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s@int wrote:Latest takeover rumour

Mail on Sunday:

After United and Glazer, now Liverpool are the target for American takeover
By Daniel King

LIVERPOOL are a takeover target for an American multimillionaire who once owned
the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team. George Gillett junior, whose colourful
business career has also taken in American football and ice hockey, has emerged
as a serious rival to Dubai Holdings, the government-owned company who have been
negotiating with Liverpool chief executive Rick Parry in the past week.

Gillett, owner of the Montreal Canadiens NHL team, is thought to be the mystery
American businessman who has been linked with Liverpool for a number of months.
With the potential investors from Dubai reported to be dismayed at publicity
surrounding Parry’s third visit to the Middle East in the space of a fortnight,
Gillett is tipped to become the frontrunner to put money into the debt-ridden
club. Liverpool remain desperate for funding to build their proposed £180
million stadium in Stanley Park and to allow manager Rafa Benitez to bring in
more high-pedigree players. After almost three years of false alarms and
embarrassment, fans will not be holding their breath about the search for
investment ending soon. But if Gillett follows up his interest with an official
bid, Anfield could have its very own Malcolm Glazer. Like his fellow American,
the ailing owner of Manchester United, Gillett, 68, is a ruthless investor who
shuns the limelight and leaves three of his four sons to act as the public face
of his diverse business interests. But his track record backs up his reputation
as a sports fanatic, albeit one whose motives for investing in teams have been
called into question. He left leading consultancy firm McKinsey in the Sixties
to become business manager at the Miami Dolphins and in 1967 led an investment
in the Harlem Globetrotters — he helped to run them for 11 years. After making
further money in the meat-packaging and communications industries, Gillett
bought two leading ski resorts but, having once reputedly been a billionaire, he
went bankrupt in 1992. He quickly bounced back, adding new interests in the meat
and skiing businesses, and in 2001 he spent £100m acquiring the Bell Centre rink
complex and an 80 per cent stake in the Montreal Canadiens, where son Foster is
now his eyes and ears. The sticking points for a Gillett takeover will be the
club’s tens of millions of debt and the spiralling cost of the stadium, not to
mention the £300m valuation believed to have been put on the club by chairman
and majority shareholder David Moores. Reports of a Liverpool director
criticising Benitez and fearing for the club’s financial future are also
unlikely to have impressed Gillett or the rulers of Dubai, who already have a
foothold in the Premiership through the sponsorship of Arsenal’s stadium and
shirts by state airline Emirates.