would likely take some time to materialise given the amount of due diligence involved in acquiring a $4bn business and the likely need for both the UK Government to have to give their blessing and UEFA to be assuaged that there was no conflict of interest between someone like the QIA and PSG, who are owned by Qatar Sports Investments, a fund that has strong ties to the Qatari state.
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