Liverpool Takeover Thread

Tombstone · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:35

BaZ87 said:
To be fair to Redknapp, he knows far more about clubs going bust than you do

And getting this thread slightly back on track; a few reports are saying that the court hearing could be as early as tomorrow.

I'm sure he does. I'm sure he also knows a lot more about under the table brown envelopes, fraud and tax evasion than I do

However, to say that he doesnt think Hicks and Gillette have done anything wrong in their time at Liverpool. That I simply dont agree with, nor does virtually any other manager or person who knows about football or clubs, or past chairman. I think maybe ol' twitcher has been too long in the bookies today and maybe had a pint too many

Burned_Alive · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:42

I mean really, who cares what Harry Redknapp thinks anyway?

Tombstone · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:44

Burned_Alive said:
I mean really, who cares what Harry Redknapp thinks anyway?

Mrs Harry Redknapp

Burned_Alive · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:44

I bet she doesnt.

Tombstone · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:46

I bet she does.

Burned_Alive · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:48

Has anyone got her number?

BaZ87 · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:48

I'd imagine Harry Redknapp will have.

Burned_Alive · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:51

I bet he doesnt. Wait..

Tombstone · 7 Oct 2010 at 16:52

I bet he does.

(its like panto-season already ! He's behind you !)

Pigeon_Killer · 7 Oct 2010 at 18:11

Tombstone said:
Er...not entirely sure I agree with Harry Redknapp on that one.

When does he ever say something anyone would agree with? He's a **** just like his son.

BaZ87 · 7 Oct 2010 at 18:15

DM agrees

Weebull · 7 Oct 2010 at 18:54

In fairness, they did put £144m into Liverpool while they were there, into player fees and the like. It's just that by promising so much more and delivering so little, they've ****ed it up royally.

Whilst I can actually understand them wanting to make a return on that money, I don't think they have much of a leg to stand on in challenging this takeover. If they wanted a profit, they should have invested the money better, and at least attempted to pay off some of the debt. Then they'd be in position to actually pick and choose. As it is, they're getting unished for making a complete balls of it, and deservedly so.

Harry Redknapp can relate to them because he knows what it's like to take a football club to the wall by frittering away ridiculous amounts of money.

BaZ87 · 7 Oct 2010 at 19:26

Weebull said:
In fairness, they did put £144m into Liverpool while they were there, into player fees and the like. It's just that by promising so much more and delivering so little, they've ****ed it up royally.

Neither Hicks or Gillett put a single penny into the football club.

As I said earlier in the thread; they bought the club for ~£230m but borrowed £350m, leaving them with £120m of 'working capital'. All of that £120m as well as money the club generated was spent on interest and bank fees.

Around 18 months ago RBS would only refinance on the basis of the debt being paid down to £230-240m. This meant that H&G had to come up with £120m or risk losing the club all together. The other ~£20m is just rolled up interest on their loan to the holding company.

H&G's plan right from the very beginning was to buy the club with borrowed money, pay the interest on the borrowed money with.....borrowed money and then hope to sell the club on for a massive profit a couple of years down the line. Their plan didn't work because they were too greedy. They've had offers for as much as £550m in the past but that wasn't enough for them and now they stand to lose the ~£140m in directors loans and are also responsible for another ~£40m in interest and charges to RBS.

Pigeon_Killer · 7 Oct 2010 at 19:33

No idea where this £144 million figure has even come from tbh.

BaZ87 · 7 Oct 2010 at 19:46

Pigeon_Killer said:
No idea where this £144 million figure has even come from tbh.

It's money they had to put into their holding company to pay down their debt as they ran out of the cash that they borrowed to pay the interest on their debt.

That roughly translates as they've spent £144m on Liverpool :rolleyes:

DanH84 · 7 Oct 2010 at 19:54

only read last few posts but is someone suggesting Liverpool aren't a huge club?

mike62 · 7 Oct 2010 at 20:15

There are only two huge clubs in England, ManU and Liverpool.

Arsenal and Chelsea are only large domestically.

drunkenmaster · 7 Oct 2010 at 21:09

BaZ87 said:
It's money they had to put into their holding company to pay down their debt as they ran out of the cash that they borrowed to pay the interest on their debt.

That roughly translates as they've spent £144m on Liverpool

Well its fairly simple, they have spent £144mil then, past chairmen like to not take the blame of selling the club into a crippling takeover by only blaming the new owners, so its entirely shocking to me they take the low road and absolve themselves of blame.

TO be fair to everyone, no one really saw(though that was daft aswell) the market crash coming, had it not happened, Liverpool could well have a new stadium built or almost built and be winning the league year on year.

Anyone that took out a huge loan right before the crash got utterly screwed, anyone who made a similar move 5 or 10 years earlier probably made a mint on whatever deal it was on, thats life.

Blaming them for not building a stadium after they lost a **** load of money after the economy went boobies up is a touch harsh. Most other owners who could have bought Liverpool would likely have been unable to find funding for the stadium as the market crashed, the loan worked against them with the crash, without the crash its fairly obvious things would have been different, how different, who knows, maybe they would have stolen a few hundred mil from Liverpool and run off, maybe they would have built a stadium, been in large debt but be making a profit every year and with a strong team.

You can't just randomly ignore the two owners losing a huge portion of their worth right after getting a big loan.

As for the rules of not making a loss, people are absolutely kidding themselves, in a laughably daft way that it will stop the billionaires from spending to get success, infact the naivety of those saying so is a tad embarassing.

Watch Ambramovich have one of his companies up the shirt sponsorship from 20mil a season to 80mil a season and the books suddenly been in the black.

Watch City offer season tickets for £5k a piece, with a rebate of £4.5k for those who buy a burger at the first game of the season, thereby increasing ticket revenue 10 fold and no fans being out of pocket.

All thats got to happen is the books balance, theres several dozen easy ways to manipulate the books, theres just been no reason to as of yet.

THe only clubs these rules will hurt are smaller clubs who get into debt and without a massive benefactor, its more likely a Spurs/Villa spending out of their means who get screwed out of European places who then suddenly drop into even deeper debt who the rules hurt, not your Barca/Real/Chelsea/City clubs, those 4 are writing blank cheques for whatever they want, it doesn't really matter who the cheques go to or why, pay player wages, or pay a company to sponsor the team which is then paid as player wages, it doesn't matter one iota to those guys who spray around money like theres no tomorrow.

BaZ87 · 7 Oct 2010 at 22:07

drunkenmaster said:
Well its fairly simple, they have spent £144mil then.

I know it's pointless trying to explain anything to you but I'll try 1 more time.

They have not put a single penny into Liverpool. The money they have spent is on interest on the money they had to borrow in order for them to be able to afford to buy the club. Not 1 penny was seen by the football club, it went from the holding company to the bank.

They are being blamed for broken promises, such as the debt and a the way in which they have conducted themselves.

There was never any intention of them fulfilling the promises they made. From day 1 they were trying to sell the club and their greed is what has cost them and I for one am over the moon that they're going to lose upwards of £140m.

And I think you'll find that David Moores and Rick Parry have been heavily criticised for their role in ****ing up the club.

shine · 7 Oct 2010 at 22:51

In the end it boils down to - they made a business decision and their greed has potentially cost them £144 million. If they were better business men they would have sold at a very large profit when DIC came back in for the club during a time of economic uncertainty. I have no sympathy for them and will be glad to see the back of them.