Al Fayed does not comment regarding Fulham takeover

English Fulham owner, Mohamed Al Fayed, rejected speculation twice last season that his club was facing a takeover bid, but there has been no response to the current takeover report.

A Sunday newspaper reported that a GBP 120 million offer of Fulham is on the table and that an "unknown party", with a rival "foreign" consortium is "considering its options".

Al Fayed, owner of the London's Harrods, was the first major non-British investor in an English club when he bought Fulham for GBP 30 million just over 10 years ago.

Kevin Keegan was appointed manager at that time, but when he was selected as England manager, former French player Jean Tigana took over the position. Al Fayed took the club to the Premier League from the old Second Division in four years.

After Tigana's extravagant GBP 11.5 million purchase of striker Steve Marlet from Lyon, whose contract was eventually cancelled, Al Fayed's investments slowed down considerably in recent years, even though another French striker, Louis Saha, was sold to English Manchester United in 2004 for the same price that Fulham paid for Marlet.

But since Chris Coleman was fired five matches before the end of last season, considerable funds have been available for new manager, Lawrie Sanchez, to rebuild the club.

Sanchez, a former Northern Ireland manager, spent GBP 6 million on striker Diomansy Kamara, GBP 3 million each to sign striker Hameur Bouazza and midfielder Steve Davis, GBP 2.5 million for defender Paul Konchesky, and over GBP 1 million each on David Healy and Aaron Hughes.

Source: euFootball.BIZ © Copyright 2006 - All rights reserved.