Dubai International to make bid for Liverpool FC

[Pacman]

They wont sell - FACT

[Jayesh87]

Mihir Bose was in Gillet's camp right throughout the last campaign. This is G&H using the press to negotiate. I suspect we are nearing the end game in this.

My prediction is

THEY WILL SELL FOR ABOUT 350M pounds (maybe 375M)

:bird: Hicksy

I'm not sure mate, it looks like they will re-finance the loan today which imo means they wont sell in the near future.

Hopefully Barrett will shead some light on the situation but i think he will just use Hicks quotes from the weekend and not have any new news.

[blacky]

They wont sell - FACT

Have you got a or do you just like the word FACT?

[Guest]

They wont sell - FACT

Where is it ?

[Jayesh87]

Tom Hicks stands firm but fans set to deliver their verdict

Jan 21 2008

by Tony Barrett, Liverpool Echo


GIVEN recent events at Anfield, it surely can’t be long before a banner is hung on the Gwladys Street bearing the legend: “Agents Hicks and Gillett, Mission Accomplished”.

From being the club which was so well run it was compared to a machine, Liverpool today finds itself in the unlikely role of national laughing stock – and with good reason.

In the latest twist to the ongoing farce, Tom Hicks has insisted that the keys to Anfield which he was given by outgoing Reds chairman David Moores last year will not be handed over to Dubai International Capital.

“I’ve not received any offer to purchase the club from DIC or anyone else, much less accepted any such offer,” he said.

“Nor do I have any intention of doing so,”

DIC clearly think differently and are hovering with an offer of around £350m.

Despite his protestations, there are those who know him well who believe Hicks is merely playing hard ball with the investment arm of the Dubai government to try and force them into paying over the odds for Liverpool.

The only problem is, DIC simply do not operate like that.

If Liverpool FC exists to win trophies, then DIC exists to make profits and you don’t get rich by being held to ransom.

Stalemate is therefore a distinct possibility – that is unless George Gillett refuses to sign up to a financial restructuring deal which will overnight turn Liverpool into a club with one of the biggest debts in world football.

If he refuses to sign up this week then DIC’s bargaining position is strengthened as it is now less than six weeks before Hicks and Gillett have to pay back their initial loan.

When they bought the club in February last year, Hicks and Gillett borrowed £220m from the Royal Bank of Scotland to make it happen.

That personal debt currently stands at £270 and the American duo are now looking at shifting the debt onto the club with a financial restructuring deal worth £350m from RBS set to be done this week – unless DIC’s interest is made concrete and an offer from them is accepted.

DIC officials were today meeting senior executives from RBS in London, talks which are likely to be the precursor to a formal bid of around £350m for Liverpool.

Should refinancing go through as planned then it is still unlikely that DIC will walk away – but any future offer for the club would be lowered to take into account the extra debt and banking fees they would have to take on.

Hicks remains adamant – in public, at least – he will not sell at any price and his stance has only served to inflame tensions between himself and the Liverpool supporters. Not since the days when “Deadly” Doug Ellis was seen as the scourge of Aston Villa has a Premiership club owner been as reviled by the fans as Hicks is today.

Almost a year on from having the red carpet rolled out for him at Anfield, the Texan will tonight to see the Kop attempt to pull the rug from beneath him in an unprecedented demonstration against the Liverpool hierarchy.

By picking a fight with Rafa Benitez – the most popular Liverpool manager since Kenny Dalglish – Hicks has totally alienated the Reds support which will use tonight’s league game against Aston Villa as the vehicle for their discontent.

How ironic that just six months ago Hicks was talking of his visions of the Kop at the long planned, but still not delivered, new Anfield as the orchestra to whose tune the team would play.

Tonight, the Kop will be playing a tune. But far from being sweet, the music will be angry and it will be directed at him and his co-owner, who has remained strangely silent given the firestorm which is raging around him.

“The fans want them out, unconditionally,” said Kevin Sampson, of Reclaim The Kop. “It's as simple as that. “They’re no good for us; no good for the club.

“As the world is seeing it right now, Liverpool is the most welcoming city and its people are the most generous hosts you're going to find anywhere.

“But cross us, and that's that. We're enemies, for life. Ask Mackenzie. Ask Thatcher. Ask Boris The Buffoon.

“These two tried to capitalise on our good will and our unswerving love for this club. But they underestimated us badly, and badly underestimated our love for Rafa.

“The moment they confirmed our worst misgivings and admitted they'd been plotting to oust Benitez, they may as well have started saddling the horses.

“That's it. They are finished here. The fans despise them as passionately as we hate any football rival – in fact, at the moment, it's worse.

“Not that they've shown much nous, but if they have a shred of common sense they'll take the DIC money and gallop out of town.”

In the previous 113 years of its existence, Liverpool FC had never been subject to a single demonstration by its fans.

In the last eight months alone there have been three – all of which have occurred while Hicks and Gillett have acted as self-styled club “custodians”.

The first, a display of outrage over farcical ticketing arrangements for the Champions League final in Athens, was anything but their fault and no-one was suggesting it was, either, at the time or since.

But the following two demonstrations – the “Save Rafa” march prior to the Porto match in November and tonight’s – undoubtedly have their roots in public disquiet about the way one of sport’s finest institutions is being run.

In an article in yesterday’s Irish Independent, Leeds United legend Johnny Giles lamented the recent demise of a club he respects unequivocally and spoke of his fear that Liverpool could end up heading down the same road to ruin as his former club.

He said: “It never ceases to amaze me how quickly a club can go from rude health to perpetual crisis, but at no time before now did I ever imagine I would be talking about Liverpool in such terms.

“For so long, Anfield was an antidote to the crass stupidity we witness at many clubs on a daily basis – certainty in an environment that often leans towards chaos.

“But it doesn't take much to lose the work built up over decades. Success at a club is such a fleeting and fragile thing if you don't continue relentlessly to do the basics right from the chairman down to the tea lady.

“This is a sad time for Liverpool and for all of us who looked to Anfield as one of the last remaining outposts of common sense and decency.”

Sympathy is the one thing that Liverpool has never sought before. But today, that is exactly what it is getting.

But if something is not done fast then such sympathy will soon turn to ridicule.

The Kop will speak tonight and it will speak as one. It can only hope that Hicks and Gillett – and DIC for that matter – are listening.

[calvoboy]

Has anyone posted the e-mail that's been doing the rounds yet?

Mark this date in your calenders – February 18th 2008. Massive press conference being planned at Anfield as we speak. The club has been sold to DIC for 375 million pounds that will give the current owners $710 million – a $70 million profit. Al Ansari, CEO of DIC has completed his due diligence.

The players and staff were made aware of this prior to the Luton game. Rafa's job is safe but he has to bring in an assistant, this will be Gary McAllister. Rick Parry who offended members of DIC last year, will 'step down' and the new owners will bring in David Dein as a replacement.

No more money will be available for transfer's in the January window as the current owners will not sanction any deals, unless players are sold. The Summer will see massive player investment from DIC, believed to be in the region of 85 million + whatever is made from player sales. This could see a transfer budget of around 115 million. This is not a rumour, this is all legit. Remember who told you the Americans had bought the club, four days before it was released and who let you guys know that Fernando Torres had signed a deal a full week before the press even got wind of it. Thats me. From Anfield Insider

Not sure where it's come from though....just throwing it into the mix

[Pacman]

Has anyone posted the e-mail that's been doing the rounds yet?



Not sure where it's come from though....just throwing it into the mix

It's a load of balls mate.

It's from football rumours.com.

[Dalglish]

from The Sunday Herald

American Express route out of Anfield
Ian Bell
Comment | Read Comments (10)
BACK WHEN Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr were still talking up their plans for Liverpool FC, I had a thought. This was when the dollar was a little mightier than it is today. This was before the Royal Bank of Scotland reminded the bold pair that it was owed a ton of money. This was, in fact, at around the time when the first, grandiose plan for a new stadium was being revealed.

Fine, I thought. Modern, forward-thinking, progressive: all of that. Those supporters, of all supporters, deserve no less. But what will they do with the sign?

It hangs, as everyone knows, above the players' tunnel. It is unapologetically corny, sentimental in that defiant Scouse way. Bill Shankly used to swear, in both senses, by it. Tradition dictates that the team touch it for luck as they go out. "This is Anfield," it says.

Do Hicks and Gillett understand those three words? I wondered. The Americans were making great play of their deep respect for the heritage they had purchased with RBS money. They were very careful about that. Yet as we now know - and as they have gone to some lengths to demonstrate - they didn't have a clue.

Whether Dubai International Capital (DIC), the investment arm of that small rich, emirate, is better informed remains to be seen. The Anfield support might welcome anonymous corporate owners more interested in a £500 million investment than in talking patronising nonsense.

Rafa Benitez, we can be certain, would be delighted. The Americans may be ready to sell to DIC - they may have no choice in the matter - but the Spaniard is clearly eager to see them go.

Can you blame him? Benitez has yet to deliver the league title for which the Kop yearns. It is open to question whether, with his bizarre yet stubborn adherence to rotation within his squad, he is up to that job. But two European finals, and one title, are all the credentials any coach should require. The fans know it. The Americans appear to have no inkling.

According to one report last week, that could cost them £5m if the DIC bid fails to materialise and Benitez lodges a claim for constructive dismissal. A chat with Jurgen Klinsmann is always valuable, no doubt, but a £5m chat is a new one. Calling it "insurance" against possible "communication" problems may count as an in-joke in financial circles, but lawyers would probably take a different view.

In short, the Americans were touting the Spaniard's job (his contract extends to 2010) to the German. Dignified? Sensible? In keeping with all those Anfield traditions? The spluttering noise you hear is the shade of Shankly demanding to know what has become of his club.

It is a good question. It is, for the Kop, the only question. In the days of Shankly, Paisley and Fagan, even in the days of Dalglish, Liverpool FC did not conduct itself in this manner.

Put all the legends of the boot room to one side. The old Liverpool more closely resembled a benign, if dour, mafia: what happened within the family stayed within the family. It made the club, by most yardsticks, the most successful England has seen.

Benitez is many things. Enigmatic is one, sometimes perplexing is another. But he is a football man above all. Foreign or not, he knows what the team means to the city, what the Kop means to the team, and what the red shirt means within the European game. He is paid, as Hicks and Gillett saw fit to remind him, to pick that team. So who picks the people who pick the man who picks the team? An RBS accountant?

The bank has no such interest. Backing Hicks and Gillett, it made a business decision. It has no say in defining a fit and proper person where club ownership is concerned. It takes no view, to my knowledge, on overseas involvement in the British game. Nor would it care to involve itself in deciding the relationship between an employee and his employers.

In these matters the fans, equally, are spectators, in every sense. This column has made the point often enough: talk about "your" club as much as you like, but unless you have a bundle of share certificates, spare me any talk of ownership.

Hicks and Gillett bought Liverpool with £350m of RBS money that will shortly, as they say, fall due. If they accept £500m from DIC they will turn a nice profit. But they will not be throwing fivers at the Kop.

Instead, should they depart, the pair will leave Liverpool with some difficult questions to answer. Bob Paisley would not have tolerated the treatment accorded to Benitez during the Klinsmann affair, but Paisley would never have been subjected to such an indignity. In those days, there was one boss at Anfield and the Moores family did not dispute the fact. That, though it is no small thing, is all that Benitez asks. Can the wish be granted?

Clearly, the Americans believed they had bought themselves another "sports franchise" with their purchase of Liverpool. Football, as such, was a mystery to them, but they understood revenue streams well enough. For the English elite, those are cascading from Sky and the Champions League. In Liverpool, they are topped up by a support that could fill the current Anfield twice over, most weeks. All that remains is a small detail: winning.

It seems to me no accident that the two men who dominate the English game also have unchallenged control over their clubs. Benitez sees no reason why he should not enjoy the respect accorded to Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger. I tend to agree with him. That management model has an indisputable virtue, after all: it works.

Clearly, an American pair who could not see a problem in bringing a German hero to Merseyside have taken a different view, with disastrous results.

They should take the money and run. Football in general should meanwhile remember that the value of foreign investments can go down as well as up.

[dawmdt]

They wont sell - FACT

You got a source on that or are just confusing your opinion for a fact?

[Gazmo1]

**** me, I just want to watch my team play football and win on the field. I was brought up on football in the 80's and was lucky enough that my dad took me to virtually every game.

I don't know anything else like Liverpool that can make me laugh, cry, scream and yell all in the space of 10 minutes.

When did we become 'just another football team', washing our dirty clothes in public?

**** me, I really hope this concludes soon and we can get on with securing CL football for next year and secure finance for new players to launch a serious attempt on the title.

I'm off to cry now

[el matador]

mihir bose is in the know - and this man is definitely not pro gillett and hicks. He has connections within Dubai and knows the DIC group very well.

If someone knows what's going on - its him.

[Jayesh87]

Key points from Barretrs article:

Tom Hicks stands firm but fans set to deliver their verdict
Jan 21 2008
by Tony Barrett, Liverpool Echo

DIC clearly think differently and are hovering with an offer of around £350m.

Despite his protestations, there are those who know him well who believe Hicks is merely playing hard ball with the investment arm of the Dubai government to try and force them into paying over the odds for Liverpool.

The only problem is, DIC simply do not operate like that.

If Liverpool FC exists to win trophies, then DIC exists to make profits and you don’t get rich by being held to ransom.

Stalemate is therefore a distinct possibility – that is unless George Gillett refuses to sign up to a financial restructuring deal which will overnight turn Liverpool into a club with one of the biggest debts in world football.

If he refuses to sign up this week then DIC’s bargaining position is strengthened as it is now less than six weeks before Hicks and Gillett have to pay back their initial loan.

That personal debt currently stands at £270 and the American duo are now looking at shifting the debt onto the club with a financial restructuring deal worth £350m from RBS set to be done this week – unless DIC’s interest is made concrete and an offer from them is accepted.

DIC officials were today meeting senior executives from RBS in London, talks which are likely to be the precursor to a formal bid of around £350m for Liverpool.

Should refinancing go through as planned then it is still unlikely that DIC will walk away – but any future offer for the club would be lowered to take into account the extra debt and banking fees they would have to take on.

In the previous 113 years of its existence, Liverpool FC had never been subject to a single demonstration by its fans.

In the last eight months alone there have been three – all of which have occurred while Hicks and Gillett have acted as self-styled club “custodians”.

The first, a display of outrage over farcical ticketing arrangements for the Champions League final in Athens, was anything but their fault and no-one was suggesting it was, either, at the time or since.

But the following two demonstrations – the “Save Rafa” march prior to the Porto match in November and tonight’s – undoubtedly have their roots in public disquiet about the way one of sport’s finest institutions is being run.

In an article in yesterday’s Irish Independent, Leeds United legend Johnny Giles lamented the recent demise of a club he respects unequivocally and spoke of his fear that Liverpool could end up heading down the same road to ruin as his former club.

Sympathy is the one thing that Liverpool has never sought before. But today, that is exactly what it is getting.

But if something is not done fast then such sympathy will soon turn to ridicule.

The Kop will speak tonight and it will speak as one. It can only hope that Hicks and Gillett – and DIC for that matter – are listening.

http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0500liverpoolfc/0100news/tm_headline=tom-hicks-stands-firm-but-fans-set-to-deliver-their-verdict%26method=full%26objectid=20375179%26page=2 %26siteid=50061-name_page.html

Looks like we need GG to do us a favour, can't see that happening tbh

[Tee]

Lets hope that we can reach out to Gillett, and if he has any genuine love for the club he can and will make it happen.

[KK07]

Hopefully if DIC do make an offer then Hicks will take the chance of a quick profit and sell up.

I really hope he doesn't dig his heels in astick around FFS!

[kopdan]

so are we still 50/50 or are we still looking at Hicks staying on?