In the second attempt, German professional football cleared the way for an investor to get involved. At the meeting of the 36 first and second division teams on Monday in Frankfurt am Main, the necessary two-thirds majority for negotiations between the German Football League (DFL) and potential donors was just achieved.
Participants confirmed this after the meeting. First the “Sportschau” and the Kicker reported unanimously about it. There should be four to six interested investors from the so-called private equity sector. These are equity investment companies that specialize in forms of investment. In May the efforts had failed. The majority on Monday could not have been narrower: 24 yes votes, ten no votes, two abstentions. The election was held by secret ballot.
The new plan calls for selling six to nine percent of the shares in a DFL subsidiary, to which all media rights will be outsourced, for 20 years. There should be between 800 million and one billion euros for this. Before the vote, DFL managing directors Marc Lenz and Steffen Merkel once again pointed out that the future partner should only be granted limited say in the economic area. “If a potential partner does not accept the red lines, he is not the right one for us,” emphasized Lenz.
The fan alliance “Our Curve” described the decision to become an investor in German professional football as a “setback” and expressed criticism. “The DFL’s cheap words during the Corona break have finally vanished into thin air. Money comes above everything,” the organization said in a statement. “The uniqueness of German football is being thrown overboard in a hopeless rat race with the Premier League.” The nationwide alliance had already warned against such a step before the DFL general meeting’s decision and now found that the decision “exacerbates the unequal opportunities in the German leagues in favor of an increasingly artificial product of the international TikTok world.”
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