Nottingham Forest ‘very confident’ of avoiding multi-club breach after Evangelos Marinakis move
Nottingham Forest are “very confident” they will avoid breaching Uefa’s multi-club ownership rules if they win the Europa League.
That is according to former Manchester City financial adviser Stefan Borson, who exclusively told Football Insider talks may have been held with the governing body around the situation at the City Ground.
Forest beat Aston Villa 1-0 in the first leg of their Europa League semi-final tie last week, with the reverse fixture taking place on Thursday (7 May) at Villa Park.
Vitor Pereira’s side would qualify for the Champions League if they manage to win the second-tier competition this season.
However, Evangelos Marinakis’s ownership of Forest and Olympiacos, who could also qualify for the elite European club competition, presents a potential issue.
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Marinakis has put Forest into a blind trust as Uefa’s rules prohibit clubs controlled by the same owners or directors from competing in the same European competition.
The ownership change didn’t appear on Companies House until 17 April despite the governing body setting a strict deadline of 1 March to comply with the regulations.
| Europa League Knock-Out Round Opponents | Result |
| Fenerbahce (A) | 3-0 (W) |
| Fenerbahce (H) | 2-1 (L) |
| FC Midtjylland (H) | 1-0 (L) |
| FC Midtjylland (A) | 2-1 (W) (3-0 on penalties) |
| Porto (A) | 1-1 |
| Porto (H) | 1-0 (W) |
| Aston Villa (H) | 1-0 (W) |
Speaking exclusively to Football Insider, Borson discussed Forest’s potential issue with Uefa.
“They say they’re very confident,” said Borson.
“They’d certainly like to have a go at it by winning the Europa League. Clearly, they took a step towards that with a win in the first leg against Villa. Villa are still maybe just about favourites to get to the final.
“You would think either of Villa or Forest if they get to the final would win it given the opposition, and then it will be dependent on whether Olympiacos are in the mix or not. It may never come to fruition, and the blind trust may never be relevant.
“But if there is an issue, Olympiacos are going to finish higher, and they are therefore going to be the preferred team if there is a conflict under Article 5.
“We’ll just have to see what conversations took place with Uefa before 1 March, and whether they were given any comfort that as long as they did certain things by 1 March, they would be fine to process the change once the owners’ and directors’ test had passed, which didn’t occur until 17 April.”
How Nottingham Forest missed Uefa’s multi-club deadline
Borson insisted Forest will be unable to argue the filings for the blind trust were in place before the 1 March deadline.
“I’ve heard a few people doubt whether you can take the Companies House filings as being definitive in terms of when the club was put into the blind trust,” said Borson.
“The filings are pretty clear that they took effect in mid-April, so I don’t think that they will have an argument that it all took place on 1 March. It definitely took place in April.
“The question would be whether Uefa had effectively told them, ‘Yes, as long as you’ve done X, Y and Z by 1 March and all you’re waiting for is the owners’ and directors’ test from the Premier League to sign off, we will be happy to allow you to play in the same competition’.
“The problem is Uefa won’t confirm either way, so we don’t know. Forest are confident, but the first thing they’ve got to do anyway is win the Europa League.”