A new rescue plan for The Roca Team has emerged, according to Monaco-Matin, centred on a Monaco-based investor who made his fortune in industry and is reportedly prepared to offer a €10 million bank guarantee, along with €1.2 million he says could be deposited into the club’s accounts within a day. The development comes as businessman Benjamin Erisoglu, who has spent recent days working to help save the club, confirmed that an earlier plan involving Brazilian football icon Ronaldinho, through investment vehicle Clayton Sports, is no longer viable, after the group was unable to secure the €10 million bank guarantee that plan required.
The new proposal emerged just as the club’s case was being examined before the CNOSF on the afternoon of Tuesday, August 25, a session Erisoglu says he and his team were shut out of entirely. Speaking to Monaco-Matin shortly after proceedings concluded, he said he and his group had been waiting in front of a screen since 2pm without ever being brought into the discussion, and that they had received no video link from the club’s lawyer, Xavier Le Cerf-Galle.
Erisoglu, the former president of French football club Cholet, said he had only been approached ten days earlier, the previous Sunday, to help find a solution for the club, recalling being told his track record as a driven young entrepreneur spoke for itself, and that those behind the approach wanted him to take on the role of club president. In the days since, he described an intense push to gather the financial guarantees being requested, including daily phone calls running up to 20 hours, two non-disclosure agreements, and two separate letters of intent signed between the club and prospective investors, though the process never reached a final conclusion. He acknowledged the difficulty of convincing investors and decision-makers to commit within such a tight window, noting that the LNB’s president had made clear he wanted, in Erisoglu’s words, both a belt and braces when it came to financial guarantees.
Despite the frustration of Tuesday’s hearing, Erisoglu maintained that the underlying goal remains building a sustainable, long-term project around AS Monaco Basket. What happens next in the case remains to be seen.