Anyone For Chinese?

[maffff]

Tiger and Narin are both staying, Sassima is going.

Probably a controlling stake for the Chinese, but not entirely sure, basically the Thais want to remain involved but have money in from other sources. Imagine the Chinese want control. Looking at how the Belgian team seem to be set up, I can't see them being that incompatible however the makeup of a new board is set.

and either way, at least we don't have Becchetti, who wanted us before the Thais took control.

[CountryRoyal]

Just seen this

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footba ... Hearn.html

[Nameless]

Land is an asset I guess, and the Thais, as owners have every right to sell the land (to themselves). I'm just uncomfortable that the club was given that land by RBC (IIRC) as a club & community asset. Is it right that the thais have essentially sold that off for their own private gain?

Did you complain when the club sold parts of the land previously to developers in order to generate cash ?
Why is this different ?
It would be wonderful if the club had the resources to do this huge developemnt but we didn't have the much smaller sum needed to build the ground so how we would have funded this one without taking a potentially disaster out risk I am not clear.
Who owns what is extremely clear. How any one is at all confused I am not sure. The Thai's own 100% of everything. They own the land, they own the hotel, they own the club, they own the players. How they split that in the accounts is purely a bookkeeping exercise but ultimately talking about what 'we' own is pointless. This is really no different to how it was under SJM because apart from a few token shareholders he owned us lock stock and barrel.
The best w can hope for is that the Thai's and Chinese continue to be the fairly benevolent sort of owner SJM was. I don't think they have been stripping cash out of the club, managers have been allowed to buy players, they haven't been forced to sell stars, we'v be n treated well in terms of th cost of watching games.

[royalp-we]

Someone get that man a beer ^

[M U R T Y]

Depends on what happens next, though. If they then sell off 75% of the football side of the business, but keep all of the land surrounding the club, (regardless of whether RFC got £15m for the land - which probably offsets the amount they have "invested"), it very much appears that they only bought the club to obtain the land and permission to develop the land.

[From Despair To Where?]

If they sell 75%, they will still own 25%, and I assume that the Chinese will expect them to pay 25% of the costs.

It's all ifs, bits and maybes. As it stands, they have put the club back on a more even keel. Any property deal may or may not benefit the club in the same way that the sale of the land for Reading Gate may or may not have benefitted the club beyond the sale of the land.

[Nameless]

Does anyone think the Thais bought the club out of pure footballing philanthropy ?
of course they did it as business people, because they saw an opportunity to make some money.
I don't think that is an issue. If they are smarter or richer than SJM was and can generate income in ways he could not then they are better business people.
What we need to judge them in is whether alongside making themselves money they continue to support the club. The noises coming from Tiger seem positive (and so far his actions have been pretty positive too ). If Jaap continues to be supported properly in the transfer market, fans benefit from progressive pricing and the bills are paid on time then can we not have the best of all worlds ?
The profit from REP is not being taken away from the club as it would never have happened under 'the club'.
My concern is that REP must not be an excuse to load debt on the club. The Thais could stick all the costs on the club books, put all the profits offshore and leave us utterly destitute. That would be real asset stripping and absolutely must not happen - although we have no way of preventing it.

[Stranded]

Depends on what happens next, though. If they then sell off 75% of the football side of the business, but keep all of the land surrounding the club, (regardless of whether RFC got £15m for the land - which probably offsets the amount they have "invested"), it very much appears that they only bought the club to obtain the land and permission to develop the land.

I guess I can just say - and?

They probably did but if they hadn't somebody else would have done the same thing. The land around the stadium is one of the reasons that buying the club was seen as a decent potential investment.

There are very few people out there who will be willing to buy a club just to throw money at it, any money they put it in is with an eye on either getting to the riches of the PL or to make money elsewhere.

The land around the stadium is empty money to the club as the club can't afford to develop. So the club would either need to go out and get more debt to do something or sell the land to realise some value now. The owners can invest to develop, but as with any investment they will expect a return.

I'm struggling to see any scenario whereby the club would have benefitted from the land around the ground without somehow becoming cash rich or having massively increased regular income to be able to borrow enough to finance a REP kind of development.

So if the Thai's leave, having steadied the club and sell to someone with deeper pockets who wants to have a club and can help take the next steps as a club then overall we've done pretty well out of it too.

[M U R T Y]

Yep, all fair points. I know they have every right to do what they are doing, and if they didn't, someone else would've - but it would have been nice if they came in and developed the land for the benefit of the club - so that the profits were shared with the club, rather than siphoned off to a separate company. After all they only managed to get the land because of the club.

[Nameless]

Yep, all fair points. I know they have every right to do what they are doing, and if they didn't, someone else would've - but it would have been nice if they came in and developed the land for the benefit of the club - so that the profits were shared with the club, rather than siphoned off to a separate company. After all they only managed to get the land because of the club.

If they hadn't come In Then we were on the verge of administration, points deductions and probably a downward spiral.
If they weren't able to see an upside for themselves they wouldn't have come in.
The club have benefitted financially already.
We have no idea how the REP profits will be used but the Thai's have talked about the club being sustainable over the long term which suggests that if they make money from REP they will put money into the football side as well. There is no way that could be guaranteed, 'sharing the profits' is meaningless when everything is owned by the Thai's.

[From Despair To Where?]

I do wonder if someone who is loyal to another part of their business empire is sitting behind a keyboard in Thailand complaining about them syphoning profits instead to pay for their football club plaything over in England.

The football club is but a small part of a larger business portfolio.

[Hound]

They are clearly looking for investment into the club to help support it long term. Could they load debt onto the club if the Chinese pair got the go-ahead? Presumably not.

Basically Tiger and co have come in, stabilised, given a bit of investment and walking away with a bit of crappy if potentially profitable land as a reward for it.They have treated the fans very very well imo with low ticket prices and various subsidies. Considering some of the positive decisions they have made over the last year or two (i.e. bringing in BT/Stam, funding some very exciting young talents in Moore and Swift, any involvement in selling Norwood/Tish/Blackman for very big money), its probably not a bad deal

The fact that Tiger still wants to stay on 25% is a positive for me. As mentioned he does seem genuinely interested in success on the field. As long as the chinese pair aren't solely in it for some warped scheme to rinse the club, I think things look positive.

[BR2]

Land is an asset I guess, and the Thais, as owners have every right to sell the land (to themselves). I'm just uncomfortable that the club was given that land by RBC (IIRC) as a club & community asset. Is it right that the thais have essentially sold that off for their own private gain?

Did you complain when the club sold parts of the land previously to developers in order to generate cash ?
Why is this different ?
It would be wonderful if the club had the resources to do this huge developemnt but we didn't have the much smaller sum needed to build the ground so how we would have funded this one without taking a potentially disaster out risk I am not clear.
Who owns what is extremely clear. How any one is at all confused I am not sure. The Thai's own 100% of everything. They own the land, they own the hotel, they own the club, they own the players. How they split that in the accounts is purely a bookkeeping exercise but ultimately talking about what 'we' own is pointless. This is really no different to how it was under SJM because apart from a few token shareholders he owned us lock stock and barrel.
The best w can hope for is that the Thai's and Chinese continue to be the fairly benevolent sort of owner SJM was. I don't think they have been stripping cash out of the club, managers have been allowed to buy players, they haven't been forced to sell stars, we'v be n treated well in terms of th cost of watching games.

Fair points.
One comment on your not forced to sell stars-we did sell Tish and Norwood under the Thais for quite a lot of dough and not spent much on newcomers.
It is questionable of course whether they are "stars" and it is also questionable if we now have any stars to sell but I would suggest that trading on ins and outs of players hasn't cost these owners much.

[Nameless]

Land is an asset I guess, and the Thais, as owners have every right to sell the land (to themselves). I'm just uncomfortable that the club was given that land by RBC (IIRC) as a club & community asset. Is it right that the thais have essentially sold that off for their own private gain?

Did you complain when the club sold parts of the land previously to developers in order to generate cash ?
Why is this different ?
It would be wonderful if the club had the resources to do this huge developemnt but we didn't have the much smaller sum needed to build the ground so how we would have funded this one without taking a potentially disaster out risk I am not clear.
Who owns what is extremely clear. How any one is at all confused I am not sure. The Thai's own 100% of everything. They own the land, they own the hotel, they own the club, they own the players. How they split that in the accounts is purely a bookkeeping exercise but ultimately talking about what 'we' own is pointless. This is really no different to how it was under SJM because apart from a few token shareholders he owned us lock stock and barrel.
The best w can hope for is that the Thai's and Chinese continue to be the fairly benevolent sort of owner SJM was. I don't think they have been stripping cash out of the club, managers have been allowed to buy players, they haven't been forced to sell stars, we'v be n treated well in terms of th cost of watching games.

Fair points.
One comment on your not forced to sell stars-we did sell Tish and Norwood under the Thais for quite a lot of dough and not spent much on newcomers.
It is questionable of course whether they are "stars" and it is also questionable if we now have any stars to sell but I would suggest that trading on ins and outs of players hasn't cost these owners much.

Not sure how questionable it is we have stars. Moore, Kelly, McLeary and Swift would all attract lots of interest if made available.
The sale of Tish and Norwood weren't the sort of flogging off of stars we've seen in the past. Turning down £5 million for Tish would have been crazy and subsequent events have shown we were bang on. Losing Norwood was a significant plus for the team, Kelly would probably have left for nothing if Norwood had stayed.
All clubs buy and sell players and we will always be the sort of club that needs to wheel and deal. The difference is whether you replace them and I think it's clear that we don't miss either, and we are £7 million up on the deal. Neither sale saw the manager's plans being ripped up by owners wanting to make a quick buck. If we sell Moore or Kelly this summer it would be completely different.

[Nameless]

Did you complain when the club sold parts of the land previously to developers in order to generate cash ?
Why is this different ?
It would be wonderful if the club had the resources to do this huge developemnt but we didn't have the much smaller sum needed to build the ground so how we would have funded this one without taking a potentially disaster out risk I am not clear.
Who owns what is extremely clear. How any one is at all confused I am not sure. The Thai's own 100% of everything. They own the land, they own the hotel, they own the club, they own the players. How they split that in the accounts is purely a bookkeeping exercise but ultimately talking about what 'we' own is pointless. This is really no different to how it was under SJM because apart from a few token shareholders he owned us lock stock and barrel.
The best w can hope for is that the Thai's and Chinese continue to be the fairly benevolent sort of owner SJM was. I don't think they have been stripping cash out of the club, managers have been allowed to buy players, they haven't been forced to sell stars, we'v be n treated well in terms of th cost of watching games
.

Fair points.
One comment on your not forced to sell stars-we did sell Tish and Norwood under the Thais for quite a lot of dough and not spent much on newcomers.
It is questionable of course whether they are "stars" and it is also questionable if we now have any stars to sell but I would suggest that trading on ins and outs of players hasn't cost these owners much.

Not sure how questionable it is we have stars. Moore, Kelly, McLeary and Swift would all attract lots of interest if made available.
The sale of Tish and Norwood weren't the sort of flogging off of stars we've seen in the past. Turning down £5 million for Tish would have been crazy and subsequent events have shown we were bang on. Losing Norwood was a significant plus for the team, Kelly would probably have left for nothing if Norwood had stayed.
All clubs buy and sell players and we will always be the sort of club that needs to wheel and deal. The difference is whether you replace them and I think it's clear that we don't miss either, and we are £7 million up on the deal. Neither sale saw the manager's plans being ripped up by owners wanting to make a quick buck. If we sell Moore or Kelly this summer it would be completely different.
As for not spending much on newcomers, we spent the Tish money on Moore and Illori with Norwood funding Popa, Beerens, Joey, Blackett.....

[Hound]

yep, been plenty of investment this year. I very much expect that the likes of Moore and Swift particularly are on a pretty nice weekly as well, especially considering the demand someone like Swift was in. Garath's new contract wouldn't have been cheap either, whilst Al Habsi and Kelly both probably earnt themselves a nice little raise, along with the loan signings - again they would have cost plenty on wages

[Ian Royal]

Did you complain when the club sold parts of the land previously to developers in order to generate cash ?
Why is this different ?
It would be wonderful if the club had the resources to do this huge developemnt but we didn't have the much smaller sum needed to build the ground so how we would have funded this one without taking a potentially disaster out risk I am not clear.
Who owns what is extremely clear. How any one is at all confused I am not sure. The Thai's own 100% of everything. They own the land, they own the hotel, they own the club, they own the players. How they split that in the accounts is purely a bookkeeping exercise but ultimately talking about what 'we' own is pointless. This is really no different to how it was under SJM because apart from a few token shareholders he owned us lock stock and barrel.
The best w can hope for is that the Thai's and Chinese continue to be the fairly benevolent sort of owner SJM was. I don't think they have been stripping cash out of the club, managers have been allowed to buy players, they haven't been forced to sell stars, we'v be n treated well in terms of th cost of watching games.

Fair points.
One comment on your not forced to sell stars-we did sell Tish and Norwood under the Thais for quite a lot of dough and not spent much on newcomers.
It is questionable of course whether they are "stars" and it is also questionable if we now have any stars to sell but I would suggest that trading on ins and outs of players hasn't cost these owners much.

Not sure how questionable it is we have stars. Moore, Kelly, McLeary and Swift would all attract lots of interest if made available.
The sale of Tish and Norwood weren't the sort of flogging off of stars we've seen in the past. Turning down £5 million for Tish would have been crazy and subsequent events have shown we were bang on. Losing Norwood was a significant plus for the team, Kelly would probably have left for nothing if Norwood had stayed.
All clubs buy and sell players and we will always be the sort of club that needs to wheel and deal. The difference is whether you replace them and I think it's clear that we don't miss either, and we are £7 million up on the deal. Neither sale saw the manager's plans being ripped up by owners wanting to make a quick buck. If we sell Moore or Kelly this summer it would be completely different.

I think there are three reasons to sell. Footballing (player not wanted, player wants to leave etc), sell to buy, and to plug a debt.

Long and Sig were obviously to plug debt. Tish and Norwood somewhere between the other two.

If a player wants to leave and has somewhere to go it'll happen no matter your finances. And it's a no brainer to sell if it can get you a replacement and part fund someone else, or you have a ready made replacement waiting.

[Lower West]

REP needs the football club. The match attendance brings footfall. Footfall brings customers. Customers spend money and generate profit. A business will pay a far higher rent for a prime location. Out of match time. There's the business park trade.

[Nameless]

REP needs the football club. The match attendance brings footfall. Footfall brings customers. Customers spend money and generate profit.

Except the football is once a fortnight and match days are the times when no one else would go there. So on 340 days per year there is no football to drive footfall and on the other days the football inhibits football !
Undoubtably whatever bars and restaurants there are will benefit from the football but it's amaze business model if it assumes that he football will be the main attraction for football.
They will need lots of business conference / exhibition activity Monday- Friday and then medium sized concerts / events at weekends.

[Hound]

REP needs the football club. The match attendance brings footfall. Footfall brings customers. Customers spend money and generate profit.

Except the football is once a fortnight and match days are the times when no one else would go there. So on 340 days per year there is no football to drive footfall and on the other days the football inhibits football !
Undoubtably whatever bars and restaurants there are will benefit from the football but it's amaze business model if it assumes that he football will be the main attraction for football.
They will need lots of business conference / exhibition activity Monday- Friday and then medium sized concerts / events at weekends.

Surely selling and leasing the flats is the business model. I would have thought the conference centre etc will just need to tick over, along with the football club