While Zinedine Zidane is expected by some to sit on the bench of Olympique de Marseille in the event of the club being sold to Saudi Arabia, Frank McCourt does not seem decided to sell the Ciel et Blanc.
The saga of the sale of Olympique de Marseille does not seem close to reaching its conclusion. For those most keen to see Frank McCourt sell the Olympian club to Saudi Arabia, there is certainly still Thibaud Vézirian to be convinced that the deal is already closed and on the verge of being formalized. “ The intelligent sporting hypothesis is that this is announced in December, and that there are 3 or 4 new players, not 10, in the January transfer window so that OM can play in the Champions League next season. Saudi Arabia, they are businessmen, they know perfectly well where they are going,” he again argued recently.
The discourse has nevertheless remained the same since February 2021 and the widespread excitement around the sale of OM to the Saudis. Two and a half years later, the affair still appears to be in bad shape. Saudi Arabia’s interest is certainly real. France Bleu Provence even revealed last month that Saudi investors had already agreed with Zinedine Zidane for him to become the new strong man of Ciel et Blanc.
McCourt’s demands
But Frank McCourt seems intransigent. “McCourt doesn’t seem to want to let go of the controller,” thus summarized the La Minute OM account. In addition to being very greedy, demanding no less than 600 million euros to consider selling OM, more or less what he has spent since his arrival at the head of the club in 2017, the man American businessman would like to keep a percentage of the club, around 10-15%. A requirement which goes down badly with Saudi investors and which makes the arrival of Zinedine Zidane in the Marseille city a little more illusory.
The former world champion did not hide his impatience to return to the sidelines. While Carlo Ancelotti is expected to leave Real Madrid at the end of the season to take the reins of the Seleçao, his new one is once again being talked about with insistence in the Spanish capital.
