Everton takeover: finance expert estimates price Dan Friedkin will pay Farhad Moshiri to buy club

Leading football finance expert Kieran Maguire has given his reaction to Dan Friedkin’s prospective Everton takeover.

The American billionaire has been selected by Farhad Moshiri to complete a purchase of the club after 777 Partners’ deal collapsed last month, having failed to be given the green light by the Premier League.

A number of parties came to the table to buy Everton - but Freidkin has seemingly won the race as an exclusivity announcement awaits. The 59-year-old, through the Friedkin Group, already owns Italian side AS Roma after completing a takeover in August 2020 for a reported fee of around £550 million.

Maguire, a lecturer at the University of Liverpool, believes Freidkin is likely to pay a similar amount for Everton as he’s set to take on significant debts. And he believes that Friedkin would have been keeping a close eye for several months on the takeover situation as 777 deal’s stalled.

Speaking on his podcast The Price of Football, Maguire said: “Dan Friedkin is the guy in charge. He's very successful in his own right and, therefore, unlike 777, he appears to have the resources, which is good from an owners' and directors' test perspective. He's got experience of a significant purchase as far as a football club is concerned.

“Roma have had three sixth-place finishes and I'm sure Everton fans would accept that. They have also won the Europa Conference League, they got to the semi-finals of the Europa League this season, and Roma cost them around £500 million. We're probably talking somewhere in the same ballpark in terms of total cost to him in terms of taking over a significant amount of the debts of Everton.

“What we're not getting is news from the club itself i.e. via Farhad Moshiri. That's the disappointment. We're not here to praise or slaughter people but he's not handled this particularly well in terms of being proactive, communication and transparent with the fan base because he's looking after No.1. He's trying to nickel-and-dime himself a deal where he'll get some money. He'll have to write off a huge amount but as far as this deal is concerned from what I understand, it wouldn't involve the club taking on further debut, which is good. Could it involve some of the existing loans being paid off as part of the overall deal? We'll have to wait.

“I'm far more happy in the Everton position. We said from day one that we didn't like what we were seeing from 777 but the doom-and-gloom merchants, I always felt Everton was too big of a club not to have a significant party come into the ownership debate and that's what we have.

“I think they would have been monitoring the situation. Could they have bought another Premier League club? Yes. We're fully aware there are three or four not explicitly up for sale but owners are willing to pick up the phone, I'll say no more than that. Everton has a lot going for it. It's in the city of Liverpool, good transport links, culturally football is a huge issue as far as the city is concerned and Americans love Liverpool because of the music connections.”