Arsenal shareholder Alisher Usmanov has stepped in with an "emergency loan" so that Russia can pay national team coach Fabio Capello 400M rubles ($6M) in "back wages," according to Alec Luhn of the London GUARDIAN. The country's "richest man," a mining magnate worth an estimated $14B according to Forbes, is the "second-largest shareholder in Arsenal." He announced on Thursday that he was giving the Russian Football Union the loan on "preferential terms, and the first payment was made later that night." Usmanov made the loan at the request of Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko, who said on Thursday that the back wages "would be paid over the course of two days." Usmanov: "I think the situation created by the current Russian Football Union management is intolerable. It's an embarrassment when a person who works for Russia doesn't receive wages for his labor." Although the money has "finally started to flow, Russia will still owe Capello for his work in 2015," an issue that Mutko said "must be solved soon to preserve the 'country's prestige.'" In total the coaching staff is reportedly owed 600M rubles ($9M).
While some lawmakers have "proposed tying the coach's wages to the team's
performance, others have called the months-long delay in payment a
national embarrassment" (GUARDIAN, 2/6).
