by JC »
10 Feb 2012 23:28
Friday's Legacy Hampshire Royal Has his promise to 'give something back to the local community' been fulfilled yet (bearing in mind that at the time he took over we were nearly out of business, and now we are a pretty well-established club which has been to the PL and is consistently pushing to get back there)?
the point is however that we (the football club) has paid for all of that. sjm's loans were just that, and have or are being repaid. none of it was a gift. yes you can argue he still had to put the money up at the time and continue to do so for many years, but he still got that money back.
I consider that to be an odd view. The truth is that without him the club could have folded. There was never any guarantee he would get his money back, in fact it has looked for quite a time as if he would not.
You also overlook the fact that as well as loans of £26 million he has also an equity value of another £15 million. So he has not got his money back even if you assume the whole £25 million from the Russian goes into his pocket. You don't know how much of that investment includes sums for buying players, investing in the academy and the other things they have mentioned.
