Liverpool owners cap transfer spending at £20m-a-season for next five years

[Scratch]

Tom Hikcs (sic): You don't even have to win a championship every year to draw the fans. You just have to show you're really trying.

Or you could look at it that he has said that ok, you know it's not gonna be your season every season, but so long as it's obvious that everyone is trying to achieve it, or "showing that they are really trying" and not just making a false push (ie from board level down, and this means backing the club financially as well) and that people aren't just settling for being also-rans, then the fans really shouldn't complain and new fans will also be drawn in.

That quote is not exactly saying we're happy to be in the top four, unless you try to twist it to suit your thoughts.

[The_weatherman]

Tom Hikcs (sic): You don't even have to win a championship every year to draw the fans. You just have to show you're really trying.

Or you could look at it that he has said that ok, you know it's not gonna be your season every season, but so long as it's obvious that everyone is trying to achieve it, or "showing that they are really trying" and not just making a false push (ie from board level down, and this means backing the club financially as well) and that people aren't just settling for being also-rans, then the fans really shouldn't complain and new fans will also be drawn in.

That quote is not exactly saying we're happy to be in the top four, unless you try to twist it to suit your thoughts.

I give up.

[kingfunk]

Tom Hikcs (sic): You don't even have to win a championship every year to draw the fans. You just have to show you're really trying.

Or you could look at it that he has said that ok, you know it's not gonna be your season every season, but so long as it's obvious that everyone is trying to achieve it, or "showing that they are really trying" and not just making a false push (ie from board level down, and this means backing the club financially as well) and that people aren't just settling for being also-rans, then the fans really shouldn't complain and new fans will also be drawn in.

That quote is not exactly saying we're happy to be in the top four, unless you try to twist it to suit your thoughts.

That is the worst attempt at sticking up for Hicks I have ever heard/read!

[The_weatherman]

OK, one more try, just so we can see what kind of a man this is.

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-evening-chronicle/tm_headline=tycoon-returns&method=full&objectid=18588846&siteid=50081-name_page.html

Tycoon returns

Feb 7 2007 By Nick Whitten, The Evening Chronicle
Tom Hicks

He'll now be singing You'll Never Walk Alone but scores of his former workers are still ruing the day his corporation walked out on them.

Tycoon Tom Hicks completed the £450m takeover of Liverpool FC yesterday along with fellow American George Gillet.

But the Chronicle can reveal he is a former chairman of Viasystems Group Inc, the parent company of Viasystems Tyneside Ltd which dumped 1,000 Geordies on the dole in 2001.

And to this day they have still not been paid their redundancy payments worth an average £27,000 each, with some payments running as high as £50,000.

Under a Viasystems redundancy scheme they should have received a set amount of money for every year they served with the company.

But workers have only ever received a statutory Government payout worth just 2p for every £1 they were owed.

Circuit board manufacturer Viasystems Tyneside Ltd went into administration in September 2001.

This forced the closure of its Longbenton factory and made hundreds redundant at its South Shields factory which was saved from total closure after a buyout by Circatex.

But today former workers reacted furiously to seeing Mr Hicks splash millions of pounds on taking over control of Liverpool.

Selby Armstrong, 67, of Mill Grove, South Shields, should have been entitled to £46,000 redundancy pay but received only the maximum £7,200 available from a Government "safety net".

He worked at the factory for 33 years as a chemist. He said: "I feel very bitter that he is still able to buy into this country.

"The company has left so many people such as myself without money. He is obviously not short of cash to buy Liverpool."

In 2004 the GMB union sent three former Viasystems workers to the Texas HQ to call for a meeting with Mr Hicks.

But they were unable to meet with Mr Hicks, one of the richest men in America and a close pal of President George W Bush.

Val Smith, 64, of Silverdale Way, South Shields was one of the three who visited the States. She said: "I just hope he treats them a lot fairer than how we were treated.

"I do not want to see Liverpool let down if the going gets tough. I worked at the plant in South Shields for 33 years. I look at him with the contempt that the company seemed to show our workforce."

Tom Ross, GMB senior organiser, who led the delegation to Texas said: "His former company's involvement in Tyneside has left a legacy of despair. People were expecting something but have got nothing.

"We went out there in 2004, cap in hand, and while I guess legally they have done everything by the book, morally I think they owe the people of Tyneside a lot more."

Mr Hicks co-founded and became chairman of investment firm Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst in 1989 which in turn founded Viasystems in 1996, with Mr Hicks on the board of directors.

In 2001 the investment firm, of which Tom Hick's was chairman, took majority control of Viasystems and in February 2002 Mr Hicks became chairman of the Viasystems Group.

He eventually retired from the board of Viasystems and the investment firm at the end of 2004.

Mr Hicks is the son of a Texas radio station owner and has bought into sport with a passion.

In addition to the Dallas Stars ice hockey team, he also bought the Texas Rangers baseball team from a franchise that included President Bush among its owners.

[Norbs]

that's a daft reply.

Bar arsenal they will all have what they need to spend in order to challenge.

We won't.

I edited my previous reply btw.

I didn't see the pre-edit...


Ok, put it like this. I want a Ferrari but can't afford one, should I beat my wife up?

[EwarWoo]

I didn't see the pre-edit...


Ok, put it like this. I want a Ferrari but can't afford one, should I beat my wife up?

No, you should go on a Ferrari forum and make sure every thread eventually moves in the direction of whining because your wife stopped you getting one

[EwarWoo]

OK, one more try, just so we can see what kind of a man this is.

I think you're wasting your time. It's the same **** wrapped up every which way and I think most who haven't already agreed have stopped reading.

It's just needless depression, there's **** all we can do about the situation, may as well just get on with it and enjoy the footy.

[barnes10]

exactly. fook all we can do about it and they are lying scheming arseholes. thats a fact no one is disputing. but they have made some good decisions.

get them out? Sure. but can you guarantee we'd get better in? we dont want to jump out of the frying pan into the fire do we. who would people suggest at this moment in time? who is interested in us?

[BG1973]

I didn't see the pre-edit...


Ok, put it like this. I want a Ferrari but can't afford one, should I beat my wife up?

Put it like this. If before you married your wife you told her you wanted children but then reneged on that she would have reason to want to beat you up.

[cream]

Relax everyone, there's nothing to worry about. Everything is fine and dandy.

[carheex]

This may already have been mentioned (i can't be arsed to read the whole thread) but the article says "figures published in march". Since then we have signed a new sponsorship deal and announced publicly that a portion of that money would go into investment in the team.

[Scratch]

This may already have been mentioned (i can't be arsed to read the whole thread) but the article says "figures published in march". Since then we have signed a new sponsorship deal and announced publicly that a portion of that money would go into investment in the team.

Makes no odds, the figures from march are proof positive that we are going to do a Leeds.

(Altho they don't seem that bad, reading them...and a lot of them are outdated...8% ticket price rise??)

[dom9]

I give up.

[BrianF80]

That's not correct, is it?

As you pointed out the poor ****ers can't even read.

It's major scaremongering they've read "average" and turned it into cap.

The graph clearly shows that we've budgeted more than 20m a year.

[RoadEnd]

When players are bought these days, it's not often that the whole fee is paid up front e.g. spread of payments for Aquilani. Does this mean that we could effectively "overspend" the budget in a given year if the payments are staged and the whole amount is not paid in that season?