By Kris Gonzo | Senior West Ham Columnist (Follow on X)
West Ham’s shareholders wanted Amanda Staveley to look elsewhere after blocking her route into the club. Now she might actually do it.
Hammers News reports that Everton are among the alternative football projects being seriously considered by Staveley and PCP Capital Partners.
There is no suggestion of an offer, negotiation or agreement at this stage. However, Everton’s owners, the Friedkin Group, are reportedly exploring the possibility of attracting significant new investment.
For many West Ham supporters, the prospect of losing Staveley to another English club might feel like a major missed opportunity. I suspect the current Hammers hierarchy would consider it a successful outcome.
Kretinsky successfully blocked Vanessa Gold’s attempts to sell her shareholding to Staveley
West Ham blocked Staveley’s route in
Let us not forget how we arrived here.
West Ham’s existing shareholders exercised their pre-emption rights over Vanessa Gold’s shareholding before redistributing the shares among themselves. As Claret & Hugh revealed, the arrangement left Daniel Křetínský with approximately 46%, David Sullivan on around 40% and Tripp Smith holding 11%.
The outcome was quite clear: Staveley’s immediate route into the football club was blocked.
I don’t believe Sullivan or Křetínský assumed she would wait patiently for another opportunity at West Ham. I think the hope was that she would become bored and scarper.
If she eventually chooses Everton, those responsible for shutting her out will presumably congratulate themselves on a job well done.
Everton offer a very different project
In purely footballing terms, Everton make sense for Staveley.
She has previously spoken about enjoying projects where a football club is underperforming and can be improved. Everton are a Premier League team with a magnificent new stadium, yet they made a complete hash of the most recent transfer window and left themselves with only one available striker.
That presents an obvious football operation requiring better recruitment, leadership and strategic planning. Staveley has already demonstrated at Newcastle United that she can help transform the mood and direction of a club.
However, Everton are completely different to West Ham in one particularly important respect.
Staveley previously spoke about undertaking a “big property play” alongside her next football investment. Her proposed West Ham project was believed to include an interest in the London Stadium and the huge redevelopment possibilities presented by the surrounding land.
We previously reported on Staveley’s potential London Stadium plans, which could have included residential, business and retail development alongside improvements to the football venue.
Everton’s Hill Dickinson Stadium has already been built. There is also little room around it for significant expansion, removing much of the property opportunity believed to have attracted Staveley’s financial backers to east London.
That contradiction is possibly the most intriguing aspect of this story.
Staveley wanted to match Daniel Kretisnky’s big plans to revamp the London Stadium
The ideal West Ham partnership is disappearing
My preferred outcome remains exactly the same: Staveley and Křetínský working together, hand in hand, with David Sullivan no longer involved at West Ham.
Staveley would bring football expertise, energy and a hands-on approach. Křetínský could provide financial strength and stability. On paper, their respective qualities could complement one another extremely well.
Instead, Sullivan has increased his shareholding to around 40%, while Křetínský remains below the threshold for outright control. It is difficult to view that outcome as significant progress.
Staveley has made it clear that her ambitions for West Ham remain, but she will not wait forever.
Everton may not offer the same property opportunity, but they can offer Premier League football, their own new stadium and a club requiring investment and improvement.
West Ham’s shareholders wanted Staveley to look elsewhere.
In 2016 Sullivan said “I want to reiterate that we, the current owners, have no desire to sell the club unless it is to somebody like the King of Saudi Arabia who can take it to a level we cannot ourselves hope to reach.”
He said that well that’s the kind of people Amanda Stavely deals with but now Sullivan doesn’t want to sell? Yet once he was looking for investment into the club and allowed a Czech geezer to take over the club.
are you going to stop fawning over her then? we still don’t have a scooby who she’s fronting for or what their plans are.
do you get a cut if she comes in or something?
The Moral of this story is that you can’t own 46% of something, and then vow publicly to never want to own the majority of it and then expect or want nobody else to want to buy the rest of it, just so that you can run it. Eventually at some point your supporting shareholders will want to cash in their chips due to age or need leaving the whole thing up for grabs.
Or maybe, just maybe the old codgers sticking around are there long enough to see through what Kretinsky is after, a property grab ! Yes that’s right, he , just like Stavely isn’t there for football reasons, he’ll make money through the land available due to the stadium proximity. Dare I say the same can be said for Tripp Smith. The Sullivans hang around miss for the same reason. Staveley is no different but at least she appears as though she would want a majority share holding.
Kretinsky defintely wants the whole club, but just not at the expense of filling Sullivans pockets in the meantime. The minute Kretinsky goes over 50% he is forced to make an extremely over priced offer for the rest of the clubs shares including Sullivans. If Krretinsky and his business partner Jakub Havrlant can get 51% between them without going over 50% himslef then why wouldnt he. Playing the long game and being invested in the club (like he is in Prague) is exactly the kind of stability that West Ham need right now.
Theres bags of land development at Hill Dickinson with the surrounding docks. Huge potential.
My ideal outcome is the same as yours Gonzo
Think she would bring drive to our club and if Nuno moves on she could bring Howe.
Good, lets hope she does finally move on to other pastures so we dont have to continue reading these pandering articles you’re producing. It’s fair enough you wanted her to be involved with the club, but you just dont know when to call it quits. Enough is enough mate, you are now using your platform to almost advertise for her, whilst also trying to convince others that she is some kind of saviour or something. SHE is NOT!
The timing of her offer and the way it was done was specifically designed to cause as much disruption as possible for Kretinsky and West Ham in the hope that it would help her get a foot in the door. It threw our transfer window into chaos when Gold accepted the Staveley offer and pulled the plug on the Kretinsky deal. It also meant the £90 million would not be invested to cover most of our losses, as he wouldnt have been the largest shareholder as planned. And with that Staveley hoped she could rush in with all this money to save the day and our transfer window, or so she thought – but it didnt quite turn out like that now did it?
Because of Gold accepting her offer it meant debts then had to be covered by player sales, along with trying to generate a small transfer budget. If Staveley had any love or thought for West Ham she could have delayed her offer and kept it between herself and Gold until after the transfer window, but then again she might have lost her opportunity as well.
If you cant see any of that then you have been blinded by the Staveley PR. However the board blocking her was the best thing that could have happened!
Very well said. We are in much better hands with DK who after all is a multi billionaire. Everyone was on board with this and the fanbase United until she came along.
Absolutely fantastic news. The scousers deserve iher and we we will be free!
Amanda stavely is a leach. Don’t want her near our club. She has fallen out with all her partners. Doesn’t have any money of her own. Will saddle west ham with debt and destroy us
She and her investment consortium won’t walk away lightly. West Ham represents enormous return with the developments possible on the land surrounding the stadium. London also has a far greater draw for property and development than almost anywhere in Europe. Everton would have to rely on breaking the top six regularly to gain a return. That’s probably harder than a property development with the spending constraints put on clubs.
Think bout time we moved on stop writing about her ! Who’s wanna be owned by a consortium anyway she just want line her pockets