Tottenham Hotspur's owners have stood firm in their stance that the north London club is not on the market, despite rumours of a record £4.5 billion takeover bid from a US consortium. Recent reports emerged that tech entrepreneur Brooklyn Earick is leading a consortium that has expressed interest in purchasing the club, just weeks after Spurs' owners ENIC dismissed two informal approaches to buy their majority stake in the Premier League team.
Earick, who earlier this year failed in his attempt to buy Formula E team Maserati, is said to be spearheading a £3.3 billion takeover bid from a group of 12, including NFL and NBA investors, with an additional £1.2 billion earmarked as transfer funds for head coach Thomas Frank. This total package would surpass Todd Boehly's £4.25 billion acquisition of Chelsea in 2022.
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However, insiders close to the Lewis family, who operate Tavistock, the company behind ENIC, told football.london that their position remains unchanged and Tottenham is still not up for sale. The family are also understood to have received no bid or expression of interest from Earick's consortium at this stage.
ENIC holds 87 per cent of the Lilywhites, but due to the remaining shares being publicly traded, the club is subject to the UK takeover code. This stipulates that any expression of interest or bid must be lodged with the takeover code panel and made public, which has not been the case thus far.
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Whether ENIC would reconsider their position if an actual bid were to be made, particularly one exceeding the club's valuation, remains uncertain.
The Lewis family are key players in a period of significant transformation at Spurs. Daniel Levy, a long-standing chairman, stepped down after 24 years following an internal review instigated by the family.
Vivienne and Charles Lewis, siblings, have been present in the directors' box for recent home matches against Villarreal and Doncaster Rovers in the Champions League and Carabao Cup respectively. Vivienne also joined the club on their summer tour to Asia.
Earlier this month, an Asian consortium of investors led by Dr Roger Kennedy and Wing-Fai Ng via Firehawk Holdings Limited informally indicated their intention to bid for Spurs on the day Levy left his post. Amanda Staveley and PCP International Finance Ltd are also thought to have shown sufficient interest, without formally indicating a forthcoming bid, triggering takeover panel rules on disclosure.
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PCP later clarified that they would not be making an offer. In a statement prompted by the takeover interest, Spurs confirmed that ENIC had "received and unequivocally rejected separate preliminary expressions of interest" to acquire their entire stake in the club.
They declared at the time: "The board of the club and ENIC confirm that Tottenham Hotspur is not for sale and ENIC has no intention to accept any such offer to acquire its interest in the club."
Spurs CEO Vinai Venkatesham emphasised this month: "There's been a lot of newspaper articles and a lot of media speculation around a takeover, so I can be really clear on this. So the Lewis family are really clear. They see their involvement in Tottenham Hotspur being long-term and they see their involvement continuing through the generations.
"We made a statement very late last night and a statement I hope was unambiguously clear that Tottenham Hotspur is not for sale."
The report regarding Earick's bid also references a £250million stadium naming rights agreement having been secured by the consortium, though that sum would represent the lower end of such arrangements unless it covers only a relatively brief period.
The Staples Center in Los Angeles, home to NBA sides the Lakers and Clippers amongst other sporting franchises, was rebranded as the Crypto.com Arena in 2021 under a £565million 20-year naming rights agreement.
Similarly in LA, the SoFi Stadium, which houses the Rams and Chargers NFL franchises, opened in 2020 with naming rights valued at £504million across 20 years.
Given the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium's worldwide recognition for football and NFL alongside other sporting occasions and concerts, anticipation had always been that any naming rights agreement would mirror its standing as amongst the globe's premier venues.