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Warszawa

Warszawa

Posted
Posted

Some lovely Tom Hicks information, taken from various Liverpool websites. You have to love Moores and Parry for selling to him, don't you? They must have checked out his background but ultimately it came down to Moores wanting a few more million in the bank and Parry wanting to keep his job. Evil men.

http://www.liverpoolway.co.uk/forum/ff-foo...know-hicks.html

R. Steven Hicks

Chairman of Capstar Partners, LLC, former vice-chairman of AMFM Inc., Austin, Texas, brother of Thomas

Thomas O. Hicks

Vice-chairman of Clear Channel Communications, San Antonio, Texas, brother of Steven

What they gave: Amount raised for 2000 Bush Campaign: Approximately $200,000

Amount donated by Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst to Bush through 2000: At least $315,000

TOTAL: $ 515,000

What they got: While Bush was governor, the Texas Legislature approved legislation creating the University of Texas Investment Management Company (UTIMCO), a private enterprise controlling the school’s public funds, and Thomas Hicks was named its chairman. With Bush as president, Clear Channel also benefited from a June 2, 2003 Federal Communications Commission vote that loosened media ownership rules that, if upheld, will allow the radio empire to continue to grow.

The Story:

COST TO THE PUBLIC:

Loosening media ownership rules will result in further loss of diverse ideas and voices on the broadcast airwaves, as well as the loss of multiple sources of news and information; a reduction in local news coverage; homogenized play lists; fewer new recording artists heard; the strengthening of Clear Channel's communications empire and the loss of smaller, independent stations.

BACKGROUND:

Thomas O. Hicks is chairman of the board of Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst Inc., a global private investment firm that specializes in leveraged acquisitions. Hicks Muse is the nation's largest active investor in the broadcast industry, with significant ownership in LIN Television and Clear Channel Communications, Inc., where Tom Hicks serves as vice-chairman. Tom Hicks is also chairman and owner of the National Hockey League's Dallas Stars as well as Major League Baseball's Texas Rangers. Both of these teams, along with a variety of other investments, are run under Southwest Sports Group, LLC ("SSG"), where Tom Hicks also holds the self-appointed positions of chairman and CEO.

The connection between Tom Hicks and President Bush has long been a source of public speculation. Tom Hicks served on the Board of Regents of the University of Texas System and as chairman of UTIMCO. Under his direction, UTIMCO placed a large portion of the university's endowment under the management of companies with strong ties to Bush.

R. Steven Hicks, brother of Tom Hicks, is chairman of Capstar Partners, LLC, a private technology investment company. He is also a member of the board of directors for ClickRadio, the country's most widely used interactive digital radio service. Steven Hicks began building the family radio empire in 1993, when he co-founded SFX Broadcasting, Inc. Steven Hicks left SFX in 1996 following passage of the Telecommunications Act, which greatly loosened limits on station ownership. Steven Hicks went on to form Capstar Broadcasting, thanks in large part to a $700 million equity commitment from Hicks, Muse, Tate and Furst. In August 1999, Dallas-based Chancellor Media Corporation acquired Capstar Broadcasting for $4.1 billion, creating AMFM Inc., one of the largest radio groups in the country, with over 450 stations. Steven Hicks served as vice-chairman of the new company until August 2000, when AMFM was purchased by Clear Channel for $23.5 billion. Clear Channel Communications now owns operates, programs, or sells airtime for more than 1,200 radio stations throughout the country. Under the FCC's new ownership rules, the radio giant could expand beyond its current television holdings of 39 stations.

WHAT HAPPENED:

President Bush's involvement with the Hicks family began shortly after his first gubernatorial victory in 1994. In 1995, as a member of the University of Texas Board of Regents, Tom Hicks successfully lobbied then-Governor Bush and the Texas legislature to approve the formation of UTIMCO, a private enterprise that controlled the school's public funds.

Tom Hicks served as chairman until 1999, when reports surfaced that almost a third of UTIMCO’s $1.7 billion in private equities between 1995 and 1998 had been invested with firms personally or politically connected to the Hicks family or then Governor Bush.

In addition to these questionable dealings, Hicks helped make Bush a very wealthy man in 1998 when he purchased the Texas Rangers for $250 million from the ownership group that included the then-Texas governor. Bush's 1.8 percent stake in the franchise landed him nearly $15 million on a $600,000 investment.

Not surprisingly, Clear Channel is known for advancing an agenda friendly to the Bush Administration. For example, many media critics questioned Clear Channel’s "Rally for America," a series of controversial 2003 pro-war rallies sponsored and promoted by individual Clear Channel stations throughout the country.

Due to the partisan FCC vote in June 2003, media ownership restrictions were loosened even further. However, support for rolling back the new regulations continues to gain steam with the public and in Congress, giving the Hicks brothers and Clear Channel continuing reason to try to curry favor with the Bush Administration.

Thanks to the efforts of Steven and Tom Hicks and the continuing erosion of media ownership laws, Clear Channel now owns more than 1,200 radio stations, making it the largest radio ownership group in the country. It also owns 39 television stations, a number that could grow under new media ownership laws, as well as 135 live entertainment venues, 41 amphitheaters in the United States, 30 venues in Europe and over a half million outdoor billboards worldwide.

Jane Kirtley, a professor of media ethics and law at the University of Minnesota, said Clear Channel's support of the Bush administration's policy toward Iraq makes it "hard to escape the concern that this may in part be motivated by issues Clear Channel has before the FCC and Congress."

So far, it seems Clear Channel's efforts have largely succeeded. After the FCC vote last June, Commerce Secretary and close Bush ally, Donald Evans, showed the Bush Administration's continuing support of media conglomerates like Clear Channel. Evans said, "I commend the FCC for its action on media ownership today. The FCC has answered the call of Congress and the courts to modernize its rules."

Tom Hicks Still Suspects Juan Gonzalez Was on the Juice

Posted Jun 21st 2007 5:50PM by Matt Watson

Filed under: Dallas, Rangers, AL West, MLB Gossip

Not surprisingly, Rangers owner Tom Hicks caught a bit of heat for his flippant comment about how he regrets giving Juan Gonzalez a two-year contract "after he came off steroids probably." He tried to clarify his position yesterday:

"I have no knowledge that Juan used steroids. His number of injuries and early retirement just makes me suspicious," Hicks wrote in an e-mail to the Associated Press yesterday. "In any event, we paid him $24 million for very few games."

Since when is missing games with injury a sign of steroids? Usually people point to a sudden drop-off in production as a sign that someone has come off the juice, but that didn't happen with Gonzalez. Although he was only able to play in 70 games in 2002 and 82 games in 2003, he was very productive when he was on the field, combining to hit .288 with 32 home runs and 105 RBI in 604 at-bats.

Maybe his injuries were the result of years of steroid abuse, but does anyone know for sure? A lot of players have spent a lot of time on the DL, and I don't think that's reason enough to point fingers. Gonzalez was always injury prone: he appeared in at least 145 games just twice over his entire career. The fact he suddenly broke down late in his career wasn't all that surprising considering he struggled to stay on the field even during his prime.

Once he hit the wrong side of 30, his body fell apart. But his bat remained strong the entire time, and without any drastic swings in production it should be difficult for anyone to say with any degree of certainty that he was on the juice.

Unless Hicks is prepared to publicly address some other questions like, "When did he first suspect Gonzalez was on the juice?" and "what did he do about it?" and even "how much money did he make off of players he suspected were cheating?", it's probably in his best interest to quit throwing names around.

Tom Hicks' Folly

Subject(s): Michael Mark's Trattoria, G. Craige Lewis, Tonex, Harry Potter, Tom Hicks, Texas Rangers Start from scratch: I've been watching this franchise flounder since its inception ("Boy Blunder," by Richie Whitt, July 12), and it sickens me more to watch them with each passing year. I played three years of pro baseball myself, but for a small-market, shallow-pocket team affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers. I have not been to a Rangers game in years, since their last collapse against the Yankees with our steroid boys Rafael and Juan leading that ill-fated, no-pitching squad, and will never attend another game.

I have even stooped to interacting with the overpaid robot sportswriters over at Belo, and even they reluctantly agree that this team should be sold to whomever would buy it and start from scratch. Hicks is completely disconnected, incompetent, has no real commitment to this team or this city and appears to already be well into Alzheimer's with the Daniels hire. Daniels is a punk with no track record or respect among the real teams and GMs in this league.

Mike Serviente

Hicks takes old idea on new ride

Investment magnate using once-shunned SPACs as modern investment vehicle

By Arleen Jacobius

Posted: November 26, 2007, 6:01 AM EST

AP Photo/Dave Thompson

The SPACs created by Thomas Hicks will hold their target companies for five to 10 years.

DALLAS — Thomas O. Hicks, in retirement, might be fishing in the same private equity waters as some small- to midmarket companies that include the new incarnation of his old firm.

Instead of raising money from institutional investors, his new endeavor, Hicks Holdings LLC, is going to the public markets for some of his private equity investments, resurrecting a once-reviled financial instrument, special purpose acquisition companies.

These vehicles give Hicks Holdings permanent capital to compete successfully against institutional buyout firms by enabling it to scoop up companies with a relative minimum of debt, one SPAC at a time, Mr. Hicks said. SPACS are publicly traded vehicles that are used to buy one business or asset. A SPAC can use the money raised only to buy a majority interest in another company.

Unlike executives at midmarket private equity firms such as HM Capital Partners LLC — the firm that Mr. Hicks co-founded as Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst — the exit to the public markets is immediate, and the founders of each SPAC reap extra profit. And like private equity funds, investors do not know what companies the fund will be investing in when they commit.

Hicks Holdings already completed one SPAC — known as a “blank check” or blind pool company. Hicks Acquisition Co. I Inc.’s initial public offering on Oct. 1 generated $520 million, the largest-ever IPO of a SPAC. (Since then, Norman Peltz, chairman and chief executive officer of investment firm Triarc Cos., said he would raise a $750 million SPAC.)

Hicks Holdings plans to file another similarly sized SPAC to buy a company in the energy industry, Mr. Hicks said. Each SPAC will buy a company valued between $750 million and $2 billion.

Hicks will use a long-term, buy-and-build strategy. Each SPAC will hold the company for between five and 10 years, a relative eternity compared with the average two- to three-year ownership span when Mr. Hicks was at Hicks, Muse.

“We view it as permanent capital and expect to buy one company and use the public company to grow within the industry by acquisition,” Mr. Hicks said.

Not that long ago, SPACs were considered vehicles used for fraud and abuse. No Wall Street firm would touch them, said Michael L. Zuppone, partner in the corporate practice and co-chair of the securities and capital markets practice group of New York law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP. In the 1980s and 1990s, the SEC investigated a number of SPACs because they were mainly raised by third- and fourth-tier, off-off Wall Street groups, many of which defrauded investors, he explained.

‘Decidedly upmarket’

“They have gone decidedly upmarket, where Citibank and Deutsche Bank are underwriting them now,” said Mr. Zuppone.

Anyone with a memory of the early days would not recognize the SPAC industry of today. So far this year, 54 SPACs have raised $9 billion, up from 12 SPACs in 2004. “It’s a way to use a skill set in finding and buying businesses and realize a gain on that,” Mr. Zuppone said.

SPACs are popular because they are a way for smaller investors to get in on the ground floor of a private equity transaction; there are more professional investment managers employed in current firms; ad the American Stock Exchange now lists them, which is a further endorsement, Mr. Zuppone noted.

Hicks Holdings is using the blank-check instruments to buy larger companies than targeted by the rest of his private equity business.

Mr. Hicks insisted, however, that his new venture, which invests family money, does not compete with the buyout firms he used to trawl with. The companies he buys are smaller than those the megafirms are interested in, he said. “We run smaller firms and we have a unique very proprietary deal flow.”

Hicks Holdings is divided into four main businesses: a real estate business, a private equity business, a sports ownership business and a business that owns companies and real estate in Argentina.

The new venture has no plans to raise money from institutional investors, Mr. Hicks said. Hicks Holdings invests for three families, including his own.

“The big difference (between Hicks Holdings and what he was doing at Hicks Muse Tate & Furst) is that we can take a long-term view to really build a company,” Mr. Hicks said. “Institutional private equity is a great business, but it has become more of a short-term holding one where people cycle out (of investments) on a regular basis to run their next fund, and we don’t have that pressure.”

UTIMCO Raiders: Thomas O. Hicks

Tom Hicks Tom Hicks is a Dallas billionaire and investment banker who began raiding the University's public funds after the University refused to invest in his dental company in the early 90's. Hicks first appeared on the public scene when he donated $17,500 to Ann Richards, Texas governor at the time. He was subsequently appointed to the Board of Regents by Governor Richards in 1994.

After Ann Richards was defeated in 1994 by George W. Bush, Hicks shifted his heavy donations to Bush. Hicks gave $146,000 to Bush in both of his gubernatorial campaigns. In return for the gratitude, Bush approved legislation to form UTIMCO in 1995. Hicks had used a full-court press strategy, spending between $50,000 to $110,0001 in lobbying and using with the powerful lobbying team Vinson and Elkins, who represents several Texas business interests, to achieve this dream.

Conveniently for both men, Bush appointed Hicks as the first chair to UTIMCO, which began the tradition of tit-for-tat management and good-ol' boy favoritism that has defined the relationship between UTIMCO and Texas politics since. In 1998, Hicks would make Bush a multi-millionaire by purchasing the Texas Rangers. In addition, Hicks' company, Hicks, Muse, Tate, & Furst, Inc., is now Bush's number 4 career patron. The company is still donating to the GOP; Rick Perry has received $283,481 from Hicks Muse, with another $176,500 coming from Charles Tate [Hicks, Muse, Tate, & Furst, Inc.]. Hicks's brother Steven has also thrown in $138,516.

For several years, UTIMCO acted in secrecy under the protection of the Texas Attorney General, which facilitated the process of questionable investments in return for political favors. UTIMCO invested some $525 million in assets run by Hicks associates and other major GOP donors. After the Houston Chronicle exposed such insider dealings in a 1999 article, Tom Hicks resigned from the board.

Investments made by UTIMCO under the watch of Tom Hicks include the following, as reported by the Multinational Monitor, Texas for Public Justice, and Bushwatch.net:

* The Carlyle Group: the Group's partners include Bush Sr. and ex-Secretary of State James Baker III.

* Maverick Capital Fund: Major project of the Wyly brothers.

* Bass Brothers Enterprises: The Bass family donated $210,000 to Bush's campaign through PAC's, with $273,000 from themselves, and they invested $25 million in Bush's Harken Oil venture.

* Kohlberg Kravis Roberts: This corporate buyout firm would soon join Hicks Muse in a $1.5 billion takeover of Regal Cinemas.

* Evercore Partners: Evercore and Hicks joined forces for a $900 million television buyout.

* American Security Partners: Landed a contract with UTIMCO months after selling several radio stations to Tom Hicks.

* Wand Partners and Inverness Management: Firms run by friends of Tom Hicks, such as former frat brother Bruce Schnitzer.

Another notable company not covered by the Multinational Monitor was an investment in Capstar Broadcasting, run by R. Steven Hicks- Tom's brother. The brothers have had strong interests in national communications companies, and some deals that have been proposed (some sought after by trustbusters) have reached the billions. Clear Channel Communications/AMFM (owned by Hicks Muse with Tom Hicks as the vice-chair) is the largest chain of radio stations in the U.S. Hicks Muse also owns the second largest chain in the U.S., Chancellor Media.

Hicks is also known as the power behind the revitalization of Dr. Pepper and he gained 1,477 percent when he sold to Cadbury Schweppes in 1995.2

See the Austin Chronicle on Hicks' buyout of Stratus

Hicks and Ross Perot, Jr.

Together Hicks and Ross Perot, Jr. (chairman, CEO and director of Perot Systems Corp. and son of the former presidential candidate) created the most expensive hockey and basketball arena in U.S. history. The American Airlines Center cost $420 million; $125 million of that came from Dallas's taxpayers. This was soon after the Ballpark in Arlington was constructed and partially funded from tax-payer dollars. As an added incentive for constructing new arenas, franchise owners received $10 million bonuses. Hicks did see some money of this money from building the American Airlines Center for his Dallas Starts although he did not receive it from the newly constructed ballpark that houses his Texas Rangers (it was built before he made the purchase). Hicks also has interests in minor league baseball; he just built a new stadium in Frisco, and three entrepreneurs have filed a lawsuit against him for "freezing them" out of their interests in bringing a minor league team to Frisco.

Currently, Hicks and Perot, Jr. are working together in another business venture that coincides with this new arena. Hicks's company, Hicks, Muse, Tate, & Furst, Inc., and Perot's company, Hillwood Development Corporation, have joined forces to develop the land around the arena. In the private sector, Hicks frequently combines his corporate dealings with his personal relationships. As chairman of UTIMCO, Hicks continued this practice, leading to numerous conflicts of interest. For example, UTIMCO has $988,080 invested in Perot Systems Corporation as of March 2002 and $109,309 in Electronic Data Systems Corporation (which Perot Sr. founded) as of June 2003.

Forbes Faces: Thomas O. Hicks

Debra Lau, 04.23.01, 11:30 AM ET

NEW YORK - Texas tycoon Thomas O. Hicks has learned a very painful lesson: Don't try to be someone you're not.

Throughout most of the 1990s, his Dallas-based Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst, one of the nation's largest leveraged buyout firms, was richly rewarded for securing a controlling stake in old-economy companies, improving their bottom line and selling out at a profit. Hicks Muse is best known for pulling off the $23.5 billion merger in October 1999 between Clear Channel Communications (nyse: CCU - news - people) and AMFM (nyse: AFM - news - people), a deal that created the nation's largest radio broadcaster.

Hicks Muse jumped on the Internet merry-go-round in 1999, played venture capitalist and sunk about $1.2 billion into public companies like Rhythms NetConnections (nasdaq: RTHM - news - people), Teligent (nasdaq: TGNT - news - people), Globix (nasdaq: GBIX - news - people), ICG Communications (otc: ICGXQ - news - people), Metrocall (nasdaq: MCLLC - news - people), RCN Corporation (nasdaq: RCNC - news - people) and Viatel (nasdaq: VYTL - news - people).

Hicks, chief executive of Hicks Muse, ended up badly bruised. Broadband service provider ICG has since filed for bankruptcy protection, and shares of high-speed data provider Teligent and digital subscriber line company Rhythms have dropped more then 90% since their investments, all of which have had a significant impact on the fund's performance.

After that expensive lesson, Hicks Muse has returned to what it knows best--and wants everyone to know it. The firm, which usually keeps mum about the profits it makes on deals, uncharacteristically dished out information about the $506 million cash sale of G.H. Mumm & Cie and Champagne Perrier-Jouet to U.K.-based Allied Domecq in December. That deal brought a return of about four times Hicks Muse's committed equity in just 18 months.

But the firm's investors--the nation's largest pensions, foundations, endowments and wealthiest individuals--have been so unforgiving that Hicks Muse is having a hard time raising its latest fund, which originally set out with a $4.5 billion target. Instead, the firm will have to take what it can get, conceding it might not even reach $3 billion by the end of this year, most likely because of the current economic climate and the firm's recent bad bets.

Hard times have even reportedly forced 55-year-old Hicks to scale back plans to build a 30-story, 700,000-square-foot office in downtown Dallas to house all of the firm's subsidiaries, including the offices of Hicks' sports teams, the Texas Rangers and the Dallas Stars.

"Our strategy now is back-to-basics, focusing on buy-and-build opportunities in the food and branded consumer product, media and cable and manufacturing sectors," said Hicks in a prepared statement, brushing off requests for an interview.

Yes, Hicks Muse, which raised more than $17 billion of private equity and worked on more than 390 deals with a combined value of $47 billion over its 12-year existence, is back to basics. And that includes deals he's best known for. Earlier in his career, Hicks and former partner Robert Haas scored big when they bought Dr. Pepper's bottling operations for $100 million in 1985. The company later became Dr. Pepper/Seven Up and was sold in 1995 for $2.5 billion.

The firm is now working with London-based private equity firm Apax Partners to buy British Telecommunications' (nyse: BTY - news - people) yellow pages business Yell for some $4.3 billion in cash and debt. Earlier this month, Hicks Muse also agreed to buy the American assets of Vlasic Foods International for $370 million, beating H.J. Heinz's (nyse: HNZ - news - people) previous $174 million bid for some of the bankrupt company's pickles and condiments, Swanson frozen food and Open Pit barbecue sauce.

Hicks Muse may have sworn off Internet deals, but it's still not immune to mistakes.

The firm, along with takeover giant Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., each sank about $500 million into Nashville, Tenn.-based Regal Cinemas in 1998. Now the troubled theater chain is considering filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from its creditors. Hicks Muse and KKR had hoped to reacquire Regal with a new buyout plan from Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz, who owns a controlling stake in Regal's debt.

But it looks like Anschutz isn't giving in, and the failed deal would mark Hicks Muse's biggest financial loss to date--far outweighing any of its individual telecom disasters. Hicks won't be able to use the Internet blame game to get him out of this pickle.

So far, so successful conman. And then there's the incedences of running his mouth like a cunt and hiring a new coach with NO EXPERIENCE. Sound familiar?

And then there is this:

http://www.redandwhitekop.com/forum/index....opic=206073.760

Dallas Stars fan in Texas here. What tex27 says is true. Mediocrity rules the day for both the Texas Rangers and the Dallas Stars.

The unfortunate thing for Liverpool fans is that Hicks learned here that winning is not important; marketing and profits are what counts. The Stars are mediocre and have signed no one of consequence during this free agency period.

Here is a nice quote on sports ownership from Mr. Hicks from the Dallas Business Journal:

Sports team ownership is no longer just a rich man's hobby, sports magnate Thomas Hicks said Friday.

The chairman and CEO of Hicks Holdings LLC, whose sports-related holdings include the Texas Rangers Baseball Club, the Dallas Stars Hockey Club and 50 percent interests in American Airlines Center and Liverpool FC, made his comments to Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce members.

"All of these teams have become businesses in the past 20 years," Hicks said. " ... This business has to do with fan affinity and brand devotion. It doesn't necessarily have to do with winning."

You can read the rest here: http://dallas.bizjournals.com/dallas/stori...07/daily47.html

So remember that. It's not about winning, it's about turning a nice profit for the owners. Why would Hicks want us to progress to the next level with the ferociously ambitious Rafa at the helm when he can potentially make more money by us being a nice, steady '4th place machine' with minimal investment and a cheaper, less ambitious manager happy to tow the line? Hicks should be made aware that such a strategy will not work, and that his tidy, steady little profit maker would soon be usurped by more ambitious 'smaller' clubs. Add that with his propensity to make outbursts and you have exactly the sort strategy which will NEVER give you major success in the Man Utd / Arsenal mould!

Oh, and it gets better:

http://www.liverpoolway.co.uk/forum/ff-foo...p-then-too.html

There are other examples: a contract between Bank of America and Vasco da Gama was intended to cover twenty five years but lasted only two. Worst of all, perhaps, is the case of the Hicks group. This group is a hedge fund based in Texas and linked to President George W. Bush. Hicks took over two teams, Corinthians and Cruzeiro, through contracts that should have run until the year two thousand and ten.

These deals included promises of construction of new stadiums. Hicks also bought forty nine percent of the traffic television network and dreamed up its own ultimate soccer business: Hicks teams facing each other in matches broadcast, naturally, by Hicks. Hicks set up a cable channel in Latin America, PSN, acquired national basketball association rights, formula one races and soccer championships at overblown prices. Hicks invested about five hundred million dollars and in only two years filed for bankruptcy.

Carlos Roberto de Mello, Corinthians' vice president for finances, says Hicks, Muse waited too long to reinvest the profits from the trades. "That hurt Corinthians' performance and irritated fans used to a better playing team," he says. He warns that the strategy may cut into future team profits if Hicks, Muse doesn't get busy building the team up again.

But Hicks, Muse's Pan-American Sports Teams President Richard Law defends the decisions. "The reality of any sports franchise is that teams go through cycles as players mature," he says. "Our job is not to turn back the inevitable, but to build Corinthians and Cruzeiro up from the junior ranks," referring to the teams' 16- to 20-year-old players.

Chirpy-chirpy CHEAP CHEAP!

As part of a separate deal, Hicks, Muse plans to build the club a new training center in early 2001 and a new 45,000-seat stadium in the next few years.

(It didn't happen)

Meanwhile, the free flow of capital has resulted in foreigners investing in football clubs, often with disastrous consequences, such as when the American buyout firm Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst bought Corinthians, Sao Paulo’s leading club.

Corinthians won the World Cup championships in 2000, but the club’s performance subsequently slumped and a political row ensued as fans began to protest about everything from player trades to changes in the colour of jerseys. Hicks, Muse exited three years later, following a row with its local partner.

Ultimately, Rafa could see from inside the club what conmen our new owners are and how they would hinder us long term. He didn't blow the whistle for nothing.

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Commander Jameson

Commander Jameson

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DIC Want to Buy Out both Hicks and Gillette which would be good news if true.

Incidentally the "gossip" here on Merseyside is that if DIC are successful in the buy out then Rick Parry would be told to fuck off and David Dein would be installed as Chief Executive.

I've heard that story about Dein too.

Even though DIC are an unknown prospect, anything would be better than Statler and Wladorf right now. And if we get the added bonus of getting rid of Parry, then I'm all for it.

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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Skinflint tossers want to rush through a cut-price Sissoko sale because they blessed us with an entire £6m to purchase Skrtel. :lol:;)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/arti...amp;ito=newsnow

Valencia waiting on £7m Sissoko

Last updated at 20:31pm on 19th January 2008

Liverpool midfielder Momo Sissoko could be on his way back to Valencia for a knockdown £7million.

Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez has been asked by the club's owners to find a buyer for Sissoko to finance the £6m purchase of Slovakia defender Martin Skrtel.

American owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett sanctioned the purchase of centre-back Skrtel believing that Sissoko's £10m move to Juventus was imminent. However, that fell through.

Benitez is now under pressure to get the best price while Sissoko is on Africa Cup of Nations duty for Mali.

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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Good piece here from the Irish Independent.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/other-spor...ts-1269774.html

Rafa revolts

By seeing through the bluster of the club's new owners, writes Dion Fanning, Rafael Benitez could be Liverpool's real saviour

Tools

Sunday January 20 2008

It was a good week for Rafael Benitez. And, as a result, it was a good week for Liverpool Football Club. Last week, Rafael Benitez's warnings about the men who employ him and run the club were, at least partly, grasped by all.

Benitez has been misjudged, underestimated and written off by many who shape opinion on English football. He doesn't play the media game, but he understands it. Last week, the football world recognised what Benitez was the first to comprehend about Tom Hicks and George Gillett: that they posed a serious threat to his desire to manage a football club properly and, as a result, they threatened the existence of the club as it has been run for 50 years.

Benitez avoids bulls***: he doesn't indulge in it and he is not influenced by it. Last May after Liverpool lost a European Cup final they would have won if he had been allowed to sign the players he had identified the previous summer, Benitez called on the new owners to act. "We talk and talk but we never finish," Benitez, downcast and depressed, remarked in Athens. Tom Hicks' private response was swift: he wanted to fire the manager.

It was the first sign of American edginess. Benitez had strayed a little too close to the truth. In TV interviews before the final, Gillett and Hicks appeared consummate PR men. Gillett produced some dollars, then some euros to illustrate his point that they would be backing the manager. When the manager looked for more than the few quid in their pocket, they wanted him sacked.

Last November, Benitez's private frustrations turned to a public explosion when he responded to a private message from Hicks and Gillett by stating publicly that he was "concentrating on coaching and training the team". Hicks would later refer to it as a pout. Friends of Benitez had warned before the manager's outburst that Benitez was "going to send a message to the world".

The world has taken some time understanding it but last week they finally did. The Liverpool Echo's Tony Barrett, in the interview which revealed the plan to appoint Jurgen Klinsmann, managed to expose the thinking of Tom Hicks and perhaps saved the club from itself or at least its owners. Benitez was wise to them last year when they refused to consider signing Kaka Kaladze and told him to concentrate on coaching. They weren't losing confidence in a manager; they were struggling to find money. If they stay and Benitez goes, there is no evidence that any successor, even Jose Mourinho, will have more money. Liverpool will be an impoverished Newcastle United and that's very poor indeed.

Last week Mark Lawrenson wrote that when Benitez gently chided the Americans for their lack of knowledge of the European transfer market, he did not go far enough. Lawrenson suggested he could have said they know nothing about football.

Hicks' comments were a stunning abandonment of the traditions he had promised to uphold. They were also self-serving and cunning. The only reason Hicks and Gillett were meeting Klinsmann last November was not, as Hicks suggested, because they were frightened Benitez would leave but because they wanted to fire him. And the only reason they wanted to fire him was because Benitez had rumbled them: they had no money and their plans for the club were dangerous.

There had been warning signs. In an interview with the American press, Hicks remarked that against Manchester United in December, Liverpool had "played tight". They did not, he claimed, play like they believed they could win. Either he had learned fast or someone was in his ear. Either way, it told of an owner thinking he knew more than he did.

The feud between Benitez and Hicks has been compared to the situation at Tottenham when the club lost faith with a manager but this is a different narrative and a different club. The distinction is not that Martin Jol won nothing while Benitez has claimed the European and FA Cups. Hicks and Gillett have abandoned Liverpool's values and they have no plan B. If their ideas for saddling the club with debt are approved and they move on to dismiss the manager in May, as Benitez expects them to do, then the club itself will be in jeopardy and a manager will be just a patsy.

Benitez is the son of a Madrid hotel owner and as a child he presumably spent many hours watching guests drawn from the business community talking s***. Hicks and Gillett are a new kind of businessmen, but an old-fashioned type of speculator. They are rich guys with no money who have provided one service during their 12 months in England and that is to offer an illustration of how capitalism works in the 21st century. They may soon depart with a profit of between £75m and £150m for their paper investment. Rich pickings.

But the sale of at least Hicks' share is essential if Liverpool are to survive and, if they do go, the club have Benitez to thank for exposing, firstly in May and again in November, that these were men with neither the money nor the ambition for the club he manages.

Tomorrow evening, there will be the most public display of disaffection yet from Liverpool supporters. Last November, they marched to support Benitez, now they will voice their opposition to the owners. The supporters have decided they too must adjust to the new world. Liverpool fans have always signed up to the belief that things are done "in-house". Managers were rarely booed; dissatisfaction with the board was usually kept quiet. But they too have changed.

A senior Liverpool figure during their days as England's pre-eminent club surveyed the mess last week and ruefully commented, "How can they do business like that?" Now the 'Reclaim the Kop' group is planning mass protest with chants directed at the owners and Foster Gillett, George's son, who is supposed to be the Americans' presence at the club.

Rick Parry and David Moores had the bright idea to appoint co-managers in 1998 when they gave Gerard Houllier (a man so well versed in bulls*** that he could work for Hicks) and Roy Evans joint authority. Nine years on, they promoted even more dangerous lunacy when they let DIC drift out of the picture. Instead, Moores agreed to sell the club to Hicks and Gillett and Parry pushed the deal. At the time a former player, hugely respected at Anfield, was moved to ask the simple question: "How can there be two owners?"

Gillett may this week look for another partner or he may agree to back Hicks in a refinancing deal which places enormous debt on Liverpool -- something they promised not to do when they took over. If DIC come in, they will be treated as saviours, a role they were not necessarily cast in when they first agreed a deal to buy the club and their long-term commitment was questioned.

Now they are all Liverpool have got. Benitez and Parry are said to have put their differences behind them and both are united in opposing the plans of Hicks and the determination to place the debt on the club. These men who arrived eager and bright-eyed, who talked about the club's heritage and promised to learn the values of the institution they were buying and respect it, are now displaying their ignorance.

Liverpool handed over their club to men who knew nothing about football and knew a lot about bluff and bluster. Benitez realised their new frontier was a mirage in the desert. He did what he had to do. His future and the future of the club is now beyond his control.

This, it must be repeated, is not a story of a chairman losing faith in a manager. This is not Tottenham Hotspur or Chelsea. This is a manager losing faith with his owners, seeing through their promises, their false starts and computer-generated images. When the history of these days is written, last week may be viewed as the real Rafa-lution.

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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"It's a great economic model. People are worried that I might take money away from the Rangers to go to Liverpool. It's just the reverse. Liverpool is going to pull off lots of extra money that if I choose I can use for the Rangers or Stars."

Tom Hicks on Liverpool FC

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Sng

Sng

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Jesus, things are looking pretty fragile at the moment :unsure: No idea if I'm looking too far into it but if the Americans stay and aren't willing to spend, and Rafa goes... who would want to come into such a volatile situation? And why would Gerrard/Torres want to stay? And then where would Liverpool end up? Struggling around mid-table!

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dogsout

dogsout

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"It's a great economic model. People are worried that I might take money away from the Rangers to go to Liverpool. It's just the reverse. Liverpool is going to pull off lots of extra money that if I choose I can use for the Rangers or Stars."

Tom Hicks on Liverpool FC

That was you on RAWK, was it? I was just coming in here to share that very quote. He's a dirty, thieving slag and he's got us by the balls. :unsure:

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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That was you on RAWK, was it? I was just coming in here to share that very quote. He's a dirty, thieving slag and he's got us by the balls. :ph34r:

I didn't post it on there but I read it earlier on one of the forums. I'm not sure which one.

I think Hicks' 'denial' today is a good thing....It offers no concrete language, all of it offers a get out. And - crucially - there's no mention of Gillett. He offers known lies by denying he's heard of DIC interest and also by implying that he DIDN'T try to sell them some shares in November (which we know is incorrect). All he's doing is strengthening his bargaining position and trying to spin it to make it look as though he's not going to cut and run.

He's not long for our club.

Jesus, things are looking pretty fragile at the moment :unsure: No idea if I'm looking too far into it but if the Americans stay and aren't willing to spend, and Rafa goes... who would want to come into such a volatile situation? And why would Gerrard/Torres want to stay? And then where would Liverpool end up? Struggling around mid-table!

If we're lucky. 'Doing a Leeds' is entirely possible.

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dogsout

dogsout

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We're bigger than Leeds, surely? Thing is, if we went down we'd stay down until those fuckers from across the sea fuck off. Which really doesn't look likely unless Gillett has a big fall-out with Hicks. Which doesn't look likely. :unsure:

To be honest, I feel more confident about it by the day. It's a horrible situation and the fear of what could happen if things go wrong for us is causing a panic. If you step back from it and think about it, the fact that DIC have come back in after the way they ended their interest last time indicates that they have confidence in this coming off.

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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The whole DIC thing could just be newspaper talk. And surely there are other billionaires, real ones, who want a peice of us.

It's not newspaper talk. A lot of the journalists running the story are Moores & Parry's favourite 'leak agents'. Oliver Kay for Moores, for example, and McNulty at the BBC for Parry.

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DeNeo

DeNeo

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Incidentally the "gossip" here on Merseyside is that if DIC are successful in the buy out then Rick Parry would be told to fuck off and David Dein would be installed as Chief Executive.

That would be brilliant.

All this is like transfer rumours at the moment; hoping that the ones you like come true.

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Warszawa

Warszawa

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/t...ool/7199247.stm

BBC sports editor Mihir Bose told BBC Radio Five Live: "Tom Hicks is right to say he hasn't rejected an offer from DIC because I am told they haven't made one yet.

"However, I understand that DIC are prepared to pay about £400m for Liverpool."

Bose was spot on about The Cowboys buying the club in the first place, when DIC were still heavy favourites.

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V3zna

V3zna

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BBC sports editor Mihir Bose told BBC Radio Five Live: "Tom Hicks is right to say he hasn't rejected an offer from DIC because I am told they haven't made one yet.

"However, I understand that DIC are prepared to pay about £400m for Liverpool."

*Crosses fingers*

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dogsout

dogsout

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It's not newspaper talk. A lot of the journalists running the story are Moores & Parry's favourite 'leak agents'. Oliver Kay for Moores, for example, and McNulty at the BBC for Parry.

Exactly. Too many of those that have proved to be 'in the know' in the past are saying DIC's interest is real. Bascombe has been on the money about the yanks since this whole sorry saga began. As much as he pissed me off by leaving the Echo to work for that rag, he's been bang on the money so far, and it's obvious that he still has very good connections at the club. Barret has played a blinder as well.

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DeNeo

DeNeo

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I'm sure I read somewhere that 18th February should be a significant date for all this buying guff. Hmm...

It's really bizarre - on my birthday last year (6th Feb) I came home from uni to see the news conference about our brand new American owners; promising money, a new stadium and above all to adhere to The Liverpool Way.

Now almost exactly a year later no doubt I'll come home from work to watch a news conference about our brand new Dubai owners; promising money, a new stadium and above all to adhere to The Liverpool Way....

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V3zna

V3zna

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Apparently Liverpool FC honorary president David Moores has left the club. George Gillet's son, Foster, has also alledgedly cleared out and returned to America.

This says one of two things -

1. The Arabs have got their hands on the club and are clearing out everyone connected to the old regime.

2. Gillet and Hicks have fallen out with each other and Moores has fallen out with both of them or just Hicks.

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