[Offspring]

Interesting post for you to read. Some hard core fan have already done their research.


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See if this story sounds familiar: His group purchased the Boston Red Sox in 2002. Up to that point, the Red Sox had a strong regional following; but were mismanaged on and off the field and never came close to their full potential. His group cleared out the management team and installed young and bright people to improve the product on and off the field.

Eight years later, they have won two league titles (After going 86 years without winning one) and have not had a home attendance below capacity in over 7 years (631 games - which is a league record and 2nd longest in North American sports).

The Red Sox have spent very well, but the Henry group has used a similar philosophy to his financial career - exploring inefficiencies in the market. Simply dumping large sums of capital in the roster will not happen. Rather than simply dumping money into large salaried veterans, they invested in scouting and development. Their system isn't perfect; but it allows them to avoid over committing to any particular group of players.

The Dubai people may spend silly money as a public relations loss leader (or Abramovich for amusement); but Henry's group will look to improve the product without dumping absurd amounts of money. I expect they will hire someone to run the club's operations with an attitude to team building similar to Wenger's or SAF's.

Two last things:

1) The new owners will not be "hands on". They will hire football people who share their philosophies and have them run the team. Like Berkshire Hathaway's ownership of Coca Cola, they have too many investments to micro-manage LFC.

2) While this is an investment for them, that doesn't mean the LFC supporter will suffer. The game day experience at the Red Sox stadium has improved 10 fold. The stadium is a century old. Rather than tearing it down and building a debt heavy modern park, they analysed what they have and systematically improved the park over the 7 years. I cannot emphasize enough how enjoyable attending a game is today compared to when they took over in 2002. I expect that they will view Anfield as a special place that shouldn't be hastily destroyed.