Zapping Goal! Football club ASSE: the Greens’ tribute to Loïc Perrin
“We should have spoken here about this more courageous than successful match, delivered by the Stéphanoise team against Qatari club Paris. But the backstage took over with what is more than a rumor without being a promise. Except dreaming so hard that one imagines oneself in real life before being pulled out of its sum by economic reality. The one that makes Claude Puel say “The sale will only take place the day it becomes effective.” The club as a whole must be careful to stay focused on what we have to do: take points and leave the club in Ligue 1 at the end of the season, with assets ”.
Because of course, it was this Forez snake, flushed out by L’Equipe, that stuck its tongue between the snowflakes marking the onset of winter. The sale, its sellers and buyers. All are bound by secrecy. “Those who speak to the media are still poor and dangerous candidates, including at the legal level,” smiles a person familiar with the matter, made suspicious by a few failures. Radio silence, therefore, but there are signs that are better than speeches. For example, the happy face of Roland Romeyer during the week, suggesting the good news, watched before and after the match on Sunday. A black van, tinted windows to see clearly that we are transporting incognito VIPs, it does not go unnoticed, neither in Saint-Étienne nor in Etrat.
Roman Dubov from Portsmouth to Tottenham
In this town which has the spirit of a village, it is impossible to blend in with anonymity, even in the midst of 24,884 spectators. Miguel Salgado has experienced it. His presence did not escape the eye of our colleague from Progress, Thomas Dutang. The ex-international could have made people believe he was there for his friend Sergio Ramos, whose performance he praised in front of the Spanish press. But no, he was there as sports advisor to Roman Dubov, the one who gave Roland Romeyer a smile by presenting a takeover project, among other offers, all from “people of identified fortune and already involved in football. “.
For some, this is a guarantee, for others who remember Peak 6, it is not assurance and their suspicion grows after a few digs in the archives. Roman Dubov is president of Total Sports Investments (TSI), a venture capital fund specializing in sports, including ice hockey, which he plays, but also football. So in 2011 he took over the Portsmouth club with Convers Sports Initiatives and Vladimir Antonov. He then announced that he wanted to make it a “Chelsea’s by the sea” and the two men “agreed to provide immediate funds to buy players”. The reality was more brutal since in 2012 Portsmouth was placed in receivership. Later it was in Tottenham that Roman Dubov was found, TSI taking care of all the club’s marketing. In the midst of the Covid crisis, his manager was recognized as a benchmark in the economics of English football.
Record fundraising for Sergei Lomakin, the king of discount in Russia
If Dubov was in Saint-Étienne, it was as a project leader, in this case that of Sergei Lomakin, as Le Progrès revealed. In the spring, the billionaire had the honors of the business press, the Russian discount retail group, Fix Price, which he created having raised two billion dollars on the London and Moscow stock exchanges. “Among the main investors, the American BlackRock, the largest asset manager in the world, and the Qatari sovereign fund” then revealed Les Echos, which somewhat situates the means of the one who could take over the club founded by Casino. Heavy, although he hasn’t done everything in football. Owner of the Latvian football club Riga, “he is on the list of persona non grata” the Baltic Times said a year ago, which the club’s executive director denied. We will see more clearly if this recovery file is progressing enough to be presented to the DNCG, knowing that several candidates have come forward in the past three weeks and emissaries crossed on the side of Châteaucreux. And we suppose that neither KPMG nor the shareholders of ASSE will go on an adventure, although the time seems long, that Roland Romeyer would gladly leave his chair for his place at Cœur vert and with the young people and that Bernard Caïazzo all by saying “not touched by the banners” wants to turn the page. “
Didier BIGARD
to summarize
Didier Bigard evokes this week the file of the sale of ASSE and its possible takeover by a Russian billionaire. “We suppose that neither KPMG nor the shareholders of ASSE will go on an adventure, although the time seems long, that Roland Romeyer would gladly leave his chair for his place at Cœur vert and with the young people and that Bernard Caïazzo all by saying “not touched by the banners” wants to turn the page, “he explains in particular.
