Leonid Fedun and his “Spartak” – Sport – Kommersant

This week it was announced that Leonid Fedun, who has been considered the owner of FC Spartak since 2004, will leave the team. Let’s summarize his work.

Victories and defeats

“I am an enthusiast… First of all, I love football, I sincerely love it. Secondly, it was extremely disappointing when Spartak began to lose, although he wore the LUKOIL logo on his chest. I wanted to change something, because I saw that the people who are there are not coping.”

In 2004, Leonid Fedun acquired a controlling stake in Spartak from Andrey Chervichenko for $70 million. At that time, the club was going through hard times – after the successful 1990s (from 1992 to only eighth in the Premier League.

During the tenure of Leonid Fedun as president of Spartak, the red-and-whites won only three awards. In 2017, the club earned its only championship under Mr. Fedun and became the owner of the country’s Super Cup, and in 2022 won the Russian Cup. Celebrating the victory in 2017, Leonid Fedun drank moonshine on the Evening Urgant program with the words: “You don’t need glasses, they drink this from a container.”

Six times Spartak managed to get the silver medals of the Russian championship (2005-2007, 2009, 2012, 2021) and once he took bronze (2018). In European competition, the best result was reaching the quarter-finals of the Europa League in the 2010/11 season. But everything ended unsuccessfully there – Porto beat Spartak with a score of 10: 3 in the sum of two matches. In the 2021/22 season, the red-whites took 10th place in the Premier League standings, which was the worst result during the presidency of Mr. Fedun.

In terms of the length of his tenure as president of the Premier League club, Leonid Fedun is second only to Evgeny Giner, who has been heading CSKA since 2001. Krasnodar has been run by businessman Sergei Galitsky since 2008, Ilsur Metshin (12 years old) was a long-liver at Rubin, and Alexander Dyukov (9 years) at Zenit.

cash injections

In 2015, one of the shareholders of Spartak, the head of LUKOIL Vagit Alekperov, said that he and Leonid Fedun spend $60 million a year to maintain the club. In 2019, information appeared in the media that Leonid Fedun had spent over $2 billion on Spartak all the time. In May 2022, the media reported that over the next two years, the Spartak budget could be reduced by 60%, rub. up to 4 billion per season

Attendance at matches involving the club grew in the early years, but since 2020 it has begun to decline sharply due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Under Leonid Fedun, the Otkritie Arena stadium was built for Spartak in Tushino. The work was carried out from 2011 to 2014 and cost the businessman 14.5 billion rubles. The stadium hosted the first match in September 2014, and the matches of the 2018 FIFA World Cup were also played here.

From 2004 to 2022, Spartak spent €392.8 million on the acquisition of new players, and earned €231.5 million on the sale of players.

In general, the total transfer value of Spartak varied from €64.3 million to €168.4 million, averaging €110 million.

The most expensive player acquired was Dutch AZ midfielder Guus Thiel, for whom the club paid €18 million. if I’m not mistaken, $87 million. That’s all, you understand? $280 million could have bought three Hulks…”

The most successful sale was the departure of striker Quincy Promes for €21 million.

Promise is reality

As the president of Spartak, Leonid Fedun made various predictions and promises, not all of which came true.

About the IPO

“We have such a fixed idea – to sell part of the block of shares through the stock exchange in order to confirm the money invested.”

“In 2018, Spartak should reach a deficit-free budget thanks to the new infrastructure – and then an IPO is possible.”

Leonid Fedun spoke several times about a possible IPO of the club: first, in 2014, it was planned to enter the stock exchange by the 2018 World Cup in Russia, and in 2019, by 2023. Spartak has not yet entered the stock exchange.

About Spartak and Chelsea

“What is the difference between Spartak and Chelsea? Well, Spartak is a legend in Russian and Soviet sports, while Chelsea, if I’m not mistaken, did not even come close to our achievements … in a few years, Spartak’s income will be comparable to Chelsea, and then we Let’s see who is the bigger club.”

In 2011, Leonid Fedun said that by the end of 2015 the club would become self-sufficient and become a greater club than the English Chelsea. Since that time, Spartak have won only three trophies in the domestic championship and cups, while Chelsea have won the Champions League and the Europa League twice, and became the champion of England the same number of times. Spartak earned 9.4 billion rubles for the 2020/21 season. (£131.8m) and Chelsea’s turnover for the same period was £434.9m.

About Legionnaires

“The number of legionnaires will be reduced. The formula “10 + 15” will most likely be transformed into “9 + 16”, “8 + 17” and so on … My second team is growing, we are specially preparing it, we do not pull it. After some time, the guys will replace the places of legionnaires. There is no other future for Spartak, we are shaping this future ourselves.”

In 2014, Leonid Fedun took a course to reduce the number of foreign players in the club. Currently, there are six legionnaires left in Spartak, including striker Quincy Promes, who recently returned to the team.

About Coach Unai Emery

“Emery is one of the three most progressive coaches in Europe.”

In 2012, Spartak was briefly headed by the Spanish coach Unai Emery. He worked for five months, did not achieve results and was fired by Mr. Fedun, after which Emery’s career went uphill – later with Sevilla he won three Europa Leagues in a row.

About the Champions League

“Winning the Champions League is unrealistic, but with a lot of luck you can reach the semi-finals. Perhaps today this is the peak that Spartak can count on in the current financial realities.

Leonid Fedun has repeatedly set the goal for the club to reach the playoffs of the Champions League, and after the champion title in 2017, he stated that Spartak could reach the semi-finals of the Champions League. Nevertheless, under Mr. Fedun, Spartak never left the group in the Champions League.

On withdrawal from the championship of Russia

“I don’t want to participate in this clownery that they staged. And spend money too. You don’t need Spartak, so you don’t need it!”

In August 2020, in the second round of the Russian Championship after a home match with Sochi, which ended with a score of 2: 2 and in which Spartak conceded both goals after a controversial penalty was awarded, Leonid Fedun announced his intention to remove the team from the tournament. As a result, Spartak continued to participate in the championship, and Mr. Fedun was fined 200 thousand rubles by the RFU for criticizing the refereeing.

About the future of Spartak

“After much deliberation, I made the following decision: in 2023, when we complete all the infrastructure changes and, I hope, look for new sources for real self-financing of Spartak, which will not depend on shareholders, the club will be ready for independent swimming.”

In June 2019, Leonid Fedun announced his intention in 2023 to transfer a controlling stake in Spartak to a non-profit organization, whose members would be “all fans” of the team. In August 2022, Mr. Fedun’s stake was sold to LUKOIL.

On the future of Russian football

“It is necessary to convert quasi-state benefits and sponsorship into transparent state support for professional leagues. The best way to do this is through the mechanism of media rights with a direct dependence on sports results … This will completely change the system of our football. From subsidized and distributive, it should become self-financing with powerful sports incentives.”

In September 2018, Leonid Fedun published an article in which he proposed administrative measures to tighten the rules for licensing teams and reduce the number of clubs in the Russian Premier League. He proposed to make the main emphasis on creating conditions under which clubs would be able to form a significant part of the budgets from the proceeds from the sale of rights to television broadcasts. So far, these ideas have not been implemented.

Evgeny Fedunenko