It is deeply ironic that a successful, influential, independent woman has been the figurehead of the impending Newcastle United takeover.
Successful, influential, independent women are thin on the ground in Saudi Arabia.
Thin on the ground, or in prison.
Princess Basmah is a senior royal, cousin of Saudi ruler Mohammed Bin Salman – the man who is chairman of the investment fund that will own 80 per cent of Newcastle United.
She is also a human rights advocate. Therefore, she is behind bars in a maximum security prison.
In a tweet sent as a lot of Newcastle fans were welcoming the Saudi Crown Prince’s takeover, she said her ‘health is deteriorating to an extent that is severe and could lead to . . . death’.
She is being held without charges.
Princess Basmah’s plight is far from unusual in Saudi Arabia but is just the latest to come to light.
The timing is grotesquely perfect.
In the extremely unlikely event Newcastle supporters needed, or wanted, reminding of Saudi state brutality and human rights abuses, here it is.
Again, with grim timing, figures published by one British-based human rights organisation claimed there had been 800 executions in Saudi Arabia since the current rulers took over.
Bin Salman is the deputy prime minister, but his dad, who is the King and prime minister, has effectively given him control.
Again, Bin Salman is the chairman of the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund which is buying Newcastle.
Such is the widespread dislike of Mike Ashley among fans, any new owner with the resources to seriously invest in the club and to
seriously compete with the elite would be welcome.
Even if you are the most powerful man in a kingdom that beheaded 37 people in a single day last year. Thursday is the anniversary of that mass execution, by the way. Perhaps the fit and proper persons test can take place then.
And you can get it. Get why Newcastle fans will be happy with the prospect of wealthy Middle
Eastern ownership and ecstatic at the departure of Ashley.
And you can get it when they point to the involvement of other countries in football that might not have the cleanest human rights record.
And you can get it when they highlight how this country sells arms to Saudi and our governments enjoy a relationship. And you can get it when they produce snaps of Gianni Infantino schmoozing Bin Salman or when they highlight Saudi commercial interests in other clubs here.
You can get all the whataboutery. But it still does not feel right. Amanda Staveley – that successful, influential, independent woman – will have a 10 per cent stake, but the club will belong to a sovereign wealth fund of a country which, according to Human Rights Watch, ‘silences’, ‘imprisons’ or ‘exiles’ independent women.
“There was a time when women of a powerful background could say things about women’s rights,” says Rothna Begum, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. “But under the crown prince, that space has gone.”
Still, at last one powerful woman has helped his investment fund get a Premier League club.
Newcastle United fans, like so many fans up and down the country, are loyal and long-suffering. They deserve a better owner than the one they have had over the past 13 years.
And, albeit in a different way, even if success lies ahead they deserve a better owner than the one they are about to get.
It is hard to know which is the more risible — that Mauricio Pochettino is still getting his £8.5million Tottenham salary or that Daniel Levy has, apparently, asked him to take a pay cut.
You could not make it up.
With every Jose Mourinho misstep and moan, the sacking of Pochettino is looking more and more ill-judged.
But when it was done, why didn’t Spurs just pay him off?
Surely some agreement could have been reached.
Instead, it seems, Pochettino will be on the books until he decides to take a new job.
And after fan reaction forced Levy to reverse his furloughing plans, the chairman is looking to make all the cuts he can.
That is why he has reportedly requested a reduction or, at least, a deferral in his ex-manager’s pay.
As there appears to have been no concessions yet made by Mourinho, perhaps we do not have to guess what Pochettino’s answer will be.
Had the sad job of writing Norman Hunter’s obituary on Friday, paying tribute to a fine gentleman who became a friend of the media during his long spell as a radio co-commentator and pundit.
Speaking to those who were more familiar with his playing career than myself, it was clear Hunter could dish out the tough stuff, as has been well documented.
What was also clear is that play-acting, feigning injury, diving, time-wasting were never in his locker. He might well have crossed the line a good few times — but at least he crossed it honestly.
Jamie Carragher was clearly irritated that a comment from Graeme Souness in a light-hearted exchange between the two has been reported as evidence of a continuing agenda or vendetta against Paul Pogba.
Souness had referred to putting medals on a table and that he had a ‘big table’. Considering Pogba has more medals — including a World Cup winners’ one — than Souness had at the same stage of his career, this particular barb missed its target. But Carragher still considered it unnecessarily sensationalised. Maybe.
But not long after Pogba had returned to Old Trafford, Souness said United ‘had their trousers taken down’ by the deal. Since, Souness has claimed Pogba has failed to learn ‘basic stuff’, does not track back well enough and that he would ‘be an absolute doddle to play against’.
It might not be a vendetta but it is certainly some sort of agenda.
It is unlikely there is a single professional football club not doing its bit, in one way or the other, for the community during this coronavirus crisis. That is why it will always be unfair to single anyone out.
But Chelsea have been a beacon of social responsibility from the moment Roman Abramovich made the club’s hotel available free of charge to National Health Service staff. Now, they are providing 78,000 free meals for NHS workers and associated charities. And as fellow hacks who regularly cover matches at Stamford Bridge will tell you, those people are in for a well-deserved treat.
