Search: 'Avi Cohen'

Our regular update on clubs in crisis by Tom Davies

Harry Redknapp’s departure from Portsmouth has led to a flurry of speculation that he might be interested in taking over at Bournemouth, his former club. It’s all paper talk at present, but, whatever other baggage Redknapp might bring, his cash would come in handy for a club around £4.5 million in debt. The League One club narrowly avoided a stadium repossession order last month, brought by Bristol & West, who are owed £300,000. The order was only postponed until February, though, and the stringent terms of the B&W deal have been raising plenty of hackles, as the building society’s loan was arranged by Bournemouth president Stanley Cohen, who also happens to be a non-executive director of Bristol & West.

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Keegan and Brut, McAteer and Head & Shoulders, Owen and Daz: Cameron Carter traces the evolution of player endorsements

Before the current era of personal branding, foot­ballers were placed in front of the camera merely as cele­brated tradesmen whose fame, as a result of mastery of their craft, was viewed as sufficient reason for the impressionable viewer to go out and buy the very latest hair lacquer. 

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Letters, WSC 184

Dear WSC
While Ian Kelp (Letters, WSC 183) makes some valid points about the bizarre soft spot banks have for football clubs in allowing them to trade on nought but pro­mises year after year, I fear that he is too pur­it­an­ical in his approach to business planning. Page one of the Company Treasurer’s Handbook tells us about cashflow planning and a seemingly valid contract pro­m­­ising revenue at fixed future times is a reasonable thing to make plans on, or, if necessary, borrow against. No business waits until the money is in the bank account before planning how to spend it, or indeed actually spending it. Would Marks and Spencer wait until it had a queue of unsatisfied customers waving bunches of tenners in the branch until it ordered a batch of knickers from its sup­pliers? Where the clubs have probably been naive is in what appears to be a less than watertight contract. If it is true that Carlton and Granada can walk away without liability for their little joint venture, the clubs should be looking at the quality of their legal advice. The fact that the share prices of both Carlton and Granada rose once the situation became public is a pret­ty depressing sign of what the City thinks of that contract.
Jonathan Gibbs, via email

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Leeds United no longer have to look back in anger, says Dave Cohen. They have finally shed the burden of the club's great years under Don Revie

The history of Leeds United is the history of Don Revie and can be written as follows: Chapter One: Before Don Revie; Chapter Two: The Revie Years; and Chapter Three: The Revie Legacy.

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England peaked in 1966, not four years later, as is often believed, says David Montrose

It’s the view put forward in the official history of the England team. It’s what Geoff Hurst thinks. Sir Alf himself supposedly believed it, though I’ve never discovered when and where he said so. And, of course, it’s been the opinion of assorted scribblers. Joe Lovejoy of the Sunday Times, for one, whose contribution to the pre-millennial surfeit of list-making was his assessment of the Greatest Football Teams. Occupying the top five slots, a genuine celebrity parade: Brazil 1970; Real Madrid 1960; Ajax 1972; Brazil 1958; Hungary 1953. Then, England 1970 – outranking the boys of ’66 as well as every team produced by Germany, the Netherlands, Argentina, Italy and France. Praise indeed for a side that lost two out of four.

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