Gordon Strachan is now the fourth biggest shareholder at Dundee Football Club.
The club’s technical director took shares in the club in lieu of a salary at the beginning of this year.
And, in doing so, the former Celtic and Scotland manager took on 4% of the club.
A filing with Companies House in February stated over 14 million shares were “issued as payment under a consultancy agreement between the company and Gordon Strachan dated 30 January 2023 and registered in the books of council and session on 28 February 2023”.
The same document states that each share has the “nominal value” of £0.01. Using that value, the shares would be worth £142,222.
That moves him fourth behind majority shareholders Tim Keyes and John Nelms and secondary shareholders Dee4Life.
Third is Carnoustie-based manufacturer Smyth Composites.
Keyes and Nelms at the helm
Football Partners Scotland, the company set up by the Keyes family to purchase Dundee FC back in 2013, own over 240m shares.
Dark Blue Property Holdings, the company set up to build the club a new stadium at Camperdown Park, owns a further 7m.
Fan group and former majority shareholders Dee4Life, previously known as the Dundee FC Supporters Society, have 26m ‘Ordinary’ shares and 15m ‘A Ordinary’ shares.
The ‘A Ordinary’ shares include entrenched rights over the future of the club, including a veto over major events including a change of ownership, a merger, moving to a new stadium and even substantial borrowing.
They possess all 15,475,294 of the ‘A Ordinary’ shares.
In percentage terms, as of the latest Companies House documentation, the Keyes family own 74% of the total shares and 75.6% of the ‘Ordinary’ shares.
Dee4Life’s total is 12.2% of the total shares, 7.6% of the ‘Ordinary’ shares.
Smyth Composites have 4.4% and Strachan is fourth with 4.2%.
Others with more than one million shares include The Forfar Roof Truss Company as well as ‘Graham Thomson, Stephen Martin and Peter Marr as Trustees of Dark Blue Business Trust’ and club director Bob Hynd.
New investment?
The expectation is that since the rules over club ownership in Scottish football have been relaxed that Dundee’s ‘strategic partner’ Burnley would be keen to take a financial interest in the club as well.
Speaking before the rules were changed to allow Bournemouth owner Bill Foley to invest in Hibs, Clarets chairman Alan Pace said: “We are very interested to see how the rules play out and what the feeling is.
“We would never want to go against what the fans and community want, as well as the FA overall.
“The reality is, we thought this was the best way to build a relationship for now. We’ll see if it develops further and, if the rules change, then we are all for considering it.”
It’s understood Keyes and Nelms met with Pace in the past week during Keyes’ visit to the UK.
Also meeting the Dundee owners was John Neace, owner of American second-tier side Louisville City.
He attended the recent St Johnstone match as a guest of Keyes and Nelms.
Neace is the founder of Neace Ventures, a global venture capital and real estate investment firm based in Louisville, Kentucky.
Their website says: “Neace Ventures was formed by chairman, John Neace, after founding, building and selling one of the nation’s largest insurance brokerages.”
The Dark Blues owners – and representative of the Burnley owners – have been tight-lipped over any potential future dealings, however.
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