Re: AVFC Takeover Thread, Rumours, Gossip and Hearsay...all goes here

by Wookster Fri Apr 29, 2016 9:26 pm

DaveAV1 wrote:Firm but fair absolutely Jeff. They'll thank you for it one day mate, especially when we're European Champions again. Or storm to the Division 2 play off final.......

Tell me about it. I live in Leeds and my little un is currently Chelsea mad.

I refuse to buy anything in blue

by DaveAV1 Fri Apr 29, 2016 9:53 pm

Refusing to buy anything blue should be a general rule 04.29.2016 Scarf Waving

by DaveAV1 Fri Apr 29, 2016 9:54 pm

Where the hell did that date come from??

by **Trotters** Fri Apr 29, 2016 10:14 pm

Three quarters of the way through this disastrous season, my 11 year old asked why we weren't Man City fans. I grabbed the laptop off him, opened a web browser and logged into eBay.

He asked what I was doing. I told him I was selling him to Arabs and would spend the money on a new car.

The look on my face informed him that this was not a drill. :) :)

by Chrissylee1111 Fri Apr 29, 2016 10:40 pm

My little 4 year old asked me why villa keep passing it backwards. Told him that, this is how not to play lol.

by nickf21 Fri Apr 29, 2016 10:56 pm

love the new thread - "Parenting the Villa Way", helps distract from the F5 blister. I took my 7 year old daughter to the FA Cup final in May. Just to get her used to the 70 odd years of disappointment she is going to feel being a Villa fan.
I know its bad, but hearing her sing "Shitting on the City" just filled me with pride.

by achilles Fri Apr 29, 2016 11:09 pm

nickf21 wrote:love the new thread - "Parenting the Villa Way", helps distract from the F5 blister. I took my 7 year old daughter to the FA Cup final in May. Just to get her used to the 70 odd years of disappointment she is going to feel being a Villa fan.
I know its bad, but hearing her sing "Shitting on the City" just filled me with pride.

It is bad, but it brings a lovely smile to the face as well! lol!

by deadbuzzardalive Fri Apr 29, 2016 11:52 pm

I haven't seen it myself but apparently the sun, are saying that some of the parties interested are being put off by the mess that the club is in and want Lerner to employ Cortese to sort it out in the short term (seems like an awful cheek) and that Lerner will accept £40M. Also says that the Chinese are the favourites.

Probably a load of rubbish.

by deadbuzzardalive Sat Apr 30, 2016 12:24 am

ASTON VILLA could be sold for as little as £40million as the reality of relegation bites.

Owner Randy Lerner is desperate to get out and may be willing to accept even less than the £75m which has been quoted to some interested parties.

But Lerner’s exit strategy is being hampered by Villa’s off-field meltdown after former Bank of England chief Mervyn King and ex-FA chairman David Bernstein quit the board earlier this month. At the time, Villa revealed that chairman Steve Hollis was “engaged in extensive negotiations in relation to the sale of the club”.

A Chinese consortium has been reported as the current front-runner and are said to be keen to appoint former Tottenham and Liverpool director of football Damien Comolli to sort out the on-field problems. Potential buyers, however, are being put off by the mess Villa are in from top to bottom, in all departments.

They feel Lerner and Villa need a chief executive with football experience — either to get the club in shape for a takeover on a short-term contract or to front a credible bid and be part of the club’s medium-term future. Whispers of fresh interest from Nicola Cortese, the former Southampton executive chairman, who was linked with a Villa takeover in 2014, are yet to come to anything.

Buying a football club is a leap of faith at the best of times. Relegation adds an extra level of uncertainty to a financial market which is already slow because of the forthcoming UK referendum on EU membership.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football/7117334/Aston-Villa-could-be-sold-by-owner-Randy-Lerner-for-40m-rather-than-75m-as-Premier-League-relegation-reality-sets-in.html

As I say probably a load of rubbish, the other day they were saying Ellison was going to buy us. I think they just make it up as they go along.

by smetro Sat Apr 30, 2016 12:26 am

Maybe Ellison has fallen on hard times ?

by gaffer85 Sat Apr 30, 2016 1:23 am

Why so quiet something must be afoot

by simbrenn Sat Apr 30, 2016 1:58 am

Clearly waiting on me to throw my hat in the ring . But being this emotionley involved just doesn't seem right .
Learner had the money I've got the love / nuresmaent.

by Guest Sat Apr 30, 2016 7:08 am

Nothing is happening. You're being fooled. We need protests. I'd love if someone hang dummies of Lerners family off the Tower bridge. I'd like to see his plane get trashed and spraypainted with the worst vulgar shite ever. I'd like everyone to refer to all Villa Park toilets for Randy's.

Force that cretin out. Make him accept anything.

And FWIW the same goes for Black.

by **Trotters** Sat Apr 30, 2016 7:41 am

I'm absolutely sure something is happening. But given the remarks made by King in his resignation letter, it's clear those things had already started.

So now Lerner has a problem; whatever was negotiated may have been done with the view of the club getting back on its feet with plans out in place by King/Bernstein but whatever moves they may have made to set the club right have likely been scuppered. And now we have the manager coming out saying he regrets ever joining and that the club is toxic. It's not just a matter of buying a club with underperforming, overpaid players; it's far far FAR worse that anyone could have imagined.

Let's face it, what we as fans thought was a shit-show a few weeks ago - and we've been following this sad tale for years - was nothing compared to the reality of it. And maybe a new owner, negotiating in good faith has since come to see all this as we have and has put the brakes on.

An owner may have been of the thinking that once half the first team's trouble makers are gone, they'll essentially be left with a blank canvas. But that's not the case at all; if the club was being bought as a marketing platform, it's potential is currently being far outweighed by the shear amount of awful negative press.

In a nutshell, is Villa now in the "too hard" basket to save?

I don't know what Tom Fox is doing these days but if he's not got another of his high flying jobs by now, I'd suggest he needs to get one quick before players and senior staff begin to leave with a story to tell. Because as much as the players and Lerner are to blame in all this, Fox seems to have actually shaken up this bottle of shit rather than managing to get a cork in it.

Let's look at things financially - and maybe someone can chime in here - but if it wasn't for Lerner constantly writing off debt by share-swaps (whatever they are) then I'm pretty sure the administrators would have come in a long time ago.

So if you could buy a club for a quid from the administrators, why is it worth 75 million times that now? Randy won't be throwing money at this project to save us again and I have a feeling that he'll be asking for the entirety of the end-of-season money and Christ knows what else. So if all buyers walk away, what's going to be our value in another season?

This is why I think Hollis is saying there are multiple buyers...in the pure hope that maybe he can create a sense of urgency and get us sold. Anyway he possibly can.

In 8 weeks if we're not sold, Lerner will be shitting it.

by Guest Sat Apr 30, 2016 7:42 am

Tell you what, if these stories are true and we're sold within the next month, I'll buy you all a beer the next time I bother to take a flight over. I've heard this shite before, and then like now people are buying it hook line and sinker.

by **Trotters** Sat Apr 30, 2016 7:54 am

There are 200 people logging in here every 24 hours. You're gonna need N'Zogbia's clown pants with the really deep pockets to afford all those beers.

lol!

by DaveAV1 Sat Apr 30, 2016 8:21 am

He'll be ok he's used to Norwegian prices!

by Guest Sat Apr 30, 2016 8:22 am

Made me laugh

by **De Kuip** Sat Apr 30, 2016 9:05 am

gaffer85 wrote:Why so quiet something must be afoot

12 inches?

by gaffer85 Sat Apr 30, 2016 9:26 am

De Kuip wrote:
gaffer85 wrote:Why so quiet something must be afoot

12 inches?

by deadbuzzardalive Sat Apr 30, 2016 10:34 am

I believe there are buyers, in dialogue with the club. There is no great conspiracy, involving season tickets or whatever else. But there were buyers last summer too and according to Percy the summer before that. So we know that Lerner somehow is in the habit of not seeing these deals through. Hopefully Hollis and this new firm they're using can help things along. As for Fox I'm sure I read somewhere the other day that he's technically still working for the club until the end of the season.

by smetro Sat Apr 30, 2016 10:48 am

deadbuzzardalive wrote:I believe there are buyers, in dialogue with the club. There is no great conspiracy, involving season tickets or whatever else. But there were buyers last summer too and according to Percy the summer before that. So we know that Lerner somehow is in the habit of not seeing these deals through. Hopefully Hollis and this new firm they're using can help things along. As for Fox I'm sure I read somewhere the other day that he's technically still working for the club until the end of the season.

For "buyers" - you probably mean people expressing an interest. A bit like viewers when your house is on the market.

I remember when Ellis sold us us in 2006 - there were quite a few groups interested, but in the end Lerner was the only one with the hard cash. So 'interested parties' shouldn't get us to excited about a deal going through.

I don't understand not getting a manager and running the club on a business as usual basis. Is a £75m deal really going to collapse because they don't like the manager. If we are appointing a manager mid july - we might as well write off next season - no manager is going to turn that around in a matter of weeks.

by deadbuzzardalive Sat Apr 30, 2016 10:59 am

A deal was agreed for the sale of the club for £150m plus additional fees of £25m, to a Chinese consortium, last summer. Howard Hodgson was advising on the deal told these details in a podcast that he did with Jonny Gould, also said that an American group were even further down the line. So there were very definitely buyers last summer, even Trent on Villa Talk pretty much confirmed what HH was saying at the time.

by The Utterer Sat Apr 30, 2016 11:40 am

Whilst we continue to not appoint a manager i have hope as this is surely the best indicator that there is a sale in the offing?! If a manager is hired and if it's clearly someone in the ""a new owner intending to put the club back on track would never have hired him"" mould, then i will be worried.

As for the Sun report, i don't believe a word they print! They are likely just rehashing the negativity on various fan chat sites etc thinking it'll sell a few papers!

by deadbuzzardalive Sat Apr 30, 2016 11:50 am

Hollis has said that the hiring of a new manager is in part dictated by what happens with a sale. I think the 'in part' bit is important, because I think it means that if a takeover isn't complete by certain date then the current regime will press forward with hiring a manager regardless of any negotiations because of course we still have to operate as a normal club in prep for next season (which I read somewhere is only 14 weeks away). But I don't think it means that the club will call off any deal to sell the club, at that point.

Besides even if we get taken over I'm not sure the manager we will be able to attract will be a major upgrade on the candidates that have been linked with the job so far. But then again I'd guess any serious bidders will have somebody already lined-up.

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