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Oil Money and the Remaking of European Football

For better or worse, “oil money” has redrawn the map of European football.

September 24, 2025

What began as Gulf-state–adjacent capital entering a handful of clubs is now a system-level force shaping how leagues regulate spending, how clubs are owned (often across multiple countries), and how the sport is marketed to the world. Manchester City (Abu Dhabi), Paris Saint-Germain (Qatar) and, more recently, Newcastle United (Saudi Arabia) sit at the center of the story—each a case study in soft power, infrastructure investment, competitive success, and regulatory friction.

Manchester City: Abu Dhabi’s flagship project

Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi United Group bought Manchester City in 2008, installing Khaldoon Al Mubarak as chairman and setting a long-term plan that transformed the club on and off the pitch. Investment went far beyond transfer fees. The Etihad Campus and City Football Academy—part training base, part urban-regeneration anchor for East Manchester—opened in the mid-2010s and underpinned a multi-club strategy through the City Football Group, which now spans teams across several continents.

On the pitch, City became the defining Premier League team of the 2010s and 2020s, culminating in a historic treble in 2023. Off it, the rise collided with football’s rulebook: from early-era Financial Fair Play sanctions to a high-profile legal battle that overturned a European ban but left fines for non-cooperation, and ongoing domestic disputes over “associated-party” sponsorships and historic charges. City has been both a blueprint and a lightning rod.

Paris Saint-Germain: nation branding meets elite sport

Qatar Sports Investments took control of PSG in 2011 and fused sporting ambition with nation-branding on a global stage. The club’s recruitment of superstars—Neymar’s world-record transfer and Kylian Mbappé’s mega-deal—signaled a new financial order. Commercial partnerships linked to Qatar drew regulatory scrutiny and revaluations, but PSG’s domestic dominance steadily expanded its international profile, culminating in their first Champions League title in 2025. The project continues to evolve, with a shift toward more diversified sponsorships and a push to balance global celebrity with a sustainable football operation.

Newcastle United: the Saudi era and the new guardrails

Newcastle’s 2021 takeover by a consortium led by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund introduced a third Gulf power into Premier League ownership. The deal accelerated the Premier League’s clampdown on related-party sponsorships and fair-market-value assessments. Newcastle’s rapid on-field improvement has come under the shadow of tighter cost-control rules, illustrating how quickly ambitious investment plans now run into guardrails designed to protect competitive balance and club solvency.

The rulebook changed because the money changed

UEFA has replaced traditional break-even FFP with Financial Sustainability Regulations centered on a squad-cost ratio—a gradually tightening cap on the share of revenue that can be spent on wages, transfers and agents’ fees. Rather than litigating accounting treatments after the fact, regulators are moving toward upfront cost containment.

England has layered on its own system via the Premier League’s Profit & Sustainability Rules, which have produced real-world consequences from transfer-window limits to points deductions. Whether these measures become a stable regime or a stepping stone toward a continental-style cap remains a live debate.

Multi-club ownership: normalized, but monitored

City Football Group helped mainstream multi-club ownership, with benefits ranging from shared scouting and analytics to smoother player pathways. UEFA’s stance has shifted from broad prohibition to conditional permission: common-control clubs can play in the same European competitions if they meet strict separation standards and avoid conflicts of interest. Temporary ownership structures, transfer pauses between sister clubs, and independent governance arrangements are increasingly common tools to pass eligibility checks.

Sportswashing—or something else?

Critics argue that Gulf investment often functions as sportswashing—using elite sport to launder reputations, soften geopolitical perceptions, and project soft power. Defenders point to more complex motives: economic diversification, tourism strategy, and a genuine desire to build modern sporting institutions. Fans are split, sometimes within the same club’s base: grateful for world-class squads and facilities; uneasy about where the money comes from and what it seeks to achieve.

What it adds up to

Middle-Eastern state-adjacent capital has delivered trophy-winning squads, cutting-edge facilities, and global networks. It has also stress-tested football’s rules, prompting the most sweeping regulatory shift of the modern era. The core question for the next decade isn’t whether Gulf capital is “in” European football—it undeniably is—but the terms on which it operates: how strictly related-party deals are priced, how cost controls are enforced, and how multi-club webs are supervised. That evolving rulebook, more than any single transfer, will determine the balance between ambition and competitive integrity.

Data & Chart Placement — Why the Money Flows

Below are three chart “slots.” Paste the exact chart noted in each bracket. I’ve added quick takeaways you can run as captions or sidebars.

Market scale & rebound creates a bigger stage

What this shows

  • The European football market grows from ~€28.9bn (2018/19) to ~€39.1bn (2024/25) — roughly +35% overall and ~+55% from the pandemic trough (~€25.2bn in 2019/20).

  • Big 5 leagues expand from €17.0bn to €20.8bn (+22%), while top non–Big 5 leagues rise faster (€5.6bn → €8.1bn; +45%).

  • Revenues tied to governing bodies (FIFA/UEFA/nationals) roughly double, signaling bigger central events and distributions.

Why this invites Gulf investment

  • A larger, faster-growing market supports patient, state-backed capital seeking global reach and prestige.

  • Post-COVID recovery created entry points as clubs sought liquidity; long-term investors could step in and fund capex (stadiums, academies) for the upcycle.

  • Growth outside the Big 5 opens room for multi-club networks—ideal for owners who value portfolio effects (loan pathways, shared scouting, commercial cross-sell).

England’s outsized scale and visibility

What this shows

  • The Premier League’s revenue line sits far above its peers, reaching roughly €8bn by 2024/25—about twice Germany/Spain and well ahead of Italy/France.

  • After the COVID dip, England’s growth re-accelerates sharply, reflecting global media rights and commercialization.

Why this invites Gulf investment

  • Scale + global TV reach make English clubs unmatched soft-power platforms.

  • Commercial upside (international fanbases, partner demand) helps justify marquee signings and branding plays (Etihad/PSG-style strategies).

  • Premier League visibility compounds returns across a wider diplomatic and tourism agenda.

Long-run growth momentum (2014 = 100)

What this shows

  • Since 2014, England and Spain show the strongest cumulative growth trajectories; Germany lags on the index.

  • The post-2021 surge is broad-based but uneven—evidence that some leagues (and clubs) are structurally better positioned to monetize global demand.

Why this invites Gulf investment

  • Investors target leagues with sustained secular growth, not just one-off cycles.

  • Index divergence implies relative-value opportunities: buy into clubs/leagues with catch-up potential or use multi-club structures to arbitrage development pathways and brand building across markets.

  • Predictable growth makes new cost-control regimes (UEFA squad-cost ratios, domestic PSR) feel more investable—spend becomes an allocation problem, not a survival one.

Sources & References

Accounting Web. (2020). Manchester City wins fair play rule appeal. https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/business/financial-reporting/manchester-city-wins-fair-play-rule-appeal 

ESPN. (2020). CAS lifts Man City's UEFA FFP ban, but questions remain as to why and how it got this far. https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_/id/37585038/cas-lifts-man-city-uefa-ffp-ban-questions-remain-why-how-got-far 

PE150. (2025). PE in Sports: Why the $1T Industry Is a Hotspot for Smart Capital. https://www.pe150.com/p/scoring-money-the-economics-of-sports 

Premier League. (2024). Nottingham Forest FC deducted four points by independent Commission. https://www.premierleague.com/en/news/3936397 

Reuters. (2018). The money game: How top soccer clubs clashed with rules on financial fair play. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/soccer-files-fairplay/ 

The Guardian. (2023). Manchester City owner Sheikh Mansour attends Champions League final. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2023/jun/10/manchester-city-owner-sheikh-mansour-champions-league-final