29/07/2025 36comments  |  Jump to last

Everton have sold their women’s team to a parent company in order to generate profit of tens of millions of pounds that can be used in the transfer market while remaining compliant with PSR. Clubs like Chelsea and Aston Villa also executed similar moves recently.

The assets of Everton Football Club Women Ltd have been transferred to a company called Roundhouse Capital Holdings, which is actually overseen by Everton’s American owner, Dan Friedkin.

This is the same company that The Friedkin Group used to buy Everton during the takeover last December.

According to a report in The Times, the profit from the sale could be £60million, which can be used to sign players that the men’s team desperately needs. So far, the Blues have only managed to sign two players - Thierno Barry and Mark Travers - and manager David Moyes is expecting at least “five to six more players” before the transfer window closes.

Sources from the club also say that the women’s team, who are set to play at the iconic Goodison Park this season, is a standalone entity capable of attracting its own investment. The on-paper profit will help the club achieve PSR compliance after they saw six points deducted for a PSR breach in he 2021-22 season and two points for a breach in 2022-23.

The Toffees are the third Premier League team to utilise a law that allows the club to sell assets like the women’s team to related companies and register the transaction as profit for PSR calculations.

Chelsea and Aston Villa have executed similar moves recently, but they were found to have been guilty of breaching UEFA’s financial rules, as the European body does not permit such practices.

 

Reader Comments (36)

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Rob Halligan
1 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:08:55
Martyn Ziegler of The Times is saying that we have sold our women’s team to a sister company which will raise millions. The story is behind a paywall so I can’t see the full story.

Ian Bennett
2 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:12:55
Rob, it is correct. If you go on the Companies House website for the women's team, there's a change of significant control from Everton to a TFG associate.
Danny O'Neill
3 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:13:55
Rob, previous figures reported suggested it could raise £60M.

Don't ask me how that works. Beyond my level of financial understanding.

Ian Bennett
4 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:20:40
They sell an asset for arms length market value with a book cost of zero. All of that is profit for Everton Football Club.

Id imagine that the team with Goodison & post euros could be worth more than £60M. I don't think you could put together a Premier women's club plus stadium for less than £60M.

Dennis Stevens
5 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:48:29
Assuming that the deal includes Goodison Park, Ian.

That might be a further transaction, yet to be announced.

Colin Glassar
6 Posted 28/07/2025 at 21:56:34
Can we buy a decent right-back with this money?

Or will it go into the Arteta Investment Fund?

Ian Bennett
7 Posted 28/07/2025 at 22:02:35
Goodison Park Stadium Ltd has also changed significant control notification to the same new owner at Companies House. Everton Football Club no longer own the company. All happened 27 June, so in prior year numbers.

The notification to Companies House only occurring a month later.

No PSR issues last season, nor this I'd guess. Then it will be squad ratios.

I've looked, and no notification has been made for the Bramley-Moore Dock Stadium. That remains a subsidiary of Everton Football Club.

Mark Boullé
8 Posted 28/07/2025 at 22:15:43
Villa did it, Chelsea did it, everyone's doing it to get round the ludicrous, lumpen farce that is PSR.

We need to be as unscrupulous as the rest of them, sad but true. Now get on with spending that money to improve the squad before the Premier League make Everton a test case for challenging selling your own assets to yourself!

Neil Copeland
9 Posted 28/07/2025 at 22:22:13
Colin, they will need a bigger sofa!
Mike Gaynes
10 Posted 28/07/2025 at 23:13:32
My question is whether these funds will be ring-fenced?
Jamie Sweet
11 Posted 29/07/2025 at 00:30:41
Sounds like we're starting to play the game.

Perhaps we'll start handing out 8-year contracts à la Chelsea next.

Eric Myles
12 Posted 29/07/2025 at 00:33:03
That's been blocked by Masters, Jamie.

5-year max for amortisation now.

Bill Watson
13 Posted 29/07/2025 at 05:51:59
Now we need to sell Goodison Park, the fan zone, the car park and the club shop on the corner of Gwladys Street to ourselves!

I wonder how much those portacabin ticket offices in Bullens Road are worth?

Eric Myles
14 Posted 29/07/2025 at 06:32:30
Bill, I read that Goodison was transferred to the same company as the women's team at the same time.

Dunno if part of the women's team deal or separate.

Martin Faulkner
15 Posted 29/07/2025 at 08:01:02
Clickbait sites saying we've sold the women's team to Roundhouse Capital.

Jack Convery
16 Posted 29/07/2025 at 08:12:53
Look for a sponsor for the Toffee Lady.

I'm sure Everton Mints would do it.

Ian Wilkins
17 Posted 29/07/2025 at 10:30:40
Our £60M and Aston Villa's £55M make Chelsea's £200M valuation look a bit steep…. Not to worry I'm sure they'll be fine.

Best to do this now before Masters manages to push through a stop on this sort of asset sale or transfer.
Stu Gre
18 Posted 29/07/2025 at 10:44:10
To be fair, Chelsea WFC have won the league 6 seasons in a row.
Si Pulford
19 Posted 29/07/2025 at 10:55:40
Not sure that matters, Ste. The money in the women's game still makes £200M a farce. Even if they won it for the next six.

That said, £60M is clearly too much so we can't complain really.

In 15 or 20 years, who knows where the women's game will be? But clubs selling their women's teams to themselves at these prices is clearly a workaround and nothing more. I hate this stuff. But don't blame the player, blame the game, I suppose.

As soon as we got American owners, for better or worse, we were always going to be run as a business – unlike the previous lot.

Danny O'Neill
20 Posted 29/07/2025 at 10:57:35
It's a good point, Stu.

In a different way, it's like comparing real estate.

If Everton had sold Goodison Park, how much would they have received in comparison to what Chelsea could command for Stamford Bridge?

Postcode driven.

I don't think Chelsea's plans are to sell Stamford Bridge. It looks like they will bulldoze and rebuild on the same site. The only debate I'm hearing in these parts are whether they will play at Wembley or Twickenham during the rebuild when it happens.

But back to your point, Chelsea could price their women's team at a higher value because of recent success and location.

Robert Tressell
21 Posted 29/07/2025 at 11:17:19
We're about 35 years too late in running the club as a business. Thank goodness we're doing it now.

Unfortunately, if you want nice traditional football you need to drop down to the 3rd or 4th tier or non-league.

Everything is about money, TV revenue etc now.

Danny O'Neill
22 Posted 29/07/2025 at 11:35:22
Robert, I've literally just read that in addition to generating £60M that can be spent on the men's team, part of the thinking behind selling the women's team, whilst the loophole still exists, is to promote Everton in the US, where women's "soccer" has been huge for decades.

The main revenues are TV and sponsorship deals, but it's clear that TFG want to make in-roads into the US market.

As you allude to, it's going to be a very different Everton. As a traditionalist and lifelong Evertonian from birth, like many, I sincerely hope we don't abandon everything we hold dear (I won't), but the change we wanted and called for is happening only 7 months in.

Now to get it right where it matters. On the pitch.

Robert Tressell
23 Posted 29/07/2025 at 11:56:53
You're spot on, Danny.

Hadn't occurred to me but that's a very astute comment.

Andrew Merrick
24 Posted 29/07/2025 at 12:18:16
If the women's game is a marketable product in the United States, then hopefully this will generate some income for their squad too, seems fair don't you think?
David West
25 Posted 29/07/2025 at 12:20:56
It's a welcome boost to the transfer kitty.

All the other clubs will do the same, we are one of the first, which shows how switched on TFG are.

Owners want the women's team to stand alone, so they can attract their own investors and sponsors.

You can invest or sponsor now Everton Women at much lower levels than the men's game. This makes sense.

They will probably get investors now who see the women's game as a good bet for a good return in a few years, as the popularity keeps increasing, TV money & sponsorships rise faster than the men's game.

It opens up questions for the future though. Will they have to continue with the same kit as the men? Same manufacturers, sponsors etc, if they are totally separate?

With separate investors, partners or owners, it could just end up a totally different entity with the Everton name attached.

Andrew Clare
26 Posted 29/07/2025 at 12:28:00
Robert, you are correct.

We have been left behind.

Dennis Stevens
27 Posted 29/07/2025 at 12:31:29
Aye, Andrew. We were left behind when the new league structure we helped to implement as part of the then "big 5" took effect.

Everton seemed to think it was a destination, whereas others realised it was the starting line!

Steve Brown
28 Posted 29/07/2025 at 12:59:12
The women’s team will be attractive to US minority investors as it will be the only team with its own stadium.
Graham Fylde
29 Posted 29/07/2025 at 14:08:13
While it would be great if Anjishnu's (and The Times') assertion that this deal is worth £60M, helps our PSR situation and increases our transfer kitty were true, there is at least some doubt!

The Esk is reporting (and, seemingly, has been briefed) that the transfer to Roundhouse Capital has happened at book value (rather than a projected future value, like Chelsea) so that Roundhouse can attract future investment.

So not an instant uplift, only when they bring in new investors. And, at that point, they could reinvest the money on the football side or, I don't know, pay dividends!

There are a number of people pointing out to The Esk that, if he's right, there would be no PSR uplift and that the timing of the transfer was just prior to the PSR deadline, indicating a potential problem that needed to be dealt with by a sale at the level indicated in the article above rather than book value.

I have no insight into which is true. I did see the Everton announcement yesterday that its Chief Financial Officer will be leaving the club!

Andy Meighan
30 Posted 29/07/2025 at 14:14:30
Don't our so-called fans get tired of bringing up the Arteta money line? It's so boring, it's untrue. Oh, and by the way, it lost its comedy value about 15 years ago.

Give it a rest and focus on our future.

Pete Bridson
31 Posted 29/07/2025 at 14:19:00
Was gonna say 'different world these people live in', but it's a different universe really, innit?
Graham Fylde
32 Posted 29/07/2025 at 14:55:49
Isn't it just, Pete!

Esk has clarified that there may have been an uplift but it wasn't done for PSR reasons. Either way, let's hope for the £60M helping hand.

Ian Bennett
33 Posted 29/07/2025 at 16:01:14
Are Everton likely to brief that it was done for PSR reasons?

Or are they going to make something up that it will make the women's side more investable?

If I want this to through Dicky Masters's sign-off, I'll go the latter.

Graham Fylde
34 Posted 29/07/2025 at 16:28:28
You can forget Masters on this, Ian. It's fully within the rules.

The Premier League has put changing the rule to a vote twice and both times the change was rejected by the clubs.

Mike Gaynes
35 Posted 29/07/2025 at 17:33:30
Danny #22, that's a really good point about the US market.

I do want to fine-tune your portrayal of the US being "huge" for women's soccer -- that's true only for the women's national team, which frequently outdraws the men for internationals.

The US women's pro league, which is only 12 years old, averages about 11K fans per match and pulled two million total attendance last season, which is decent and growing. But the best leagues are still England and France.

Danny O'Neill
36 Posted 29/07/2025 at 17:41:01
I'll obviously take your advice as our man on the ground with that, Mike.

The English WSL average attendance for last season was just over 7,000. Arsenal probably made that look better, as they were attracting crowds of nearly 30,000, but the rest were nowhere near that. Everton well below the average.

Let's hope that changes. I think that is TFG's intent.


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