Sport Republic

[BarberSaint]

2 hours ago, SW5 SAINT said:

Sports Republic no intention of selling Saints then, well not this year anyway……maybe next summer…! So where would that leave Sports Republic with just Goztepe and Valenciennes……?

Better off?

[davefizzy14]

Looking forward to hearing Adam and Alfies interview with Dragan tomorrow 😊 In my opinion he has clearly got good intentions for the club and stepped in and made changes to the football structure side. He has invested a lot of money into the club.

[Badger]

Just found this, no idea if any implications for us but sounds like some shenanigans going on at United Group.

Probably a load of bollocks, so have taken it down rather than waste anyone’s time.

Not particularly interesting but helps cure insomnia 

Edited June 18 by Badger

[Suhari]

21 minutes ago, davefizzy14 said:

Looking forward to hearing Adam and Alfies interview with Dragan tomorrow 😊 In my opinion he has clearly got good intentions for the club and stepped in and made changes to the football structure side. He has invested a lot of money into the club.

SR get a lot of stick, and rightly so for some of the fuck-stoopid decisions they've made.

However, Dragan has stumped up some pretty considerable £££, WITHOUT being the one making the decisions and signing the cheques. He must be pissed off as fuck. I reckon he has something to prove.

And I think we'll see him improve things massively, without vaping, slender-jean wearers around the place.

Looking forward to hearing the interview.

[manji]

2 hours ago, Suhari said:

SR get a lot of stick, and rightly so for some of the fuck-stoopid decisions they've made.

However, Dragan has stumped up some pretty considerable £££, WITHOUT being the one making the decisions and signing the cheques. He must be pissed off as fuck. I reckon he has something to prove.

And I think we'll see him improve things massively, without vaping, slender-jean wearers around the place.

Looking forward to hearing the interview.

He is very much pissed off I think the kicking chairs round hospitality proves that I mentioned the incident soon after it happened it finally made into an Athetic article recently. I know Rasmus makes a good scapegoat but the situation wasn’t his fault. 
it all started to go wrong when Wilcox fucked off at the beginning of the season. Rasmus stepped in ( big mistake) and copped all the stick. Dragon assumed his cohorts had everything under control.

i said it loads of times as well Solak was pissed off we didn’t go up via the autos but he was talked into giving Russell Martin an insanely good new contract. I bet he’s angry he took the wrong advice bearing in how much money he has put into the club.

lots of mistakes but he’s assumed full responsibility. There’s a lot of changes back stage . Spors knows what he is doing. There’s a bit of a risk appointing Stil but infitely better than a dumb choice like Dyche. 
a new dawn and again absolutely no reason why we can’t go straight back up and plenty of time to prep for the following season in the PL., if not we go up the following season.

im fucking looking forward to it . 

[AlexLaw76]

2 hours ago, manji said:

He is very much pissed off I think the kicking chairs round hospitality proves that I mentioned the incident soon after it happened it finally made into an Athetic article recently. I know Rasmus makes a good scapegoat but the situation wasn’t his fault. 
it all started to go wrong when Wilcox fucked off at the beginning of the season. Rasmus stepped in ( big mistake) and copped all the stick. Dragon assumed his cohorts had everything under control.

i said it loads of times as well Solak was pissed off we didn’t go up via the autos but he was talked into giving Russell Martin an insanely good new contract. I bet he’s angry he took the wrong advice bearing in how much money he has put into the club.

lots of mistakes but he’s assumed full responsibility. There’s a lot of changes back stage . Spors knows what he is doing. There’s a bit of a risk appointing Stil but infitely better than a dumb choice like Dyche. 
a new dawn and again absolutely no reason why we can’t go straight back up and plenty of time to prep for the following season in the PL., if not we go up the following season.

im fucking looking forward to it . 

Why would Dyche be a “dumb choice”?

[SouSaint]

3 hours ago, manji said:

He is very much pissed off I think the kicking chairs round hospitality proves that I mentioned the incident soon after it happened it finally made into an Athetic article recently. I know Rasmus makes a good scapegoat but the situation wasn’t his fault. 
it all started to go wrong when Wilcox fucked off at the beginning of the season. Rasmus stepped in ( big mistake) and copped all the stick. Dragon assumed his cohorts had everything under control.

i said it loads of times as well Solak was pissed off we didn’t go up via the autos but he was talked into giving Russell Martin an insanely good new contract. I bet he’s angry he took the wrong advice bearing in how much money he has put into the club.

lots of mistakes but he’s assumed full responsibility. There’s a lot of changes back stage . Spors knows what he is doing. There’s a bit of a risk appointing Stil but infitely better than a dumb choice like Dyche. 
a new dawn and again absolutely no reason why we can’t go straight back up and plenty of time to prep for the following season in the PL., if not we go up the following season.

im fucking looking forward to it . 

Wilcox left us in April last year. SR had time to replace him but instead tried to be clever and that led to the worst season in the clubs history. 

 

Talk is cheap, the only way SR make up for last seasons shambles is by delivering a league winning season this coming season imo. Can't say I'm confident. 

 

[ChristopheVAFC]

11 hours ago, SW5 SAINT said:

Sports Republic no intention of selling Saints then, well not this year anyway……maybe next summer…! So where would that leave Sports Republic with just Goztepe and Valenciennes……?

When SR joined us in the summer of 2023, they made it clear that they were in it for the medium-long term and that he wouldn't be leaving overnight.

And recently, the owner (I'm thinking of Dragan), would have said that he was getting impatient and that he wanted results soon. That's why we're going through a lot of changes at the moment, and I think it'll be the same for you this year.

I really don't think that SR is going to leave any time soon, from any of the 3 clubs, I think it's still early days for them.

[CB Fry]

4 hours ago, manji said:

He is very much pissed off I think the kicking chairs round hospitality proves that I mentioned the incident soon after it happened it finally made into an Athetic article recently. I know Rasmus makes a good scapegoat but the situation wasn’t his fault. 
it all started to go wrong when Wilcox fucked off at the beginning of the season. Rasmus stepped in ( big mistake) and copped all the stick. Dragon assumed his cohorts had everything under control.

i said it loads of times as well Solak was pissed off we didn’t go up via the autos but he was talked into giving Russell Martin an insanely good new contract. I bet he’s angry he took the wrong advice bearing in how much money he has put into the club.

lots of mistakes but he’s assumed full responsibility. There’s a lot of changes back stage . Spors knows what he is doing. There’s a bit of a risk appointing Stil but infitely better than a dumb choice like Dyche. 
a new dawn and again absolutely no reason why we can’t go straight back up and plenty of time to prep for the following season in the PL., if not we go up the following season.

im fucking looking forward to it . 

Did Russell Martin get an "insanely good new contract" or just the kind of deal triggered by achieving promotion? Like him or not he would/did deserve that.

Will Still will have the same kind of thing regardless of us winning the league on 100 points or scraping up at Wembley. Promotion is promotion.

[Dman]

29 minutes ago, CB Fry said:

Did Russell Martin get an "insanely good new contract" or just the kind of deal triggered by achieving promotion? Like him or not he would/did deserve that.

Will Still will have the same kind of thing regardless of us winning the league on 100 points or scraping up at Wembley. Promotion is promotion.

Mental Manji chatting utter nonsense... who'd have thought it. 

He spuouts the same crap every summer. 

[Weston Super Saint]

13 hours ago, Matthew Le God said:

The whole Sport Republuc project falls apart without a keystone club. So little incentive to sell Saints at a point when their value is lower than they've spent on it.

Why the assumption that we are the 'keystone club'?

Goztepe have a far better chance to gain Champions league football....

[Matthew Le God]

13 hours ago, Matthew Le God said:

The whole Sport Republic project falls apart without a keystone club. So little incentive to sell Saints at a point when their value is lower than they've spent on it.

Not that we didn't know already, as Saints even in the Championship have a significantly larger income and fanbase than the other Sport Republic clubs, but Dragan Solak states in the BBC Radio Solent interview Saints are the "main club" in the Sport Republic group. Even if one of the others made the Champions League Saints as a Premier League team would have a bigger income.

He also states the intention to spend hundreds of millions on the development surrounding St Mary's & stadium capacity increase.

Edited June 19 by Matthew Le God

[Holmes_and_Watson]

13 hours ago, SW5 SAINT said:

Sports Republic no intention of selling Saints then, well not this year anyway……maybe next summer…! So where would that leave Sports Republic with just Goztepe and Valenciennes……?

Goztepe would be needing another English feeder club. 🙂

[Saint86]

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/sport/25246799.dragan-solak-interview-southampton-owner-opens-sale-rumours/

Comes across really well in the interview - decent, passionate, speaks about his naivitiy and growing experience, calls Martin "cocky", has a joke about VAR last season, and makes it clear that he's now running the show with regards to saints - as essentially an authoriser for Spors, and the football team he's put in place. Its a very good PR piece 😋 

Also says we will be signing a striker and creative midfielder before any outgoings.

Edited June 19 by Saint86

[AlexLaw76]

On 19/06/2025 at 04:55, AlexLaw76 said:

Why would Dyche be a “dumb choice”?

Nothing heard

Booooooo

[S-Clarke]

On 19/06/2025 at 02:13, manji said:

it all started to go wrong when Wilcox fucked off at the beginning of the season. Rasmus stepped in ( big mistake) and copped all the stick. Dragon assumed his cohorts had everything under control.

I take issue with that bit, it went wrong long before Wilcox was involved. Remember the summer window of 2022, and the winter Window of 2023? They were amongst the worst we'd ever had, set us back years, and that was primarily on Rasmus. Wilcox wasn't even a glint in peoples eyes back then.

The issue with not replacing Wilcox last summer was a genuine one, but let's not ignore the fact that things were pretty horrific long before Wilcox was involved.

People like Rasmus will rightfully cop the stick when he releases books that are titled ''If it's not broken, break it', and then subsequently gets his hands involved in us and breaks our club.

Edited June 20 by S-Clarke

[ChristopheVAFC]

Hello friends! I'm sharing with you a long written report from a French journalist about Sport Republic. Enjoy!

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https://www.lavoixdunord.fr/1608744/article/2025-07-22/reportage-vafc-sport-republic-qui-est-vraiment-le-proprietaire-de-valenciennes
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REPORT. VAFC: Sport Republic, who really owns Valenciennes?

VAFC has just returned from a week-long training camp in Southampton, at the facilities of its owner's flagship club, the investment fund Sport Republic. We took advantage of this English week to try to learn a little more about those who have owned VA since June 2023, their operating methods, and their chances of success.

It started like one of those youthful matches you see on amateur pitches every weekend. On Friday, before facing off for two one-hour games, the Valenciennes and Southampton squads mingled in the center of one of the pool tables at Staplewood Campus, the Saints' training ground, to pose. A family photo of sorts for two of the three clubs, along with the Turkish side Goztepe, owned by the British investment fund Sport Republic. The photo kicked off a match that was anything but friendly between the two teams, and while Gaëtan Courtet and Nathan Wood had to be separated, and almost came to blows, this brief flare-up of tension shouldn't undermine the budding closeness between the two clubs.

Southampton and Valenciennes, whose red and white colors were initially their only commonality, have seen their fortunes converge following their respective acquisitions in January 2022 and June 2023, but this six-day training camp for the northern team is a first. The Franco-English relationship has so far been mainly marked by the transfer of Joachim Kayi Sanda, a VA academy graduate, to England last winter and the loan of Daouda Traoré to Hainaut last season. While the Valenciennes players took advantage of the ideal setting at their English cousins' facilities to fine-tune their preparations, including a go-kart outing, a visit to Saint Mary's Stadium, and the traditional hazing of the new players with songs, this trip across the Channel was also a great opportunity to try to understand a little more about how Sport Republic works.

"I understand why you're here, because there are a lot of questions about timeshare. Personally, I don't see many advantages. Well, we have a Japanese player who was loaned to the Turkish club and has just returned, so we'll see how it goes," says Martin Sanders by way of introduction. This friendly thirty-something hosts a YouTube channel about English football, where he devotes considerable time to Southampton, as well as a podcast (TotalSaints) dedicated to the club. "On my website, local fans sometimes chat with Valenciennes fans to share their experiences." When you're a supporter and you're interested in the future of your club, it seems normal to me to try to understand how things work for others."

"All of England laughed at Southampton"

In this sunny July, we don't see many supporters, even though they are among the most loyal in England. The club shop next to the stadium is open, but deserted, and the holidays seem to have kept many of them away from this city in the southwest of the United Kingdom, where you can hear the seagulls squawking like in Dunkirk. The main event of the moment is the numerous graduation ceremonies at the local university, which bring families in their Sunday best and students dressed worthy of the latest Harry Potter film into the streets and pubs.

Perhaps also because Saints fans need to catch their breath after a nightmare season in the Premier League, finishing last with just twelve points, only two wins and, above all, thirty defeats in thirty-eight matches. "It was a real disaster," confirms Martin Sanders. "All of England laughed at us, we became a joke because the record for the fewest number of points in a season was Derby County with eleven in 2008. No one thought it could ever be beaten and yet we came so close..."

"Before Sport Republic, Southampton was owned by a Chinese group that no longer had the means to invest, nothing was moving forward. No matter how hard the club's employees worked, they couldn't see anything moving forward." Adam Blackmore, BBC English journalist and Southampton fan.

"It was horrible, the worst season in the club's history, it was so heartbreaking," confirms Adam Blackmore, BBC radio reporter and longtime voice of the Saints. This hellish season was, above all, the latest vertigo experienced by Southampton fans, who have been on a veritable emotional rollercoaster since Sport Republic took over. With two relegations (2023, 2025) and a promotion to the Premier League (2024) after the play-offs in front of a packed Wembley, they already have plenty to talk about. “Before Sport Republic (SR), the club was owned by a Chinese group that no longer had the means to invest, nothing was moving, no matter how hard the club’s employees worked, they couldn’t see anything moving forward. It was a headless duck,” Adam Blackmore recalls. “So when SR arrived, there was a lot of hope for those who loved the club. Plus, they brought Rasmus Ankersen, who had done a great job at Brentford, and we immediately saw a lot of investment. And then it didn’t go in the right direction. When new owners arrive at a club, they want to make their mark, show that they have an ego, that they’re really there, I can understand that. But they made a lot of bad decisions, in recruitment, management, coaching. It’s as if they were going left when it seemed logical to go right.” There were a lot of mistakes and a lot of money wasted on players who weren't up to par."

Financial Stability

The amounts discussed are obviously different, but the picture painted by those familiar with the Saints is a perfect carbon copy of what Valenciennes has experienced over the past two years; it even seems almost too similar to be true. From initial hopes to a disastrous season last year with relegation to the National League, the 2024 Coupe de France semi-final for the thrills, and a host of casting errors: at VA too, the emotional roller coaster has been moving at full speed.

On both sides of the Channel, they've taken the same winding path to arrive at the same conclusion: the sporting side isn't there yet, but no one is condemning Sport Republic. "Because from a financial point of view, the club is in much better shape, there's no debate about that," assures Martin Sanders. "The business side is also doing well." » Proof of this is that, despite relegation to the Championship, season tickets are a hit at Southampton, and Will Still's new team is almost guaranteed to play the entire next season in front of a full stadium (around 32,000 seats).

Here again, VAFC has followed the same trajectory as its British big brother, with a successful club restructuring at all levels, sporting results that are still awaited, but financial stability that is very valuable in the National League and in the economic context of French football. So this is what multi-ownership is all about? A method applied to all clubs that produces the same results, whether good or bad? Could VA's future therefore be seen in what's happening at Southampton?

"What we need is to build an environment based on data and science, conducive to performance, to develop players' talents." Dragan Solak, Serbian director of Sport Republic, owner of VAFC

"If I were Valenciennes, I would be happy to belong to a group like this, which allows for financial stability, but I'm also a little worried about my good players leaving here," says Adam Blackmore. "To be honest, people here don't always understand the value of having several clubs; they think, 'Why spend money on others when you could invest everything in Southampton?' But hey, you know the fans; they always want everything for their team. I believe the system Sport Republic is implementing is especially interesting in terms of resources, skill sharing, and analysis. Each club can benefit from it. At least, Solak is fully convinced of that."

Dragan Solak is taking over.

Dragan Solak is the man at the top of the Sport Republic pyramid. At 60, this Serbian billionaire—who made his fortune in media and telecoms—and a supporter of Red Star Belgrade, is the financier of the investment fund. And therefore the one who makes the final decisions. Adam Blackmore is one of the few to have met the businessman, who has never yet been to Valenciennes, but is nonetheless the real boss. It was a few weeks ago when the BBC reporter was invited, along with a colleague from the Daily Echo, the local daily, to a golf course in Slovenia owned by the head of Sport Republic. "For three years, I'd been regularly requesting interviews, and suddenly things clicked. The man I met convinced me; I saw someone charismatic and engaging. Finally meeting him made me realize that our clubs are in good hands." »

This interview reveals about twenty minutes of conversation in which Solak reveals part of his strategy. "We thought of the Sport Republic concept mathematically, but football is anything but mathematics. Even with the best possible strategy, there's always an element of uncertainty. Team chemistry is a science of detail. What's needed is to build an environment based on data and science, conducive to performance, to develop players' talents. Even with that, there will always be an element of uncertainty, but having several clubs allows us to help each other, and ultimately, I think we'll get there," Dragan Solak confided.

This departure from the Sport Republic boss is not an accident and follows his takeover that began at the beginning of the year. Until then, the Serbian had been relatively discreet, having mainly delegated the management of his clubs, including his flagship Southampton. In January, he stepped out of the shadows and took over as chairman, the equivalent of president, replacing the Dane Henrick Kraft, who was ousted at the same time as VAFC's president in favor of the Belgian Dirk Gerkens. "It will never be officially announced, but Dragan Solak has had enough of the lack of results," explains Adam Blackmore. "It's his money that's at stake, he's not crazy, he wants his affairs to be well managed." "He was furious about what was being done with his money," adds Martin Sanders. "So he took the reins, and it's probably for the best. Since he's been there, we feel more leadership."

"I've regained faith."

Observers of the Saints are unanimous: while the change in leadership didn't prevent relegation to the Championship, Southampton has found more stability and consistency in its approach. It's also possible to cut a few heads, if necessary. The arrival of German Johannes Spors as the group's sporting director in February was particularly welcomed. "After relegation two years ago, it was as if a storm had hit the city; it was a catastrophe. Many players left, whereas now, despite the terrible season we've just had, things are paradoxically more serene. They made a good choice of coach in Will Still and a recruitment that seems intelligent and logical," summarizes Adam Blackmore.

"If you had spoken to me at the end of last year, I would have told you how worried I was..."
Adam Blackmore, on the situation at VAFC

Here again, this analysis closely matches the situation in Valenciennes, where, after two years of procrastination and a string of poor sporting decisions, real coherence is emerging from the arrival of Stéphane Moulin and the accompanying transfer window. Decisions have also been made in the North. The failure of former sporting director Ben Chorley has been confirmed, and he has been replaced by Mathieu Frison, while general manager Yoann Godin has been strengthened in recent months. Finally, the right formula for everyone? Our BBC colleague wants to believe it. "If you had spoken to me at the end of last year, I would have told you how worried I was," Blackmore confesses. "But the direction taken in recent months, seeing Solak get involved, reassures me. I think it can work, I've found my faith again." The same faith that continues to inspire the faithful at Saint Mary's Stadium in Southampton and those at the Hainaut Stadium in Valenciennes.