UNTOLD ARSENAL

As capitalism comes to an end, and the spivs lurk on corners preparing to mug old ladies as they walk home to unheated houses, their life savings destroyed by men who even how are demanding billion pound bonuses for attempting to get us out of the mess they got us into, so there is more news about how the change over to an Anarcho-Syndicalist Revolutionary Socialist form of government is affecting football.

Liverpool is backed in part by Wachovia, a financial services company in North Carolina (obviously close to Scoucer hearts) which was sold to Wells Fargo a week and a half ago.

The Wells Fargo-Wachovia deal got quick approval over the weekend from two federal regulators - but (and this is the big point) the deal won’t be completed until the end of the year.

Which leaves Liverpool’s finances high and dry, with every chance that no money will be available for the January transfer window.   Shame!

Financial news on the plight of those giants Fulham and Bolton in the next post.

Meanwhile, the new edition of Highbury High is out on Saturday for £2 (yipee!).  Look out for the matchday sellers outside the ground.   It includes (you will be thrilled to read) an Untold Arsenal special piece which hasn’t appeared on this site which analyses the nine major lies that journalists spout about Arsenal because they are too lazy to leave the pub.

There are of course other stories in the mag - its just that I haven’t seen anything other than the incredibly amazing and utterly extraordinarily brilliant article what I writ.

The subscription for six issues cost an unbelievably low £12 UK, £15 Europe, £18 World, 275 Flavian pobble beads (North Carolina).

Order by post from Highbury High, 11 Tannington Terrace, London N5 1LE

“David Healey is a big fish in a small fry.”  Neil Warnock.

I said my bit about that Rio Ferdinand, in a post earlier today.

But I failed to mention the front cover of the current edition of Private Eye’s “Colemanballs” series.

It is a quote from Rio Ferdinand, speaking on Radio 5 Live.

“Gary Neville was captain, and now Ryan Giggs has taken on the mantelpiece.”

Sums it all up really.

And that something is… Rio Ferdinand.

This is the man who says ‘Croatia were fined a few thousand quid. What good is that? It’s not going to stop people shouting racist or homophobic abuse.’ but who remains utterly silent about the abuse given to Sol Campbell.

Then he says that we are all being very unfair booing Ashley Cole like that.

Right - this is the guy (RF that is) who called Chris Moyles a ‘faggot’ live on air.

Or if we are to believe the Sun - “Rio Ferdinand was dishing out the most stick: players chipped in with limp-wristed hand gestures and camp accents…. shouting ‘chase me, chase me’.”

Or how about his crusade against gang violence: ‘I want kids to see it’s not just drug dealers who drive decent cars - kids need to know that trying to be a gangster isn’t cool.’ That’s the guy who puts on his Myspace site Notorious B.I.G., the dealer, shot dead in in 1997 after recording such masterpieces as ‘Niggas Bleed’, ‘Somebody’s gotta die’, ‘10 Crack Commandments’ and ‘Fuck you tonight’.

A government source said: ‘Kids have no male role model. Rio’s just the man.’

Thank you, you ignorant twirp - I think I’ll just carry on booing Ashley Cole if it is all the same to you.

I have often pondered the notion that the Lord Wenger has god-like powers but now I am forced to add to his abilities the fact that he can see into the future.

As one with a degree in economics we might expect him to have some insight into the collapse of capitalism but when you contemplate what is going to happen next it seems he has put Arsenal into an amazing position.

Football cannot escape the current catastrophe and several things look certain to happen:

First the value of everything football will decline - including the value of players.   So clubs that havejust spend 30 million or more on some spout or other will find that his sell-on value is far less.

Of course the player is still just as good - but if the banks demand a quick sale to reduce debts then the amount being brought in by each player is much smaller.  In this situation money in the bank is worth everything  and that is exactly what Arsenal has - thanks to Wenger’s approach.

Was it chance that he didn’t buy anyone when all the world was demanding yet another central midfielder?  Was it arrogane on his part?  Did he believe we had the best players possible?

Or did Zeus take him for a ride into the future, revealing the chaos around the corner, showing him that any player he fancied buying would be avaialble at half the price come January.

Football has got another year or so of its Sky money before that runs away down the drain as well and we return to football as it was pre-Sky.

Funny old game, this capitalism lark.

Blimey - I write a bit about the financial situation and how Liverpool Insolvency might be in trouble, and the next thing you know, they are on the brink.

Liverpool (to recap) can only pay the interest on their loans by constantly being in the final stages of the Champs League.  Without that income they don’t have enough to survive.  In essence they have been holding on desperately hoping for a buyer.

Now two things have happened.  First, all the banks are being nationalised, as the west turns to the socialism (in the sense of the state owning some of the main aspects of economic society) that it rejected with a sneer during the Thatcher-Regan era. 

In such an era the banks will be ready to loan dosh to firms that do something for the economy, rather than those that are already totally bust and with no way of paying their interest.

So the situation was already desperate for the Insolvency when suddenly, out pops the news that your local friendly Arabs (the Maktoum family) are not interested in buying a bankrupt club after all, and actually would rather take over Charlton Athletic.  Charlton, who have a solid local support policy, sound finances, and a neat new-ish stadium, look a great bet for investment, and one thousandth of the price that it would cost just to pay off the insane debts that Liverpool carry.

Sheikh Hamdan Al-Maktoum, son of Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed, is the man of the moment for those in south London who consider Millwall to be not quite classy enough (and maybe just a smidgen too neo-fascist) for their taste.

George Gillett and Tom Hicks are now not so much kicking themselves as being kicked by every Scouse being who can find them.  Indeed the Arabs also turned down the chance to buy the League’s laughing stock  Newcastle Zebras.

Hicks even went to Dubai to try and virtually give away his 50% stake in the insolvent Liverpool, but came away still owning the shares he does not want.

Then Mike Ashley - the man filmed drinking booze in view of the pitch at the Ems had a bash, but found that his beer gut ruled him out (Islamic religions don’t like the booze).  

Rothschilds, one of the banks yet to be nationalised by the state not only dealt with the nearly extinct Liverpool but also worked with  Charlton.  That’s the link - these spiv bankers get everywhere.

Now here’s the really funny bit.  Liverpool always support the football authorities since the days when they were found guilty of match fixing, and yet retained their place in the First Division (this was when Arsenal were promoted from Second to First, in return for their not insisting that the guilty clubs be expelled).    The Premier League and Football Association (that Liverpool always kow-tow to) have ownership rules that state that a single owner can’t buy two clubs in the same competition.  So if the Arabs buy Charlton they can’t touch Liverpool.

The funny thing is that this rule came in after Sir Henry Norris, chairman of Fulham bought the bankrupt Woolwich Arsenal in 1910.   Norris wanted Arsenal to play games at Fulham’s ground, but when refused he moved the club to Highbury.  The League and FA brought in the double ownership rule to stop it happening again, and it is that very rule that is going to send Liverpool over the edge.

While Liverpool have zero money and live totally on what they can borrow week by week, Charlton exist on loans from the directors - exactly as Arsenal did in the Norris era.  Charlton may have annoyed their support by the sale of Bent to the Tiny Totts, but that laughable 16 million pounds made them an attractive nearly debt free club - and that’s why the Arabs are in.

Obviously Arsenal always have been and always will be my club, but I have a soft spot for Charlton.  They don’t have pretensions beyond their position.  When they were forced to ground share they worked hard to rebuild a stadium in their homeland, and cater for local people.   They don’t play stupid games and aim to be a top three club, and like Arsenal, they don’t go in for crazy borrowing.

As for Liverpool, insolvency will follow meaning the creation of a new club, and at least 10 points deducted.

When it comes to economic comment the Guardian tends to be fairly sound.   Here they are on the Liverpool situation.

“Liverpool are very heavily in debt and do not own a cash-generative stadium. If they do not qualify for next year’s Champions League group stage - which, even if they do not progress, provides a minimum £10m in revenues - they could not service their borrowings.”

Just think of that for a moment.  The club is so fragilethat just a single season where they don’t manage to get into the Champs League and then past the group stages and they will not be able to pay their debts.  Could be this year, could be next.   One average season away from disaster.

Now the Guardian on Manchester United:

“Provided buyers could be found (no longer a given as sovereign-wealth funds equivalent to the Abu Dhabi United Group spy far more profitable targets at bottom-of-the-market bargain prices) both clubs would have to be sold. If they were “flipped” in a fire-sale it would probably be at a considerable loss to their American owners.”

Manchester are already unable to pay the interest on their debts, and all that is left is a sale - but a buyer is no longer certain.

Chelsea, (by which they mean CSKA Fulham of course) the Guardian says, is safe, as long as its owner is interested.  Arsenal’s debts are all secured against the stadium, at a very low rate of interest (unlike the debts of the northern clubs which exceed the value of the assetsand so are at much higher rates of interest), so they have no problem.

What the Guardian does not say is that Arsenal’s future is based on crowds of 50,000 and Champions League once every four year.  We are doing rather better than that at the moment.

Thus it looks like we will soon see a Big Two - both in London - with Manchester Arab playing catch-up.

As for such joke outfits like the Tony Totts they are a club that has been bred on the basis that they get into Europe and are then sold on as a top four club.  Yes, well. 

Although the Tinies, like Everton and the Newcastle Zebras are for sale no one is rushing to the door with a cheque book.  The clubs that are going to new ownership are the little ones.  QPR went last year to a consortia of Formula 1 men and an Indian company.  Charlton, it seems, is about to fall into Arab hands.

And why not?  Easier to build from the bottom with fans grateful for any success than have to deal with a bunch on endlessly whinging Scoucers and their enemies from just down the road who think that success can be bought eternally without ever having to pay the bill.

So, sorry Tiny Totts, I rather think that it is all over for you.  Just as it is for Manchester Bankrupt and Liverpool Insolvency.

Let’s sit back and enjoy the show.

The Chaos League is one of those little inventions from Untold Arsenal along with the Curse of Arsenal (see our stories on Birmingham City and WC Milan for details) which help pass the lonely hours when players forget who pays them and wander off to play games against other players doing the same thing.   And then get injured.

In the past the Chaos League has had various teams in it, but today there is only one club because they are so far ahead of everyone else that they are truly in a league of their own.

If you live on the planet Tiny Tott you may have missed the fact that Iceland’s economy has collapsed, West Ham’s owner, Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson, is Icelandic, he has just lost 250 million pounds (rather careless really), and our wonderful government is using the Terrorism Act to seize Icelandic assets in this country.

Of course the Icelandic government is not made up of terrorists, but using the Terrorism Act to do anything it wants (such as shoot Brazilians who are waiting for a tube train) is part of what has happened to our democracy, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone.

Anyway, WHU put out a nice little statement saying that everything was fine and it had nothing to do with them even though their chairman and owner of 97% of the club was also the chairman of Landsbanki - the bank that has just collapsed in Iceland.and which is causing our government to use the Terrorism Act.

In other words the owner of WHU has just been called a terrorist by our prime minister, Gordon Brown, who is as I write freezing the assets of Icelandic companies in Britain under the said Act.   He then said, “We will take further action against Icelandic authorities wherever necessary to recover the money.”

West Ham who are known for sneaky deals (see their fight with Sheffield Utd and the 30 million or more they owe there) are now going to argue that their parent company is registered in the UK, but West Ham owe millions of pounds to a syndicate of five banks, some of which are believed to be Icelandic.