Secretive billionaire's takeover bid for Newcastle

One of Britain's wealthiest and most secretive businessmen yesterday launched a surprise £133.1m takeover bid for Newcastle United after announcing he had already bought a 41.6 per cent stake in the club for £55.3m.

Billionaire Mike Ashley, who in February floated his Sports Direct retail business, said his bid vehicle, St James Holdings Ltd (SJHL), had bought 55.3 million shares from the club's biggest shareholder and life president Sir John Hall at 100p each.

The 42-year-old self-made man was ranked at No 25 in the 2007 Sunday Times Rich List, with an estimated fortune of £1.9bn. He controls a growing empire via his Sports World International group, which includes the Sports World and Lillywhites retail chains.

Yet the owner-in-waiting at St James' Park opts for tracksuit bottoms and T-shirt over suit and tie, never gives interviews, and avoids being photographed. Even his closest advisors are unsure of his plans for the club ­ should his buy-out succeed ­ and he has been described by Philip Beresford, who compiles the Rich List, as "easily Britain's answer to the late Howard Hughes".

Newcastle supporters will not necessarily be persuaded that Ashley is the "avid football fan" that one source suggested last night. "He follows England, certainly," the source said, but added that he had "no affinity to any one team". The source said "this would obviously change if the takeover goes ahead".

However, any concerns about Ashley's ability to spend heavily at Newcastle ­ if he chooses to do so ­ can be put aside. He has never been known to borrow to build any of his companies and he paid the Hall family in cash. Indeed, half of his fortune is in cash, including the £929m he pocketed when Sports Direct floated. There is no prospect that a takeover would be leveraged against club assets, like the buy-outs at Manchester United and Liverpool.

Ashley is therefore well placed to fund major moves in the transfer market and finally be the man to awaken Tyneside's sleeping giant.

Stock Exchange rules mean that SJHL now has to make a cash offer for the remaining shares, around 29.8 per cent of which belong to Newcastle's chairman, Freddy Shepherd. A formal offer document will be posted to shareholders in the next few weeks and shareholders will have a set time to accept or reject Ashley's 100p per share.

If things run smoothly, Ashley should take full control before the Premiership season starts in August, but Shepherd's stance will make or break the deal. Shepherd has shown little inclination to sell up so far, and resisted takeover approaches from the Jersey-based Belgravia Group and the St James' Park Group.

As late as last week, Shepherd, who has claimed in the past he would not stand in the way of a "Geordie Abramovich", said: "It is a plc matter, but none of these talks came to anything because I am not selling." However, the grounds for his past assertion that, "if the Halls don't sell and I don't sell, there is no way anybody can buy this club" have now shifted. With Newcastle having debts of around £80m, Ashley's offer will be given careful consideration.

In a statement to the Stock Exchange, Ashley said: "I am delighted to have this opportunity to invest in Newcastle United. The club has a fantastic infrastructure, for which Sir John and the board must take much of the credit. Newcastle United has a wonderful heritage and the passion of its fans is legendary. I am sure that, like me, they are already excited about the prospects for next season under the new manager [Sam Allardyce's] stewardship."

Little is known about Ashley's private life, but he is divorced with three children. When his marriage to Linda Jerlmyr, a Swedish property developer, was dissolved in 2002, he agreed a £50m settlement, one of the biggest in British legal history. It is thought that Ashley now lives alone in a Hertfordshire mansion, hidden by trees and protected with CCTV cameras. When the local newspaper tried to find out more about him recently ­ by placing an advert in its own pages ­ nobody responded.

Ashley's business career has not been without controversy. The City has not always been impressed with the transparency of some of his dealings and his companies have been criticised for poor PR.

In 2000, he turned whistleblower on sports retailer rivals, passing evidence of price-fixing on England and Manchester United shirts to the Office of Fair Trading. JJB Sports, owned by the Wigan chairman, Dave Whelan, was fined £6.7m as a result, which should make an interesting topic of pre-match boardroom conversation when Newcastle play Wigan next season.

Sir John Hall departed as co-owner of Newcastle by saying in a Stock Exchange statement: "It is now time for me to move on and let others take up the challenge of competing in the global marketplace. Mike Ashley is a major player in the sporting world and I am convinced that he is the right person to take my place and take the club forward."