For the first time under this ownership, I'm not fearful of change. We need the right people, but that can be of old or new.
Hopefully, it's additional funds she's after, would t begrudge her looking into that. Bit like many others, I'd be concerned if her influence left the club completely. I'm convinced regardless of investment that she'll want to honour her fathers memory.
It's always a gamble when changing owner, for every great new owner (like the Sheikh at Man City or Abramovich at Chelsea) there are about 20 horror stories with owners. The question is is have we reached our level under the current owners and would some new owners be able to take the club any further? If the answer is that we can't go much/any further with the current owners then it is definitely in their interest to sell as the club is as valuable as it is going to get. We as fans have no real input, if she wants to sell then she will, and we have no control over who she sells to. Be careful what you wish for though as I'm sure there were Blackburn/Cardiff/Portsmouth fans who were very excited about their new owners, but if we as a club want to push on to the next level then we do need to roll the dice with new owners in my view.
Hate to raise this point, but surely if you were going to invest a few quid in a club you'd want to see the room for expansion. When travelling to the Liverpool game recently, I met a group of Reds who were planning on going to Bournemouth for their next away match. To have a chance of a ticket they needed to have been to 19 away games last season. A bloke next to me in his early 30's had been using his grandfather's season ticket for the last 12 years, and had just got his own after being on the waiting list that long. We can't even fill SMS for some of our home games. The fans we have are brilliant. I enjoy the company of my fellow Saints fans, but the fact is that outside of this mad group, there is little interest in football in the rest of the surrounding area and we don't attract, say, a Swiss supporters club - one of the many that Liverpool and Man Utd can boast. So where is the expansion coming from that either interest the Liebherr family or any other big investor for the future?
The problem with this is the only way to drum up more interest is to be more successful on the pitch, which is will most likely only happen with more investment. The reason our fan base is relatively small is because historically we have been pretty ****, winning virtually nothing so we don't really atttract any fans without ties to the area
Yup. I've said this for a while. People criticised Cortese for his lack of interest in commercial income etc and that was fair to some extent but he was right in that success on the pitch is the biggest influence on a club's revenue and fan base. The number of Man City and Chelsea fans around has shot up in the last 10 years because they're winning trophies, winning the league.
This.... absolutely spot on. Sums up my feelings towards any potential takeover/investment. We aren't just any old club and I would hate us to lose our identity as part of this if it happens. I steadfastly believe that Kat must have had offers for a club on the up and up over the last few years and despite the scare stories, she hasn't yet cut and run. I can totally see the argument for further investment, the amount of money needed to develop the club in terms of wages, etc is going to be huge over the next 5-10 years. More and more Chinese money is coming into the game and it's getting scary financially-rumours of Tevez getting €40 million per season in China...! There were rumours that Liebherr bought the land around the stadium with the club. If this is true (which it may well not be) this land is prime for development as shown by the recently reported sale of the waste depot for over £100 million. If the Chinese money helped develop a prime site into something more desireable as well as money for increased wages, then I'd be comfortable with that.
I see KL as a woman with a baby in her arms....she has decided to give it away, but is looking with deep suspicion at anyone who wants it.
Maybe. But both Chelsea and Man City are situated in two of the biggest urban conurbations in the country.
Yep. We are a small city, we need to do far more commercially then them. They have the fact they are based in Manchester as a huge advantage.
Of course. That helps them. But in terms of population the Southampton-Portsmouth built up area is comparable to Liverpool and larger than the Newcastle-Sunderland area. Both of those areas support two clubs that bring in attendances of over 40k and (in Liverpool's case) compete for trophies fairly regularly. Hell, even a few years ago we took close to 50k to Wembley for the JPT final. Greater success on the pitch would bring more people to games and sell more merchandise. Pompey are in no position to compete with us any time soon so there's an opportunity to build the local fan base. The game is global these days as well. Where you're based isn't the be-all and end-all. People fly in from all over the world to watch Premier League football. People who don't fly in still watch on TV and buy shirts and other merchandise. Krueger has been building relationships in the US and if we were bought by capable Chinese owners we'd have a head start in that market as well.
"Heard SFC want to buy the surrounding land and extend the stadium - but in order to do this a train station must be put in place." "Council up for it, its National Rail that are the problem... Expect quite a few to battle it out for the land. Cemex are creaming themselves." "Worth noting that FFP doesn't come into play when clubs are investing in infrastructure, but having a bigger stadium / more income will allow us to considerably increase player wages etc. The next logical step for the club is to increase its fan base and then its stadium." LeG (a saintsweb itk) has posted these today.
Good post this, and reminds me of something. What is stopping Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool from hiking their prices up to £100 a ticket, £2000 for a season ticket? Because they would sell them all. That's about what you would pay for an NFL/NBA ticket. I don't know whether the PL would stop this, or it's just that the bad PR is not worth it. Seems strange given that the rest of the game is run by market forces.
The guy I talk to did say we owned the Cenax site, maybe he got confused and heard we are looking to own it. Tbf the idea of owning the nearby area has been around since Cortese.
I think we can get to 40k attendances, but only if we reduce tickets a little. Anything above that seems crazy to me.
I wouldn't say it's the only reason but definitely a big factor. I know it's a big reason I don't get to many league games. Done 6 games this year and none have been PL, and Pool at home will be my 7th. Obviously Milan a bit of an exception there I think the main reason is just simply we're not a big club so don't have a big fanbase. If we're looking to expand though I'd like to factor in a safe standing area as reckon we'll see that in next 5 or so years.
I think this is where the chicken and egg situation occurs though. The current prem table and where we have ended up in the last 3 seasons shows that investment is needed to break through the glass ceiling. We all believe and want Saints achieving the glory land of Champions League in the current guise, but as we get closer the players we buy to get us there keep getting taken away from us. We all know and accept the VVD will move on sooner rather than later and Hjogbjerg (?!) too if he hits his stride. But all we will do is replace them with the same thing, young, hungry players that will be successful and move on, ad Infiniti. Something has got to change on a massive scale to break this ceiling. New stadium/development will need serious cash, new wage structure would need serious cash, the next class of players up needs serious cash. Only thing I can hope is that KL forms a significant part of the deal to keep steering the ship.
