First to get many of you up to speed. American Tycoon, sports owner billionaire Malcolm Galzer ahas effectively bought the largest football team in the world, Manchester United. Details
For the Manchester United supporter this is apparently the most disasterous thing since, well, ever. Certainly there are things to be concerned about, but you would think that a convicted puppy molester and black market baby broker was buying the team. Yes, he is putting debt on the team that they didn’t ever have. NOT THE END OF THE WORLD. Yes he will probably raise prices…smart, considering Old Trafford could sell out three times over on game day.
They supporters are convinced he will destroy the grand old club, because of course that is exactly why he is spending $1.5 billion to acquire it, to run it into the ground and make it worthless. Well, he doesn’t know anything about football ("soccer’), has never been to a game, etc. True enough, but being a man with a bit of business savvy, he just might hire good people to run the club…maybe?
The hypocrisy of the supporters is ridiculous. Nothnig beats the “NOT FOR SALE” signs, considering that Manu Was a PLC meaning that in fact it is is very much for sale. No one really complained when the team floated itself to earn money and turned into a commercial behemout. Man U is not your family’s football team, it is a huge billion doallar company that sold its soul to get where it is now. Success has come, but this is the Devil you made the deal with.
So the supporters are whinging about and threatening boycotts and ripping up season ticket renewals and going on about founding there own club and give me a friggin’ break! Clearly they don’t want to support the man who at this point has done NOTHING to hurt the team, but in anticiaption that he will they are intent aon doing their part to help along that failure. Brilliant, such loyal fans.
And then there is the unspoken fct that he is an American. They donwplay it, but clearly that bugs the hell out of them. Their shrieking petulant complaing about what they fear might happen is ridiculous and want the Manchester United supporters to shut the fuck up!
I tend to think of Manchester United as the British equivalent of the New York Yankees - and have the same sympathy for their fans as I do for those of Yankees who whine that they haven’t been champions for nearly five years.
Well, while it may seem like a disaster to some (or alot)–it might be really good for soccer (uh, sorry, football) longterm.
Like, maybe soccer would actually get some airplay over here–ok, so it’ll be on the business pages instead of the sports section…
I hope that this works out well–for all concerned. I’m a fan of soccer, but here, you must speak (or at least understand) Spanish to follow any International games. :rolleyes:
Well, putting on debt which isn’t fully transparent, and where the figures don’t add up, isn’t a smart move.
I read a comment from one reporter from America, saying Glazer would consider himself successful if he was selling tickets for £100 and Old Trafford was full of Japanese tourists. Would you consider that to be a good outcome?
Spending borrowed money, don’t forget.
While certainly not being a Man U fan, and having no time for the club’s recent past, there is still half of Manchester that is and has always been red. They’re the people you’re seeing protesting - people who’ve been with the club for decades. They have as little time for fair-weather friends as the rest of us.
Right. Because they’re saying their opposition to him has nothing to do with him being American, the truth is obviously the opposite. :rolleyes:
My biggest concern, and that of other people, is how this is going to screw up the other 90-odd professional clubs. Already, the problem is the financial gulf between the big few and the many. This is going to make it worse - one of the few places Glazer will be able to find extra cash is by bullying it out of TV companies, leaving less for clubs that are already struggling to make ends meet.
Lets take a storied successful US sports franchise, like the Yankees or Red Sox. How do you think the fans would feel if some rich German with no knowlege or concern about the sport of baseball, or the team’s history and mystique, with a history of cost cutting, and price raising bought the team, raised prices, tore down Yankees Stadium and refused to spend any money to get players to win championships.
Glazer doesn’t care about winning cups and championships. He just wants the team good enought to make him a bunch of money. He doesn’t care about the history of ManU, or about making it dominant again.
Sure he won a superbowl, but he did that in a sport and league with a hard salary cap. European soccer is much like MLB, you need to spend money to compete, cause there is no cap.
I think Glazer is making a big mistake, and expect him to sell out in a few years after he destroys the club.
The other guys have pretty much nailed it. Whether Glazer ‘hires good people’ to run the club is pretty much irrelevant. This is currently the most profitable football club in the world, yet he needs to substantially increase profits just to cover the interest payments on the debts that he is incurring to buy the club for himself, then transferring to the business.
Perhaps Gangster Octopus could suggest the benefits to the business of moving from a debt-free profit making entity to one with somewhere in the region of £400 million debt?
And while you’re there, please consider that it is possiblle to be opposed to the actions of an American without being ‘anti-American’. The rest of your post just shows your ignorance of the situation, that bit makes you a twat. Have a nice day.
I know very well what is going on Avenger, whether I am twat or not is irrelevant. And no I don’t think being an American is the main thing, but I also don’t beleive it has nothing to do with it. I am not saying this is good or bad, but the hysterics are freaking ridiculous. The man has done NOTHING! yet they moan and piss on about how he Man U are headed for the First Division. It’s patent nonsense. SO he is putting debt on the team, it is not unheard of and it is not disasterous. This is not another Leeds, I’m sorry, but it isn’t People are so fucking convinced that they know what this man will do that they act as if it has already happened. Seriously, Glazer has some very savvy business men as financial backers, yet everyone is convinced all he wants to do is run the club into the ground. Idiocy. Everyone is coninced about the TV contract, but Glazer is the beneficiary of one of the most successful TV contracts, the NFL, that benefits from a cartel.
You’d think the fire and brimstone is raining down on Old Trafford. For Og’s sake give it a rest.
Leave out the lind about “some rich German” and this describes what happens in US pro sports all the time. Right now in Minnesota, we have a team up for sale, with a potential buyer group lead by a real-estate guy from the other side of the US. He was recently in town looking into places to build a new stadium. And I haven’t seen the cost of a ticket go down yet.
I see no reason why Glazer would deliberately run the club into the ground, that is patently obvious. On the other hand, I see no benefits to the club (nor have you yet suggested any) and I see no evidence that he understands his market.
So, again, what do you see as the advantages of this deal from the point of view of the business? What does Glazer bring that justfies taking a debt free company and making it the most endebted club in Britain. Even if Glazer triples the profitability, that still means the the next five or six hundred million pounds that the business earns will go to pay Glazer’s debts rather than sign players or improve facilities. For what advantage? It’s not like the current board are business failures.
Why would I care about the Yankees? They are professionals employed for entertainment purposes. They’ve no loyalty to the city, which runs off remembered days anyway.
I’ve read that Man. U. will have to triple their profits just to make the payments on the loan. If this is accurate I can’t see how it’s a good thing. It’s not like Man. U. have been holding back on milking their money cows as it is.
And I have heard that the savings from not having to pay dividends will be enough to pay the interest oin the debt. Who knows?
I am not at all saying it is a good plan. It is risky, surely, welcome to the world of business. To answer Avenger’s question. WHy do people go into debt to buy a house? Why do businesses borrow money to start-up to expand etc.? Because they think there is a profitable stream of money to be made to pay for the debt and then some. Apparently Glazer and his associates have a plan…a plan that may fail miserably or may succeed spectacularly, but more likely will end up somewhere in the middle. He probably doesn’t know fuck-all about football, but I can almost guaranteee you that he employed people who do to run the numbers. He is buying Man U to try and make it a successful and more profitable club, he may fail, but he ain’t coming in to piss it away on some lark. And I understand the fans emotional attachment to the club, but I cannot really sympathize with them, when a lot of their success has come on the shoulders of lower division clubs constantly trying to stay out of administration due to a lot of the inequities that Manchester United (and others) have foisted upon the whole footballing landscape.
The salient point is that no-one has demonstrated why the debt is necesary for the increased profits. The debt will not be used to expand, or anything of the sort, merely to cover Glazer’s personal costs in purchasing the shares. In other words, exactly the same increases in profits, if these can be achieved, could be achieved without any debt at all. Unless Glazer’s personal talents are somehow worth £450 million, then his prescence is of no advantage to the business.
As a supporter of a lower division club, there is some truth in that. However, if Man United crash and burn that is of no advantage to English football.
Probably not the best terms you could have used in regard to Manchester U.
The main thrust of the OP is against Man U fans but all they want is a successful (ie win lots of silverware) club. They already have that, it is the biggest club in the world in financial terms, and it’s not in debt either.
With the wall to wall coverage of this deal I’ve seen many fans interviewed and none of them have expressed anti American rhetoric that I’ve seen. He would be despised if he came from Timbucktoo, its what he stands for not where he comes from that’s the issue.
Disclaimer:I am not now nor ever have been a Man. U. fan.