Some good financial news for Liverpool

This summer had seemed to have the makings of being a pretty miserable one for Liverpool supporters. After their brave but ultimately unsuccessful attempt to challenge for the Premier League and Champions League last season, the fans have had to endure reports of being in a bad financial position whilst watching the likes of Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City trying to spend money like it has gone out of fashion.

Lost

The latest accounts showed that Kop Holdings, the parent company of the Anfield club, lost £42.6 million in the year to August 2008. Interest payments on loans accounted for £36.5 million of the losses.

The loan of £350 million owed to RBS and Wachovia has to be repaid by 24th July. The co-owners, George Gillett, and Tom Hicks, seemed to have got themselves into a seriously difficult predicament.

The American pair bought Liverpool back in February 2007 and whilst Rafa Benitez has made significant progress on the pitch over that period, the problems off the pitch have been many and varied.

Falling out

Gillet and Hicks have conducted a very public falling out with each other and in turns with Benitez. They have upset many of the loyal Liverpool fans and have seen the proposed new stadium for the club drift ever further away, They have put the club on the market but failed to find a suitable buyer and have seemed to block the type of moves in the transfer market that the club need in order to take the next step that Benitez is so close to making.

Now, at last, there may be some good news. George Gillett is to sell his stake in the National Hockey League club the Montreal Canadians. It is believed that the sale to the brewing giants Molson, who will become 100% owners of the Hockey club, will be worth around £330 million to Gillett.

If and when that sale goes through, that would seem to relieve an awful lot of the financial pressure on the owners and the club in general.

Massive

It is also reported that Tom Hicks has been looking to sell off some of the massive stakes he owns in Major League Baseball’s Texas Rangers and the National Hockey League’s Dallas Stars. A similar windfall of cash for Hicks could put Liverpool in a much stronger position.

Another aspect of the current situation is that maybe in selling their other sporting investments in order to shore up their position at Liverpool may show the fans that they are more fully committed to the cause than they have sometimes appeared to be.

Rafa Benitez will be a happy man if the fears over the loan and the huge losses being made in interest payments are removed and his hand is freed a little in the transfer market. Whilst he may only need to tweak what he has slightly, it will also make his position stronger in hanging on to the likes of Javier Mascherano, Fernando Torres and Xabi Alonso.

Difficult

It must be difficult to see their main opponents Chelsea and Manchester United being able to seriously compete for the signatures of the world’s best players whilst they are facing some financial concerns. If they can start to compete in the transfer market then the other two clubs better watch out.

The deal for the Montreal Canadians needs to be verified by the National Hockey League and it is doubtful whether that verification will be completed prior to the middle of August. That could lead to problems with the loans and could mean that Benitez can’t spend money prior to the commencement of the season. Despite those stumbling blocks it is difficult to see the news as anything other than good news for Liverpool.

Good news for Liverpool in relation to Gillett and Hicks has been in short supply and it would be nice to think that it was possible that Liverpool could make some progress off the field to match what they achieving on it.