Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis has a very intriguing relationship with John Textor.
In the past transfer windows, several deals have been done between Textor and Marinakis to help each of their clubs balance out financial fair play regulations.
Now, it’s been claimed that UEFA might have a look into the dealings, with Textor admitting that the prices of players were over-inflated between him and Marinakis.
But, have Forest actually done anything wrong? Nottingham Forest News investigated with a football finance expert, giving us the lowdown on the situation.
Evangelos Marinakis could come under UEFA spotlight
Clearly, this revelation from Textor has led to Marinakis likely to be under the spotlight in the coming months – but it would appear that right now, there hasn’t been an offence committed.
Football finance expert, Adam Williams, told Nottingham Forest News: “Everyone has known that Textor and Marinakis have had a pretty cosy relationship for some time, but I dread to think how Marinakis will have reacted when he read Textor’s comments about ‘adjusting’ transfer values. It’s publicity he could have done without.
Textor has since come out and claimed that he has been misinterpreted and that this was less of an accountancy sleight of hand and more a case of factoring the wider context of a deal within negotiations.
“In the same way that they look at commercial deals to ensure that they haven’t been artificially inflated, the Premier League also assesses transfers for fair market value. The aim here is to stop informal relationships between owners being used as a get-out-of-jail-free card for PSR purpose. The Premier League say that none of the Textor-Marinakis deals have been flagged by the Fair Market Value assessors, but I think Textor giving oxygen to the debate here was ill-advised regardless.
“UEFA are also pretty strict with adjusting transfer valuations down when players are traded within multi-club organisations. If they suspect that there is something untoward going on here, I think they would be able to investigate and potentially do the same with deals between Botafogo, Palace, Olympiacos, Nottingham Forest etc.
“Taking a step back, however, I personally don’t think there is anything necessarily – and necessarily is the operative word here – nefarious about two owners operating this way.
“Make no mistake, both Textor and Marinakis are looking out for their own interests. It just so happens that they have developed a relationship that is mutually advantageous. But I think the net result of the relationship is going to be more or less even. If Textor gave Marinakis a discount on Player A, he would get the value back on Player B. Sometimes that’s just how markets work.
“Ultimately, ‘value’ is subjective, and I think it’s reasonable that part of the calculation that Textor and Marinakis have made in negotiations is the wider context of the deal and the relationships between their two multi-club networks. The optics aren’t great, true, but I think the real story here should be that the regulations allow – and, in some scenarios, necessitate – clubs to do this.”
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Marinakis will go big in the transfer market in January
With injuries stacking up at the City Ground, it does feel as though Marinakis will once again make an assault on the transfer market next month.
It’s hard to imagine what Forest will have to spend, but with some players not getting much game time, Sean Dyche might look to get some players offloaded too.
Marinakis can never be criticised for the finances he’s ploughed into Forest, and the hope for him will be that the Reds become a team that regularly competes in European competition.
Textor is still in place at Botafogo and there are talks that he’s keen to invest in another English club in the near future, with him spotted watching Derby in recent weeks.
As a result, it looks as though the back scratching will remain a mutual thing between Textor and Marinakis going forward.
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