Jake O’Brien went to Moulenbeek, a Textor team and was arguably their best player. Textor bought him for OL at a knockdown price of €1million. After a stellar year with OL he was sold for £13million to Everton, a huge jump in value. I think the question is whether the deal was done on a commercial basis ie Palace getting 25% of the increase, which we usually ask for ex-academy players, or this was to help Textor out with his ongoing funding issues at the Club.
At the same time Luke Plange also went to Moulenbeek but failed to make an impression. Since then Malcolm Ebiowei and Tayo Adaramola have joined on loan. There is clearly a link so the no influence argument looks very shaky. I now suspect that only Textor selling his shares will satisfy UEFA. However, only Harris & Blitzer are in a position to purchase at the moment as no one else has come forward since Eagle Holdings offered to sell them when Textor wanted to buy Everton. H&B will want to get away with as little as possible but JT will want a price based on Palace in the EPL and in Europe. Parish is going to have to do some serious negotiation to reconcile the difference in the next few days.