AnfieldRoad.com/ January: Hicks out/March: Hicks in?

If you want to see a flip bigger than Lua Lua’s you need to check out Jim Boardman’s blog. In the space of three short months he has gone from calling for the removal of both Hicks and Gillett to just about the biggest friend Hicks has got on the blogosphere.

A Selection of Article titles and extracts from AnfieldRoad.com - January 2008 - on Hicks and Gillett.

Huge interest payments will cripple Reds

“Tom Hicks got his PR firm to confirm last night what we’ve known all along - Liverpool Football Club will be paying the interest on the loan he took out to make himself richer.

Under these owners the club is in a mess, the future of the club is on a tightrope.

We’re gambling on Champions League qualification, and even then on relative success in the Champions League. Without it, we are in serious danger of following the same path Leeds followed. And don’t for one moment think “it can’t happen to us”, because it can.

And the chances are that Hicks and Gillett will have ridden off into the sunset long before it gets to the Leeds stage - they’ll transfer the debt onto the club’s assets, pay off their own loans and disappear.”

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“We’ve got to get behind the players and the manager; they need us now more than ever. Those dissenting voices on phone-ins and message-boards who think we’re going to be alright under Hicks after all need to sit back and think about what’s really going on.

The owners will bail out as soon as they see a threat to their existing assets - we’ve got to do all we can to bring that threat forward.”

Be wary of Hicks spin as he fights for Reds support

“Liverpool supporters need to be careful in the coming weeks that they don’t fall for the PR spin that will undoubtedly be served up by Tom Hicks as he aims to get Liverpool supporters falling for his stories and promises once again.

He’ll use the promise of a fancy stadium and the so-called £17m signing of Javier Mascherano to boost his claims that he cares about the club, hoping that we soon forget the lies and deceit of the past few months in particular, but that have been there since the day he first spoke of his plans for the club nearly a year ago.”

Hicks admits past DIC talks despite past denials

“Three of Liverpool’s last five matches have seen the Reds score an own goal, but it’s the joint owner, Texan millionaire Tom Hicks, who seems to be scoring most own goals.”

How Reds owners mislead fans over transfer funding

“Liverpool’s owners borrowed £298m to take the club over, of which they spent at total of £218.9m on buying the shares and paying off the debt. There are few clues as to where the other £79m went, or what the extra £52m they are trying to borrow now will go to.”

Hicks laughs as refinancing draws nearer

“The Tom Hicks propaganda machine rolls on relentlessly as he moves closer to getting the loans he needs to continue with his unwelcome control of Liverpool Football Club.”

Hicks excuses fail to convince, time they moved on

“Tom Hicks has today made yet another bungle in his long list of errors and misjudgements since taking over at Anfield with the nowadays silent George Gillett.”

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“The owners’ plot included wining and dining both Klinsmann and his wife Debbie, Klinsmann being told he’d be the perfect for the club should Benitez either leave the club or be fired.

Hicks admitted that an offer was made to Klinsmann - but claims it was purely an “insurance policy”. He now says that Benitez has his full support. Unfortunately his word means very little these days.

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"This time they’ve gone too far. Already there is deep-seated anger from more and more supporters at the way they are handling our club. And already fans are discussing ways of making this known to the owners. It should also be made known to the financial institutions the owners are speaking to, because they need to know that the owners are not what they make themselves out to be. They’ve not got a clue how to run a football club, and there is a serious risk that the club’s status will fall under their ownership."

 All in all these owners stand to ruin this club. It’s only a matter of time before they remove their rubber masks to reveal they are actually Neville Neville and Norman Whiteside."

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"Time they left. Time the financial institutions were warned - there’s a vote of “No Confidence” in Hicks and Gillet.”

Desperate Hicks makes desperate claims

“Tom Hicks has gone off on one again, or so it seems. Gone off into one of those wild fantasy worlds where he vehemently denies something or other to do with his ownership of Liverpool Football Club. All around him are great big pointers to whatever he’s denying being actually true, yet he stands there and says it isn’t."

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"One day we might laugh, maybe, if these dark days ever end. One day we’ll probably laugh at him, as we come to terms with whatever was left behind when he does finally leave. It seems doubtful we’ll ever laugh with him. For now his attitude causes anger and the kind of resentment that meant his son Tommy was unable to sit in an English pub near Anfield and talk to fans.”

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There was more of the same in February but in March he decided that in fact he had been conned. What will be noted from all of the above is that Boardman’s anti Hicks and Gillett sentiments are virtually exclusively based upon actions or statements attributed to the two owners or their PR people.

Incredibly in the passage of merely a month Boardman claims that he now considers himself to be have been misled by lies and spin from DIC when writing in January. He has decided that doubt must be cast on all of these (his) nasty slurs against Tom Hicks who might, after all, be Liverpool Football Club’s saviour if only he can get the (still nasty) George Gillett to sell him his Shares. DIC, he reckons, must be viewed with the gravest of suspicion because they want to buy the club so badly they are prepared to pay more to George Gillett than Hicks can afford. DIC are also unwilling to come clean, says Boardman, with all of their corporate strategy and future plans for the club?

Conned??? Jim Boardman by DIC or us by Jim Boardman? On a postcard please.

Fulham 0 Liverpool 2

I know it is not the end of the season yet and we will need some heroic individual performances if we are to pull off a sixth Champions League trophy, but I already have Javier Mascherano down as my player of the season. Another masterclass today and even though I watched the match on television in a pub you could see the little chief's class on and off the ball. Masch is the only defensive player I have seen for a long time who gets the oohs and ahs of a striker. Some of the interceptions and tackles are so well executed you can't help jumping out of your seat. 

Anyway a comfortable win and you are left wondering whether we would have been in with a shout had these second string elevens performed like this when Rafa was rotating the squad earlier in the season. It took today's  selection just 9 minutes or so to gel and take effective control of the match. Whether this was because the likes of Pennant and Voronin are conscious of the need to impress as the season and the long transfer window approaches or if it is just that they have had a season playing together in the training sessions is arguable.

The first team players on show hardly put a foot wrong, Sami and Skrtl both had good games. Both goals were saveable had Keller been more on his game but we were well capable of moving up at least two more gears had we needed to. With the goal and the assist I'd go with Jermain Pennant as mom. 

Is Ground Share Really Dead?

Let's get my opinion out straight away. I hate the very mention of this idea. Why bring it up now? Well it comes down to the bits of info coming out on the Hicks/Gillett bust-up. Gillett was never an outright opponent of ground share, he wouldn't rule it in or out. Hicks has always gone for broke when building stadia for his sports teams. I am asking myself questions about the possible reasons for such a complete about turn in the relationship between the two americans and the stadium design figures large in them.

In the few statements Gillett has made he talks darkly of Hicks' use of the media and his "version of events". The economic environment has changed radically since the first Hicks stadium design was completed. We have had one return to the drawing board on cost grounds since but I am left wondering if the project still is a "stadium too far" for the resources of Hicks and the club. Is this the nub of Gillett's beef with Hicks? If such an ambitious proposal is forced through will the fans be told, once it is near completion, that the economic realities facing the club mean that the question of sharing the ground has to be revisited?

Hicks will feel confident he can get popular support for the project, most fans love it and the design is radical and would make the club stand out from the crowd. Whether he can obtain the finance without straining future revenues of the club too far is another thing. I pose the question, is this a bone of contention between them with Gillett viewing Hicks as being deceitful in conning the fans into thinking they can have both the big new stadium and all the player signings deemed by the manager to be necessary to get us back to the top and keep us there?   

Will we get the Owners we Deserve?

Someone once said that, in general, people get the governments they deserve. Populations under tyranny are usually acquiescent until maybe a low ranking military officer or professional assassin gets the job done with a bullet, bomb or coup d'etat. It is very rare for the mass of people under the jackboot to do something about their plight. The Philippines and the ouster of Ferdinand Marcos is the only exception I can remember.

Democracy is well established in the UK but it still seems to me that apathy rises to a height when it is time to vote whilst public concern and anti-government feeling rises to a peak right in the middle of a term of office. hence we get turnouts of less than 60%. So 40% cannot be bothered to get off their arses to vote but you can bet they are the most vocal in their complaints.

What's my point? Well in the last few weeks Hicks and Gillett have dragged the club through the mud with their public points scoring and, given the time of year, crucial part of the season - Hillsborough Anniversary etc, you might have expected this to rebound on them bigtime. I am a nutter for all things LFC and try to keep up with what is being said on all the various blogs and sites but all I detect is a rise in the number of fans who just want this mess to go away but don't want to support more active fans trying to get something done about it.

The messages are various; from "stop all this its making my brain hurt" down to "Hicks makes sense let's give him a couple of years then if he fails to keep his promises we will get him out" They all add up to appeasement. the parallels I drew above are uncanny. Like Neville Chamberlain with his "I've got a piece of paper signed by Mr Hitler so we will be fine" and "What do we know of Czechoslovakia? It is a far away country of which we know little". The same messages are coming about Hicks and DIC. Lets stay with Hicks because we have no guarantees about DIC? My head hurts when I read stuff like that!

So are we going to bend over and let Hicks and co. continue to royally roger us or are we made of better stuff and we will continue to try and get some degree of control and dignity back for the club. I hope so. There are positve signs, reasons for optimism if you like, One fan who started a petition calling for Hicks to go got a personal phone call so it shows the Texan is affected by what activists do. The fans's hatred is a factor or why would he bother trying to affect it, also Gillett maintains his 'I will not sell to Hicks" stance and DIC have not gone away.

This is an appeal to all those who wish we had a change of regime but have not made their opposition known. Get on a forum or write to the Echo, sign the petition do something. As we reach the endgame of this terrible episode for the club an extra push right now could tip the balance.

Hicks; Bumbling Fool or Malicious Manipulator

I must have been expecting too much. That interview with Sky could have been a turning point for Tom Hicks; instead I'm left wondering if he is in reality so insular in his thinking " England, that's not far from Europe. right?" that he can only see the LFC problem in US franchise terms. What kind of advisors does he have? Is he taking any notice of them. It seems that whenever he is interviewed, only a couple of questions in, ego takes over and the editor in his brain, which should intervene between brain and mouth, shuts down.

Take this recent interview with Sky. A one year extension for Rafa? Who was that supposed to impress? Certainly not Rafa who has a right to feel he has served his apprenticeship and deserves a contract long enough for him to fully implement his plans. The fans, who were the target audience of this PR exercise will also not feel a one year extension is a convincing enough endorsement of the manager a vast majority of them revere. 

Then there is the question of his desire to buy out George Gillett. He made no attempt to disguise the fact that although George Gillett does not want to sell to him he, Hicks, was going to make him, like it or not. What does that indicate about his style of management should future issues with club staff or Manager and players comes up?

Hold on though, he hasn't got the funds himself to buy out Gillett and the fact that he talks about other investors tells us no lending institution regards him as safe enough or having assets enough to lend him the cash for Gillett's shares.

Hicks says he wants to lead a group of investors who will relieve the club of all debt apart from the normal working capital needs. How would that work? Hicks is in debt for virtually all of his share of the recent refinancing package. These mystery investors though are going to back Hicks up with real money whilst  he retains a majority, according to Hicks. So in less than 18 months time when the current loans are due Hicks will stump up at least 51% of the then value of the club in real money or loans secured on his own assets. If Hicks can't do it now how will he achieve it then, is the credit crunch going to melt away and the shackles come off the lending institutions in that time scale OR is this all BS , pie in the sky, which can neither be proved or disproved  BUT is what the fans want to hear?

Rick Parry gets another load in the neck in public. To describe our overall performance as a club in the Parry years as a disaster is way ott. I use the term "overall performance' because as CEO that is what Parry is accountable for. The playing side reports to him just as the marketing and administrative wings of the club do. He has overseen the recruitment of Gerard Houllier and Rafa Benitez and we have won a fair few trophies, so there have been plusses. To put down our falling behind Man U solely down to the marketing side is naive. We are at least 3 major signings behind which is down to the funding situation not to Rick Parry's admin. failings. Rick Parry remember remains an employee, accountable to the Board of Directors and as such does not enjoy the same freedom as Hicks to defend his position in public. Hicks knows this hence the bully boy tactics.

On to Klinsmann. Classic diversionary strategy here. The real question to be answered and not put in the interview is, who offered Rafa's job to Klinsmann? No way was it done at the first meeting when the full Board was present. It can only have been done at the meeting in Hicks' place in California. We know it went that far because Klinsmann said so. Hicks doesn't want this question put because he knows it will negate all the cosying up he has been doing with Rafa. So Hicks keeps harping; "Gillett was a friend of Klinsmann's he set the meeting up" to deflect awkward issues.

The window dressing, the family in the background, the family's regret at not being able to come to Anfield for the half dozen times a season he can tear himself away from Dallas; all may be sincere but may be down to the PR boys or the Sky producer. Our fans regard football as essentially a man's game and a retreat from family or job concerns so this kind of embellishment is unlikely to wash. Against possible sincerity you could put the anecdotal evidence of some fans who post the gossip that as far as young Hicks and his mates are concerned, LFC is a drinking club with a football problem. Also the paparrazi did Hicks and son no favours in catching them looking bored stiff and stifling yawns at the Arsenal away CL leg.

Once again Hicks either wont answer questions on or is having none of the veto time limit. Some fans claiming legal knowledge say that there is no way a contract provision that allows Hicks to perpetually block Gillett is legally sustainable. So either, Hicks is bluffing and hoping that other financial needs will force Gillett to the bargaining table or, there is a specific time limitation on his pre-emption rights and he is upping the ante, lashing out at Parry and Gillett in an attempt to force the issue before time runs out.

All in all Hicks could have done much better with this interview. He could have come completely clean with the fans, pleaded for a second chance and laid out properly the substance behind his grandiose plans. He missed the opportunity not out of a bumbling accident prone inability to stick to his script, but because, in my opinion, his manifest unpopularity is hindering his attempts to convince the mystery investors to back him and all this new "man of the people" stuff is a callous attempt to get enough fans on side until he gets what he wants.

Remember, that throughout this interview the emphasis was not on how we are going to re-establish ourselves as the No 1 team in the country but on how he is going to put the club's debt situation and shirt-selling capability back on track. 

Not for me folks I'm not buying.

Speaking up for Rick Parry

We've all had a go at Rick Parry in the past, some of us have had good reason for anger when you think back to the ticket fiasco for the Athens final. I have joined in as well but to have a go is our privilege as fans, it keeps these guys honest. However, the stuff in that letter from Hicks and the abuse Parry has had in the media and on various fans forums and blogs seemed to me to be kicking the guy when he is down. I've had a good think back over my own criticisms of him and now think that he has not had a fair shake. Hicks exaggerated Parry's failing for his own reasons, he needs the fans on side so he thinks us suckers will swallow whatever he puts down.

The Klinsmann business and Rick Parry.

When this news came out the fans’ reaction was one of complete incredulity not about the fact that there was a succession plan being discussed but at the name of Klinsmann. How could anyone who had the least knowledge of this club or English football consider Klinsmann as a suitable replacement for Rafa Benitez? Rick Parry’s name never came up in fans protest posts on the subject nor was he quizzed on it because it was assumed, I’ve no doubt, that the CEO who effectively recruited both Gerard Houllier to succeed Roy Evans and subsequently Rafa Benitez to succeed Houllier could not have supported the appointment of such a complete rookie. Yet the credence given to Rick Parry by his detractors when accused by Tom Hicks of being one of the prime movers is - Nil! Hicks version and his assertion that he was merely a facilitator of the meetings - supported without challenge. 

The letter inviting Rick Parry to resign. 

If there is a documented case of Rick Parry ever having been caught lieing to the media or in private briefings I am unaware of it. Yet this unimpeached integrity counts for nothing when he states on camera and for the record that he learned of the contents from family members. Again the credence afforded him by some on fans forums and blogs- nil. Hicks or his son have been reported to have had a hand in getting the contents of the letter wide publicity but , it seems, the only thing written about is on the dubiousness of Parrys’ claim the he didn't see it until later.

So what,it might be said, Parry has only himself to blame, he was at the meetings with Klinsmann, hasn’t he screwed up and cost us the chance to be as big as Man U in marketing and merchandising and lost us transfer after transfer target. What, apart from assumption and gossip, is the evidence for this and has it been challenged in the interests of balance? Not that I can read.  

I believe there is another view that in fairness and the interests of balance should be put. Those are the only reasons I intercede on Rick Parry’s behalf as I am not a hypocrite and do believe he has not been a patch on Peter Robinson as the club’s main interface with the world outside the club and indeed with the fans. My antipathy however is based on what I know to be the case over issues like the ticketing fiasco and the lack of communication for long periods on the stadium.

So what could have been offered to counter the “exaggerated” case against him? On Klinsmann people close to Parry are said to protest that he was ordered to the meeting in New York. We don’t know what the agenda for the meeting was or whether it was formally set up and minuted. If you believe what is flying around on this more will come out eventually, who knows? My point is, it is entirely logical and indeed acceptable for a succession plan to be considered at that stage and by such a senior gathering. It is surely within the responsibilities of the CEO to have in place a contingency plan should a serving key official resign or need to be replaced. I heard no criticism of our CEO when the succession of Roy Evans by GH and GH by RB was smoothly handled, it being obvious the the succeeding manager had to have been approached while the incumbent was still at his desk. 

And what might have pushed succession planning to the fore? Results at the time of the Klinsmann approach were going well and hope remained that we could put in a challenge for the Premier League title. There was a vocal minority of fans anti-Rafa because of “rotation”, still is for that matter albeit less vocal recently, but there is no suggestion that this figured in either of the joint-owners’ or Parry’s thinking. So logically there are two issues which could have impacted: first the possibility existed of an early exit from the Champion’s League and second there were renewed rumours of an approach from Real Madrid to Rafa. In my view the first is a weak argument and would have been low in Parry’s evaluation of risk. The teams in the group were eminently beatable and Rafa’s track record in Europe gave grounds for optimism that we would eventually progress. The second point was though, worthy of consideration by Parry and he will have been conscious of the coincidence of the appearance of such stories at times when Rafa’s stock at the club needed a fillip. So a fair argument is possible that Rick Parry was acting prudently in making sure the contingency plans were up to date. 

How to put a case up to counter the transfer and marketing accusations is, I’ll concede, more problematical. All I can offer is a similar unsubstantiated opinion to the “Parry cost us Ronaldo, Malouda and Walcott” stuff taken as proven fact by some fans. Despite the funding problems of the late Moores era Gerard Houllier was generally able to obtain all of the players he targeted. Rick Parry was instrumental in obtaining the signatures of Diouf and Diao before those players took part to good effect in the World Cup that summer. Their subsequent failure and the setback the waste of valuable funds represented cannot be laid at Rick Parry’s door . Gerard Houllier must take responsibility for that summer of lost opportunity. The cumulative effect of those purchases and the clubs’ inability to raise additional revenues without recourse to the private wealth of David Moores could not have made Rick Parry’s job easy when it came to fulfilling promises made to Rafa Benitez when he was appointed (by Parry it should be remembered). 

Rafa Benitez did not openly express any dissatisfaction with the funding made available until the comments after the Athens defeat. Those comments were pointed clearly at the american co-owners and when they were repeated at the time of the mid-season transfer window, Tom Hicks reacted famously and Rafa lost the deals for a senior player plus two frees from South America that he had targeted. none of this was due to prevarication on Parry’s part. The money was not going to be made available nor was any preparatory work allowed until the co-owners flew in for their end of year visit. Subsequently Sissoko was sold, for silly money some say (kudos to Parry?) and Skrtl obtained with change from the Sissoko proceeds.

The Mascherano affair is still open to question. Rafa claimed all was well and terms had been agreed from as early as November but the deal was signed off much later after the official transfer window had closed. Was that down to sluggishness or lack of ability on Parry’s part? Or, was it due to the fact that the co-owners, having already fallen out with each other, would not sanction the fee, leaving Parry to perform financial gymnastics to sort out the portion of the overall fee payable to Joorabchian. I know what I believe and it does no discredit to Parry. 

So what are we left with to justify the charges against Parry. We signed Pennant instead of Malouda? We don’t sell enough shirts in the Far East? We’ve only opened one shop outside Liverpool? On the other hand we successfully transferred Torres and Babel in, deals arranged by Parry with the new owners only involved in signing the cheques. It doesn’t add up to grounds for instant dismissal in my view nor for the “he goes or I go” stance Rafa is said to be adopting. So those are my grounds for viewing the references to Parry as exaggerated. You can argue with my "case for the defense" but you can't argue with his right to have one. 

The Height of Insensitivity?

On the Anfieldroad.com blog a poster claiming to be a friend of Tom Hicks jnr has been up to high jinks for the last few weeks winding up the anti-Hicks posters on the blog. All good fun until yesterday. Most of the regular posters gave the ownership crap a rest yesterday out of respect but there were posts on the memorial service and the article by Jim Boardman on the 96 is the best you will ever read and should be printed out and put on every seat at the next Anfield match. 

But I digress. This joker calls himself Texas-dawg and he responds to most comments on the ownership threads so must read all the articles and the comments. He can't have missed the ones on Hillsborough and the time of the service. What does he do? At 2.54pm and 2.58pm yesterday on he comes with posts on Hicks. he keeps it up later in the day despite one regular pulling up him for posting.

Now as this guy has reveled in his connection with the Hicks crew you could wonder whether he runs his posts and the stuff he reads on the blog by young Hicks. I don't know but would give Hicks the benefit of any doubt. He may be a stone cold businessman but nothing he has done would tell you he would stoop so low as this so-called fellow Texan. 

Some questions need to be asked because although this day might mean zilch to some others it does mean something to us. Now we've got no right to impose respect on people not connected with our club but hey there have been posts of sympathy on the Man U and Everton sites too, for which our respect by the way, so is it too much to expect this from this Texas-dawg.