So former City star Ray Ranson wants to buy Manchester City. Why? No doubt we'll hear the usual tripe about it being a dream to own his beloved former club, this would be a good tale if Ranson hadn't first tried to buy Aston Villa. According Doug Ellis at Villa he knocked back several approaches for the midlands club because the new would be owners were borrowing money to buy the club...Randy Learner was eventually chosen because he was the only one who wasn't borrowing money.
Until very recently the adage was only a fool would want to own and run a top flight football club. Take the example of Alan Sugar who for a while owned Spurs. This is what he says on the game "The money coming into the game [football] is incredible. But it is just the prune-juice effect - it comes in and goes out straight away. Agents run the game". Ok, Sugar got a lot wrong at Spurs and maybe he lacked the foresight to see the current financial boom in the game. At least that is the view that some Spurs fans have of Alan Sugar's time at their club.
Also take a look at Man City's current owners Wardle and Makin, these two are shrewd businessmen, but having been at the sharp end of running City for a good few years now, they want out. Who can blame them? The thing is being rich is no longer enough to own and run a big club, you need to be super rich and there aren't many Roman Abramovich's around.
Glazer was only able to seize hold of United because the banks were willing to lend the Glazer family ridiculous sums of money added to which United were debt free at the time of purchase. I personally believe that Glazer will end up making United bankrupt, the club cannot afford annual loan repayments of £60m+, and at the same time compete with the likes of Chelsea on the pitch. The fact that they are currently managing to do just that isn't far short of a football miracle because under Glazer for the first time that I can remember United made a profit on transfers last summer. Ferguson and not the Glazer family should take credit for that.
There can be no doubting the current owners of City would love to jump ship, City have barely scored a goal at home this last few weeks. Added to which there's been plenty of bickering from the players. The club desperately needs investment, but is Ranson the right man for the job? City do not own that stadium, the local council takes a slice of the gate receipts on anything over City's old average figure, which is I believe around 36,000. According to Joey Barton many fans are thinking about chucking it in, even though the club have kept prices frozen and are offering cheap tickets to families, I have heard this too from several City fans.
So from the outside looking in and when you read between the lines, there isn't an awful lot of scope for improving matters from a financial perspective. Doug Ellis turned down Ranson's offer to buy Villa because of the debt element. City cannot make that stadium any bigger (there's no demand for that anyway). The club have frozen ticket prices because they realise that they cannot increase them. So unless Doug Ellis had it completely wrong and Ranson is in fact in Roman Abramovich's league then it's difficult to see where this is all going to end.
I have been waiting 3 weeks and counting for a refund since the refund was approved by Manchester United Club shop. I get promises for payment in the nexr few days every time I phone or email but the payment never arrives. The refund is for a club strip boought the wrong size. I have already paid for a new strip and had that delivered. Am I making an involuntary contribution to help them in their financial problems.
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