I stumbled across this while looking for something else. It’s a riveting story of the perfidy of North American sub-prime threadbare money-spinners, who decide to “buy” one of the great world sports franchises, the Liverpool Football Club. It’s the same kind of deal that Louis Black made famous a couple of years ago here. The Buyout Baron puts no money down; the purchased victim provides the credit. It turns out that the penniless buyers in this case were the owners of the Montreal Canadians, George Gillett and Tom Hicks.
I knew virtually nothing about LFC or its legendary manager, Bill Shankly before I started watching this. Now I can’t get some of the Shanklyisms out of my head. Playing football is like socialism? It sure beats the wit and wisdom of Coach’s Corner. There’s a well-maintained Spirit of Shankly website that makes North American sports fans look pretty lightweight as well. Liverpool fans have taken a very active role in getting rid of the absentee owners.
FROM THE BLURB ON THE YT PAGE: A 40 minute documentary exploring the ownership of one of the most famous names in European football Liverpool football club. Under new ownership in 2007 trouble flared from the outset when Chairman Gillett & Hicks found themselves at odds with the local community and the fan base. The film explored the deep mythology of Bill Shankly and his socialist agenda which had ingrained itself into the city and the fans. Through the clubs history, mythology and militancy we begin to see the cracks in the modern Leverage buyout models and the implications this rampant debt holds for Football and society. The film was released September 2010.
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