Premier League - Ashley names price to Arabs

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Newcastle owner Mike Ashley is asking for a staggering £481million to sell the club to a group of investors from Dubai, according to Arabian business experts.















Despite the Dubai ruling family insisting they are not looking to buy any Premier League club, talks have been opened between Ashley and the Dubai-based group Zabeel Investments, according to ArabianBusiness.com.
Sale documents have been given to Zabeel by Ashley containing a price of 860 million US dollars (£481 million) for the club he bought for £130m 16 months ago, and then ploughed another £100m into.
Zabeel Investments is owned by Dubai's ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum and was part of the consortium that tried to buy Liverpool in 2006.
However, Zabeel Investments chairman Mohammed Ali Al Hashimi has insisted he has not been directly approached.
He told Arabian Business: "We have not had any contact. I am not interested in any [English Premier League club] right now."
City sources still remain dubious whether a deal can be done with Middle East investors at anything like the level that Ashley wants.
One source said: "In reality Newcastle have been up for sale for the last six months. If there had been interest from Dubai or Abu Dhabi it would already have surfaced.
"What makes it even more difficult is that Newcastle do not appear as a very saleable asset at the moment - the club has no manager, the fans are protesting and the team are struggling."
Meanwhile, it can be revealed that, despite reports to the contrary, Ashley has yet to make contact with Keith Harris, the former Football League chairman who helped broker the takeovers of Manchester City by Thaksin Shinawatra and West Ham by their Icelandic consortium