How American Owners Took Over The Premier League

When Malcolm Glazer completed his takeover of Manchester United in 2005, he became the first American to ever own a Premier League club.

Twenty years on, he looks less like an opening act. Heading into the 2025-26 season, thirteen of the league’s twenty clubs held at least some US capital in their share registers, and almost half were controlled by majority US individuals, families or private groups. The richest soccer league in the world has become one of the most coveted in American sports.

That rise in transatlantic capital has changed more than the boardroom. It has saturated the biggest commercial machine in all of sport – broadcasting, sponsorship and the now tightly regulated betting market on the UK side of the game, where fans comparing licensed bookmakers can find out more through comparison sites such as Betiton. However, for business observers, the burning question is why so much American money went into English football in the first place – and what the new British football regulator intends to do with it.

The rise of American owners in the Premier League

The trajectory is clear. Before the Glazers, the English top flight had never had an American owner; today US investors spread the length of the table. Stan Kroenke, whose empire has expanded and taken over NFL, NBA and NHL franchises, controls Arsenal. Fenway Sports Group, led by John Henry, owns Liverpool. Aston Villa’s V Sports car is led by American financier Wes Edens. And the pace has accelerated in recent years: Todd Boehly’s consortium bought Chelsea for £4.25bn in 2022, Bill Foley’s Black Knights took full control of Bournemouth later that year, and Dan Friedkin – who now owns Roma – completed the takeover of Everton in 2024, moving the club to a new riverside stadium. Most of those thirteen U.S. locations have been built since 2008.

Why American investors continue to buy English football

For a business audience, the logic is not difficult to follow. America’s major leagues – the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL – are closed shops. There are no promotions or relegations, the number of teams is fixed, and existing owners rarely sell. Buying the NFL, football financial analysts point out, would cost between $5bn and $10bn, costing all but a handful of buyers. English football offers an alternative: global reach, an open pyramid and, most importantly, prices that still look modest by American standards.

Newcastle United is a very clear example. Ranked by Forbes among the most valuable clubs in the Premier League and among the top twenty worldwide, this team was recently ranked below the Columbus Blue Jackets – the lowest-valued franchise in the NHL – despite having the largest social media following and playing in a stadium nearly three times the size. For American investors, that gap reads like an opportunity: a globally recognized brand that they believe has been run fairly and, in the phrase of the industry, left unsweated. Global Premier League broadcasting revenue, still rising, is the engine they buy from.

Ticket prices, Super League and fan backlash

The influx was not universally accepted. American ownership has coincided with a sharp rise in ticket prices, and supporter groups have pushed back hard. The Arsenal Supporters’ Trust described the practice as an example of further depriving fans of money, and organized protests have broken out at Manchester United, Liverpool and Everton in the past two seasons. The deepest wound remains the 2021 European Super League, where six English clubs – several of them American – tried to break away from the closed competition, but pulled out within days amid a fiery backlash from supporters and governments alike.

Beneath the anger lies a broader dispute about where football’s money ends up. While the billions flow through the top flight, the grassroots game continues to withdraw funding – a distinction that critics of the modern ownership model return to again and again.

What the new football manager means for owners

The politics of all this is now solidified into law. The Football Governance Act 2025 received Royal Assent in July 2025 and creates an Independent Football Governing Body with statutory powers over the top five divisions of the English men’s game. For prospective owners – American or otherwise – the most important change is a new eligibility test that considers the source and adequacy of their funds, along with reliability, integrity and ability. All clubs will also need an operating license to compete from the 2027-28 season, and will have to seek the regulator’s permission before moving the stadium, changing the badge or main colours, or lending it to its premises.

The regulator, led by a former director of the Financial Conduct Authority, has signed a memorandum of understanding and has agreed to share information with the FCA. Its payoff is from the financial sanity of the club to the values ​​of the game itself – a direct response to the decline of age, mismanagement and the Super League issue. For American investors accustomed to less regulated, closed leagues at home, English football is becoming a police-heavy place to do business.

What happens next

None of this looks likely to stop US currency flows in the near term; the basic stats that make England’s teams attractive have not changed. What is changing is the environment in property: strict regulations, strong sponsors and a commercial system – broadcasting, sponsorship and regulated betting market followed by comparison platforms such as Betiton – which keeps growing in value. For the new wave of American owners, the challenge is no longer just buying into the Premier League. This proves that they can run it in a way that the fans, and now the administrator, will accept.