[Archived] Liverpool In Difficulties

[Bobby G]

Its the Al Maktoum's.

I am sure they will get their hands on them sooner or later.

[thenodrog]

Well Liverpool got unbelievably lucky against Standard Liege but its not saved their new stadium.

Pics of Shanks, Paisley and Fagan lower down that article. I wonder what they would have made of the Liverpool Circus now.

[philipl]

Gosh a sign of the times, apparently there isn't that much interest in buying Liverpool now they have been put up for sale.

[dingles staying down 4ever]

Gosh a sign of the times, apparently there isn't that much interest in buying Liverpool now they have been put up for sale.

See how many fans are willing to splash £5000 to buy a piece of their club now? It will be intersting to see how many are willing to put their money where their mouths were.

It was only last season when they spouted this idea when they knew they had a cat in hell's chance of achieving their goal

[philipl]

Keith Harris speculates that Torres and Gerrard will be sold in January.

This is the Telegraph article referred to in the Rovers for sale thread.

Things must be really grim at Anfield for Harris to be publicly saying these sorts of things.

[92er]

A follow up article in the Daily Telegraph today.

Sources close to the American owners argue that the drawn debt is £265 mil, with an available overdraft facility of £50 mil and an undrawn figure of £30 mil that will go towards the new stadium.

Hicks and Gillett also have cash collateral of £60 mil, reducing the debt to £205 mil. That would be only just over the £35-40 mil serviceable profitability of the club.

The owners plan to use Liverpool's profits to pay the interest.

The owners are confident the replacement financing of £350 mil for their original loan can be extended by 6 month and is available at any time.

As regards Everton, Harris is now saying there has been serious interest. ".......there are grounds for optimism. It's a terrific club and having Bill Kenwright as chairman is one of the strongest selling points."

[philipl]

That reads like there have been frantic calls from the two Liverpool clubs to Harris and a rapid re-packaging of the story. I doubt Harris would have said what he did in the first place if it didn't include at least a germ of reality. We'd be hearing mutterings about legal cases if it didn't.

[Billy Castell]

I think Orville was a bit too candid behind Mr. Harris' back in the 1st story.

[thenodrog]

I think Orville was a bit too candid behind Mr. Harris' back in the 1st story.

I wonder if the financial situation will have an effect on the values of Torres and Gerrard? Lpool might have a nasty shock when/if they are forced to put them on the market. They'll surely only go to CL involved clubs and I cannot see Abromovich funded Chelsea being interested, I doubt Arsene would invest that amount of money even if he had it cos it's simply not his way of doing and the old RFW might just find that the Glazers will tell him that he has spent plenty enough already.

That leaves clubs abroad and obviously Real madrid will get linked, but if there is not much serious competition they would not need to go overboard would they?.

[Billy Castell]

Real Madrid and Barca, and Inter are the obvious candidates, but if you want a real outsider how about the Gazprom owned Schalke taking a player or two? Maybe not Torres or Gerrard, but other decent players.

And could we get Beniyon for a reasonable price?

[thenodrog]

Real Madrid and Barca, and Inter are the obvious candidates, but if you want a real outsider how about the Gazprom owned Schalke taking a player or two? Maybe not Torres or Gerrard, but other decent players.

And could we get Beniyon for a reasonable price?

Benayoun would be just what we need on the right imo.

[AndyC]

Real Madrid and Barca, and Inter are the obvious candidates, but if you want a real outsider how about the Gazprom owned Schalke taking a player or two? Maybe not Torres or Gerrard, but other decent players.

And could we get Beniyon for a reasonable price?

man city?

money talks !

[Billy Castell]

Can't see Stevie G in the sky blue shirt, but Torres in some £350,000 p/w deal....................maybe.

[Majiball]

I doubt you'll ever see Stevie G in another English clubs shirt. The Americans might as well just take gun a stick it in there mouths, the scousers would hunt them down where ever they hide.

The club will get sold to the Arabs, for all this talk of players being sold is it not more likely the bank will tell the yanks to sell the club instead? Can the bank do that? Could they even not just take control of the club? I take it the loans are secured against the club?

Ah well it will make amusing reading with the morning coffee!

[philipl]

Liverpool's finance people ought to take a long hard look at the deflating fine art market.

It is true that some works are still going for record breaking prices where there are two buyers who still have cash and want a particilar piece but 40% of works are not even getting close to reserve at auction.

Just like the top of the art market has seen the number of buyers halved, a small pool of clubs that might theoretically have gone to E100m for a single player has been halved overnight by the credit crunch.

Realistically the pool of buyers that might spend that sort of money has been cut to Real Madrid (only if the global marketing deal can be packaged as well), Barca (at a push), Inter (at a push) and Man City. Juve and Man U left the game a while ago whilst the likes of Chelsea and AC have left the auction house as well and Arsenal and Bayern were never in it. It is an illusion to think that the Russians and Ukranians will step in at E100m levels given what has happened to commodity prices recently.

If City go and get Benzyma and Kaka for argument's sake this January then whilst they might still be able to afford E100m for Torres, they would no longer have an absolute need for him, just as Real Barca and Inter are already very well served by world class strikers and thrusting midfielders.

Sure there would still be a market for Torres and Gerrard but at the £30m to £40m range and not the £60m++ each which Liverpool need for serious debt-busting.

[Billy Castell]

What a shame. I do hope that we don't be nice and accomodating and demand 10m for RSC because of the financial problems that are going on. We should stick to our guns and demand £20m with Sturridge and Onhura (sp?) for RSC.

[thenodrog]

What a shame. I do hope that we don't be nice and accomodating and demand 10m for RSC because of the financial problems that are going on. We should stick to our guns and demand £20m with Sturridge and Onhura (sp?) for RSC.

Cash only please.

[adopted scouser]

Benayoun would be just what we need on the right imo.

Benny Hill would be an improvement at the mo

[philipl]

Keith Harris - "The one that worries me is Liverpool"

Headline is about the possible imminent sale of Torres and Gerrard.

Italian clubs looking at Babel and Agger

[Exiled in Toronto]

Keith Harris - "The one that worries me is Liverpool"

Headline is about the possible imminent sale of Torres and Gerrard.

Italian clubs looking at Babel and Agger

Since he seems to be the power broker in club sales, I wonder why we chose to go with Rothschilds.

[iamarover]

Keith Harris - "The one that worries me is Liverpool"

Headline is about the possible imminent sale of Torres and Gerrard.

Italian clubs looking at Babel and Agger

Good spot. And fair play to your persistence on this one... you saw this coming a year ago. I am sure they are not the only ones. Southgate this morning in the Times is forecasting hard times ahead. If we could just pull out of this one, we would be fair set for a good season next year. This is the biggest five months in the club's recent history. Could be all so right or all so cataclysmically wrong.

[philipl]

A slightly less apocleptic picture for January.... but still leaves £350m to be found in the summer whilst Gillet and Hicks are both being squeezed back across the Atlantic.

[The Prof.]

Que Government buyout with our cash!

[Anti Euro Smiths Fan]

Is Rafa cracking up ?

Rafa should be bloody carpeted for blowing 5m in just 5 months on a player that he did not need and did not fit in with the Lpool style of play. I can only think of 2 or 3 clubs that would treat it so lightly.

Reports in the media have suggested that the fee Spurs paid for Robbie Keane is just £12m plus some add-ons, so it's certainly a significant loss that Benitez has blown on the Irishman. Will Benitez be made accountable for this expensive mistake?

Rafa said today: "Robbie couldn't settle into the team and into our formation. You have to react quickly. The situation was not good and we needed to do something."

Surely it is Rafa's job to make sure that when he buys someone for Liverpool they can fit into the team's formation and pattern of play. As the former Liverpool striker John Aldridge said today, following Keane's departure Liverpool don't have the sufficient attacking depth to win the title.

"To sustain a challenge on Manchester United you have got to have more strikers on top of what Liverpool have got at the moment," said Aldridge.

Again it is Rafa's job to make sure that his squad has sufficient strength in depth. What happens if Torres gets injured again? They simply wouldn't be good enough up front to sustain a challenge for the title.

Whilst I'm certainly not a fan of Alex Ferguson and the pressure that he puts on referees, I would question the timing of Rafa's recent rant against Fergie. Surely it would have been better for Benitez to have waited until the end of the season, preferably after Liverpool had actually won something.

If Liverpool finish the season empty-handed Benitez is going to be heavily criticised in the media and comparisons will be made with Kevin Keegan's famous rant during the 1995/96 season.

According to a report in today's Daily Telegraph, Liverpool's co-owner George Gillett has admitted for the first time that he would be "open" to selling his stake in the club (after previously insisting that he wouldn't sell.)

Jay McKenna from the Liverpool supporters' union 'Spirit of Shankly' says that Gillett and Hicks have made three promises to the fans and broken them all.

The first broken promise was the debt on the club. Hicks promised that the takeover would not be like the Glazers at Manchester United and there would be no debt on the club. It's now revealed that there's a £350 million loan to be repaid.

The second broken promise was undermining the manager, with the Americans admitting that they approached Jurgen Klinsmann last season. The American owners first claimed that they approached Klinsmann to work as a consultant if Rafa had left. The reports significantly undermined Benitez, who they promised to be supportive of.

The third broken promise was the new stadium. The Americans claimed that there would be no delays on building the new stadium. That promise has been broken as well.

The following have taken ownership of PL clubs recently - which new owner would you choose?

Newcastle - Mike Ashley?

Portsmouth - Alexandre Gaydamak?

Sunderland - Quinn and his Irish mates?

Man City - The richest people in football?

West Ham - The former richest people in Iceland?

Aston Villa - Randy Lerner?

Liverpool - The Hicks and Gillett comedy duo?

Chelsea - Roman Abramovich?

Man Utd - The Glazers?

Randy Lerner at Aston Villa seems to be a decent American and Niall Quinn and the Irish boys at Sunderland don't seem to be too bad, but as for the rest of them - what a joke.

A complete bunch of shysters - and that certainly includes old Hicky and Gillett at Liverpool.

And to think that the Liverpool fans celebrated wildly when the Americans took over in 2007. The word "naive" perhaps springs to mind when you think of how easily the scousers were taken in by the promises of the shysters.

[Exiled_Rover]

I'd have Roman, Lerner, Quinn and the Citeh owners.