Saint-Etienne’s midfielder Mickael Nade (in midair) heads the ball and scores against Angers’ French goalkeeper Paul Bernardoni at the French L1 football match between AS Saint-Etienne and SCO Angers at the Stade Geoffroy Guichard.
PHILIPPE DESMAZES/AAFP via Getty Images
You can make truckloads of money owning a soccer team if you can figure out how to turn an ugly duckling into a swan on a shoestring budget.
Back in 2011, Angers SCO was toiling in Ligue 2, the second division of French soccer, and was losing nearly $1 million while generating just $11 million in revenue. In stepped Said Chabane, who reportedly snapped up the Angers squad for just $1.8 million.
By nimbly managing the team’s budget (the player costs were $8 million) and deftly buying and selling players, Chabane was able to move Angers into Ligue 1 in 2015. That’s where they’ve remained, becoming one of France’s more entertaining soccer teams.
The team posted a profit of $3.5 million on revenue of $34 million during the pre-pandemic 2018-19 season, mainly because the club pulled in $22.7 million in broadcasting revenue in the top French league versus revenue of just $5.4 million when it was in the second division.
Angers, hit hard by the lack of ticket revenue during the pandemic, lost $20 million in 2020-21, the last season for which results have been reported. But fret not for Chabane. Sources tell Forbes he’s very close to selling the team for $84 million—49 times what he paid. The buyer? One source said he heard it was Germania Financial Services, but that couldn’t be substantiated through other contacts.
Both Angers SCO and GFS didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2022/06/23/said-chabane-to-reap-huge-profit-on-84-million-sale-of-angers-sco/