Manchester City and the rise of City Football Group
During the past ten years, Manchester City has undoubtedly been the most dominant football club in England. The club was taken over in 2008 by United Arab Emirates-based private company Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG) of Abu Dhabi-royalty Sheikh Mansour. Since then, they already had six Premier League titles under their name - four of which in the last five seasons. Man City’s achievements were greatly emphasized by financial funding - but it wasn’t just about buying the players. It was about building a foundation straight from the ground up. That was the purpose of the City Football Group, created by the people who ran Manchester City, looking to mirror the club’s success onto a system of domestic clubs worldwide.
Manchester City winning their sixth Premier League title. Image: CBS Sports.
City Football Group (CFG) was founded in 2013 by the ex-Barcelona vice president, now CEO of Man City, Ferran Soriano. CFG based their brand on Man City - clearly their flagship club under the company’s management - and was also majority owned by ADUG. And by saying brand, it means that CFG is trying to establish a global franchise.
With Man City as an example, CFG started buying majority stakes in developing clubs worldwide that already had a local fanbase. As a result, some clubs invested in by CFG, such as New York City FC (USA), Melbourne City FC (Australia), Mumbai City (India), and Montevideo City Torque (Uruguay), have their names, badges, and uniforms very similar to Man City.
Other clubs that had more established history still got to keep their traditional branding, such as Girona (Spain), Troyes (France), Yokohama F. Marinos (Japan), etc. Recently, CFG acquired 80% majority stakes of Italian side Palermo F.C, which has produced many stars such as Edinson Cavani, Javier Pastore, Paulo Dybala, and more. CFG currently owns 11 professional clubs worldwide, with nearly 30 titles won under CFG; six clubs have women teams, with development squads and youth academy systems.
Melbourne City FC of Australia is one of many teams that shares the same branding with Man City.
Image: Melbourne City FC via Twitter
If there is anyone who understands how to run a successful franchise, CEO Ferran Soriano certainly has proven himself to be the one. As vice-president, Soriano contributed to Barcelona’s success during the Pep Guardiola-era in the late 2000s, continued by his tenure at Manchester City. His ideology of a global franchise-business model became the structure for CFG in the sense of giving the local fanbase a domestic club to support or improving existing small clubs that already had a fanbase.
By associating them with a well-known brand such as City, providing financial investment, infrastructure, youth development, etc. - CFG aims to create a franchise built upon both quality and loyalty from fans. As the “City” franchise started to develop, it certainly opened up opportunities for collaborations; fans worldwide will be able to see their favorite players during summer tours. In addition, local teams improved drastically, and City benefited from their brand being marketed and access to local talents, whether it’s players or management.
List of teams operating under CFG (excluding Palermo F.C). Source: CIES Sports Intelligence via Twitter.
Girona FC is a CFG club that has received Manchester City players via loan and produced many Spanish talents for the City youth team. It is also known to be connected to the Guardiola family - led by Pep Guardiola’s brother, Pere. As Soriano started recruiting ex-Barcelona executives for his project at Manchester City during the early 2010s, many speculated that the legendary manager Pep Guardiola would soon be on that list. After getting Txiki Begiristain, then director of football at Barca, to fill that position at City - they finally convinced Guardiola to join in 2016. The rest is history. Girona FC played an important role in getting Guardiola.
Another famous interaction between CFG clubs is the Frank Lampard loan deal to Man City from its sister club, New York City FC, during the MLS break in 2014, despite having not yet played a single match for NYCFC. Lampard then went on and scored “that” goal against his former club Chelsea, which became a memorable moment for Premier League fans. NYCFC, co-owned by CFG (80 percent) alongside the owners of the Yankees baseball team, are the defending champions of the 2021 MLS Cup.
Lampard’s tenure at Man City is heavily influenced by CFG.
One football “franchise” operating similar to CFG is the Red Bull Group, currently owning several clubs across the globe, such as RB Leipzig, New York Red Bulls, and Red Bull Salzburg, with the strategy of finding and developing young, talented players. Many have questioned the business integrity of these models, such as CFG; however, it has shown remarkable accomplishments and will remain popular for many years.