Ashley sues football deal broker Staveley – because she didn’t like Sports Direct logo

BILLIONAIRE Mike Ashley’s 14-year reign

as owner of Newcastle United will be remembered for the fierce criticism he faced from the Premier League club’s fans.

But the Sports Direct boss is now suing the financier who helped broker a deal to sell the club last year – because she allegedly criticised him in public and didn’t like his company’s logo plastered around the club’s stadium.

High Court papers say Amanda Staveley agreed with Mr Ashley not to ‘put him down in public’ or diminish his reputation.

But it is alleged Ms Staveley then made public statements that were ‘highly critical’ of Mr Ashley’s tenure as Newcastle owner that ‘objectively amounted to her passing negative judgment’ on him.

The papers say the actions led to a breach of a £10million loan from Mr Ashley to Ms Staveley and her husband Mehrdad Ghodoussi. Mr Ashley has demanded Ms Stavewhen ley repay the loan, which was provided to pay for costs that she incurred during the takeover.

The row has emerged three months after a group of investors, including the Saudi Public Investment Fund and Ms Staveley’s PCP Capital Partners, bought the club for £305million. It is now fighting relegation from the Premier League.

Relations between the parties had appeared cordial until Mr Ashley filed an initial claim two weeks ago, which was first reported in The Mail on Sunday. The latest documents show he wanted the deal negotiations to be conducted in private amid ‘public vitriol’ directed at him during the negotiations and a media narrative that he was ‘not popular with fans’.

He said Ms Staveley had been ‘involved in exacerbating this narrative’, which included suggestions his tenure had not been successful.

Ms Staveley’s comments referring to the removal of Sports

Direct hoardings at Newcastle’s St James’ Park stadium appear to be at the centre of the claim. She was reported to have said she ‘was looking forward to the Sports Direct signs coming down’ and that it was a ‘slight frustration’

trying to ‘take a picture in the stadium which doesn’t have Sports Direct in it’.

The legal documents suggest Ms

Staveley intended to break ‘the association’ between Mr Ashley and the club when she expressed ‘excitement’ about the removal of the hoardings.

Mr Ashley claims that Ms Staveley refused his calls for immediate repayment of the £10million loan. Ms Staveley and Mr Ghodoussi deny defaulting on the loan agreement.

The legal papers also claim that Newcastle’s new owners prematurely terminated a Sports Direct sponsorship deal. It is claimed that Ms Staveley assured Mr Ashley that the club would ‘endeavour insofar as possible’ to maintain Sports Direct’s sponsorship until the end of the 2021-22 season in May.

However, one month after the takeover, Ms Staveley told Mr Ashley that the Sports Direct sponsorship would end so there would be no ‘free advertising’ for the rest of the season.

Mr Ashley claims there was a premeditated plan to replace Sports Direct as sponsor before the deal was completed and that this was another example of how Ms Staveley had breached the loan agreement.

She is also accused of reneging on a deal to fund Mr Ashley’s £4.5million legal bill from a legal fight with the Premier League over its initial refusal to allow the takeover. It is claimed Ms Staveley said the fees would be covered by the club, with Mr Ashley claiming he received only £2 million.

It is suggested that Ms Staveley offered a full season of sponsorship rights as a means of making up for the £2.5million shortfall.

A spokesman said: ‘Ms Staveley and Mr Ghodoussi do not intend to comment on the details of the litigation, however they are very confident of successfully defending the claim in full.’

Lawyers acting for Mr Ashley did not respond to this newspaper’s request for a comment.