Monday 30th August - 1 FC Köln - fan protests against investors and the Forest-Olympiacos thing

The article below is a shameless direct lift and translation from the Fanzination Fankurve site. Posting here really just to highlight the differences between German and English fan attitudes to investors. I’ll write a bit about where Forest are and how they got there and then share the Cologne article translation. For readers in Germany, perhaps a warning of what can happen under the English model, for those in England an insight into how things are in Germany And efforts to hang onto that.

Here, the structure, culture and desperation for success and culture is that us fans will routinely call out for wealthy individuals, corporations or even dodgy states to support our clubs, which then of course stop being ‘our’ clubs, but their playthings. In Germany, where the famed 50%+1 rule has been under threat and undermined of late, not all fans accept this. 1.FC Köln, dear to my own heart, for one, are proudly and fiercely independent. My own contacts there vow they will stop going if the club is sold out and I have no reason to doubt their sincerity on that. Contrast this with clubs here where the multi-billions of Russian oligarchs or oil-rich sheiks are celebrated and envied. It’s not all fluffy bunnies and unicorns in Germany with the likes of RB Leipzig (a real horror of an ‘entity’, not a club by any definition), Wolfsburg (VW), Leverkusen (Bayern AG pharmaceuticals) and Bayern (Adidas hold an ownership stake and BMW a further 9%). Then there is Hoffenheim, 96% owned by the much-loathed billionaire Dietmar Hopp. The latter was the subject of protests from Bayern fans, with the hoisting of a banner (below) deemed offensive to Hopp leading to the players walking off and on their return just playing ‘keep-ball’ for the remainder of the match, just before lockdown 1.0, March 2020.

It’s a tricky one perhaps for us English fans to figure out. How far would our desire to feel the clubs belonged to us again (if they ever did) go? Would we rather watch a team that we owned, but in a lower division? I have no idea. It seems unlikely, but as more and more of us seem to become more alienated from the model we have, where for ‘modern’ fans choice of a team to support looks like a choice of which supermarket to shop in, maybe football will lose more ‘legacy fans’ (a vile phrase if ever I heard one), perhaps to lower league football where that feeling of ownership and belonging still exists. 

Forest, famously, were the last remaining club in English professional football, only becoming a limited company in 1984. Previously the club was effectively run by 209 members, who each paid the princely sum of £1 for the privilege. New members were admitted as vacancies arose, usually as incumbents passed away. In 1984 this membership had changed to be a shareholding. As finances worsened - the overdraft at the time was estimated to be £15 million, the 209 realised they could be liable if the club folded. A share issue was advertised in the Financial Times.

Two groups embarked on a protracted battle for ownership: The fans’ choice was largely a consortium fronted by season ticket holder Sandy Anderson; a second consortium, Bridgford PLC, headed by Phil Soar, Irving Scholar and Nigel Wray used blocking tactics to prevent a sell—out to Anderson and eventually won the war, one day before the administrators were scheduled to be in.

Bridgford PLC were never quite clear about the source of the money and the delay in the takeover effectively prevented any spending on players that might have staved off relegation. Despite this relegation, ticket prices were hiked by 30% and season ticket sales fell from over 18,000 to 12,000. The new board’s financial advisers warned against a share flotation, but they pressed ahead with one. The expected 20 million windfall was eventually only an estimated 1.8 million. It might be possible to attribute the catastrophic decline of the club to this failure. Have we ever recovered? Fan protests followed, in a fairly half-hearted way. A few leaflets and the  odd ‘Board Out’ chant.

And now we’re where we are. A few takeovers since: the fondly remembered Nigel Doughty, the despised crackpot Fawas al Hazawi and, since 2017, Evangelos Marinakis. Of the latter, There were concerns around allegations of match fixing, firebombing a ref’s home and a multi million pound heroin deal, but Marinakis passed all the tests and has never been convicted of anything. He claims to be the victim of other people’s jealousy.  Marinakis professed not to make promises, but he talked of stability, European football in 5 years, a redeveloped stadium and real fan voice in running the club. That 5 years will soon be up and Forest are nearer league One than Europe, get through managers at an astonishing rate and are playing in a rapidly ageing, decaying stadium. The only fan voice at present is an angry one from the stands, directed at a team in free-fall, playing unwatchable football.  On the positive side, Marinakis has improved communication (from a very low baseline) and conversion of loans into shares has made some money available. He does seem committed. There were hopes that ownership by the man who also owns Olympiacos might bring some benefits in decent players, but that hasn’t happened. A quick check through of Forest-Olympiacos moves doesn’t suggest that we are anything more than a money moving exercise and a place to offload players who aren’t good enough. Note some of these are pre-Marinakis era:

2011-12: Matt Derbyshire - all over the shop, back and forth between Olympiacos, Blackburn, Forest, Blackpool and Birmingham, all seemingly to no great effect,

2013-14: Djamal Abdoun in for 1.98 million, out for free; Rafik Djebbour in for 1.35 million, out on a free;

2016-17: Pajtim Kasami on loan

2017-18: Stefanos Kalinin free transfer; Andreas Bouchalakis free transfer

2019-20: Panagotis Tachtsidis free transfer; El Arbi Hillal Soudani in for 3.4 million, back out for 1.8

2020-21: Tiago Silva (not that one!) out to Olympiacos fee never disclosed; Cafú (also not that one!) in on load, permanent deal later; Miguel Angel Guerrero in free, back out free

Let me know if I’ve missed any! Of these, perhaps only Cafú really looked any good and added anything to Forest, but appearances have been limited (31 to date), no goals but certainly a decent defensive midfielder at this level. 

Anyway, onto the protests in Cologne. Protests against a move from fan majority ownership, with a real say (some would say still not enough!) in how things are run, to a more ‘English‘ model. 

Translated article below…

At 1. FC Köln there will be a so-called regular members' meeting on September 5, 2021 on the subject of “Investors joining the clubs”. As part of the home game against VfL Bochum, the active Cologne fan scene made it clear again with a poster campaign that they are against investing.

(above a list of clubs with big investors, none of whom can be particularly happy at the outcomes!)

Fans put up numerous posters in the vicinity of the stadium, on which messages such as “FC means passion and not return”, “Get popular sport - against investors !!!”, “No to investors - 100% 1. FC Cologne!”, “Investors no Thank you ”,“ FC lives through us fans !!! ”,“ Investors fuck off !!! ”or“ Get popular sport football! ”were all to be read. Behind the south curve of the Müngersdorfer Stadium there were also negative examples of clubs that had already attracted investors. During the home game against Bochum, a poster was also shown in the upper tier of the south curve, on which "FC, live as you are - independent and investor-free" was written

(Above - FC, Live as you are, independent and investor free)

Before there is an “open discussion on the subject of investor models” on Sunday, to which the members' council and the executive committee of 1. FC Köln have invited, the fan scene has once again clearly positioned itself on the subject. The professional team of 1. FC Köln was spun off into a GmbH & Co. KGaA in 2002. To this day, however, the parent association has received 100 percent of the shares in this outsourced corporation. The incumbent board of directors of 1. FC Köln also repeatedly emphasized the intention that 1. FC Köln should remain a member-run club that is independent of investors. (Fascination Fan Curve, 08/30/2021)

(FC lives through us fans)