Wow, these guys are really hated by Liverpool fans, what's the consensus across the pond? Is this a big story over there, dominating the news here! Are these guys thought of as lowly in their home country?
No one knows anything about the whole Liverpool ownership thing in the US. That said Tom Hicks also declared bankruptcy with the Texas Rangers and sold that off so this is nothing new with him. But this isnt a big story, hell its not even a small story here.
It's a no story on the other side of the pond. Hell you'd hear about hockey way before you hear about Liverpool's change of ownership. With that said, I still think Pool is doomed, even with their new Red Sox owner.
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Haha, well I suppose my two main questions answered. No one over there cares and Hicks and Gillet pulled a similar job with the Rangers. What about the Redsox owners NESV, these guys legit?
I understand it's a big deal. No one in this city like Hicks because he's from the Dallas area. He owns the Rangers and Stars. So Liverpool only cost 450 US Dollars? Let's just say it took 84 years or so for the Red Sox to win another World Series.
Yes, about that amount. Hicks/Gillet are not happy and appear to think they have been conned. They are claiming up to £1bn in damages, it's quite a big story over here and quite an entertaining one to follow, surprised it's not at least made some headlines over your way with it being owners of 2 US franchises involved...
It's a big deal, but people are just trying to find out another way to say soccer sucks. I mean there are some US born owners of EPL teams. Aston Villa is owned by the same owner as the Cleveland Browns, Manchester United is owned by the same owners as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Sure there are more, but that's is off the top of my head.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_football_club_owners Five of the 20 EPL teams are owned by Americans. Arsenal - Stan Kroenke "Former" owner of the Nuggets and current owner of the St Louis Rams Aston Villla - Randy Lerner, owner of the Browns Liverpool - folks from the Red Sox Manchester United - Malcolm Glazer, owner of the Bucs Sunderland - some dude name Ellis Short.
On that note, the Glaziers are even more hated by Utd fans than Hicks/Gillet are by Liverpool. There is protest groups set up specifically to fight the Glaziers and some fans even started their own team in a lower league and stopped supporting Utd until the Glaziers are gone!
The thing with English fans is that the only type of foreign owners they will tolerate are billionaire "benefactors" like Roman Abramovich and Sheikh Mansour who will basically give their teams money to spend on big name players without the burden of a matching return in operating revenue. Most American owners are not like that -- when they go across the pond to buy a premiership club, they do so with the intent of making money, and unfortunately do not know enough about what it takes to build a contending team. That's why the Glazers and Hicks are hated so much ... they ended up saddling their teams with insurmountable debt without producing expected results, and they look like capitalist villains while they sit on this side of the pond and wonder why all these fans hate them for trying. One major exception is Arsenal, who expressly and stubbornly choose to build by developing young talent instead of spending lavishly on transfers and free agents. I can't remember the exact numbers but I believe Arsenal's payroll today is less than 1/3rd of Liverpool's, and yet they field a consistently better team. The knock on the Gunners, of course, is their recent inability to deliver actual silverware -- they seem to be perpetually stuck in 2nd or 3rd place behind Chelsea and United. But their fans are loyal to the club management as much as Liverpool fans despise theirs.
I don't know if that's true about Arsenal, I doubt it would be a 1/3 of Liverpool's considering Liverpool themselves are only about half of what Man City and Chelsea spend. An article I read a while ago summed up the huge gap in EPL teams.. at the time Chelsea paid double in salaries of what the third highest(Liverpool at the time) paid, John Terry by himself earned more than Hull's entire player payroll at that time. It's amazing the games are still close when you consider Chelsea or Man City have payrolls 20 times that of teams like Blackpool. Salary Caps are ftw!
Actually Hicks himself said that during his tenure as co-owner, Liverpool were among top 3 or something in player spending. As a Liverpool fan, I put half of the blame on Rafa Benitez, or what some fans like to call the fat Spaniard waiter, for mismanaging the funds with crappy players. I don't think Liverpool will fare that much better in terms of consistently making the top 4 spots with the new owners since they're the profit-making type. It's a bit unfortunate that in this day and age where money is the only thing, Liverpool was unable to get a billionaire owner. I'm sure those wealthy billionaire Arabs are a dime a dozen there... why can't the good guys snatch just one? But it could've been worse. Donald Sterling could've bought the team.
Those guys are such a-holes. To put into perspective, these guys are willing to let the club go into administration, which results in a 9 point deduction, in a season where they are battling relegation. They don't care about anything but money, yet they don't know how to make money for a football club. They should be removed for incompetence more than anything else. I can't wait for the day to come when teams are fully owned by fans, including the ones who don't have much money. That's the best structure for football.
