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Various: Mike Ashley in talks with Sheikh Khaled bin Zayed Al Nehayan


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They will want something though.

 

It could just be an ego-football manager thing. Or they could just want a successful football club to raise their profile. That is all promising for as long as PCP don't get bored.

 

They may want to use the club as a corporate vehicle e.g. give away x% of seats to VIPs. That may cause some problems for fans

 

It is not impossible to churn out a profit with the TV deal. It could also be argued that more money could be generated via sponsorship and significantly increased ticket prices. This could still be run less frugal than Ashley but still as a business.

 

I don't think any owner will buy a club thinking they won't compete, but reality may eventually sink in.

 

We don't really know how things will turn out let's just enjoy the ride.

 

 

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I'm a bit wary of consortiums or managed funds, which is what we seem to be dealing with here. As we know, despite the money coming into football, it's difficult to turn a profit, because the money tends to get eaten up through the competitive costs of transfer fees and salaries. If you don't join in, you go down.

 

Chelsea, PSG and Man City have owners who are prepared to stick their own money in, regardless of the odds at getting a return, just for the prestige that success brings. I can't see whoever is behind Ms Staveley being up for that. They seem to be investors in the true sense ie they'll want some kind of return for their money, or at least won't be continually prepared to write off losses. If they're not going to get the individual ego rub that success brings, what's in it for them?

 

It looks like it's going ahead, and perhaps they'll be in a position to take more financial risks than Ashley. But let's not forget that for every Sheikh Mansour or Abramovic, there's several other foreign owners who get disillusioned after a couple of seasons and stop writing the cheques.

 

Returns might not be about cold hard annual revenue profits though, as they can be capital. Buying a football club for £300m when it makes a £30m loss every year and investing £200m isn't a bad idea if in 5 years time due to the next inflated TV deal, better commercial deals, regular European football, greater brand values, etc etc, the club is now worth £800m and has a playing squad worth double what it was when taking over. There's also "synergies" to consider, with NUFC these past 10 years being a Sports Direct advert one prime example of how there is money to be made indirectly through owning a football club and utilizing it to favor your other interests.

 

The other possibility with many of these Arab, Russian and Chinese investors/oligarchs is that they just just want to move some of the vast sums of money they have out of their respective high risk/volatile countries (over the long term) and invest in "reliable" assets in stable developed economies that aren't going to depreciate anytime soon. Business, buildings and land are the obvious options, but they're saturated markets at the moment and I'd imagine these investors already have large investments in mansions and skyscrapers in major cities around the globe. Football and sports are a different option, yet if you were to look at valuations of football clubs over time it's going to be a consistent upwards trend, and that would appeal to these types of investors looking to stash their cash somewhere safer. That's before considering the degree of prestige and exclusivity that owning a PL football club brings, whether they're football fans, etc etc.

 

It doesn't necessarily have to be the case that they have nefarious intentions or want to milk NUFC immediately. Although that's obviously always going to be a risk.

 

To be quite honest, I genuinely don't care what their intentions would be providing they put competent and skilled people in charge of running the football club, which is Ashey's biggest failure imo. I'm sure many on here wouldn't care one bit about Ashley running NUFC to the benefit of Sports Direct if he had put in place both a David Dein or Daniel Levy type in the boardroom and a Rafa equivalent (or the next best we can attract) in the managers dugout from day one and supported them (as opposed to backing buffoons like Llambias, Kinnear, Jiminez, Wise, Pardew, Penfold, etc). Of course the issue is that someone like Ashley who intends to run NUFC like a circus act isn't generally going to be able to persuade a Dein/Levy to work for him, he'll inherently want/attract yes men desperate for a job, but then Ashley isn't a good standard to measure against. The point is that I'm sure it's possible to want to make a profit from a club like NUFC and still run it competently through employing the right people. You have to be a special kind of tool to want to make money from NUFC by running it in the worst possible way.

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Surely the incentive for buying a football club comes from the increase in value that will come with the TV deals. I think it's predicted that the foreign TV deals will get more and more valuable, and that is what is driving most of the investment. If you can make a club a mainstay in the premier league, and turn it into a global brand by playing in the CL, then you could have an asset worth £1bn plus in 10 years. Maybe even a perennial midtable club could end up being worth that. Look at Man City, for all the money they've spent the club is now worth $3bn, they've been a great investment.

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How can it be impossible to make money from football when MA got club for peanuts, and almost tripled his return, whilst getting free advertising etc?

 

In order for him to get his money back, he has to sell the club. If he continues to own the club, unless he invests big sums, the club will only lose money and as an asset become even less valuable or saleable. And if he did invest... well, will he get it all back?

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Its near impossible to make money from a football club as an ongoing business. That's not to say a club needs to be in dire straights financially to operate because even Ashley has shown a club can kind of be self sufficient. If we are to kick on though, huge investment is needed because every level of the club has been neglected since Ashley took over.

 

So why would PCP or any other buyer want to buy a football club then?

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Look at how much coverage the Etihad etc gets. It's great for global exposure.

 

How would be people feel about the Stadium being rebranded under these?

No one would like it. I certainly wouldn't.

 

I'm all for making money from advertising within the ground though, instead of getting nothing for it from the fat cunt.

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Look at how much coverage the Etihad etc gets. It's great for global exposure.

 

How would be people feel about the Stadium being rebranded under these?

 

They may well have to in order to get round financial fair play in the same way Man City do. Who’s to say they wouldn’t want to build another ground? Quite frankly doesn’t bother me. Sports Direct did because it made us no money and the brand is shite!

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Its near impossible to make money from a football club as an ongoing business. That's not to say a club needs to be in dire straights financially to operate because even Ashley has shown a club can kind of be self sufficient. If we are to kick on though, huge investment is needed because every level of the club has been neglected since Ashley took over.

 

So why would PCP or any other buyer want to buy a football club then?

 

Depends. Perhaps they are happy to 'park' the money in light of the upcoming TV deal cash and watch their asset intrinsically grow. Perhaps they're a brand wanting exposure. Perhaps they genuinely believe that the can invest and then flog up at a profit or perhaps it fits within their wider business empire.

 

Could be anything.

 

I'd not be keen to have the name of the ground changed but, if we were owned with genuine intent, I could cope with it.

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Its near impossible to make money from a football club as an ongoing business. That's not to say a club needs to be in dire straights financially to operate because even Ashley has shown a club can kind of be self sufficient. If we are to kick on though, huge investment is needed because every level of the club has been neglected since Ashley took over.

 

So why would PCP or any other buyer want to buy a football club then?

 

Depends. Perhaps they are happy to 'park' the money in light of the upcoming TV deal cash and watch their asset intrinsically grow. Perhaps they're a brand wanting exposure. Perhaps they genuinely believe that the can invest and then flog up at a profit or perhaps it fits within their wider business empire.

 

Could be anything.

 

I'd not be keen to have the name of the ground changed but, if we were owned with genuine intent, I could cope with it.

 

So obviously there is money to be made from buying a football club, at least potentially, even if it's not going to be realised immediately. I'm not great on financial matters, but I would have thought Newcastle would be a great club to use as a vehicle to promote a global brand, and I use the term brand loosely. It could be a country for all I know. Man City owners come to mind.

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Its near impossible to make money from a football club as an ongoing business. That's not to say a club needs to be in dire straights financially to operate because even Ashley has shown a club can kind of be self sufficient. If we are to kick on though, huge investment is needed because every level of the club has been neglected since Ashley took over.

 

So why would PCP or any other buyer want to buy a football club then?

 

Depends. Perhaps they are happy to 'park' the money in light of the upcoming TV deal cash and watch their asset intrinsically grow. Perhaps they're a brand wanting exposure. Perhaps they genuinely believe that the can invest and then flog up at a profit or perhaps it fits within their wider business empire.

 

Could be anything.

 

I'd not be keen to have the name of the ground changed but, if we were owned with genuine intent, I could cope with it.

 

So obviously there is money to be made from buying a football club, at least potentially, even if it's not going to be realised immediately. I'm not great on financial matters, but I would have thought Newcastle would be a great club to use as a vehicle to promote a global brand, and I use the term brand loosely. It could be a country for all I know. Man City owners come to mind.

 

Most definitely - I don’t think it’ll be an expensive vanity project put it that way.

 

Man City’s Owners will probably make more money from their non-football developments around Manchester which has been undoubtedly helped from their local high profile.

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How would be people feel about the Stadium being rebranded under these?

Unacceptable.

 

If they put the sort of money in that Etihad have, and it's a blue chip company I'm ok with it. If that's the price of success I can live with it.

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Getting ahead of myself considering I have long given up the hope of the club being run on an honest potential but St James' has a lot of scope to be improved.  Whilst the Tat Direct ads being ripped down would improve things 100%, the fact that technology has advanced should and could mean big changes.    The 32" plasma's down in the food kiosk areas for a start need telescopes to be able to see properly.    Probably need £50m alone just to bring the ground back up to scratch.

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