4 Mar, 2010 @ 16:20
1 min read

La Liga follows Premier example

TOP Spanish football teams are hoping to follow their English counterparts by encouraging foreign investment.

Sides from La Liga, Spain’s top division, have watched on enviously in recent years as international investors bought their Premier League rivals.

Manchester City and Chelsea are the two most famous examples of clubs whose fortunes have been transformed by massive foreign investment.

“We want to get to the position where potential international investors see the league as a place to do investment in the right way.”

Now, Spanish football chiefs have announced they intend to market themselves as worthy alternatives for potential big-money backers.

La Liga’s chief executive, Francisco Roca Perez, explained: “We want to get to the position where potential international investors see the league as a place to do investment in the right way.”

“I want to take steps forward in that direction.”

Roca Perez added that – with the exception of Real Madrid and Barcelona – several clubs in Spain were “living beyond their means”.

Spain’s big two are currently able to sell their TV rights individually for up to 150m euros a season.

Sevilla vice president, Jose Maria Cruz Andres, confirmed that most clubs in Spain “are in a bad financial position”.

He even added that some clubs in the second tier of Spanish football are currently running a wages to earnings ratio of 150 per cent.

Jon Clarke (Publisher & Editor)

Jon Clarke is a Londoner who worked at the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday as an investigative journalist before moving to Spain in 2003 where he helped set up the Olive Press.

After studying Geography at Manchester University he fell in love with Spain during a two-year stint teaching English in Madrid.

On returning to London, he studied journalism and landed his first job at the weekly Informer newspaper in Teddington, covering hundreds of stories in areas including Hounslow, Richmond and Harrow.

This led on to work at the Sunday Telegraph, Sunday Mirror, Standard and even the Sun, before he landed his first full time job at the Daily Mail.

After a year on the Newsdesk he worked as a Showbiz correspondent covering mostly music, including the rise of the Spice Girls, the rivalry between Oasis and Blur and interviewed many famous musicians such as Joe Strummer and Ray Manzarak, as well as Peter Gabriel and Bjorn from Abba on his own private island.

After a year as the News Editor at the UK’s largest-selling magazine Now, he returned to work as an investigative journalist in Features at the Mail on Sunday.

As well as tracking down Jimi Hendrix’ sole living heir in Sweden, while there he also helped lead the initial investigation into Prince Andrew’s seedy links to Jeffrey Epstein during three trips to America.

He had dozens of exclusive stories, while his travel writing took him to Jamaica, Brazil and Belarus.

He is the author of three books; Costa Killer, Dining Secrets of Andalucia and My Search for Madeleine.

Contact jon@theolivepress.es

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