Liverpool chairman denies $2bn sale talks with Dubai-based company

The chairman of English Premier League side Liverpool has denied reports that club owner Fenway Sports was in talks with a Dubai-based company regarding a GBP1.5bn ($1.96bn) sale.

Tom Werner told the Liverpool Echo there was “no truth” to a story by UAE newspaper The National that Liverpool FC received the bid from Amanda Staveley’s PCP Capital Partners and later rejected it.

“We have better things to do than batting down rumours about negotiations with Ms Staveley,” he was quoted as saying. “However, there’s no truth to them.”

Staveley was previously involved in an attempt by Dubai investors to acquire Liverpool in 2007. The club was instead sold to American duo Tom Hicks and George Gillet before being purchased by Fenway Sports Group in 2010 for GBP300m ($393m).

A ‘Dubai Sheikh’ was also linked to the club before the 2010 deal, former Scotland international Andy Lynch told the Glasgow Evening Times last year.

He said a conglomerate looking to buy a club approached him but the potential GBP400m ($500m) sale was ended at the last minute by the ‘greed’ of the club’s owners.

Read: Dubai Sheikh’s £400m Liverpool bid scuppered by ‘greedy’ owners

PCP have been linked with other Premier League sides in recent months including Newcastle United, which current owner Mike Ashley is looking to sell for an estimated GBP300m ($393m).

Staveley herself was said to have played a key role in the sale of Manchester City to UAE deputy prime minister and minister of presidential affairs Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan in 2008.

A member of Sheikh Mansour’s family was also reported to be pursuing a GBP700m ($918.9m) deal to buy Liverpool last year, according to UK publication the Daily Star.

Read: Emirati lining up takeover bid for Liverpool FC – report