Tony Khan has found himself under fire from Fulham FC fans after the club suffered another embarrassing Premier League defeat – this time at the hands of reigning treble winners Manchester City.
On September 2nd 2023, Fulham took on Manchester City at the reigning Champions iconic Etihad Stadium with a hat-trick from record breaking goal scorer Erling Haaland helped The Citizens sail to a comfortable 5-1 win.
The disastrous performance from The Cottagers has led to several fans calling for Tony Khan to resign as the club’s Vice Chairman citing his focus on other projects, primarily AEW, and a perceived woeful transfer window as the main reasons.
Tony Khan was appointed Fulham Vice Chairman back in February of 2017 with his primary role described as “overseeing the identification, evaluation, recruitment, general maintenance and signing of players for Fulham.”
Following the sale of Fulham’s talismanic striker Aleksandar Mitrović to Saudi Arabian club Al-Hilal for a club record £50,000,000 and attempted sale/negotiated sale of the clubs best player João Palhinha to German giants Bayern Munich (for around £80,000,000) Fulham fans have been frustrated by Khan’s “underwhelming” transfer policy with Alex Iwobi, Calvin Bassey and Timothy Castagne deemed not good enough by fans and the £6,000,000 deal to sign Wolves striker Raul Jiminez questioned due to the striker woeful form in front of goal following his near career ending skull injury back in November 2020.
Following today’s defeat fans have taken to Twitter in droves to call for Khan’s resignation with one fan referring to AEW as a “poxt wrestling gig” in the process.
“Can Tony Khan tell us what the f*ck he actually does to be able to put ‘DoF/GM/Sporting director’ in his bio?
Neglected the club all summer in favour of his poxy wrestling gig. It ain’t a part time job! We’ve had 10 years of it, enough’s enough, time to sell up and get out #FFC” – @fulham__pat
Other fans would continue the trend claiming Khan, who also has roles in NFL club Jacksonville Jaguars, only focuses on AEW and Fulham is being left behind.
Can you have daddy sell Fulham already? Since you guys are gutting the team and only care now about AEW. Thaaaaanks
— Ryan C (@rchanSF) September 1, 2023
This is not the first time Khan has landed himself in hot water with the Fulham faithful, former Fulham FC manager, Scott Parker criticised Khan for his approach to transfer news/business, stating that it was “frustrating” to have the club’s Vice Chairman discussing failed transfers, such as the clubs failed £9,000,000 attempt to sign Brentford striker Ivan Toney, on public platforms such as Twitter.
Referencing the incident in an interview in 2021, Parker would state:
“Of course there are parts of that I can’t control. That’s why here now, two days before Everton, we’re talking about a Twitter post. At times, it’s frustrating.
“I think there is a good intention there. But it’s something that I don’t feel needs to happen.”
Parker had previously criticised Khan’s social media behaviour back in 2020 after he took to Twitter once again to apologies following a 3-0 defeat to Aston Villa.
How much did Shahid Khan pay for Fulham?
Shahid Khan, father to AEW owner Tony Khan, paid an estimated eye-watering £150,000,000 – £200,000,000 for Fulham FC back in July of 2013.
Forbes reports that Khan purchased the club for around $300,000,000 which would come out to around £201,000,000 based on July 2013 exchange rate averages.
Tony Khan will be looking to put the fan controversy to one side as AEW heads towards All Out on Sunday September 3rd.
The show is set to be one of AEW’s biggest PPV events of the year but headlines are currently dominated by the news that CM Punk & Jack Perry are suspended following a physical altercation backstage at the companies record breaking All In PPV.