The Esk

Independent analysis of football's money, owners and rules

Subscribe — free

Private credit & other sources of football finance

Who lends to football, on what terms and with what security, and what happens when those structures fail. Football’s capital structure has changed. As clearing banks have retreated, clubs and their owners have turned to private credit funds, insurance-backed lenders, receivables financiers, sovereign capital and each other. By February 2025, Premier League clubs collectively owed more than £3 billion in future transfer instalments.

This section brings together The Esk’s analysis across three layers. The first is the lenders: Ares, Apollo, BDT & MSD, Clearlake, Guggenheim, A-CAP, Rights & Media Funding and the US banks. The second is the borrowers: Chelsea and BlueCo, Eagle Football and Olympique Lyonnais, Everton and 777 Partners, Manchester United, West Ham and Barcelona. The third is the system: transfer debt as football’s shadow credit market, and the case for capital adequacy rather than liquidity support. All analysis is drawn from public filings, court records and audited accounts. Where facts are disputed or allegations unproven, that is stated.

Start here

  1. Private credit, private equity and insurance company funding in football: a series (May 2026)
  2. The penetration of US private credit in Premier League financing: exposure, structure and systemic risk (October 2025)
  3. Lenders, debt and influence in English and European football (August 2025)
  4. Systemic risk: football’s shadow credit market (September 2026)
  5. Solvency, not liquidity? Gordon Brown’s 2008 diagnosis and capital adequacy in English football (October 2026)
  6. Squad-value financing: private credit, unsold players and the return of mark-to-model lending (October 2026)
  7. Private credit, governance and relevance to football financing (August 2026)
  8. Financial architecture of 22 Holdco Limited: Ares’s credit exposure, warrants and embedded derivatives (April 2026)
  9. Administration of Eagle Football Holdings Bidco: a planned creditor enforcement and the playbook of alternative asset lenders (June 2026)
  10. IFR State of the Game 2026: what the regulator finds on systemic risk, what it misses, and what boards should do (October 2026)

Private credit and the lenders

Insurance-backed lending: 777 Partners, A-CAP and Leadenhall

Court documents and the full case file: Everton & 777 Partners.

Case file: Chelsea and BlueCo

Full coverage: Chelsea & BlueCo hub.

Case file: Eagle Football, Olympique Lyonnais and Botafogo

Multi-club and acquisition finance

Owner funding, refinancing and club debt

Everton’s financing archive, 2017–2025

How Everton funded a new stadium and two decades of losses: council-backed lending, bank facilities, owner loans and, eventually, specialist lenders.

Transfer debt and systemic risk

See also the Start here pieces on the shadow credit market, solvency and capital adequacy, and the IFR State of the Game.

Sovereign and state-linked capital

Related: accounts with a significant financing element

Every article

All credit, lending and systemic risk analysis · Ares Management · 777 Partners · BlueCo / Clearlake · Eagle Football & John Textor