Liverpool fans takeover hopes doomed to failure?...

Though many United fans wouldn't like to admit it we have a lot in common with our 'friends' from the wrong end of the East Lancs Road. Supporters of both United and Liverpool have seen ownership of their respective clubs change over the last few years, which has led to massive price increases for many cash-strapped fans of the Red Devils.

At Old Trafford, there was a lot of opposition to the Glazer family takeover, largely because fundamentally the Glazers' could not afford to buy the club without putting the long-term well-being of United in danger due to the level of massive borrowing. The Glazers' still find themselves running cover whenever they sneak back to Manchester, they know that there remains strong opposition to their occupation of Old Trafford.

While on the field matters are admittedly going better than anyone dared hope post the Glazers' takeover, the potential long-term damage to the club remains the subject of healthy debate.

In stark contrast at Liverpool followers of the Anfield club collectively rolled over like a tail wagging dog at the news of the Hicks and Gillett takeover, which was somewhat surprising given the nature of the city's militant history.

Now we hear that Liverpool fans are planning to mount their own takeover of their club, with talk that supporters plan to raise £500m. The plan centres on a Barcelona style regime where the fans effectively own the club. Rogan Taylor, a well known Liverpool fan and a lecturer at Liverpool University outlined the big idea to a gathering of journalists earlier this week. While Taylor's presentation was as impassioned as it was impressive, it had the hallmarks of a Mike Basset press conference with journalists smirking as this lecturer from a business school talked about 100,000 fans raising £5,000 each.

£5,000 each - are you having a laugh?

For their part, United fans are battle hardened where the subject of takeovers are concerned and they are collectively far more organised than Liverpool supporters, but even with 30,000 members of MUST (formerly Shareholders United) the United supporters Trust and fans groups were collectively powerless in their efforts to stop the Glazers'.

I do not know what the actual debt situation is at Anfield, but it is nowhere near the level at United, still the Liverpool fans hopes of raising £500m while laudable is surely doomed to failure. Barcelona and none of big clubs on the continent where the fans have effective control ever had to mount a takeover of this nature with the massive cash injection requirement, Rogan Taylor failed to address this central point. Some United fans have suggested to me that Liverpool fans are indeed the most deluded of all after hearing this news. Still, it is better to have tried and failed rather than do nothing which is precisely what happened prior to Hicks and Gillet exerting a metaphorical Boston strangle-hold over their beloved club.

There has been talk that a website commissioned with a view to accepting pledges from Liverpool fans has fallen over, I actually hope this is true and that they are successful in their objective. Sadly, I believe that Taylor and his acolytes are about to discover exactly how apathetic vast swathes of their Lemming like fans really are, which is precisely what happened at United.

The best hope of resting control of Liverpool rests with DIC or another wealthy consortium.