Belmiro Pinto dos Santos fears Vitória Guimarães’ new leadership can facilitate changes in the upcoming Extraordinary General Assembly to favour Aston Villa.
The Premier League side’s owners, V Sports, own a minority stake at the Portuguese club.
The Aston Villa custodian first acquired 46% stake at Vitória in February 2023. In June of that year, V Sports reduced it to 29% in order to not breach UEFA’s multi-club ownership regulations. They had transferred 17% back to the Primeira Liga side.
António Miguel Cardoso was their president when these changes took place at the club. He stepped down from his role in June to join Olympiacos as their managing director the following month. His departure led to an election.
Pinto dos Santos contested the top spot and lost it to the current president, Rui Rodrigues.
Dos Santos critical of Aston Villa owners
The V Sports connection helped the Europa League winners sell Yeimar Mosquera to the Portuguese club in the summer window.
Aston Villa had signed the 21-year-old centre-back from Colombian side Orsomarso Sportivo Clube, and he left Villa Park without making the first team appearance.
Belmiro Pinto dos Santos, however, isn’t happy with the potential developments that could take place between Vitória Guimarães and Aston Villa later this month.
Vitória have scheduled an Extraordinary General Assembly on October 30th. Wednesday’s edition of O Jogo reports this is ‘to discuss the transfer of 17% of the club’s capital in the SAD to V Sports’.
Dos Santos, as per the newspaper, ‘challenges the statutory legitimacy’ of the upcoming General Assembly.
Aston Villa owners accused
Belmiro Pinto dos Santos suspects Vitória Guimarães will transfer the 17% stake to V Sports for free. He fears this will favour the “exclusive business interests” of the Aston Villa owners.
“…and it seems likely to be a transfer made free of charge. [The intention] is to transform Vitória SC into a mere shell club serving Aston Villa,” he said.
“In reality, the purpose of this extraordinary General Meeting is a sham that will facilitate fraudulent acts to the detriment of Vitória”.
It’ll be interesting to see whether V Sports or Aston Villa will respond to Dos Santos’ suspicion.
