The San Francisco 49ers view their investment in Leeds United as a “bargain”, according to a football finance expert.
The NFL side upped their stake in Leeds last month from 15% to 37%, with 49ers Enterprises president Paraag Marathe becoming vice chairman of the club as part of the deal.
The initial investment began shortly before Marcelo Bielsa's arrival as manager of the club in 2018 and has been increased following their excellent start to their first Premier League season in 16 years.
Leeds owner Andrea Radrizanni said the increased funding would help the club in “reaching our potential commercially and developing Elland Road and our training facilities.”
Football finance expert Kieran Maguire, of the University of Liverpool, believes the deal makes sense for both sides.
“I do think it’s great news for Leeds, although it’s a strange number, 37%, very weird, a bit arbitrary,” he told Football Insider.
“But the US owners believe that the European football market is hugely undervalued. If you compare it to the situation in the MLS, if you want to set up a new MLS franchise, it’s going to cost you $300m. So the Premier League looks relatively cheap.
“From the San Francisco 49ers point of view, they value Leeds at somewhere between £250m and £260m in total. They think that the club has the ability to be worth substantially more than that, so they feel that they’re getting a bargain.
“They can use their expertise in terms of the commercial aspects of the club to increase Leeds’ revenues.”
Having achieved promotion to the top-flight and stabilized under Bielsa’s management, Radrizanni is now targeting European football by 2024.
“Now that we have achieved promotion and made a positive start to the new campaign, there is no better time to be looking ahead to the future, as we aim to take this football club to the next level, initially by becoming an established Premier League side before chasing our dreams of taking Leeds United back into Europe,” he said in a statement.
With Marathe now involved in the day-to-day running of the club, Leeds are likely to look towards developing Elland Road.
During his time with the 49ers, Marathe has helped oversee the building of the 68,500-seater Levi Stadium in Silicon Valley.
