Liverpool FC Forum

Redman in wales wrote:well i'm not a happy bunny. but at least it miught bring an end to all this speculation for a while.

None of us know quite how the money will be spent, but so far I've seen these two bits in the press:

'Liverpool's sum includes £105m cash for the club, £65m of which will be used to kick-start work on the new stadium in Stanley Park

A further £45m will be working capital, including cash for new players'

metro link

and bbc's rumour mill says:
Liverpool's American owners are ready to signal their commitment to the club by finally signing Javier Mascherano on a long-term contract for £17m. (Various)

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so we may have up to £45m for players, and we may still get mash.... just trying to be optomistic after my hopes of being owned by DIC to a battering with this news

flipmode wrote:I have heard that the Americans will be staying and that DIC will turn to the Blue side of Liverpool!!! Hope Bulls**t

Redman in wales wrote:well i'm not a happy bunny. but at least it miught bring an end to all this speculation for a while.

None of us know quite how the money will be spent, but so far I've seen these two bits in the press:

'Liverpool's sum includes £105m cash for the club, £65m of which will be used to kick-start work on the new stadium in Stanley Park

A further £45m will be working capital, including cash for new players'

metro link

and bbc's rumour mill says:
Liverpool's American owners are ready to signal their commitment to the club by finally signing Javier Mascherano on a long-term contract for £17m. (Various)

---

so we may have up to £45m for players, and we may still get mash.... just trying to be optomistic after my hopes of being owned by DIC to a battering with this news

Yeah good shout, if we do indeed get 45Mil to spend then we must make an effort to keep masch. Add money on top of that for finishing wherever we do from TV deals (hopefully 4th :-() plus any from a champions league run and Rafa should have enough for next season too. I say Rafa but knows who will be in charge.

lakes10 wrote:Radio 5 just done a bit on this.

They say the Mascherano could be done in the next few day but his agent is looking at another club for him to go to...............get the money out now G&H.

bavlondon wrote:

lakes10 wrote:Radio 5 just done a bit on this.

They say the Mascherano could be done in the next few day but his agent is looking at another club for him to go to...............get the money out now G&H.

I knew something like this would happen. Now its a case of player vs agent? Does he even stilll want to stay here?

inglis5 wrote:Now I've been as worried as the next man about developments at Anfield for the last 3 months. However (it may just be because it's nearly the weekend but..) upon analysing the reports this morning things may not be as bad as first feared.

If you look at what are the main areas of concern for every fan and what the new deal means -

No development of promised stadium - the refinancing should see the project begin almost immediately and although the new design will not be as amazing as the one last unveiled, it will still be a marked improvement of the 60,000 bowl we almost got.

Lack of transfer funds for the manager - the deal for Mascherano would (in my mind) go a long way to offsetting this fear. It would have meant that in the past 8 months we would have secured the services of 2 (Torres and Masch), arguably 3 (Babel - potential) genuinely world class players. You could also argue that being forced to sell before buying is not necessarily a bad thing as we all agree there is a lot of dead wood in the squad.

The debt - this is, according to the reports, not as bad as feared. Although any debt on the club is against what H&G originally said, the £105 million that will be placed against the club is for working capital (potential transfers) and for the new ground. Anybody who thought that the money for these would come straight from H&G back pockets was living in cloud coockoo land. Our owners, like it or not, are business men, and we are not a billionaires play thing. Personally I'm more comfortable with our club being run as a proper business, rather than a toy which can be discarded at any time.

The other two factors are still unresolved - support for the manager and the damage done to the club with all of this infighting.

However, the first can be resolved immediately - publically Hicks and Gillett should back the manager with both a statement and with actions. Benitez is a world class manager and he needs time to deliver.

The second point (the damage to the club) is more difficult to resolve. It will take a lot of the Americans to rebuild the damage they have done and to regain the resect of the fans but I don't think it is impossible. Football is a fickle game, a 5 match winning streak and things will seem a lot rosier. Rome wasn't built in a day (though it was conquered in one in 1977!), the transition was always going to be difficult and there was always likely to be difficulties.

It appears the owners are here to stay so let's continue to support the team & the manager.

"At the end of the storm there is a golden sky"

lakes10 wrote:

inglis5 wrote:Now I've been as worried as the next man about developments at Anfield for the last 3 months. However (it may just be because it's nearly the weekend but..) upon analysing the reports this morning things may not be as bad as first feared.

If you look at what are the main areas of concern for every fan and what the new deal means -

No development of promised stadium - the refinancing should see the project begin almost immediately and although the new design will not be as amazing as the one last unveiled, it will still be a marked improvement of the 60,000 bowl we almost got.

Lack of transfer funds for the manager - the deal for Mascherano would (in my mind) go a long way to offsetting this fear. It would have meant that in the past 8 months we would have secured the services of 2 (Torres and Masch), arguably 3 (Babel - potential) genuinely world class players. You could also argue that being forced to sell before buying is not necessarily a bad thing as we all agree there is a lot of dead wood in the squad.

The debt - this is, according to the reports, not as bad as feared. Although any debt on the club is against what H&G originally said, the £105 million that will be placed against the club is for working capital (potential transfers) and for the new ground. Anybody who thought that the money for these would come straight from H&G back pockets was living in cloud coockoo land. Our owners, like it or not, are business men, and we are not a billionaires play thing. Personally I'm more comfortable with our club being run as a proper business, rather than a toy which can be discarded at any time.

The other two factors are still unresolved - support for the manager and the damage done to the club with all of this infighting.

However, the first can be resolved immediately - publically Hicks and Gillett should back the manager with both a statement and with actions. Benitez is a world class manager and he needs time to deliver.

The second point (the damage to the club) is more difficult to resolve. It will take a lot of the Americans to rebuild the damage they have done and to regain the resect of the fans but I don't think it is impossible. Football is a fickle game, a 5 match winning streak and things will seem a lot rosier. Rome wasn't built in a day (though it was conquered in one in 1977!), the transition was always going to be difficult and there was always likely to be difficulties.

It appears the owners are here to stay so let's continue to support the team & the manager.

"At the end of the storm there is a golden sky"

"At the end of the storm there is a golden sky".........called The Bank of Scotland and a £350 mil loan.

Seriously, I don't think it should be all doom and gloom.

From what Ciggy says though, if DIC are selling off assets to gather the money needed to buy the club, what does that say about them? I think we need to face up to the fact that neither party (H&G or DIC) are simply going to throw money at the club, whether we like it or not!

Shanklys Ghost wrote:AN OPEN LETTER TO ALL LIVERPOOL SUPPORTERS

Yesterday was a day that will go down in infamy in the history of Liverpool Football Club. Yesterday was the day that the stewardship of our beloved club by two most undesirable proprietors was sealed. Yesterday was the day that Liverpool Football Club lost its soul.

I have stood and sat in the Kop for fifty years, through its greatest, its humblest (some on here may not realise we were in the old second division within the living memory of most Liverpool supporters) and most tragic times. I have witnessed all our major triumphs and all our humbling defeats. But now no more. This, my fellow Reds, is the end of the line for me.

Unlike many of those who resisted the takeover of Manchester United by the Glazer family I am not set against Americans per se owning our club. It is these particular Americans that I am opposed to for obvious reasons (it was educational to hear that former Chairman of Aston Villa, Doug Ellis, was prepared to accept a lower offer for his shares from Randy Lerner rather than allow Gillett gain control of the club). And make no mistake HICKS &GILLETT are in this now for the long haul – no matter how many REDS are left sleeping on bare mattresses!

What we are witnessing now is the birth of a commercial sports franchise the hub of whose operations will just happen to be within the City of Liverpool. It will be about as Scouse as any Merseyside branch of Tesco or Sainsbury. And worse still, as we have already become aware, our new and most unwelcome owners will do this in a way so underhanded that it would make MI6 blush.

But I haven’t ventured on to Liverpool fan websites for the first time in my life simply to deliver an ‘I Quit’ ultimatum. I have come here to say that ANY Liverpool fan that  continues to go to matches is propping up the current regime. Boycotting the odd match here or there will not make the individual fan any less of a collaborator. S/he has to be ready to abstain from match attendance for the duration.

Unfortunately, the outlook for this kind of protest, at first sight, is not encouraging. Barely 300 people failed to renew their season tickets at Old Trafford after the Glazers took over. And those who stayed but decided to boycott club merchandise (and hypocritically vandalise the property of Manchester United executives) couldn’t prevent the clubs turnover reaching a record £250m last year (NB the 76% here who stated they would reduce their financial commitment to LFC should H&G remain).

The formation of an opposition football club on the other hand appears slightly more promising. Playing well outside Manchester at Bury’s Gigg Lane ground, FC United of Manchester regularly commands gates in excess of 3,000. More importantly, the dissidents are not only sticking with their new creation – they are growing in number.

There is much we can learn from the experience of Man U fans who opposed the Glazer takeover. I believe that we could make a sustained boycott of Liverpool FC much more effective and that a new club venture could be more successful. I believe this because Liverpool is a more tightly knit community with a more distinct identity with a greater appetite for struggle.

Fellow Reds, we are now at a crossroads. Either we can just talk of contempt for Gillette and Hicks while continuing to aid them in their monstrous scheme by passing through the turnstiles or we can sever our ties with their alien creation and reclaim our heritage by forming a new club:  ‘Liverpool 2008 FC.’

I call upon the moderators, administrators and members of this forum, with links to the official and unofficial Liverpool Supporters Clubs and Associations to lobby your committees and officers to convene within a month an open meeting in a local public venue to discuss the topics that I have just raised: namely the launch of a long term boycott of ALL Liverpool FC fixtures and the establishment of a new association football club, ‘Liverpool 2008 FC.’

I hereby authorise all those who sympathise with the opinions expressed herein to reproduce them for a wider audience.

So I take it you don't agree with my sunnily optimistic view on the events of the last couple of days? 

Seriously, I respect your views but I support the club and I feel that it should remain bigger than any two individuals. The events at Anfield merely reflect the bigger change in the economics of football over the past 20 years. It's incredibly sad but times change and Liverpool will change with them.