Ex-Portsmouth owner Al-Fahim jailed for stealing £5m from wife to buy club

LONDON: The man who owned Portsmouth for six weeks during an ill-fated spell in 2009 has been sentenced to five years in a United Arab Emirates jail for stealing £5m from his wife to fund the purchase.
Sulaiman Al-Fahim, who also fronted the Abu Dhabi United Group’s deal to buy Manchester City in 2008, was found guilty of forgery, using forged documents and aiding and abetting.
He and an accomplice were found to have stolen the money used to buy Pompey from Sacha Gaydamak, with Al-Fahim soon selling the club to Ali Al-Faraj.
Al-Fahim, 42, did not attend the hearing and was sentenced in his absence.
Prosecutors said that Al-Fahim’s wife discovered the money was missing after the returns she had expected from a high interest rate account she opened in 2009 did not come in.
Dubai Criminal Court also convicted the bank manager of theft, forgery of official documents and use of forged official documents. He was also sentenced to five years in prison.
At the time of Al-Fahim’s ownership, Portsmouth were in the Premier League but the club was also in financial difficulty and had struggled to pay players and staff.
Four years later, Pompey had gone into administration twice, suffered three relegations and had seven different owners.
The Premier League has tightened its rules on ownership since Al-Fahim’s brief spell, and stricter criteria now have to be met than at the time of his takeover — with changes introduced largely as a result of the club’s tumultuous ownership history.