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Meet Nottingham Forest’s ‘sugar daddy’ who has spent over £150m on Awoniyi, Dennis, others

Interesting facts about Nottingham Forest owner, Evangelos Marinakis, who is responsible for the club splashing over £150m on 16 new signings so far.
Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis is responsible for splashing the cash on Emmanuel Dennis and Taiwo Awoniyi
Nottingham Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis is responsible for splashing the cash on Emmanuel Dennis and Taiwo Awoniyi

Nottingham Forest have announced the signing of Morgan Gibbs-White for a £25 million fee rising to £45 million, taking their overall spend this summer to over £150 million.

That enormous amount of money has been expended by Nottingham Forest on 16 new players (and counting) so far this transfer window, including Super Eagles stars Taiwo Awoniyi and Emmanuel Dennis.

Their transfer activities have been very well publicised so far with manager Steve Cooper at the forefront but the man responsible for the spending really is Evangelos Marinakis, the owner of Nottingham Forest.

Who is Evangelos Marinakis?

Evangelos Marinakis is a 55-year-old from Greece who owns two football clubs, Nottingham Forest and Olympiacos.

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Marinakis is also a shipowner, media mogul, lyricist and politician according to his Wikipedia page.

A biography on his website describes Marinakis as an international businessman and investor who first made his name in the shipping industry, but has since then also invested in media and football in Greece and the UK.

Marinakis has an estimated net worth of $3 billion and is known for being happy to invest funds in the football teams he owns, especially Nottingham Forest.

Marinakis is Nottingham Forest’s sugar daddy

Evangelos Marinakis has owned his hometown club, Piraeus-based Olympiacos since 2010 where he also serves as club president but it wasn’t until 2017 that he became involved with Nottingham Forest.

Marinakis completed the £50 million transaction to buy Nottingham Forest in May 2017 and has since ploughed millions into the team in a bid to help take them back to the Premier League.

And now that the club gained promotion back to the top flight for the first time in 23 years, Marinakis is not shying away from splashing the cash.

The 55-year-old promised to back head coach Steve Cooper financially in the transfer market when they gained promotion, “Now is the time to give Steve all the ammunition he needs, to be able to not only survive but bring some good results”

He has since made good on that promise with over £150 million worth of new signings coming into the club to help establish Nottingham Forest as a Premier League team.

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