Rumours are rife in the City that Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy is preparing to sell the club. The club is valued at £29m, Levy wants £50m. Do we want a stinking rich Russian oligarch to turn us into the Real Madrid of North London? Or should we be just plain worried?
Well i'm not quite sure how this would work. Levy doesn't own Spurs, he is simply an appointee of ENIC who are the biggest shareholders in the club. Garth Crooks was saying the other day that Sugar was looking to get back into charge, although that might be rubbish.
Joe Lewis and Levy control 52% of shares in ENIC. If they both decide to sell, the sale will go ahead if there's a willing buyer
This was a Harry Harris "exclusive" so take it with a pinch of salt. There's been no movement on the share price, which is sign nothing's brewing. As it is I haven't heard anything from the TopSpurs snouts, although it's worth bearing in mind the share issue in the summer did make it a lot easier for ENIC to sell up their stake. If Levy does sell, let's hope it's not to Sugar or Malcolm Glazer Or heaven forbid Ken Bates
If I had a choice between them 3, I would have Sugar back because he did spend money, he spent £11m on Rebrov, £5m on Thatcher & £4m on Perry, even though they didn't work out, he was prepared to spend that sort of money on the say so of Graham & Pleat. I would be against him though if he scrapped the director of football plan, I think with the money that he gave Graham, Arnesen will be able to do something with that & make it work
i don't want to see any major changes. don't want to see some new moneybags owner of the abramovich/fayed model. don't want some high profile fruitcake of the bates/jesus gil school, either. look. spurs' problem over the last 10-15 years hasn't been our ownership. we do not need to become more popular or high profile. this club doesn't need to generate a ton more revenue. and we don't need to spend more of what we generate. we just need to spend it well. i think the problem of spurs recent history has already been addressed. and, while it's early on, i think it has been addressed well. frank arnesen, combined with our existent revenue streams, will (in my optimistic opinion) suffice nicely, thank you very much.
The name doing the rounds at the moment is Philip Green. He's a known Spurs fan and has been linked to buying us for years, he is a billionaire, rated in The Times as the 4th richest man in Britain. Made his money in the retail industry with BHS and Arcadia. Only problem is that he's been reluctant to buy us in the past largely because he's a very money conscious bloke and views football (rightly) as a financial blackhole. However recently he seems to have slowed down on the business side and received some whopping dividends. May well be that he has had a change in heart and decided to invest. I'm satisfied with ENIC and Levy but a sugar daddy who genuinely loves the club is always welcome. Will wait and see what happens if anything, although the lack of an official denial from the Club is interesting.
If think the keyword there is IF theres willing buyer. Im no business man but I imagine youd have to be fairly stupid to buy a commodity valued at £29m, for £50m.
But woulndt a 52% share mean that if the ENIC boys decide to sell, there are not enough non-ENIC owned shares in the company to out vote them?
ENIC don't own 52%, Levy and Lewis own 52% of ENIC, I believe. The share issue last year changed the balance of the whole club, and I for one was not willing to pour more of my hard earned into the bottomless pit that is THFC. I would doubt that Green will get involved as he has said many times that he doesn't want to. However, I would love it if he did as he is probably the most savvy businessman in Britain today and if anyone could turn the club around it would be him. Given the dividend he paid himself this year he should have plenty of hard cash floating around. Here's hoping.
pookspur speaks the truth. The club has had too much turmoil over the last 15 years. We've lurched from one crisis to another. The last thing we need is another upheaval and a new owner with his own ideas. The new structure must be given time.
While I am inclined to agree with pookspur almost wholehearedly, I cant help but wonder.... You guys have seen numerous management and squad changes in the last decade. None of which had brought the club an notable success. Maybe a fresh perspective from the top level is what the club needs. At the end of the day Spurs are in the situation where things cant really get any worse (short of relegation of course) so surely any change can only be an improvement?
but we only just restructured. Some of these plans can take up to 5 years to come to successful fruition. One thing I know is that constant change doesn't bring success.
We've already had a change at the top. Out went Sugar, his main crime being the clowns he hired to manage the team, in came ENIC and Levy. I think we're moving in the right direction now. We've got a good young squad in place (and always being added to), and a proven (overseas at least!) coaching structure. The next few seasons at Spurs are going to be very interesting indeed. What Jol and the rest really need to do though, is just ignore the fans and the press and get on with their vision for where they want Spurs to be. It was the fans who got Graham out, and I for one regret that.
with every change comes, in varying degrees, hope. the appointment of arnesen, however, is the first in a very long time that has also inspired a significant degree of confidence. the club must not be derailed.
I think the club needs some kind of catalyst to set things in motion. Seems everytime something starts to go right for you guys, something imediatly goes wrong. You get santini in, and then procede to not-win a lengthy string of games, to give a recent example. But if the club could get something tanagable under it belt by the end of the season then it might just be enough of a spur (excuse the pun) to get the club back on track. Needed be anything huge either. Top five finish, or a Carling Cup win. With success comes money (gate receipts etc), and with money comes players, and the rest just kinda falls into place. I do wonder though. Are spurs fans in general impatient? Are they expecting an EPL win to follow within a season of a new manager, or superstar signing? I may be way off the mark on that one but its the impression i get from a few of my friends who are Tottenham fans. If that is that case (IF), then I think looking at Arsenal as a point of reference for expectations of change isnt such a bad idea. Blasphemous - perhaps - but he joined in what, 1995, and his efforts have only born serious fruit in the last couple of years or so. Almost a decade at the helm.... But as I say I may have missed the mark completely on that one so.....excuse me if I have
I don't think we're necessarily impatient, it's just that we've been plodding along in mid-table obscurity for so long it's just gotten frustrating and to the point where because it's been like that for so long that surely it's got to be our time to push up in the table and compete.
i don't think it's being unfair to suggest that spurs fans are less than the model of patience. but we still aren't suffering at the gate. generating revenue really isn't the problem. besides, at this point, i don't know of anyone who's looking for anything in the short term other than meaningful signs of improvement. there have been more than a couple of false dawns over the last 10+ years, and that's why (as my last post implies) each change tends to bring more hope than confidence. i think martin jol agrees with your assertion that anything tangible could work as a boost to the club's progress. that's why he made it clear from day one that he and the club will be taking the carling cup very seriously this year. but the 'catalyst to set things in motion' to which you refer has already, in my opinion, been put in place. it is, as earlier claimed, the appointment of frank arnesen. don't be put off by santini's exit. i don't know well the club really expected them to work together, but you can be sure that if they didn't (and we now know they didn't) it was arnesen who was going to stay. jol will work better with frank than santini ever would.* arnesen's appointment is certainly not the kind of catalyst that's going to show immediate dividends, like a high-profile managerial appointment; but it's going to go much further toward stabilizing the club than will the appointment of any team manager like santini... or hoddle... or graham... or gross... etc. only relegation - or new ownership - can change the direction in which spurs are now heading. *this may beg the question, 'why hire santini, then?'. but that's another issue, altogether, and i've got to go back to work.