hello, everybody. a very warm welcome to talking business weekly with me, aaron heslehurst. let's go and take a look at what's on the show. the saudis are splashing out on sport. golf, football and boxing are all being punched with cash. but what does this middle eastern money mean for the business of sport? qatar, bahrain and the uae are also upending the sporting establishment. but is it all about prestige, profit, or trying to take the focus away from human rights concerns? i'm going to be discussing all of that with these two. there they are. a leading expert on the links between sport and politics, and a top us sports investor who thinks there's millions to be made from playing for profit. also on the show, i'm going to catch up with the man who puts the big deals together for boxers such as anthony joshua and jesse rodriguez. i'm going to ask him how saudi arabia's vast oil wealth is reshaping the prizes on offer in his big money sport.

wherever you'rejoining me from around the world, once again, a big hello and a warm welcome to the show. you know, eye—watering sums of money are being thrown at sports all over the world, but it's the middle east that seems to be doing most of the buying. and saudi arabia in particular. whether it's in football, golf, formula 1, boxing or cricket, billions of dollars are flowing in. so what impact is it having on the business model that has allowed these sports to become, well, some of the world's most popular forms of entertainment? just a few weeks ago, saudi arabia's sovereign wealth fund known as pif, agreed a deal to merge its live golf series with the us and european tours. the saudis, they're thought to be pumping in $3 billion. it'll bring their acrimonious rivalry, including lawsuits, to an end. football, it's also seen an influx of saudi cash. back in december, cristiano ronaldo signed for al—nasr

for around $220 million a year. it does include commercial activities, but it is the biggest salary football has ever seen. and two years ago there was a $385 million takeover of the english premier league team, newcastle united, and the subsequent signing of expensive new players has propelled them into the riches of the champions league and led rivals to complain about unfair competition. last year, our sports editor dan roan tried to ask the man who runs pif about these investments as the very first liv tournament got underway. but what can it do for golf, do you think? it's the big thing in golf, and we're going to enjoy it. that's why i'm here. i'm going to play the pro and i'm going to have a lot of, hopefully fun playing with, like, five or six players. thank you. can i ask you quickly about suggestions of sports washing? what do you say to that? what's your response? i'm really not sure

about this terminology. but newcastle united, can i ask about that? e—sports, boxing and formula one, they're also seeing saudi dollars speeding in. saudi arabia, it's not the only middle eastern country investing its vast oil and gas wealth in sport. qatar is estimated to have spent $220 billion on hosting last year's world cup, and its sovereign wealth fund owns the top french football team, paris saint—germain. the united arab emirates, the uae has also spent heavily with abu dhabi united group owning a string of football teams, including european champions manchester city and dubai state—owned airline emirates is a prominent sponsor of many leading teams and tournaments. whilst profits have been made on some of these investments, most have resulted in questions about whether that's the primary motivation. this is sports washing. it's part of a clear strategy to use the glamour and reach of elite sport to change the conversation away from the country's appalling human rights record.

that rights record is getting worse, not better. it includes the growing repression of human rights activists and the banning of organisations. that includes, for example, 3a years in prison for a woman, who simply tweeted peacefully her views about the country. its includes a trebling of executions in one year, including 81 people killed in a single day. the continued exploitation of migrant workers, discrimination against women and minority groups and of course, still no justice for the dissidentjournalist jamal khashoggi. and those worries are highlighted by the death ofjamal khashoggi at the saudi consulate in istanbul, have led us senators and the us justice department to open investigations about competition, national security and the impact of sports washing. in a recent interview with our colleagues at cbs, the saudi sports minister denied that the money was being spent to shift attention from human rights concerns. it's not true, when you look at the benefits that we get out

of sports and these events, all of these facts benefit the population in saudi arabia. and that's what that's why we're doing it. we also tried to interview the saudi government but didn't receive a reply to our request. and the question i wanted to ask is why is so much money flowing into sport? so instead, i turned to a leading academic who's been studying the links between money, power and sport for more than 25 years and is currently part of the cma business school in paris. professor simon chadwick, a real pleasure having you on the show. and simon, let'sjust start with this. why is saudi arabia spending so many billions of dollars on sport? when you look at it, let's be frank, not a country with a reputation for a deep sporting heritage. so two responses to that. i think the first is around the sport itself. there is a lot of engagement. there's established engagement with sports like football. but the sporting heritage of saudi arabia as well

is bound up in camel racing and falconry, also in equine sports as well. so there is a sporting culture there. we're not making a giant leap into the unknown as far as what saudi arabia is doing, there are lots of reasons for it. there's an economic component. this is an economy hugely dependent upon oil and gas revenues in a world that is kicking back against fossilfuels. it needs to diversify very, very quickly, especially in terms of ensuring the resilience of its economy. at the same time, unemployment is high, and sport is seen as one of the ways of generating new jobs and new revenue streams. at the same time, sport is a public health intervention. and of course, there are always political dimensions. absolutely. there are image and reputational benefits associated with investing in sport. but we know that there are a lot of critics saying that saudi arabia's investments in sports is sports washing, an attempt to distract the outside world from its human rights records. but how much of this

is internal, trying to to make sure that the younger people are kept happy, so that they're still happy for the royalfamily, basically, to maintain their grip on power? what's particularly interesting about saudi arabia and accusations of sport washing is if we're thinking about this externally, we're here today to talk about it, so we're not forgetting about it. so it does tend to suggest that if there is a sport washing effect, that it may be manifesting itself in a different direction, possibly internally. and i think what we are seeing is, is the saudi authorities catering for the needs, catering for the demands of its predominantly gen—z population, so that that population doesn't question too much, so that it doesn't challenge too much. and what it certainly, absolutely doesn't do is it doesn't take to the streets and challenge the hegemony in a way that we saw during the arab spring years, ii or 12 years ago. and that saudi wealth fund, the pif, says it's currently worth around $700 billion and the aim is to increase

that tenfold, so that becomes the world's largest sovereign wealth fund. how much do you think the saudis are prepared to spend on sport? i think short to medium term, we'll see more of the same, we'll increasingly see infrastructural projects coming online. ultimately, longer term, my feeling is that we will see saudi arabia perhaps becoming the home for sports governing bodies. i've been asked frequently recently, what's the end game? i can imagine fifa, the ioc, maybe one of these other big global organisations, global governing bodies, relocating to riyadh or to neom, for example. that will be the end game. when it stops, i think is it will stop in one of two ways, it becomes self sustaining, or alternatively, it will stop when saudi arabia believes that it has ascended to this position, whereby instead of talking about the best football league in the world as being the premier league, or instead of talking about switzerland as the home

of sports governance, what we'll be doing is we'll be talking about riyadh and jeddah and neom and saudi arabia more generally as these homes of sport. and of course, we know saudi isn't the only middle eastern nation investing heavily in sports. i mean, that's also been the case with qatar, as we saw last year's world cup and also with the united arab emirates, the uae. i mean, i'm wondering how these rivalries are influencing their investments in the sporting arena. so we had abu dhabi, then we had qatar, and now we've got saudi arabia. the perfect storm potentially could be where they all begin to, to try and outcompete each other. you know, keeping in mind, for instance, that kuwait has the largest sovereign wealth fund in the entire middle east. but what we do see is this kind of copying behavior. you know, the gulf region in particular seems to be caught up in this cycle of copying at the moment. and, simon, let me end on this. basically, where is all of this heading? so this is absolutely

an exercise in legitimacy on behalf of saudi arabia. and so what saudi arabia is looking for is the point at which, when people talk about saudi arabia, they don't talk about some of the more unsavoury issues, some of the human rights issues, some of the issues around sport washing. instead, they're saying great sport, great athletes, fantastic country to hold events in. well, on that point, professor simon chadwick, a real pleasure having you on the show. we appreciate your time and i'll check in with you soon. thank you. thank you for inviting me. you know, the business of sport is one that makes us money from activities including broadcasting deals, sponsorship and selling merchandise to fans. but it also goes beyond that. in fact, one european union study found that sport made up more than 2% of the entire economy. so i've been speaking to the founder of the top sports investment firm, its us—based bruin capital, which works with everyone from fifa to the nba and golf�*s pga and european tours

about the impact of these saudi investments. george pyne, a real pleasure having you on the show. and george, let's start with this because, boy, you know, when you look at the huge amounts of cash that saudi arabia through its pif, which is its sovereign wealth fund, and other middle eastern countries, what they're pouring into sports. i'm just wondering, george, what changes is all of this money causing? well, i think a couple of things. one, sports as an asset class is becoming more embraced by investors around the world. what it means is sports or sports businesses or teams or federations or clubs could accelerate their growth. also, teams, federations, clubs are going to have to think defensively, what does it mean to have all this capital sloshing around? where do i have a potential blind spot or weakness? i think also, depending on what the investment is in, it really, it really can change

the game on the pitch. and george, you know, the big deal at the moment is the gulf deal bringing togetherthe us, pga, europe's dp world tour and of course the saudi—backed liv golf. and of the three, it's the saudis that are pouring billions of dollars in. why does that make financial sense? golf has the potential to be truly a great global game, but it's run by regional enterprises. and in orderfor golf to become a great global game, it needs the risk capital to go in and grow the game on an international basis. and so saudi arabia is going to provide the capital to grow and build golf around the world and take risk capital. risk capital that the gp tour and the pga tour. was not willing to commit. well, let me ask you this, because it's reported that the saudis are throwing in around 3 billion to grow the game commercially. and, george, just for the uninitiated, why does it

take billions to do that? and what do you think that growth will look like? you're going to have to go and work out deals with the various regional entities to build the game on a global basis. beyond that, it'll take investments in golf courses and i'm sure there'll be condominiums and hotels and investment and training, investment and media. so it will take a substantial amount of investment to really build professional golf at the highest level. to be successful, you need money to do that. and i think what this allows is for the globalisation of golf in a way that we've never thought of before, which i think is deserving of the game. and george, i want to pick out another particular deal, because at the end of last year, saudi arabia made cristiano ronaldo the highest paid footballer in history around something like 220 million bucks a year. it does include commercial activities, but given saudi football isn't the most popular league in the world, what's the rationale behind that sort of deal?

well, i think the saudis, it could be any territory, is trying to build a football business in their country. and so what they have to do to do that is attract marquee players to come play in your tour or your national league. and that will help build the league, will help draw attention. you're going to have to do a little bit of loss leading in order to build a business in a particular territory. some are asking what impact does that have on wages in the rest of the game? well, i think for a period of time it will increase the wages for sure. right. and that's not a new phenomenon. when new upstart leagues come out, they have to overpay the players or they're going to go be aggressive in paying the players, and that's going to increase the cost of the players. so it's going to drive the cost up for sure. if it drives the cost up, surely that means that clubs are going to have to find more ways to make the money back from, say, fans, such as higher prices

for tickets or, you know, replica shirts, for example. for sure, they're going to have to increase the prices. but also you're opening up new markets and it's going to open up new revenue streams that didn't exist. now, time will tell. there's no guarantee that they'll be successful, but that's the thought process behind it. george, i want to talk about broadcasting or at least televising sports, because i'm wondering if you try to move to a model where individual sports are selling streaming subscriptions direct to fans, are you not looking at a more uncertain financial outlook? well, we're in a transition, right? the money today is still in the old media, but the future is going to be in the streaming. however, overtime, the new streaming model will have new revenue streams as well. and i think you'll be hearing a concept called the lifetime value of the consumer and the ability to offer value to the consumer that the clubs or properties will be able to make more money from. so in that transition, though, it's going to be tricky and there's a potential

for adjustment in terms of what revenue can be generated by a club or a federation. so george, as we've been saying, you know, we know the saudis have been pouring huge sums into football, formula i, boxing, cricket, and the accusations from the critics of, you know, they're levelling this and saying, look, this is all to detract from human rights concerns. is it as simple as that, in your opinion, or is there more to these investments than just the prestige? yeah, i think there's more to it. i think they're trying to reinvent their country away from energy and trying to create new lifestyle businesses in their country. and they're making investments to do so. and time will tell whether they're good investments or not, but they're investing in an asset class sports that the value has gone up for like 30 or a0 years. so logically, investing in sports so far has been a good investment for most people around the world. and obviously, in this case,

you know, saudi arabia has some human rights concerns and we'll see how that plays out over time. but sports is a good investment, and sports also brings other people and cultures together in the ways that other business opportunities cannot. and george, let me end on this, because there have been suggestions that saudi arabia might be interested in buying formula one or investing in in men's tennis. george, do you think there's more spending to come and which sports are ripe for these kind of for these investments? the number of people that are investing in sports is an asset class today has increased dramatically. so to me, for somebody, if i'm a public investment fund with $700 billion, i'm probably going to invest more in various sports and i think places where there. things are underdeveloped and need capital, i think are going to be great opportunities for investors, notjust saudi arabia, but a whole number of investors. and you're seeing it, the number of investors in sports in the last ten years

has dramatically increased. well, on that point, george pyne, a real pleasure having you on the show and i appreciate your time. my pleasure. thanks for having me. really appreciate the opportunity. good to be with you. you know, back in 2019, saudi arabia really put itself on the sporting map when it secured the right to host the biggest boxing match of them all, the heavyweight championship of the world. it's been widely reported that the fight which saw anthonyjoshua beat andy ruinr cost the host the best part of $100 million in hosting fees and prize money. so i've been speaking to one of the men behind that deal, the chief executive of matchroom boxing, frank smith. a real pleasure having you on my show. and frank, let me start with this, because in many ways, you are where this saudi investment in sport really started, the anthonyjoshua versus andy ruinr fight back in 2019. that was something of a watershed moment for saudi investment in sport. so, frank, i've got to ask you, how did it come

about that riyadh hosted a world championship fight? we've had a lot of approaches over the years from saudi entities to bring events over. and we had an approach from prince khalid aziz around bringing anthonyjoshua. and, you know, ithink the truth is we've been approached, as i say, on so many occasions that you don't quite believe it because you have so many people come on to you and say we want to bring a huge event. and this isn'tjust a saudi, but across the middle east, you go down the path of six months of discussing and then it doesn't get anywhere. so i don't think we really believed it at the time when this discussion came up, it was only when it moved very quickly within. we had to make a decision whether we took this event to cardiff. so i think that helped, the fact we were in a rush meant that these negotiations couldn't be prolonged. we gave them very strict deadlines and they and they stuck to it. and that showed that they had huge intent to bring massive sporting events to the region. and, frank, when you're

looking after an athlete, what do you think about? because i'm wondering, is it simplyjust getting the most money in a short career or are there other considerations? i think you have to look at it from all angles. at the same time, boxing compared to other sports, is one of the most dangerous sports out there. and, you know, any fight could be your last. i think at that point, you have to look at being able to deliver the best possible opportunities for your fighters and that, you know, nine times out of ten is financial. you know, it depends at what stage of their career as well. if you're building them up, you can take a different view if you have a long term view of a fighter. but if they're in the sort of peak of their career, as you know, anthony is the heavyweight world champion at the time, it was the right time to take those types of fights. frank, when you're picking locations forfights, what can other cities and countries do to secure them when they can't compete with somewhere like saudi arabia in terms of the dollars that they offer to host these things? i think one thing that

helped saudi well, saudi and the middle east region and notjust the middle east, but government funding with events is making events that maybe aren't possible historically. yeah, possible. you know, sometimes some fights arejust, it's too hard to negotiate and they don't get over the line for many different reasons. and having that funding helps deliver events that otherwise wouldn't take place in other markets. i don't think you're going to see a huge reduction in events in other territories. we look at the core markets for where we can deliver. uk for us is obviously our core initial market. we were in for boxing, us, we go to new york, las vegas, all of these territories want internationally renowned events and i don't think it's going to be singled outjust to one country. we know that the saudis have made no secret of wanting to boost their economy through sport and then the tourism that brings. but from your perspective, what does it do economically for any city that hosts major events like a world heavyweight title fight?

i think, you know, every city and every destination will have different views of what they want from it. you know, certain places we go to, we recently did an event in abu dhabi with the department of culture and tourism. that was heavily led by driving tourism into abu dhabi. and that was the focus for them. other territories, and like i say, when you talk about saudi, for example, i think their big drive is to aid and grow participation of these sports in the country. when we first went to saudi in 2019, the growth from 2019 to 2020, i believe was around 600% in people attending boxing gyms. so, you know, every market we go to will have a different view and vision of what they want us to deliver with the event. and a lot of the the focus from a lot of the governments is tourism led and driving tourism. when the saudis recently did their major deal in the world of golf,

rory mcilroy said, and i quote, "at the end of the day, money talks." is he right? is sport just about money these days? all of these territories want internationally renowned events. i don't think itjust comes down to sport. i think any business you know, every business has to have a focus around money. if you're the best at what you do, you deserve to get paid every penny, you know. and i think, pga had long sort of ruled the sport of golf and someone else came in who wanted to take over. and, you know, you can't stop that. you can't stop that in any sport. and they put the funding behind it. and like i say, any business, an athlete has to treat themselves like a business as well. and, you know, they have a short career and you need to do everything within your power to make as much money as possible. so, look, i understand it from an athlete's point of view completely. frank, as you know, some critics say that saudi arabia,

it shouldn't be hosting major sporting events because of their human rights record with government critics being jailed and killed. what's your response to that? you'll always get questions around the politics, around the sport as well. but i think we have to sort of split the two up. you know, politics is not our place to get involved in. that is the way i look at it now. we want to deliver the best opportunities for our athletes, and we also want to grow the grass roots of the sports we're involved in in these territories. and if that can benefit the countries long term being a sport we're involved in, then i think it's beneficial. frank, is there any country where you wouldn't put a fight on me because of human rights concerns? 0bviously, there's countries legally we wouldn't be able to put events on for sure. you know, sanctioned countries where we wouldn't be able to put shows on. but when it comes to putting on events, our business is to deliver the biggest

sporting events in the world. it's what we do week in, week out, you know. and like i say, i think we have to separate the politics from the sports themselves. i think there's benefits and we're going to learn a lot over the coming years with more and more events going to these new territories. and frank, let me end on this, because you've obviously worked closely with the saudis to to put the fights on. are there any limits to their sporting ambitions? because i'm just wondering, do you think, you know, they could end up replacing the likes of las vegas and new york as well, sort of the home of boxing? i don't think there's any limit to what they can do in sport. you know, we've seen that with the investment. and i think it's only going to continue, you know, across a whole host of sports. on that point, frank smith, an absolute pleasure having you on the show, my friend. thanks for your time and i'll check in with you soon. no problem. thank you for having me. well, that's it for this week. i hope you enjoyed the show. don't forget, you can keep up with the latest on our global

economy on the bbc website or the smartphone app. of course, you can also follow me on twitter. tweet me. i'll treat you back. you can get me a bbc hour. thanks for watching. i'll see you soon. bye— bye. hello there. it was a very thundery start to the weekend, and particularly so across parts of the west midlands, into north—west england. and later, those storms spread their way northwards, into scotland, during the overnight period. part two of the weekend looks a little bit better. there will be sunny spells around, but further showers too and low pressure always close by, and these weather fronts, which will continue to generate these showers and thunderstorms. now, we start sunday off on a bright note, plenty of sunshine. that's the overnight rain — thundery in places, clearing northwards, so it could be quite wet in 0rkney all day. an area of rain, some of it thundery, could affect east anglia and the south—east for a time through the morning. then that clears into the afternoon, and then it's sunny spells, scattered showers. most of these, northern ireland, wales and western england. now, it's going to be a cooler,

fresher day across the board. top temperature, around 23 degrees in the south—east. so we could have some disruption at wimbledon for that early rain. but then, into the afternoon, it does look like conditions will improve, with increasing amounts of sunshine. so as you move into sunday evening, most of the showers fade away — not completely, but most of them will. we'll see lengthy, clearer skies, but across the south—west, here, we'll see some cloud thickening, with increasing breeze too. temperatures lower, fresher than what we've had over the last few nights. range from 10 to 12 degrees. cooler than that out of towns and cities. this area of low pressure will throw out further weather fronts into the south—west. this area of cloud will thicken up further. we'll see outbreaks of rain, strengthening winds — south—west england, into wales, pushing into the midlands. some of this could be quite heavy. elsewhere, it's sunny spells, scattered showers. so we could be up to around 2a degrees in the south—east, given plenty of sunshine. a little bit lower than that further north. but as you move out of monday into tuesday, this area of low pressure sits right on top of the uk, so a really unsettled day, i think, on tuesday. it'll be quite breezy. there will be some sunny spells

in—between, but showers or longer spells of rain, and some of these showers could turn out to be heavy and thundery in places. pretty much anywhere could catch a shower. and temperatures will be lower, 16 to 21 or 22 degrees. that's below par for the time of year. and temperatures fall further as we move deeper into the week. this area of low pressure pushes towards the north of the uk, bringing some cooler air down on that north—westerly wind. so it stays unsettled for much of this upcoming week, with temperatures below par for the time of year. there will still be some sunshine in—between the showers.

when they were 17. live from washington, this is bbc news. further allegations tonight concerning a bbc presenter accused of paying a teenager for sexually explicit photographs, beginning