new liverpool thread - everyone loves them (1 Viewer)

[ratmonkey]

3) Club itself is a profitable entity with cash reserves (and thus able to afford to spend) until the interest on the debts mounts becomes oppressive and the cowboys take money out of the club and into holding company and club no longer can afford such things.

 

[washingcattle]

4. That's bollox.

It was a financial timebomb from day one and everyone involved should have known better.

 

[Hector Grey]

the owners weren't up to their eyes in debt, and the club was profitable. it's just they bought it with borrowed money, and then set it up so that x amount of the revenue paid off that debt. the owners put in personal loans of 150 mil, which is what they're moaning about. that bought players, until they gave up and stopped giving money to the club. it's a bullshit scenario, no doubt, but they weren't in debt from overspending.

and houllier wanted silvestre real bad. i think fergie bought him to spite ged, which he likes to do... backfired though

 

[washingcattle]

Again, I'm not saying you we're in debt from over spending I'm saying that you were in debt and kept on spending in spite of it. I mean jesus, I'd love us to sign players like Torres but we'd have crippled the club in the process. We're in debt (a tiny fraction of yours) we don't spend, it just makes sense.

 

[Hector Grey]

but the club wasn't in debt, kop holdings was. it's daft, but it's as far from the portsmouth situation as you can imagine.

 

[actwithoutwords]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/oct/20/roy-hodgson-manchester-united-fernando-torres

Get to fuck Roy. His handling of Torres is nothing short of a disgrace. Barrett in the Times apparently reporting that Fernando is completely disillusioned as well. I doubt NESV anticipated having to make such big decisions so quickly, but he's got to go now. Anfield this weekend is going to be ugly. Pellegrini making overtures too. Get it done.

Read this interview yesterday: http://www.liverpoolfc.tv/news/latest-news/how-an-email-helped-save-lfc
Which is very on message obviously, but he comes across really genuinely, and his bona fides have been vouched for. This evening looks like he's replacing Purslow. Fingers crossed he does the business.

Soccernomics/Why England Lose is absolutely brilliant by the way. "The manager doesn't matter" stuff was presented very provocatively in the press to drum up interest for the book, it makes more sense in context, though obviously remains hugely counterintuitive. It's a real goldmine of great stuff, albeit occasionally a bit dispiritingly hard-nosed about the game. Hearing that Henry had been reading it over the summer was what got me quite excited about NESV I have to say. Showed a level of engagement and forward thinking that G&H wouldn't even bother dreaming of.

 

[coast to coast]

The messers didn't have any money and yet you bought Fernando fucking Torres .

Jesus am I going insane here ?

Yes. The reason Liveprool had no money is because they spend all of their profits paying interests on loans taken out by someone lese. You did follow this whole thing right? We don't need to go back to arguing again do we washingcattle? Is this the end of the friendly derby?

 

[Cormcolash]

If Liverpool hadn't been taken over by Gillette and co., they'd still have ended up paying loads of money on interest and shit, because they would have gone into debt trying to buy 'big' players.
It's blatantly obvious that's the case.

 

[coast to coast]

If Liverpool hadn't been taken over by Gillette and co., they'd still have ended up paying loads of money on interest and shit, because they would have gone into debt trying to buy 'big' players.
It's blatantly obvious that's the case.

Its blatantly obvious that something that didn't happen is the case. Explain to me how that one works.

 

[Cormcolash]

If you don't think Liverpool would have spent shit loads of money on players and gone into debt trying to satisfy Benitez in a quest to win the Premier League even if Gillette and Hicks didn't take over the club, you're wrong.

 

[coast to coast]

If you don't think Liverpool would have spent shit loads of money on players and gone into debt trying to satisfy Benitez in a quest to win the Premier League even if Gillette and Hicks didn't take over the club, you're wrong.

If I don't think that something that didn't happen would've happened but for the fact that it didn't happen, I'd be wrong. I'm sure you can phrase that sentence better.

If you're saying that its probable that in the absence of a buyer for Liverpool football club in 2006/2007, David Moores/Granada/etc's ownership of the club would have funded competing with United, Arsenal and Chelsea by using more and more debt to purchase players maybe that might have happened. There's just to many ifs and buts and might'ves there for you to conclude that.

So, no, you're wrong.

 

[Hector Grey]

sorry cormo, that's nonsense. liverpool can be one of the mopst profitable clubs in the world, they would never have gone into crazy debt to buy players. the reason that masch, alonso were sold, wasn't to get money together. it was because they wanted to leave. liverpool's record signing is still torres,a t 26 mil. chelsea and united (and city) have spend that on 10-15 players. if the club was willing to go into debt to buy players, then why didn't it happen? why didn't the move for villa materialise 4 years ago?

 

[oh shit]

In fairness to cormac and washingcattle, they're completely financially illiterate... the sad thing is that liverpool and united supporters have ended up having to learn how this all works.

I read the part about 'not needing a manager' last night. as has been said already it's just a provocative way of making a bigger point. i'll copy a part out over lunch.

that interview's interesting, but why does he think the titanic was built in liverpool?

 

[Unicron]

sorry cormo, that's nonsense. liverpool can be one of the mopst profitable clubs in the world, they would never have gone into crazy debt to buy players. the reason that masch, alonso were sold, wasn't to get money together. it was because they wanted to leave. liverpool's record signing is still torres,a t 26 mil. chelsea and united (and city) have spend that on 10-15 players. if the club was willing to go into debt to buy players, then why didn't it happen? why didn't the move for villa materialise 4 years ago?

Didn't they take out a loan to buy Torres or would you argue that doing something like that was symptomatic of Hicks and Gilette policies rather than something that whoever was owning the club might have done?

Tell you what though, what's happened with pool and what looks like it's coming down the road with United has made me even more sure that I hope Kroenke or Usmanov (though the former seems the lesser of two evils) don't get control of Arsenal. Mostly in the past I've felt that way because the current regime has run the club well and I didn't think that we need a change at boardroom level however I've come to the conclusion that it would likely be the ruination of the club if it happened. There's a wierd old-money public-school vibe off the Arsenal board but most of them do seem to approach their position as though they are genuinely custodians of the club, which is what you'd want from them as a fan.

 

[Unicron]

I read the part about 'not needing a manager' last night. as has been said already it's just a provocative way of making a bigger point. i'll copy a part out over lunch.

As I've said I haven't read the book but I've heard Kuper set out his argument on the radio a couple of times on radio and I think he wrote a 442 column on it, based on those things I think that he's got his causality backwards but I'd be interested in reading the full part of it.

He also said recently that England would globablly be one of the most supported teams in the world cup due to the scope of the Premier League's TV penetration. He even said that hte Irish (specifically) would be supporting England because we watch their league.

 

[oh shit]

Tell you what though, what's happened with pool and what looks like it's coming down the road with United has made me even more sure that I hope Kroenke or Usmanov (though the former seems the lesser of two evils) don't get control of Arsenal.

Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't they in recent years appeared to back off from that track? Or are they both still sniffing around for more shares? I honestly think that the era of people viewing English football clubs as an investment enterprise is over. West Ham, Portsmouth, Liverpool, Newcastle, Leeds, and lastly, slowly United have proved that it really doesn't work. And everyone knows that the British economy ain't what it was so it's not like you'll be able to flip it for a profit further down the line. I don't know what the Glazers are planning to do but they must see that as United decline on the pitch, their revenues will start to decline too and that means a) less profits for their own dividences and b) less revenue, making future refinancing harder and harder and putting off potential buyers.

It'll be interesting to watch. Rooney's statement last night is probably a watershed moment. One point that Soccernomics makes about managers is that when you consider clubs in terms of revenues and ability to pay good wages, United's success over the last 20 years is basically all you would expect of a club their size - there would be something seriously wrong with Lord Ferg if he hadn't won all before him. But at the same time it's not saying anyone could have done it. It takes great ability to manage something that large and stressful while looking constantly to renew the team, and of course, United weren't dominant when he took over and helped build it up. Anyway now the cash is drying up and the team slipping in the table, Fergo should get out with his reputation intact.

 

[Hector Grey]

the debt, however it was achieved, is gone. we've other, more malodourous fish to fry. how did roy get it so wrong? bring back that other roy, he of the evans. then we'd see some football. we could at least win nothing by playing the way we used to.

 

[Unicron]

Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't they in recent years appeared to back off from that track? Or are they both still sniffing around for more shares?

I think the current state of the global economy has slowed things on that front significantly but it was still relatively recent (well, last November) that there was some movement on the issue, Kroenke was quietly buying up shares in bits and pieces and now has a holding of 29.9% which puts him right on the threshold of getting to 30% and then under stock market rules being obligated to make an offer to buy up all the issued shares. There won't be anything happening with him until he makes up his mind as to whether he still wants the club. I'm unsure of the exact size of Usmanov's holding but it's at least 25% but he's been unable to have any board influence, whether or not it's a good idea to freeze out someone who owns that much of the club I don't know. He was engaged in a pretty large PR campaign with the press at one point, flying people off on junkets and then stories would appear in the papers saying that if Arsenal wanted to compete they'd have to find a sugar daddy like Chelsea did and he was said to be fond of issuing writs to people that had a dissenting opinion. The current board have an agreement in place up to October of next year to give each other first option on the sale any shares so beyond that we'll have to wait and see. The potential fly in the ointment is a woman called Nina Bracewell-Smith who is the wife of the grandson of a former chairman and less steeped in the tradition than other long term shareholders, she owns 15.9% and is widely known to want out.

On the subject of American owners even the seemingly most benevolent of them, Randy Lerner at Villa, will probably take a bit of a hiding on all this too. He was very shrewd in his purchase, choosing a club with the potential to make the step up to the CL with the right investment and put an awful lot of his money in, allowed MON to gamble by assembling a squad who's wage bill added up to 85% of turnover which is both completely unsustainable for a business and one of the highest in the league but if they got top 4 the CL would likely help fix that. Then along came City who he can't compete with and even worse, Spurs got to 4th first so the difficult job of making the CL when he arrived became far harder than it first looked.

Do you read the Swiss Ramble blog? I think you might find it interesting if you don't.

 

[oh shit]

As I've said I haven't read the book but I've heard Kuper set out his argument on the radio a couple of times on radio and I think he wrote a 442 column on it, based on those things I think that he's got his causality backwards but I'd be interested in reading the full part of it.

He also said recently that England would globablly be one of the most supported teams in the world cup due to the scope of the Premier League's TV penetration. He even said that hte Irish (specifically) would be supporting England because we watch their league.

I think this is the part referred to - maybe there's something more later on. p111. This chapter's been about the discrimination against black players in the English game during the 80s and up until the early 90s. Basically, by comparing the performances of teams with the same wage bill but different proportions of black players, you show that black players were undervalued in the market as the team with more players tends to do better than the one without, while spending the same money. This is because wages are generally a very accurate indicator of a player's worth on the market. It also meant that clubs could take advantage of the undervaluing by buying up lots of black players.

They then go on to show that the same doesn't apply to managers. Black managers are obviously very much underrepresented, and Barnes, Blisset etc have gone on the record about it. But it's hard to show this based on market data. This is because the managers market is closed, secretive, and hard to quantify in terms of success, unlike with players.

Markets tend to work when they are transparent - when you see who is doing what and place a value on it... when you can't see what people do, it's very hard to assign a value to their work. Efficient markets punish discrimination in plain view of everyone, and so discrimination tends to get rooted out. Inefficient markets can maintain discrimination almost indefinitely.

Black players became accepted because the market in players is transparent.l It is pretty obvious who can play and who can't, who's "got bottle" and who doesn't. The market in players' salaries, as we have seen, is so efficient that it explains 92% of the variation in club's league positions.

However, the market in managers doesn't work nearly as well. Only a few managers, like Brian Clough or Bill Shankly, consistently perform better with their teams than the players' wage bill suggests they should. It's hard to identify what it is that these men do better than others, because if it were easy, everyone would copy them. Most other managers simply do not matter very much, and do not last very long in the job. They appear to add so little value that it is tempting to think that they could be replaced by their secretaries, or their chairmen, or by stuffed teddy bears, without the team's league position changing. Even Manchester United's manager, Alex Ferguson, who has won more prizes than anyone else in the history of soccer, has probably performed only about as well as the manager of the world's richest club should. Perhaps his unique accomplishment is not winning but keeping all the interest groups in the club united behind him for so long. If you manage to stay manager of the world's richest club for nearly 25 years in an era when the rich are getting even richer, you are guaranteed to stack up prizes.

It would be interesting to see what would happen if a club stopped hiring managers, and allowed an online survey of registered fans to pick the team. We suspect the club would perform decently, perhaps even better than its rivals, because it would be harnessing the wisdom of crowds. And it could use the money it saved on managers to up those crucial players' wages.

None of this is good news for black managers...

So, yeah. They aren't suggesting that the manager has no real job to do. It's just illustrating the point that statistically, there's no reliable way to actually rate a manager's input across the entire league. I'd be interested in seeing a comparative analysis of several individuals' careers, like Mourinho vs Benitez in terms of goals, points, wages, and transfer spending. Or compare fucking Hodgson to Benitez on those terms and you see the difference.

 

[Unicron]

I think the Fergie case is an interesting one, especially as they cite it as their main example. As was pointed out earlier in the thread when he arrived united weren't the juggernaut that they are now. A big club certainly, one with history but not the biggest, or richest, club in the world. They got there under his watch, and they stayed there under his watch (if they ever did get there) but I'd certainly accept that it's not just about him and that it's based on a confluence of events the key one being that his first title winning side was the first in the Sky/Premier League era and the riches as well as the expansion into foreign markets that came with it. They were second English team to go into the the restructured Champion's League and for a number of seasons, more than anyone else in fact they were England's sole representatives. And then when UEFA restructured again to allow non-Champions entry into it they benefitted again by winning the fucking thing.

So yeah, perhaps if he'd gone at any point in the least 15 years some other punter could have come in and taken over from him but I'm not sure that said random punter could have got them there in the first place.