No smoke without fire: Lerner will sell, if the right offer is made

[PaulTheVillan]

The Daily Mail are too busy telling us how we're all going to die next.

[olaftab]

Sport Witness forum. This is the guy apparently



Could be an interesting few weeks.
[/quote]

Good looking fella and filthy rich to boot...is that Ronaldo standing next tom in a hat?

[dave.woodhall]

Has anybody heard or seen this rumour? 

You know what it's a small World, people say it all the time but is really is. I had the honour of attending some close friends wedding this weekend and who should appear at the at the reception? MM (not to be confused with MysteryMan), the man who worked at SkySportsNews, the man who's scatter gun approach to rumour flinging made him popular and despised in equal measure.

 

His life is going swimmingly, from dancing with Davina to recently being selected to host a pilot for a potential prime time terrestrial TV game show, so soon he could be a house hold name, but for now he shall remain as the one and only MM.

 

So after some severe ribbing about his hair cut and his new pose to hide the fact he's got a big chin, I tapped MM up for some of the media rumours around football... (remember these are journalistic or mystery tip-offs received by SkySportsNews, you must understand that they receive hundreds if not thousands of "tip-offs" everyday from people claiming to be in the know but are not able to quantify their information, but some of them are very, very good for a bit of rumour mongering. As much as people like to think SSN will put out any story on a whim, you must understand that every time they say "Sky Sports News understands..." that rumour has been through many, many pairs of hands and is only released to the news desk when the bosses are happy there is enough suggestive evidence.)

 

MM promised he would get in touch and get back to me, so this morning I check my e-mails and true to his word MM has forwarded an e-mail. For obvious reasons I can't show you the screen shot of the e-mail because it contains the information of both parties, however I will copy and paste the text. Interesting reading....

 

 

    Hey Matt, as requested - Randy Lerner has contacted officials of Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani, you remember him right! Rumours have been that the Qatari's are looking at other Premier League clubs after being frustrated by a lack of movement at MU. This has prompted several chairman to contact the Sheikh's offices with the aim of raising interest in their club. Kenwright at Everton seem to have been rebuffed for reasons unknown.

     

    However the latest club to make contact is Aston Villa, the source believes Lerner would be looking for £130-150m for the club, and the Qatari's are interested. The source (the same one who gave me Venkys) went on to say that several key factors play in to the hands of Aston Villa which makes them far more desirable than say Everton or Blackburn. Watch this space is all i can say, it would seem the horse has bolted and soon there will be another big player in the Premier League money stakes.

     

    Hope that helps, catch up soon mate.

 

 

Interesting, I'm not going out and putting my house on the rumour, but it would certainly be an exciting time for Villa if it did happen.

 

I wonder what the "key factors" could be? Villa Park redevelopement?

 

I wonder if this is rumour mongering designed to make the Glaziers think again.....

 

The problem I see with this is the FFP... I don't see how they could come in to a club like Villa and turn us around like City have been... the process would have to be a slower one... but I suppose a few "sponsorship" (Qatari state sponsored of course ) deals would improve our turnover and spending power hugely...

I'd take that 'journalist' a bit more seriously if his written English wasn't so poor.

[willywombat]

Has anybody heard or seen this rumour? 

You know what it's a small World, people say it all the time but is really is. I had the honour of attending some close friends wedding this weekend and who should appear at the at the reception? MM (not to be confused with MysteryMan), the man who worked at SkySportsNews, the man who's scatter gun approach to rumour flinging made him popular and despised in equal measure.

 

His life is going swimmingly, from dancing with Davina to recently being selected to host a pilot for a potential prime time terrestrial TV game show, so soon he could be a house hold name, but for now he shall remain as the one and only MM.

 

So after some severe ribbing about his hair cut and his new pose to hide the fact he's got a big chin, I tapped MM up for some of the media rumours around football... (remember these are journalistic or mystery tip-offs received by SkySportsNews, you must understand that they receive hundreds if not thousands of "tip-offs" everyday from people claiming to be in the know but are not able to quantify their information, but some of them are very, very good for a bit of rumour mongering. As much as people like to think SSN will put out any story on a whim, you must understand that every time they say "Sky Sports News understands..." that rumour has been through many, many pairs of hands and is only released to the news desk when the bosses are happy there is enough suggestive evidence.)

 

MM promised he would get in touch and get back to me, so this morning I check my e-mails and true to his word MM has forwarded an e-mail. For obvious reasons I can't show you the screen shot of the e-mail because it contains the information of both parties, however I will copy and paste the text. Interesting reading....

 

 

    Hey Matt, as requested - Randy Lerner has contacted officials of Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani, you remember him right! Rumours have been that the Qatari's are looking at other Premier League clubs after being frustrated by a lack of movement at MU. This has prompted several chairman to contact the Sheikh's offices with the aim of raising interest in their club. Kenwright at Everton seem to have been rebuffed for reasons unknown.

     

    However the latest club to make contact is Aston Villa, the source believes Lerner would be looking for £130-150m for the club, and the Qatari's are interested. The source (the same one who gave me Venkys) went on to say that several key factors play in to the hands of Aston Villa which makes them far more desirable than say Everton or Blackburn. Watch this space is all i can say, it would seem the horse has bolted and soon there will be another big player in the Premier League money stakes.

     

    Hope that helps, catch up soon mate.

 

 

Interesting, I'm not going out and putting my house on the rumour, but it would certainly be an exciting time for Villa if it did happen.

 

I wonder what the "key factors" could be? Villa Park redevelopement?

 

I wonder if this is rumour mongering designed to make the Glaziers think again.....

 

The problem I see with this is the FFP... I don't see how they could come in to a club like Villa and turn us around like City have been... the process would have to be a slower one... but I suppose a few "sponsorship" (Qatari state sponsored of course ) deals would improve our turnover and spending power hugely...

I'd take that 'journalist' a bit more seriously if his written English wasn't so poor.

In fairness Dave, it's a rapidly dashed off e-mail not a published article

[dave.woodhall]

It's still got the sort of basic errors it's easier to not make than make.

[nodge]

That's an Indian Bernie Winters! eeeee Schnorbitz!

[Salsa Party Animal]

We need to be very very careful

We need someone who will be like Man City current owner rather than Blackburn or Liverpool previous owner and stay with the club like Roman or our beloved leader before Randy. 

Oh the bright side we might be able to have an Robert Mancini type as our manager. But who ? If this means stopping our players moving to Manure or Man City that would be great.

Personally it is just fish and chips wrapping. Nothing worth reading.

[Mazrim]

Well the Qataris are taking sport very seriously indeed and there's a lot of competitive rivalry between these gulf states.
So here's hoping.

[Iago]

We need to be very very careful

We need someone who will be like Man City current owner rather than Blackburn or Liverpool previous owner and stay with the club like Roman or our beloved leader before Randy. 

True. If they come into the club with ambition and a strategy to help us grow locally and globally, then I would be fully behind the takeover.

[willywombat]

One Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani,
There's only one Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani,

has a certain ring to it?

[bones.]

One Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani,
There's only one Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr ­Al-Thani,

has a certain ring to it?

I think Id get a bit tired part way through the second verse. Can we shorten it to Sheikh Al.

[Greg N'Ash]

bring him on i say. If someone can be found to buy a basket case club like Citeh then a club like Villa should have no problems

[PaulWinch again]

Well the Qataris are taking sport very seriously indeed and there's a lot of competitive rivalry between these gulf states.
So here's hoping.

It makes me sad that I'm really hoping that we do get bought by someone with this sort of money so that we can compete.

[Greg N'Ash]

Lerner knew the score when he bought us. Buying a big premier league club is a huge ego trip and status symbol like buying a ferrari - and you don't buy one of them if you're worried about the running costs. If you can't afford it anymore you flog it off to someone who can. You don't devalue it by cutting down on the servicing and only putting in a tenner's worth of petrol so you're running on fumes.

[PaulTheVillan]

Not sure I would be too happy with the idea of a Man City type ownership. I've spent too much time slagging them off about their owners haha