I have to be honest and say that the news of the Gold/Sullivan partnership buying a 50% stake in the Hammers filled me with mixed emotions. The good news was that the pair are businessmen with a track record of success, any involvement in football is madness from an economics point of view but at least these two know what it's all about, the bad news was the fact that they are both fans.
Being a fan of a football club is something that is difficult to explain to any non-believers, it's a bit like asking the Pope to try and convince me that the virgin birth and resurrection took place, defies logic. Most people are born with a club, or at least choose it at an early age and stick with it, some like my neighbour Gary switch clubs when something more interesting comes along (he changed from being a lifelong Spud to being a lifelong Chelski fan when you know who turned up with his billion) whatever type of fan you are you generally commit to your club emotionally. So how do you marry up the emotion with the business sense? How do you financially support an enterprise when you know that you will get nothing in return, unless you buy low and sell high as this pair did with Birmingham City.
David Sullivan has spent the best part of a year studying the finances of football clubs in this country and he admits it's not a pretty sight, in a press conference this week he claimed that one Premiership club will go into administration, possibly before the end of the season. He didn't state which one but you don't need to be Einstein to work out it's the one whose ground has the postcode PO4 8RA. I'd hazard a guess and say that in the Premiership only Arsenal and Aston Villa can meet their debt repayments, all clubs have debt, the fact that West Ham have debts of £110 million and the latest accounts will probably show a loss of between £40 and £50 million doesn't mean they are about to go bust, it does mean however that their cash convertible assets are exceeded by their liabilities. This means that the club will probably have to sell the naming rights of the Boleyn or sell the ground and move to Stratford and takeover the Olympic Stadium, of course that's a no-no whilst the 'dream ticket' of Coe-Johnson insist on the 2012 Olympics leaving behind an athletics legacy. Presumably that's the same sort of legacy that half fills Crystal Palace three times a year!
Anyway the point of the headline is that, having said that the club is in a mess, it has debts and is going to hell in a handcart, they have offered Ruud Van Nistelrooy a £100,000 to get off the Physio bench at the Bernabeau and come to the East End on some sort of rescue mission. It's the sort of deal that got us into this mess in the first place, Lucas Neil on £80,000 a week, Freddie Lunchbox on £90,000 a week, Lee Bowyer on a £1 million bonus if we stayed up. If football is ever to come into the real world of business practice it will have to stop paying these stupid salaries for players who clearly are not superstars, until that happens clubs will become the playthings of the rich and stupid or owned by businessmen who really ought to say no, after all Sir Alan Sugar didn't get rich by holding onto his share in Spuds did he?
btw, I know that's not David Sullivan in the photograph but let's be honest Karen Brady's arse is prettier (allegedly) that David Sullivan's face.
4 comments:
Yes but imagine the great match-day programmes dotted with what Gold and Sullivan made their money from!
Well we need some sort of stimulus.
A good Pete Townshend inspired title here, I see.
It's sad that such a fine club with a tradition of playing decent football should be in danger. I hope business acumen triumphs over raw emotion.
So do I Les, we've been saved from the brink now let's be sensible about it.
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