Newcastle United have been hit with a demand for £3.2m from HM Revenue and Customs over a “deliberate” failure to pay tax, according to official disclosures that relate to a near decade-long investigation into player transfers under the club’s former owner, Mike Ashley.
The Tyneside club, who have been owned by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund since 2021, owe HMRC £1.9m in tax and have also been hit with a penalty of £1.25m, the newly released documents show. The bill emerged as a result of the tax authority’s regular publication of a league table of “deliberate tax defaulters”, with Newcastle featuring at the top of the most recent list, released on Thursday.
