Tom Hicks Talks

[cream]

From what I heard Lyon and Man utd had agreed a fee. Benzema chose Madrid ahead of them

Pretty obvious since he is now playing for them. He's been saying for a while thay he wanted to play in Spain, United never stood a chance of signing him.

[cream]

Rafa has always complained about money, it's a tactic that ensures you don't get fleeced in the transfer market by teams inflating player values, like they do when City or Madrid come knocking.

We allegedly looked at these players, it was all paper speculation...the minute City wanted Tevez, we were never gonna match their valuation of him, and I'm pretty certain that, like Ferguson, Rafa decided that other players were over-priced.

Don't be so soft, you don't get anywhere in the transfer market by pleading poverty.

I bet you believe in 'smokescreens' as well

[Scratch]

Don't be so soft, you don't get anywhere in the transfer market by pleading poverty.

I bet you believe in 'smokescreens' as well

Ah, so you think if we claim to have loads of money, we'll do much better? You'd be more advised to sticking to posting your "insider" info cream, rather than trying to contribute to a debate.

[Bender]

LONDON (AP) -- Liverpool co-owner Tom Hicks says too much money has already been spent for the Premier League team's proposed new stadium not to be eventually built.

Hicks believes replacing the outdated Anfield due to its 45,000 limited capacity and restricted commercial possibilities is central to cementing the Reds' status as one of the world's top football clubs.

Construction on the new site was frozen in August 2008 just before the world sank into a deep economic depression, and Hicks acknowledges he doesn't know when the stadium will be completed.

"When we get to the point where the global market settles down and we bring pieces together to finance the stadium (then we can again start building)," Hicks said in an interview with The Associated Press this week. "It's certainly not anything we have changed our mind on. I don't know about the dates because of the global financial markets, but I know the markets will settle down and get better.

"I'm an optimist. I've been through lots of cycles, although none as severe as this in my lifetime. It's a dynamic world."

Hicks is believed to have had financiers scouring the world for minority investors to help fund the stadium for the past year.

After buying Liverpool in 2007 with George Gillett Jr., Hicks wrote off 10 million pounds by ditching existing plans to replace the crumbling Anfield so architects from his native Texas could design a more spectacular stadium in the adjacent Stanley Park.

The subsequent economic downturn forced the new vision to be scaled down but it will still hold 15,000 more seats than Anfield, which has few amenities to generate extra revenue.

"We have spent a lot of money and we have a fully designed stadium," Hicks said. "We have every permit in place, all the city councils' approvals, the judicial reviews on a national basis -- everything is done. That's a great asset to have just to wait for the markets to open up and be able to do anything. Certainly it will happen."

Liverpool's financial situation was boosted this week by a new primary sponsorship deal with British bank Standard Chartered that will start before next season. Hicks expects that deal, along with a new one with Carlsberg, to generate 26 million pounds a year.

Hicks says the new stadium will attract global interest in naming rights and help the Reds in their rivalry with Manchester United, which beat them to the Premier League title by four points last year to match their record haul of 18 English championships.

"We think that the stadium is one of the biggest opportunities for Liverpool to be truly one of the top clubs in the world," Hicks said. "Liverpool was a famous club around many parts of the world before Manchester United became strong in the last 20 years, and that's a heritage we want to build on and try to get to be as strong as possible. The club's in the best shape in many, many years.

"(Manager) Rafa (Benitez) has put together an outstanding group of players over the last two or three years. We can always have more, but I think we're doing very well and I think we will have great success on the pitch this year. Transactions like this week's new sponsorship agreement can only help to give us the resources to compete right there with the other big guys in the world."

[Slinky Skills]

The thread name should be amended to 'Tom Hicks talks ****e'.

[dom9]

It may be inadequate, but ANFIELD IS NOT CRUMBLING.

[wildman]

It may be inadequate, but ANFIELD IS NOT CRUMBLING.

true but we've got to move its the only way we can compete, Utd have been lucky with where their ground is based, if only there wan't so much infrastructure around anfield then we could extend.

[Bender]

would love it if Anfield could be re-built

[Le Chef]

Pretty obvious since he is now playing for them. He's been saying for a while thay he wanted to play in Spain, United never stood a chance of signing him.

United had agreed a deal with Lyon for around the same fee that Madrid paid, Man utd had agreed terms with Benzemas agent. Benzema had a tour around Old Trafford and met a number officials excluding Ferguson.
Madrid matched everything man Utd offered to the penny but it would appear that they courted him on his visit like a king which may have been the deciding factor.

With regards to the £80m they received for Ronaldo some will go towards administrative costs associated with the club, but suffice to say Ferguson will see the better part of it if needed.

[Fierce]

Bit late to the discussion, but jesus christ there are a lot of people massively over-reacting on here

Anyone who is proficient in accounting and finance in general knows that we're not in nearly as bad a situation as is made out to be. On here at least

That said, H&G did LIE about not putting debt on the club, but I think that any investor was always going to do that. Maybe they were naive in thinking that what they said wouldn't be questioned, I dunno. Fact remains, anyone other than an Abramovich type figure would HAVE to put debt onto the club. It would make zero sense for someone intending to run the club as a business to just pay off £60m or whatever we owed initially out of their own pockets without seeing a return

I'm not a sympathiser by any means, but I think its fairly obvious that we're in a better situation with regards to the commercial side of the club than ever before

Yes the debt is worrying, but we needed to step up to the plate, and that means being cleverer about the finance side than simply having an owner that loves the club and will dip his hand in every now and again

[dom9]

true but we've got to move its the only way we can compete, Utd have been lucky with where their ground is based, if only there wan't so much infrastructure around anfield then we could extend.

Yes, agreed. However it annoys me that I keep reading about a 'crumbling Anfield' when this is plainly not true. A lot of clubs would kill to have Anfield in it's present form.

Bit late to the discussion, but jesus christ there are a lot of people massively over-reacting on here

Anyone who is proficient in accounting and finance in general knows that we're not in nearly as bad a situation as is made out to be. On here at least

That said, H&G did LIE about not putting debt on the club, but I think that any investor was always going to do that. Maybe they were naive in thinking that what they said wouldn't be questioned, I dunno. Fact remains, anyone other than an Abramovich type figure would HAVE to put debt onto the club. It would make zero sense for someone intending to run the club as a business to just pay off £60m or whatever we owed initially out of their own pockets without seeing a return

I'm not a sympathiser by any means, but I think its fairly obvious that we're in a better situation with regards to the commercial side of the club than ever before

Yes the debt is worrying, but we needed to step up to the plate, and that means being cleverer about the finance side than simply having an owner that loves the club and will dip his hand in every now and again

[Robbie-fowler999]

Bit late to the discussion, but jesus christ there are a lot of people massively over-reacting on here

Anyone who is proficient in accounting and finance in general knows that we're not in nearly as bad a situation as is made out to be. On here at least

That said, H&G did LIE about not putting debt on the club, but I think that any investor was always going to do that. Maybe they were naive in thinking that what they said wouldn't be questioned, I dunno. Fact remains, anyone other than an Abramovich type figure would HAVE to put debt onto the club. It would make zero sense for someone intending to run the club as a business to just pay off £60m or whatever we owed initially out of their own pockets without seeing a return

I'm not a sympathiser by any means, but I think its fairly obvious that we're in a better situation with regards to the commercial side of the club than ever before

Yes the debt is worrying, but we needed to step up to the plate, and that means being cleverer about the finance side than simply having an owner that loves the club and will dip his hand in every now and again

You are Right. I also Think about the new stadium that there isn't a Club in the world at the moment that can afford to Build a new stadium in the Financial Crisis. Even if it was remotely Possible, No-one in the right mind would do it.

[dom9]

You are Right. I also Think about the new stadium that there isn't a Club in the world at the moment that can afford to Build a new stadium in the Financial Crisis. Even if it was remotely Possible, No-one in the right mind would do it.

Stadium, office development, and the rest.

There was that article about 'The World' artificial islands off Dubai's coast, which are now just lumps of rock on the ocean.

The Telegraph has adverts in it which are advertising stays on the Dubai Palms at cut price rates.

The economy is too ****ed for infastructure projects, apart from governments pumping money into their economies to generate growth.

[Molby]

You are Right. I also Think about the new stadium that there isn't a Club in the world at the moment that can afford to Build a new stadium in the Financial Crisis. Even if it was remotely Possible, No-one in the right mind would do it.

You're right Robbie - it's like any one of us making a big capital expenditure, in the current climate we would think twice about, for eg. buying a new car, moving house....

These cunts are thinking the same, only on a different scale.

To me, the difference is, when they arrived, all we got was the great American Dream. They promised the earth, moon and the stars.

All good houses have solid foundations - these yank wanks have none of that.

To a certain extent, they are hiding behind "the current economic climate" - the crux of the matter is, the wealth was never there in the 1st place

Anyone Agree?

[dom9]

You're right Robbie - it's like any one of us making a big capital expenditure, in the current climate we would think twice about, for eg. buying a new car, moving house....

These cunts are thinking the same, only on a different scale.

To me, the difference is, when they arrived, all we got was the great American Dream. They promised the earth, moon and the stars.

All good houses have solid foundations - these yank wanks have none of that.

To a certain extent, they are hiding behind "the current economic climate" - the crux of the matter is, the wealth was never there in the 1st place

Anyone Agree?

Yes and no.

Had the takeover happened in the last 15 years, the economy was such that the business model would have worked.

Hicks has said that this is the worst downturn he has known. He will ride it out, becuase he, like most people, knows that the economy will pick up again at some point. It always does. Boom and bust is the reality of the situation. He is sitting tight until that happens.

Whether that is right or wrong is where most people diagree, but those, I think are the facts, in simple terms.

There are not many people on the planet that can spunk £500m on a football club, then a further £300, on a stadium out of their own pockets. Many people (not all) used to buy houses as an investment, pension even. It was their strategy because they didn't trust the stock market, or pensions system. That was their choice, and it too was based on borrowing. The recession has caught a lot of people out.