Like I said I don't think 400 million is an outrageous price. Sports clubs over here in North America change hands for considerably more money than that and their worldwide exposure is nowhere near that of the PL. It's not a bad price when you rake in a guaranteed 100 million just by surviving in the division, that's a 1/4 of your initial investment in one year, that's not profit of course but few owners are in it for that, even if Ashley had taken the 300 million, he would have recouped all his investment in the club and had a decade of priceless free band exposure.
This is not America ... Sha la la la la ...
It doesn't matter, I just used that as a reference point. The big take here is that Ashley could recoup all he invested in the club, by taking the lowest offer he was made already (along with the hard to quantify value for brand exposure).. 400 million is a lot of money though and not many folks have it to spend on a football team but I do think it's a OK price for what an investor would get.
He's already moved the goal posts with Staveley's offers. If someone offered 400m he'd want 425.
Anything he says is PR and stall tactics to temporarily keep the pressure off.
This.
He's not selling as long as he makes money from us. Whatever he does, including the lack of transfers, keeping fans hope over the takeover, press leaks and releases, is to keep the revenue flowing in.