Gary Neville embroiled in huge libel case brought by Nottingham Forest owner

Not ideal for Neville.

Gary Neville has surprisingly been cited in a £2.1 million libel action case which Nottingham Forest owner, Evangelos Marinakis, has brought against Irini Karipidis and Ari Harow.

Karipidis is the owner of Greek club Aris, who are rivals to Olympiacos, also owned by Marinakis, while Harow is a former chief of staff to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Greek businessman has accused the men of falsely referring to him as a “leader of a criminal organisation, guilty of match-fixing practices including extortion, fraud and arson, as well as there being strong grounds to suspect him of deep and active involvement in international heroin trafficking."

Marinakis has alleged that a "smear campaign" has tried to influence the beliefs of Sky Sports pundit, Gary Neville, who was highly critical of the owner's behaviour after Forest's loss to Leicester two weeks ago.

Marinakis walked onto the pitch after the 2-2 draw to remonstrate with manager Nuno Espirito, after an incident involving Taiwo Awoniyi.

The player collided with a post but was left on the pitch and later had to be admitted to hospital and placed in an induced coma after suffering a ruptured intestine.

Also, back in 2024, Sky Sports had to publish an apology after Neville said that the club had acted like a "mafia gang".

Marinakis’s solicitor, Christopher Scott, wrote: “There has been significant document production which include over 500 documents that were provided shortly before this hearing on 20 May. The documents produced include WhatsApp chats, project plans, commentary and internal communications at Harris Media LLC, including congratulating each other on the impact of the campaign in Nottingham including being of in excess of 1.5 million views on social media, through to listing journalists and pundits to target to seek to influence their views of the claimant, including the likes of the Sky Sports presenter Gary Neville.

“It is notable that since the smear campaign commenced the claimant has been greatly aggrieved by the apparent change to a hostile attitude towards him by many such pundits, including Mr Neville. Indeed, Nottingham Forest FC recently had cause to complain about hostile and ill-founded criticism from pundits, including Mr Neville, of the claimant’s expression of concern for a seriously injured Nottingham Forest player.”