Liverpool owners Fenway Sports Group are no longer in the running to acquire Atletico Mineiro, according to reports in Brazil.
The Reds owners, who have been linked with a purchase in the South American football market to add to their stable of clubs, were reported to be one of the interested parties in taking a majority stake in the Brazilian Serie A team, with Paris Saint-Germain owners Qatar Sports Investments, headed by PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaifi, having also been among those said to be looking at acquiring the club.
But Brazilian media outlet Radio Itatiaia have claimed that while initial talks took place with Atletico chiefs with both FSG and QSI, neither will be moving forward with any deal, the interest in the Brazilian side from FSG first reported by well followed Atletico Mineiro fan channel Falo Galo.
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According to Itatiaia as many as 16 parties have expressed an interest in either acquiring the Belo Horizonte-based team or making some kind of minority investment, with FSG and QSI 'no longer in the fight'.
FSG have been linked with the potential purchase of a Brazilian team due to the changing nature of the domestic football landscape in the country through governance, a potential breakaway league, an expected lift in media rights and teams becoming more open to outside investment than they had traditionally been.
The Brazilian domestic market is changing, and the country where the beautiful game is the national sport and receives fervent support in a nation where the population is north of 215m there is enormous scope for growth, investors believe, particularly with the revamping of the domestic game.
A number of Brazilian clubs are changing the way they are governed, which has opened up opportunities for outside investment. With some having the need to find funds to deal with the impact of the pandemic, some clubs are now switching from a non-profit entity to a corporate one in a bid to restructure its finances, forming a ‘Sociedade Anônima’ (SA) to attract investors. That has alerted interested parties, a number of them from the US.
FSG are looking to add more sporting teams to their $10bn empire in the coming years as part of their 'FSG 3.0' plans for growth. An NBA team, potentially an expansion franchise in Las Vegas, is high on their list while interest remains in other football teams.
Speaking at the Leaders Week sports business conference in London, RedBird Capital Partners founder and managing partner Gerry Cardinale addressed his future involvement with FSG, his firm owning an 11 per cent stake in the Reds, saying: "I think we’ve been clear with Fenway Sports Group, we’re going to continue to look at that as a platform for aggregating blue chip teams,” he said.
“We’ve got baseball, we’ve got European football, we have hockey, we have content production. You should expect that we’re going to take a hard run at the NBA, we’ll see if we can ever get there with the NFL if the rules evolve."
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