Topic: Can two clubs owned by one person participate in the Champions League? (Read 399 times)

This rule is all about keeping things fair and avoiding conflicts of interest. Like, if Manchester City and Girona FC were owned by the same company, only one could play in the Champions League. The other would have to play somewhere else or just chill if both make it.

It is only small clubs that have the same owner and journalists always love such topics, just a sports lover will expose the truth if they doubt the result of the match, if both clubs in a match do not show their full strength, they should be investigated and removed from the tournament, there will also be very few people paying attention to such clubs. With big clubs, the terms are relatively clear and when facing a worldwide audience, a mistake or manipulation is enough to lose a sponsor and affect other shareholders, so most big clubs have only one owner and many investors.

Yes, two clubs owned by one person can participate in the champion leagues but here's the twist - they cannot face each other in the competition.
It actually makes sense when you think about it.  If two clubs owned by the same person were to compete against each other, it would mean knocking out one's own team. That doesn't make sense, right?

I like to think of it like siblings. Just because they're not on the same team doesn't mean they're not connected. They're still family, and you would expect them to support each other. Similarly, two clubs under the same ownership should be seen as "siblings" in the football world.

UEFA's regulations, effective from the 2024-25 season, say clubs under common ownership can participate in different UEFA competitions, including the Champions League, but they won't be matched against each other.
Simply put, two clubs owned by one person can participate in the Champions League, but they'll not be allowed to face off against each other.

I seriously don't understand how you guys can rush aside this situation so easily, especially considering the place we're discussing this, here on a crypto forum that promotes decentralization, and you see no problem with someone acquiring and gaining more influence in a field.
Ok, two teams might not be a problem, what happens if there are 6 or 7,  doesn't this trigger the same situation we have in mining where pools just grow bigger and bigger and have a larger share of it till they reach alarming levels where they can control a lot of things? It's the same with those clubs, once somebody wons a lot of them the implication will be disastrous because it's not just the game
- the guy will own television rights for half of the matches he could easily arrange who will get the rights
- with so many teams he can decide the advertisements if he doesn't like one spons that one suddenly loses half of the market
- imagine you are a player and you get into conflict with a club suddenly you have twenty clubs where you're not wanted anymore

Forget about rigged games, the $ implications if this grows out of control are huge!

There are legal, ethical and economic subtleties to this issue. There is too much money and too little sport in modern sports. Sports have long been a business and therefore it is not entirely honest in one way or another. Of course, if one person has large blocks of shares or other ownership interests in two or more clubs, then one way or another he can influence the state of affairs in both clubs. Let's imagine that there will be a match in which two clubs will play, owned by one person or one person will have a large share of ownership in both clubs. Such matches will always be suspicious in terms of preliminary agreements about their outcome...

Those rules were made in the past and I believe soon they won't be valid anymore as changes come. In my own opinion, all clubs should be eligible to participate in the Champions League whether are bonded to another club through ownership. And my reason is all players deserve to participate in the competition it will be a plus of how progressive they have been. As a football player, I won't be happy if put in the effort to qualify for the champions league and don't get to play.

You pretend like you are the recipient of some top secret and elusive information, yet the owners are pretty well known for all the biggest clubs. This is not much of an issue for the billionaires behind these clubs as they are often just trophies and toys. If there was a scenario that a billionaire wanted to own both, there are all sorts of structures that can be dreamed up to disguise them, but a risk analysis will be done to avoid these simple conflicts. If it looks like a club is in danger of violating this rule they might offload the weaker club, but it would seem fairly common they might own a scrappy smaller club along with a bigger one, just to see if it's possible to build one up from the grass roots and build more of a legacy for themselves.

Football is one of the lucrative business in the world right now so if a capitalist has a enough money to buy two or more club, then all the two clubs will play the leagues but remember the players are not the same they are different players from different backgrounds so even the two clubs are paired to play a game, they will play and one must win.
And they are two things involved in such game. The players are playing for their bonuses so they will play well for their club to win and the second is they play to win the cup for the owner.

Despite owned by the same entities. Manchester City and Girona are participating in the UCL.



UEFA has cleared this problem with both of clubs have participated in UCL. I think they were relaxing the rules for the two clubs owned by same owner are able partiipating in the UCL. Everything is clear now with this.

You don't see it as a problem when they meet in the same group and the owner could decide to throw one match so that at least one of his team goes through the next stage or they both qualify? You don't see a problem in an investment buying a team in every championship and turning the CL into a private league between his teams, influencing betting, tv broadcasting, transfers, everything?

Right now they don't have the majority for the Girona case, but this doesn't mean they can't collude on the outcome of the matches if they feel like it, and the decision to let them play really opens a can of worms, like there weren't enough problems already!

I don't think there is lack of interest here in the start of the competition and this can become a conflict if both teams face each other in the final (which is highly unlikely for Girona) and the owner may favor the team with less trophies but so far if this true it should not compromise anything as Manchester City is only one time Champions League winners and recently in 2023 they won 1-0 against Inter Milan.

I also don't think there is any conflicting thing in which team one would support, this is easy a supporter of Manchester City would surely support them and a supporter of Girona will surely support them, based on such stats I highly doubt there is something to forbid such teams to be participating in Champions League and the fact that they are owned by the same person should not mean anything in my opinion.

i don't see any reason why if both teams are qualified to participate in the UCL that they shouldn't be allowed to do so. Aside from whatever the role states, if a team is allowed to participate in a build up games that guarantees thier place at the UCL, it's only fair that they be allowed to play if they eventually qualify. The placement of business and politics in sports is seriously getting in the way of seeing pure football that's void of an interference of a governing body. The ownership might be the same but the team is entirely different with different managers and game tactics should one be disqualified because another equally qualified for the UCL? So if for instance in this case of girona and man city, the two teams qualifies for the UCL, who's going to step down for who?

I learnt about this information regarding Manchester City and Girona being owned by an individual and as at last season, there was talks about one between both clubs not participating in the champions league, because the selection will be based on if any won their domestic league first. Manchester city won the premier League and already have a spot in the champions league ahead of Girona who finished among the top finalist in their own league.

All the while, it doesn't matter the status of ownership of the club I support, because I think a fan like myself would love the manager and style of play of a team more and would choose to support and cheer for them without even a bother as to who the owner of the club is.

That's gonna be more like an impartial competition, given that the owner stands a chance to either lift the cup with his right nads or his left; They can do a whole lot of things with it.. manipulatively playing against another team with the second team (girona) as a bait to weaken or displace them in group stages. That way, they can't be fixed with their main team, City.. Although, everyone knows city is undiluted and formidable.

Therefore, there's a grand rule - the independence club rule that doesn't permit that... I've also heard rumors that it'll be allowed soon, although I don't seem to accept that fact.
I think we can all agree that it goes beyond the unimaginable.

As per my research, there are 36 clubs involved in the Champions League. So the chance for both Clubs (which is owned by a single owner) to head to head on the finals can still be slim, unless only if there is already a corruption that applies right from the start.

They can make a lot of money but I think other people who betted on the correct team can also make too. This is still not reason though to allow them but it's always better if the game is being played fairly because each bettors will also have a fair chance of winning, even though or especially they made a solid analysis.

Wouldn't be neglected or not restricted? But he already said that there is a rule against it. I'm with it despite of what I said earlier that the chance for both clubs that is owned by a single owner to head to head on the finals is only less since there are also lots of clubs that are participating, and we are also talking about champions league here, so the clubs that are involved are what we can say highly skilled for them to reach this far. Corruption is not a new thing and people are like used to them already, so there is no way that this signals the end of sports or sports betting.

To be fair I think fans wouldn’t care too much if two teams were from the same ownership in a sense that they would still be loyal to the one team they really represent and they wouldn’t magically care about the other team even if they are a “sister team”.

With this said, if one team gets disadvantaged in favor of the other, fans would immediately call it rigged even if it isn’t. The bias and reputation would be too much to argue otherwise. There is also a real possibility that the owner would try to sacrifice the other just to make the other team win. They might not do it but they can and that is what a lot of people, not just fans but also commentators, sport analysts, journalists and the general public, would think and imply.

Yeah, that would open the door to the  gambling corruption and the person who owns two clubs could make a boatload of money ^{(I have my personal distaste for such kind of people)} . Sure both team  wouldn't be neglected but , it would signal the end of sport. Therefore, I consider the rule to be correct and fair.

There is a very fine line between what the law says and what is actually sensible in these scenarios.
Today, we have several football clubs that belong to more than one person or company, that is, they have mixed participation in some teams, sometimes more than one.

So, how can we prohibit them from participating in a championship? It is difficult.

I believe that the ideal would be to define a maximum percentage of each company's participation in the championships, but even in this there are many controversies and decisions being more favorable or not in very similar scenarios. I believe that there is no ideal formula for what is correct and each case must be analyzed independently.


Exactly, this happened in the 2017/18 season and the decision was favorable because they understood that the Austrian club was only sponsored by RedBull, without there being any actual "ownership" of the team and therefore it did not violate the so-called "article 5" of the competition's integrity.

I believe that's one factor that officials are considering in this specific scenario. If they are sister clubs, the owner may have his preference as to which team should have the edge in the championships. We can't deny the fact that there will be bias in this situation.
If the league will allow such arrangement, for sure, the owner in question doesn't really have full ownership for the other club. He may have influence but he is not the major stakeholder of the club.

It's good that UEFA tries to remain fair and impartial but I think if rich people want to game the system they will find a way eventually. 

If UEFA wants to keep things fair they should make it so there's an extern review body for arbitration that has guaranteed funding and had representatives rotate or be elected from a blind large selection. Without an external body to review such matters any football organization can fall into corruption like many national leagues have reported collusion and corruption in the past.

Already to a large extent the champions league favors the richest teams. Funnily enough the nations league which has lower funding and lower stakes has matches that are more interesting to watch. It's not always about the money.

That's quite a naive thinking. How do you think football fans would look at the competition between two sworn rivals and a competition between two sister clubs? The intensity of the game would be different at the very least. Another thing is that there will always be rumors of a rigged game that would affect the league's reputation. They don't want any of that so it's better to avoid it from ever happening.

These rules are important to sustain the integrity of UEFA competition. Without these rules, rich club owners can even feature more than one club which will increase their chances of winning these UEFA-organised competitions. These club owners will definitely influence the outcome of the games that include clubs they own. I read that these football regulatory organisations want to relax these rules. I am comfortable with these rules but UEFA can still look into these rules because there have been a wise of businesses that are investing in different clubs. Denying a club that has worked so hard to get to the Champions League the opportunity to compete because of its ownership will be a great disservice to the players and coaching crew.         

The UEFA rules state the following:
Source

So only 1 team could participate

Take a look at the rules in the link above, what is most worrying in these cases are possible influences to manipulate results

Imagine a scenario where 2 teams are owned by the same owner. Team A and team B, now imagine that a result for team A can directly affect team B, whether it's with qualification, a place in the round of 16, or even a direct confrontation
What should you do in this situation and how can you guarantee that the team's owner won't influence the result to benefit both teams?

I'm a little confused. Does the ruling state that both teams financed by a single entity couldn't join the UEFA, or will the league allow one of them to join it only? Plus what could be the reason for this ruling in the first place? I don't think there's much effect that it could cause towards the game other than the fact that there would now be more stakes to claim in major football leagues especially since you have more than one team on your payroll.

I don't think the monopoly of team would be a massive problem too, for all I care this will mean that even players from not-so-respected teams could get the chance to payments as good as those in the upper echelon, get brand deals and sponsorships, and be able to finance their lifestyles necessary to fare well in the game. Teams that don't get bought out could sell their slots to more capable ones and give players a better viewing experience, similar to what they are doing in ESports titles like Valorant and League of Legends at the moment.

I don't think there's something wrong with allowing teams financed by a single source into the UEFA really, it doesn't tarnish the reputation of the league in the first place, it allows more people to enjoy the game and more players to show their prowess, and most of all, it's going to keep the game of football alive!

Theoretically, and if you follow the rules, the two teams could not play in the same edition
But I'll bet anyone that if the two teams qualify (they will certainly qualify), UEFA will allow it with some loophole or other stuff, perhaps even separating the teams and not allowing them to face each other until a possible final, but they will certainly allow the two teams

The most plausible loophole is to claim that it's not the same 100% owner of both teams, that someone else has a majority stake, etc
Or they could even do some political maneuvering within the teams to make it possible to play in the UCL

As far as I know, at this time the majority of shares owned by Girona have now been acquired by the City Football Group (CFG) which is indirectly like a family with Manchester City now because it is in the same shade but even so if in the end Girona does qualify for the Champions League I think they can still play there even though there is Manchester City because in the end things like this also often happen to Salzburg and Leipzig which are actually in the same shade too, namely Red Bull although there may be a slight difference but still they are under the same supervision so that for the problems of Manchester City and Girona this will not be much different. But this is just my opinion, it could be wrong but I think it will be allowed.

This is why I love football. It is because amidst the fact that humans cannot run away from errors that are as a result of interests, they still try as much as possible to look critically and legislate rules that will ensure that there is sanity in the game and a sense of fair play in the system as an entirety.

This rule on clubs owned by same entities not allowed to participate in champions league was a well-thought out idea and this is because although the both teams will be run by different management and may have different orientations as well as they may be very competitive to one another, that is not the only issue.  Another issue is that both teams can be easily bias when they are fixtured in the same pitch.

For instance, one club can decide to make it easier for the other club to win because the owner must have arranged the plan to the advantage of the latter club and reasons to that can be due to when one of the club is seen as more promising to the other,  that bias can come in immediately to favour one another.

Another instance is when they play same table, they can plan on ways to sabotage other clubs and even when that may seem incredibly difficult to do, they can still bring about that insecurity and fear in the minds of the other teams.

It's possible that if two clubs own by one person can participate because the clubs will not bear the same identity or relate to each other, one person can own a two company but it will be managed by different person and except that the own of the two companies inform you that the two companies belong to them they will not go, so what I'm telling you is that you have to know that management will determine the exposure of the two, and even in clubs if the moderators of teams noticed that a two clubs belong to person I don't think that they will have anything to do because the two is of business and they are paying the entitlement

It would be interesting to see if other teams also voice opinions on this.
It's a serious issue to have conflicts of interests in leagues but then again... While 44% might not be a majority stake, it is a very large stake nevertheless and a lot of influence could be coming by someone who owns that big of a stake in a team.

If there is a dispute regarding this it would be good to have further clarification on such rules.
Some might say that free market principles should allow owners to buy stakes at whatever tram they have, but imo leagues should also be able to apply rules such this one because some limitations make sense.

As stated by @tranthidung, it is the latest updates that rules saying such clubs cannot participate in European competitions has been relaxed and by 2023/2024 season any of such clubs would partake in the competitions, if they qualify because they have seen it that some investors have shares in two clubs, using football as their investment.

We will see to this by next season because I know that it is possible for two clubs own by the same company to qualify this season.

44% seems a very large amount to own, its not in theory 'the owner' but I could understand them excluding a club on that basis of a conflict of interest.   However I imagine the clubs will go ahead unimpeded because any adjustment required in ownership % could be done on request, it would only need a sale to a friendly partner of that large holder.  Because of that I would guess it wont be used as a reason to exclude the clubs from playing against each other without actual evidence of a genuine concern as to conflict of interest etc.

UEFA will not provide any official statement regarding this matter, not until Mancity and Girona are qualified for the UCL in the next season.
But Im sure both of the teams will be play in the UCL 2024/2025, Mancity and Girona will find a legal loophole to eligible for the event.
Also having 44% stake in Girona should be not classified as conflict of interest and Girona already had the UEFA license since last year.

According to news a few months ago, it was still not allowed but UEFA are considering to relax their restrictions on it a little bit.

• UEFA could relax restrictions on clubs with same owners in Champions League.
• Same news but on Reuters
  

UEFA has their document that says it is not allowed and I believe this idea is still in consideration, not enforced officially yet. They have cumbersome structures so I don't expect this idea will be pratically applied soon.

• Article 5 Integrity of the competition / multi-club ownership

The case of Manchester city and Girona or Chelsea FC and Strasbourg is a clear example of how football club owners have been expanding their portfolio to acquire major stakes in other clubs and if we look at City and Girona which are both part of City Football Group (CFG), we must understand that they must comply with Uefa's rules on multi-club ownership before they are being allowed to play together in any league in Europe.

No. It is good you brought this question because it will educate many of us. This rule against dependence of clubs was adopted around 1998 and towards 2001 it became active. It prevents clubs that are directly owned and financed from one source to participate in UEFA competition.

I think the major reason for such role is to avoid match fixing. Imagine where the one of the two clubs is yet to qualify and they are to play each other, so what will happen in such instance, of course match fixing.

I think both clubs will be able to participate in the UEFA champions league next season, based on some news from some reliable football analysts, the club only  need to connivence UEFA to grant permission, I can recall that the UEFA body have dealt with similar scenario in the past with Both RED BULL SALZBURG ( Austria) and RED BULL LEIPZIG (Germany) are owned by RED BULL Company and both clubs are allowed to participate in this season champions league. So I strongly believe if both club should qualify for the champions league next season UEFA will grant them permission to both participate in the next season champions league.

The owners of Girona are City Football Group and Girona Football Group, while City Football Group is one of the companies developing in the football industry and has the largest stake in this industry.
This company is owned and founded by Sheikh Mansour but City Football Group only has 44.3% shares or you could say only half because half of the shares are owned by Girona Football Group itself.
In contrast to Manchester City, it is clear that 100% of the shares are held by the City Football Group and this means that all control and ownership rights of Manchester City are under the hands of Sheikh Mansour.

Indeed, UEFA regulations do not allow two clubs that have the same owner to take part in European competitions such as the UCL, but because Girona is not completely owned by the City Football Group, there could be considerations made by UEFA.
It just that I don't really know what it will be like next season because these two teams are really quite strong this season and have big chance of getting UCL tickets.

From this thread I remembered case that occurred in the past where UEFA allowed Leipzig and Salzburg to compete in the UCL and there was debate over the same ownership, namely Red Bull, an energy drink company.

Please I need a confirmation on the information I recently received regarding two clubs owned by the same person not allowed to both participate in the UEFA Champions League which means that one club must have to participate and the other club not allowed to. Furthermore, I've heard that Girona FC and Manchester City are both owned by the same person. If this is the case, I'd like to know your thoughts on which club you would support in reference of the above information.