Ex-Macquarie banker Ben Carberry is looking for European football’s hidden gems

Former Macquarie Banker Ben Carberry and his growing team think they can find some hidden gems among Europe’s down and out football teams.

Athlon’s David Gibson (left) and Ben Carberry at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Picture: Ryan Osland

Forget football giants like Liverpool, Barcelona or Juventus — and even other clubs in the English Premier League or France’s glamorous Top 14 rugby union competition.

A Sydney boutique private equity group is set to buy a string of European football and rugby teams in lower divisions, polishing some rough sporting diamonds in what they hope is a case of “owning the worst house on the best street”.

Athlon Partners, featuring a group of sports financing and administration experts, is in the midst of raising $US15m for its Athlon Club Investment Fund and is set to clinch its first deal as soon as next week, potentially a team based on the French Riviera.

The firm’s executives are mostly targeting soccer and rugby clubs in the $5m price range, including many that had once been successful in the top leagues but had slipped down the grades and are now up for sale, in need of fresh capital to survive and restore their on-field fortunes and finances off it.

In that way, they believe the returns in percentage terms can be higher than buying a club at or closer to the top levels where billionaires, sovereign wealth funds and global private equity firms play.

“We are looking for assets that are undervalued and have been underperforming. We are operating at a level that the big players are not as it is almost rats and mice to them,” said Ben Carberry, an ex-Macquarie banker who also had a stint in institutional and wholesale equity sales at Bailieu Holst before starting his own investment firms.

Mr Carberry founded Athlon Partners, a corporate advisory firm specialising in sport, last year, and has also struck deals to buy sports assets such as the Spartan cricket bat and equipment maker. He has partnered with David Gibson, a long-time administrator with NSW Rugby who once helped buy and run French rugby union team Narbonne with former Wallabies coach Bob Dwyer.

Athlon believes there are bargains to be had in French football and rugby. Picture: AFP

Mr Gibson will run the club fund as chief executive and Mr Carberry is its chairman.

They have been scouring Europe for deals at the lower levels, having already seen at least 30 clubs for sale ranging from Italian teams formerly in the top Serie A who have been relegated several divisions in recent years to German national champions who have similarly fallen on hard times. Some are iconic names who have good-sized stadiums with loyal fans but have run into significant financial problems in recent years.

“We don’t know many other players that are operating in this space, and it is our speciality,” said Mr Gibson, who listed countries such as Andorra, Germany, Scotland, Spain and the US where lower level clubs were for sale.

“One for us in the south of France, (it is) the worst house in the best street surrounded by giants such as Monaco, Nice and Marseilles. There were 25 (interested buyers) and now we are in the last two. We think we have a good chance to get it.”

If Athlon can clinch the deal they will be a rare example of an Australian-based group that owns overseas clubs. Billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes is a minority owner of NBA club Utah Jazz, while fund manager Anton Tagliaferro is chairman of Maltese club Balzan FC and Sydney businessman Bill Papas owns second division side Xanthi. Previous owners include Con Makris and Tony Denny, both members of The List – Australia’s Richest 250, who for a time owned Greek club Panachaiki and Bohemians of Prague respectively (Nine newspapers have reported Bohemians may be bought by an Australian group, though Athlon is not involved.)

Mr Gibson and Mr Carberry are working with ex-cricketer Shane Lee and digital agency founder Craig Hodges in Australia and sports agent Greg Keenan, former Roland Garros boss Gilbert Ysern and ex-international soccer player Gerald Passi in France. Todd Greenberg, former CEO of the NRL, will join their advisory board. They may tap into some Australian sports medicine and commercial nous, but have ruled out using Australian coaches and players in Europe.

Mr Gibson said the opportunity at their level lay in buying a club cheaply and executing a turnaround. Then, if a club moved up from, for example, the third or fourth divisions to the second, it would be more attractive to richer buyers and Athlon would make its exit.

“I almost demand a break-even. We are not going to live beyond our means and be a fund that keeps having to tip in. I will activate the commercial streams, the stadium and sponsors and get that going, so there’s more revenue. You make savings on the budget as well. We have to do it properly.”

Mr Carberry said the group could also make returns from selling good players to better clubs, and would invest in junior academies in order to develop talent. Athlon may look at buying Australian clubs or sports but would prefer northern hemisphere assets.

Most importantly, he said the group would enjoy investing in clubs but could not be swept up in the emotion of chasing short-term success.

“The discipline to say no is crucial to us. What looks good on a spreadsheet, well you have to look at a lot of other risk factors as well. We have seen a lot of deals out there already (but) we have to be careful not to be a bull at a gate. We have to maintain discipline, because there is still a COVID risk out there and who knows where asset prices will be in 12 months time.”