Daniel Křetínský has been associated with Sparta for twenty years. One of the richest Czechs, as the main shareholder, who has Patrik Tkáč and the J&T group by his side, gives it long-term financial stability. But big successes didn’t always go hand in hand with that. Only in the last two years did the defense of the championship title and the triumph in the domestic cup recall the successful period even before the arrival of Křetínský. But even he left an indelible mark on Letná, where Sparta plays its matches, in two decades. “It’s really been twenty years, it’s a massacre,” he says for the club’s website.
Sparta she dropped the almost hour long interview with Daniel Křetínský as part of his new paid channel, on which he wants to offer similar bonus content or a preferential option to buy tickets to fans starting at 149 crowns a month. Sparta’s communications director Ondřej Kasík discusses with the club’s owner some painful memories in the past, discusses the key decisions that led to success in recent years, or the significant role of the fans. And also whether it was a mistake when Křetínský once sent the now famous SMS to Karel Poborský, through which he kicked him out of the club.
We pick five of the less interesting topics from the interview, which you can read below. Did Daniel Křetínský ever consider selling Sparta? Why doesn’t the two billion crowns that the club accumulated as part of the cumulative loss bother him so much? Why did he point to František Čupra from EPH as the new general manager years ago, who had not worked in football until then? And under what circumstances would he be willing to put even more money into Sparta than he already has?
When is Daniel Křetínský under stress?
There were two cases of deep prolonged stress in the past. On the one hand, when Sparta was disunited and there was a fight within, between the fans, the club, tension within the club. The lack of unity was a stress factor because you know it’s going to be terribly difficult. And there were such periods. The second moment of great stress is when you see that you are not doing well. (…) There were times when you could see that we were simply playing badly. So the stress starts practically from the beginning of the match, because you can see that we will win only by chance. (…) At such a moment you see a terrible vulnerability, then Karviná and Zlín are deadly rivals. From the first minute you see some superiority, but you know how fragile it is.
Sparta soccer stadium on Letná
Would he sell Sparta?
We went on a mission. And when we set out on it, of course I didn’t understand what it all meant. Today, however, I cannot imagine rationally evaluating whether we should sell Sparta. For me, the only situation where I could even think about it would be if I was convinced that we couldn’t fill the role and there was someone else who could fill it much better and it would be better for the club.
Otherwise, it is our duty to serve the club, its history and do everything we can. There might be an element of arrogance, but even though there were fans who said that, I didn’t feel like there was anyone we could hand Sparta over to who would take care of them better than us. Not because I thought we would do it the best, because objectively enough we didn’t do it, but at least some consistency, loyalty and financial strength always led me to the conclusion that this would not be a solution, but only a gesture that would give Sparta it didn’t help. We are talking about the past.
Were two billion crowns in accumulated losses worth it?
I don’t want to sound arrogant, because I know how much money it is and what can be done with it, but this is not a site that bothers me at all. Really. We have to do what is needed for Sparta, and if it required a significant financial injection, which we could afford, mainly because of our mistakes, then we were obliged to do it. We only paid our bill. We nominated ourselves for a role. We nominated ourselves for the role of owner of Sparta, by deciding to buy the club we nominated ourselves for the obligation to continue its tradition and, among other things, every weekend we decide on the emotions of many people who support Sparta. That’s a huge commitment. And if it is necessary to supply two billion crowns for that commitment, we will supply two billion crowns. If it was necessary to supply more, it would play a role and I could afford it, we will give more.
What is holding back even greater investment?
The first absolutely clear condition is Financial Fair Play (rules for club financing set by UEFA – note ed.). We can now afford to pay more (for player arrivals) also because we can sell much better. We know how to meet the rules we have to follow. If Financial Fair Play did not exist, we are ready to invest more, so the obstacle for us today is not our willingness to invest, but compliance with the rules of Financial Fair Play.
The second important point is that I have always said that it makes sense to invest when we know the recipe for what we are doing. To put it bluntly, if you have an excellent chef and you know what you’re cooking, and he comes to you saying he still needs to add caviar on top that costs some money, that’s when you can afford it. But at the moment when you are cooking eintopf, whether you still add caviar to the eintopf or not makes no sense at all. It’s a waste of money. I don’t want to say that it was always eintopf, but we needed to have a reasonably built self-confidence when we know what we are doing and why we are investing.
Why did he point to František Čupra as CEO of Sparta?
We did not succeed in the project with Adam Kotalík. Adam is a very smart guy who understands football, has good empathy, but together we underestimated the need for management skills. This was visible and led me to believe that we owe Sparta much more. That’s why I convinced František (Čupra), because he is one of the best managers I know, really. His ability to manage people, set up processes, a combination of consistency, commitment and at the same time an extremely fair approach to people is exceptional. As a manager, František is much better than me, it cannot be compared at all.
I approached someone in whom I have 1000% trust, we have known each other for a very long time, I know how he can put his heart into things, I knew he liked Sparta, and at the same time he was the best for the role. It was a surprise for him and we discussed for a while that František had no history in football at that moment, but I told him that the absolutely key thing was to bring order to Sparta and to put the club together as an organization. And I think that František completely fulfilled that.
