The dawn of a new Liverpool era

After years of speculation and discussions former Chairman David Moores finally made good on his promise to secure a future for Liverpool Football Club both on and off the field.

Shortly after midday Liverpool announced they were to move in to ownership of American duo George Gillett and Tom Hicks who had made a substantial offer for the club, it’s current deficit and to fund a new Liverpool FC stadium.

Rick Parry, still reds Chief Executive paid tribute to the former chairman:

“This was probably the hardest day of his life,” admitted Parry. “It’s been very tough, something he didn’t want to do but something he knew he had to do.

“I know, however, that like everyone else he’s very excited about the future and once today is over I’m sure he’ll be buzzing again.

“No-one cares about this club as much as David. He’ll still be very much involved and will always be viewed as the custodian of its values.”

And Gillett and Hicks have already spoken to team manager Rafael Benitez and they had this to say after the meeting:

“We spoke to Rafa this morning and his thinking is very much similar to ours; the need to keep our core players, bring in some star players and develop young players,” said Hicks.
 
“We’ve not got a budget for what we’re going to do. Rafa and Rick will bring their plans to us and we’ll support these.” 

Gillett continued:

“We can assure the fans that we understand what winning is all about,” he said.

“This is the most important sport in the world. Within that sport this is the most important club and it’s not far away from being the best in the world.

“It’s already a very well-run club, which has enjoyed a lot of success under Rafa and we are not aware of any significant fixes

“Money is not our number one objective. Near the top of that list would by winning, passion, legacy and respect for history and tradition.

“It’s not appropriate for us convince fans that we know as much as them about the club but respect is important. Myself and Tom have been in this situation before; taking over a club with an illustrious heritage.”

Further interviews with both Moores and the American duo are in our forum, but finally Rick Parry had this to say:

“When we go back to last November, it was a very finely balanced decision when we went with DIC,” said Parry.
 
“David Moores had a lot of soul searching. We had two great bids on the table and at that stage, as George will no doubt tell you, I had to tell him that he’d been unsuccessful.
 
“He was very, very gracious in defeat. He wished us good luck, but was at pains to ask where he’d gone wrong and where the shortcomings were.
 
“To his credit, he kept his own counsel, but didn’t go away. He was persistent, dogged and determined.
 
“Clearly things with DIC took longer than we expected and we thought we would have things wrapped up before Christmas, but it was taking significantly longer than that.
 
“As we got well into January, so George started to come back again. I wouldn’t say we welcomed him with open arms at first, but he wouldn’t go away.
 
“The thing that made a difference is he came back with a very different proposition because he brought Tom on board. No disrespect to George, but that changed the complexion of the bid.
 
“If George and Tom had been sitting down in November, maybe the decision would have gone that way then.
 
“I’ve no doubt that we’ve made the right decision.” 

The future’s bright.