Newcastle’s Saudi Arabia takeover could be re-examined by MPs in wake of WhatsApp leaks

Newcastle United’s Saudi Arabia takeover could be re-examined by MPs over The Telegraph’s WhatsApp cache suggesting both the kingdom’s Crown Prince and UK ministers were involved.

Boris Johnson and Richard Masters, the Premier League’s chief executive, denied Government interference prior to the £305 million deal being approved in October 2021.

However, leaked messages from Amanda Staveley, who brokered the sale, now suggest top-level state interventions from both Saudi Arabia and the UK behind the scenes.

WhatsApps sent by Staveley suggest that Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto Saudi ruler, was signing off key decisions within the takeover, while Lord Grimstone, then minister for investment in the UK, “pushed behind the scenes” for the deal to be approved.

Ms Staveley also detailed enlisting the help of the Saudi ambassador to the UK to rescue the deal in April 2021. That same month Mr Johnson, then Prime Minister, said his government “was not involved at any point in the takeover talks on the sale of Newcastle” in a written parliamentary answer.

‘Unlikely’ Johnson was ‘telling the truth’

The sale eventually went through after the Premier League was given “legally binding assurances” that the Saudi state would not be in control of Newcastle.

However, MPs, who had repeatedly raised concerns at the time, reacted with concern to revelations in The Telegraph which shed fresh light on negotiations.

Newcastle Central MP, Chi Onwurah, said it now seems “unlikely” that  Mr Johnson was “telling the truth” when he stated in a parliamentary answer to her in April 2021: “The Government was not involved at any point in the takeover talks on the sale of Newcastle.”

Onwurah said on Monday: “From the Covid pandemic to the European Super League debacle, events have demonstrated  the former Conservative Prime Minister’s opportunistic relationship with both the truth and the beautiful game. It seems unlikely he was telling the truth.”

The £305 million purchase in 2021 had taken a bruising 18 months to ratify, with human rights activists calling for the takeover to be turned down. Mr Masters, the head of English football’s top tier, was scrutinised by the the Culture, Media and Sport Committee on the deal at least twice. He denied being put under pressure by the Government to look favourably on the deal. “You are suggesting we were put under pressure to go one way or another,” he told the committee. “That has not happened.”

‘Football should not be allowing sports-washing of this kind’

In light of Ms Staveley’s leaked messages, Dame Caroline Dinenage, who now chairs the parliamentary committee, has indicated MPs could look again at the deal. The new committee will be constituted on October 29 and “it may come up then”, she said.

Clive Efford, a Labour MP who was part of the committee which scrutinised the deal, added: “It was always clear to anyone interested in the truth that Newcastle were being bought with sovereign money and that the Saudi government were the real owners of Newcastle. The fact that the then Government were keen for the takeover to go ahead knowing their constant human rights violations... is a disgrace. Football should not be allowing sports-washing of this kind.”

In the messages first published on Sunday, Ms Staveley said she was in direct contact with Lord Grimstone and told the sellers of the club that the minister “pushed behind the scenes and made it very clear that their preference is for the deal to go ahead”.

At one point, Ms Staveley also warns the sellers that “the Crown Prince is losing patience”, and when the deal hit trouble, she said the governor of PIF was “trying to… convince the Crown Prince not to pull out”.

Rival Premier League clubs declined to comment on the furore on Monday. One senior figure said only that messages “rubber stamp why the takeover should never have been approved”. The main point of contention for rivals was a Competition chair Gary Hoffman served only 18 months in the job after an unofficial vote of confidence amid complaints he should have consulted clubs more.

‘Legally binding assurances that Saudi Arabia will not control Newcastle’

Via lawyers, Ms Staveley said she only ever referenced the Crown Prince in his capacity as chairman of PIF. To suggest that her messages cast doubt on whether the assurances about independence from the Saudi state have been adhered to subsequently “is as illogical as it is misconceived,” she added.

Foreign states are not banned from owning Premier League clubs under its own rules, but the Saudi state was accused of illegally pirating the league’s games on a state-run channel, which presented a barrier to ownership.

The Premier League eventually removed its objections after being convinced that PIF would be acting independently of the Saudi state in the running of Newcastle.

While the Crown Prince is chairman of PIF, the Premier League said at the time it had “received legally binding assurances that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will not control Newcastle United Football Club”.

Ms Staveley said at the time of the takeover that PIF was “an autonomous commercially driven investment fund”.

The Premier League is understood to have stood by its position that it was never influenced by Government in approving the deal. The league declined to comment on whether the ownership structure at the club is under investigation.

A spokesman for PIF said: “In October 2021, following a lengthy investigation, the Premier League announced that the sale of Newcastle United Football Club had completed following the receipt of assurances that the government of Saudi Arabia would not control the club.

“The facts and circumstances that underpin those assurances, as confirmed at the time to the Premier League, remain unchanged.”

Lord Grimstone told The Telegraph that he kept abreast of large potential investments into the UK in his former role as investment minister, particularly those such as Newcastle United, which was in the public domain and “attracting a great deal of public interest”.

He added: “I made it very clear to Mr Hoffman that my only role was to facilitate the passing of ideas between the PIF and Premier League and that in no way did I seek to prejudice the Premier League’s complete autonomy in this matter.”