Frankfurt - The German Bundesliga Tuesday kept the door closed on wealthy investors effectively buying up a club. The 36 first and second division clubs at the German Football League's general assembly voted down a move to scrap a rule which prevents majority holdings by potential investors.
Hanover president Martin Kind had called for the Bundesliga to open itself to outside investment, saying it would allow smaller clubs to be more competitive against wealthier rivals.
However his call for Germany's 50+1 rule to be overturned - which would have needed a two-thirds majority - was overwhelmingly rejected.
The motion received just one vote with three abstentions and 32 against.
Kind had argued that German football regulations were not keeping pace with international developments and may also be in breach of commercial law.
However, federation officials as well as most clubs fear the traditional nature of the game in Germany would be severely compromised if the Bundesliga were to follow the route taken by some English Premier League clubs among others.
"We don't want German football to be controlled from Russia or Asia," Borussia Dortmund chief executive Hans-Joachim Watzke had said this week.
DFL president Reinhard Rauball said the vote could not have been clearer.
"The Bundesliga remains true to itself and continues to support the factors that have contributed decisively to the success of German football in the past decades: stability, continuity and its closeness to the fans," he said.
German football federation (DFB) president Theo Zwanziger has also been an opponent of any attempt to allow an investor to take over a club by gaining a majority stake.
"We have to ask ourselves: can and do we want to allow ourselves (a situation) that a sponsor or a sheikh buys a club and then sells it?" he said earlier this year.
