Hull City: Owner Assem Allam says club put up for sale

[seagullsovergrimsby]

He wants £72M.

David Conn [MENTION=1785]david[/MENTION]_conn · 10m
Assem Allam loan to Hull City was £72m at last accounts, year to July 31 2013. He charges club 5%; his interest was stated as £2.8m. #hcafc

With the additional interest for last season added on this must take the loan up to around £75M. All he needs now is a Russian or Middle Eastern billionaire to make him an offer.

 

[Creaky]

Another reason for the FA to ensure that purchases of clubs are investigated properly. With this joker running Hull and the announcement that a professional European football club is being run by a crime syndicate goes to show that the football bodies globally are failing to deal with their members.

What basis would the FA have had to prevent Assem Allam from buying Hull City - He is a local British businessman, known for his philanthropy and support of local sports teams. He assured the club's financial standing and in three seasons saw them promoted to the Premier League.

 

[severnside gull]

Just a ploy to get the fans to kowtow to his demands and the football authorities to back down.
I am sure he will get his way using MKDongs as a precedent and football will be a step closer to US-style soccer

 

[Vegas Seagull]

So it's been up for sale for 5 months and no'one has bought it. I've backed them to go down, so here's hoping he can see the writing on the wall and is starting to panic in going public.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Interesting move, to put the club up for sale on the quiet in April, and spend millions upon millions on new players in August.

 

[Marty___Mcfly]

If Hull went up for sale in April, how come no one noticed until September? How has he been publicising the availability of the club? Gumtree ad?!

 

[Barrel of Fun]

Hasn't he generally been a good owner? He's not a fly by night JCL, but has been involved in Hull business for decades.

He'd definitely be towards the upper echelons of 1 to 10 (ten being the best) of owners.

They were a basket case in the late nineties. Kept us company along with the likes of Swansea, Doncaster and others at the wrong end of the Football League.

However, he now seems to be an opportunist. Did he ever have Hull in his heart or did he get lucky and wants to cash in

 

[Poojah]

He'd definitely be towards the upper echelons of 1 to 10 (ten being the best) of owners.

They were a basket case in the late nineties. Kept us company along with the likes of Swansea, Doncaster and others at the wrong end of the Football League.

However, he now seems to be an opportunist. Did he ever have Hull in his heart or did he get lucky and wants to cash in

Followed this situation quite closely as a Grimsby fan, it's been hard not to given that they get the lions share of coverage on BBC Humberside. It's not as black and white a situation as many seem to think. Allam arrived in Britain several decades ago, or more specifically Hull, a poor man. He's now a self made man who has done a lot for his local community over the years, and initially sunk £40m into Hull City to achieve little more than clearing the debts that had been left behind by the previous ownership who gambled, and lost, on the club's first stint in the Premier League.

They were in deep, deep trouble at the time and it's fair to say they'd have been in a similar situation to Pompey right now, or worse, had he not intervened. Naturally, having taken the club from the brink of oblivion back to the Premier League he was somewhat of a hero in the city.

The juxtaposition arrived in the form of the proposed name change. On the one hand, you've got a supremely wealthy man who whilst not a local boy as such, has strong connections with the city and not only saved the club but has run it extremely well since, achieving the club's highest league finish of all time and an FA Cup Final to boot. On the other, you have someone who seems hell bent on pissing on over a century's worth of history and tradition in the name of a highly speculative commercial exercise aimed not at local supporters, but those in the far east.

The former sounds like every fan's ideal owner; the latter, every fan's nightmare. Personally I'd take tradition over money, but you can see why there are mixed emotions amongst the club's support.

 

[Spun Cuppa]

In other news, Mike Ashley says Newcastle are not now for sale. Make your mind up you div, you were 'trying' to unload it for about three years, until now coming to the conclusion it's about as likely as selling a secondhand Skoda with a month's MOT on it

 

[Creaky]

He'd definitely be towards the upper echelons of 1 to 10 (ten being the best) of owners.

They were a basket case in the late nineties. Kept us company along with the likes of Swansea, Doncaster and others at the wrong end of the Football League.

However, he now seems to be an opportunist. Did he ever have Hull in his heart or did he get lucky and wants to cash in

Not sure how he could expect to "cash in" having just recently wiped out the £70+ million the club owed him by converting it into equity.

My take on the situation, (right or wrong), is that he has recognised that the club needs additional revenue streams to survive - the council have refused to sell him the ground and surrounding large car park which he wanted to develop as well as increasing the stadium capacity, so he is now looking further afield and feels that a change of name would assist in this. Without additional income it looks likely that any owner will have to keep pumping money into the club.

Why it has to be an official name change I don't know - why not remain known as the Hull City Tigers

 

[gregbrighton]

How would people feel if we were called the Brighton & Hove Seagulls?

 

[severnside gull]

How would people feel if we were called the Brighton & Hove Seagulls?

We are the ALBION
............nuff said!