Bollaert is changing scale
One stadium. That is what all of this is really about.
RC Lens confirmed on Monday a reshuffle of its shareholding. Joseph Oughourlian keeps a clear majority with 69.10% of the shares, but he is no longer the only man at the table.
Entrepreneur Equity Partners, an investment fund built around sports infrastructure, comes in with 13.93%. Jean-Paul Lempereur, a long-time backer of the club through his car group, now appears in the ownership as an individual with 2.79%. Side Invest keeps 13.56%. Seko Fofana holds on to his 0.62%.
Try it for $0.99.
Bricks, not a 30 million euro striker
Oughourlian left no room for wishful thinking on this one.
“Their investments will be devoted to the redevelopment projects we are driving for the Bollaert-Delelis stadium and its surroundings,” the Lens owner said in the club statement.
The plan is to turn Bollaert into a site that lives seven days a week rather than one Saturday in two, plugged properly into the town around it. The chairman keeps using the word partners. He avoids the word shareholders.
A club whose ceiling just moved
Lens arrive at this moment off the back of a season that reset expectations. Runners-up to PSG. Coupe de France winners. Trophee des Champions winners. Champions League football to navigate now.
And all of it inside a French game squeezed hard financially. Oughourlian talks about major economic challenges and a push for financial autonomy, which in plain terms means leaning less on television money and more on revenue the club actually controls.
Stadiums take years, not transfer windows. The interesting part starts once the diggers arrive.
Discover the rest of the FOOT news on our mathodds website and app!
in your pocket.
Real-time notifications & alerts
Leave a Reply