Betic counselor José María Gallego, in talks to buy Real Zaragoza

Jose Maria Gallego, counselor of the Real Betis which in turn owns the Blackberry, club of the League 3 Portuguese, is in talks with Fernando Sainz from Varanda Y Juan Uguet, councilors of the Real Zaragoza and nephews of Cesar Alierta, to carry out a purchase-sale operation of the shareholding package of the blanquillo club owned by the former president of Telefónica (49%), valued at around 20 million euros, as reported Herald of Aragon (family property Yarza, another of the club’s reference shareholders) and has been able to confirm MD.

Jose Maria Gallego has the backing of a North American fund to set up a multiclub project in Europe, to which the Blackberry and a club that the group could acquire in Spain, which is why it has entered into discussions with the shareholders of the Zaragoza, although these are still in an embryonic state.

The Real ZaragozaBefore the end of 2021, you need three million euros to meet your payment obligations. Between January 2022 and the end of the season, next June, the Aragonese club will need another 9 million. The net debt of the Maño club has fallen from 71 million euros to 68 in the last year, as reported in the Shareholders’ Meeting held last Tuesday, which was not attended by several of the entity’s reference shareholders, due to the disagreements between them.

To undertake the purchase operation of the shares of the Zaragoza, Galician would need the participation of an investment fund to help restructure the debt of the club maño, otherwise the operation is unviable, as confirmed by sources close to the Betic counselor MD.

Last summer, the Real Zaragoza was about to be sold to society Spain Football Capital, group led by the brothers Alvarez del Campo and the lawyer Kiko Dominguez. The negotiations advanced to the point of finalizing the drafting of a contract that the two parties approved and agreed to. Carlos Lapetra, current president of the Maño club, even announced that “the sale operation, in its contractual details, has been closed for a long time. The signature and the arrival of the funds are missing.” But those funds did not arrive and Zaragoza is still in the hands of Cesar Alierta and three other families: Yarza, owners of the Herald, Juan Forcen, promoter, and Carlos Iribarren, of the automotive sector.

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