Read this in todays Times.
REVOLUTION IN FANS' FINANCING OF NEW PLAYERS
In England, the big-money summer signings were being welcomed by expectant fans, but the move completed by Panagiotis Kynigopolous to Sint-Truiden in the Belgian top flight could not have been more quiet.
Standing in the club’s luminous yellow kit on an empty training ground, Kynigopolous arrived without fanfare — or even a mention on the club’s website. But the 18-year-old winger’s transfer from AP Eginiakos, a Greek club, could become one of the most significant of the year.
Kynigopolous has become the first player to be financed by Kickrs, a Swiss start-up company that offers supporters a chance to invest their own money in young players.
The concept brings together gambling and scouting. Fans can watch and study players before deciding whether they are going to put hard-earned cash into their club’s coffers to help to make a transfer happen.
Daniel Hildebrand, one of the founders of Kickrs, has a background in corporate finance, and the similarities with the stock market are unavoidable.
Supporter ownership of clubs is becoming common — and successful — in Britain, where teams such as Portsmouth and Wycombe Wanderers have raised a challenge to the traditional model of private ownership.
But investing in players is altogether different, and the senior figures at Kickrs are aware that they are in uncharted and, thanks to Fifa’s ban on third-party ownership, murky waters.
The company allows fans to support their club financially to help them to sign a player, and they would receive their money back if that player reaches pre-agreed “milestones”, for example signing a professional contract, or being called up to the national under-19 team.
“The main goal is to support clubs and talents and give the fans a sexy kind of return,” Hildebrand says. “Every time a player reaches a certain milestone, the club has to pay back to the crowd.”
The player remains owned by the club — not the fans — so there is no money to be made if the player secures a lucrative transfer elsewhere.
This ensures that everything remains within Fifa’s strict third-party ownership regulations, but raises concerns that clubs will be able to fleece their fans for cash and, if that player turns out to be successful, give very little back.
“We are the opposite of one big spender injecting money into a club,” Hildebrand says. “We try to involve fans, let them look behind the curtain and present them with interesting entertainment formats.”
Kynigopolous, who has impressed for Greece Under-19, is the first of three players that Kickrs, which has a network of about 30 scouts across 27 countries, has agreed to finance at Sint-Truiden.
Ben Shave, a development manager for Supporters Direct, Europe’s leading football supporter organisation, said that individual player investment will have a huge appeal to the average fan, but warned that such short-term contributions will do little to secure a sustainable future for clubs.
“Potentially the risk for this, and one of the things we try and work against, is the idea of supporters being tapped up for cash by owners or clubs that maybe are not run in the most sustainable way,” he says.
Kickrs has not ruled out investment in academies and training pitches, but it is the glamour of players, and the opportunity for fans to play a part in bringing the next big star to their club that underpins the process.
“We see ourselves as the facilitators to help these talents take their chances in interesting leagues,” Hildebrand says. “A lot of younger players are forced to stay in their home league. This is where we jump in. We help the clubs, we help the player and we help the fans.”
Just how much this helps the fans remain to be seen. For some, it will be seen as a bright new dawn. For others, it could prove nothing more than an expensive gamble, for which they see very little return as their team reap the rewards of being handed a gift-wrapped superstar in the making.
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