OFFICIAL HEARTS JUGGERNAUT THREAD 2020-

[itzdrk]

3 hours ago, DC92 said:

It seems the Tony Bloom stuff is true then. Looks like an arrangement similar to USG's but I'll reserve judgement until we get more details.

Maybe partly explains Savage's departure and replacement with a less recruitment-focused SD.

Ouch

[Hoose Rice]

12 minutes ago, topcat(The most tip top) said:

Given that whatever form this potential deal takes the hearts support will have to vote on whether it goes through or not I’d be curious to hear what you think of the deal that Hibs took before casting my vote 

My worry is that the electorate will decide based on the last few results before the vote

 

I feel if worked well it's a very good thing to use the resources of successful networking.  I don't think either club would be a feeder club or be dictated to.  I don't see many downsides whatsoever. 

[Jim McLean's Ghost]

34 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

Absolutely none here.

What Hibs have done is shameful and I think it'll be a great thing for Scottish football if it fails.

From the sounds of this, it would be no better.

All the same things apply here as applied with Hibs. You need to ask the question "Why?", and I don't see any good answer.

Honestly what hibs have done is very funny imo.

They took the Bournemouth money and then kept things exactly as they are. A complete riot.

Bill Foley has 25% of Hibs but no say of how they are run.

[topcat(The most tip top)]

1 minute ago, Hoose Rice said:

I feel if worked well it's a very good thing to use the resources of successful networking.  I don't think either club would be a feeder club or be dictated to.  I don't see many downsides whatsoever. 

I’m in the “Don’t like sound of it but I suppose could be persuaded” camp

[VincentGuerin]

1 minute ago, topcat(The most tip top) said:

I’m in the “Don’t like sound of it but I suppose could be persuaded” camp

It's utterly depressing to me that most of our support will probably go along with this.

[Hoose Rice]

1 minute ago, topcat(The most tip top) said:

I’m in the “Don’t like sound of it but I suppose could be persuaded” camp

That's fair.  I'm more in the I've not got a clue what's going to happen so just have to go with it camp  

[Tony Wonder]

Don't think it's that similar to the Hibs deal at all tbh, but the devil will be in the detail.

He's not after any shares in the short term and offering us access to their recruitment model for 2 years will mean it has to be a success if they want fans to vote in their favour.

He's also got a track record of providing good recruitment and having interest in a club that has pretty much retained full autonomy and independence. 

Budge has also publicly stated we've turned down bids before as we aren't interested in getting money for the sake of it. 

We are about as strong financially as we have ever been and the fans have the ability to stop us becoming someone's plaything.

I'm not saying I'd be for it, if it was to plug into another teams system it'd be a hard no. If it's something designed to actually further Hearts then I'd be open to it, but it won't happen full stop without being very transparent. Its not as if Bloom and Budge can hammer out a deal on their own that dilutes ownership, so quite comfortable with seeing what's being offered.

[VincentGuerin]

7 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:

 

He's not after any shares in the short term

I see this part as completely meaningless.

If I wanted in, I'd say I didn't want shares in the short term too. He'll just buy them later.

 

Edited Monday at 19:33 by VincentGuerin

[Tony Wonder]

2 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

I see this part as completely meaningless.

If I wanted in, I'd say I didn't want shares in the short term too. He'll just buy them later.

 

Not if the 2 years before it have done nothing to help the club and he can't get the votes to proceed.

[Hoose Rice]

5 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:

Not if the 2 years before it have done nothing to help the club and he can't get the votes to proceed.

If it's successful shares are bought, which means in an ideal world you want to sell shares to the guy and before that being dictated who to sign with someone that has no attachment to the club as to who the club signs.   It is different from our deal as Foley has no input at all as to who we sign. 

[VincentGuerin]

8 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:

Not if the 2 years before it have done nothing to help the club and he can't get the votes to proceed.

But that's the problem.

2 years of bringing in some good players, our fans go all starry eyed, and suddenly we're part owned by Brighton.

f**k that.

[DC92]

1 hour ago, VincentGuerin said:

Not for me at all. There's only one direction this kind of pish goes in.

 

1 hour ago, RandomGuy. said:

Be a sad day if the two Edinburgh clubs end up feeder clubs for Bournemouth and Brighton tbh.

The reporting suggests it is independent of Brighton and is instead a recruitment link-up with Bloom's data company. It is 100% correct to be sceptical of that, but it's worth looking at Union Saint-Gilloise where Bloom has been involved since 2018.

On the face of it that has been an unqualified success on the pitch. They've gone from lower leagues, to title challengers to title winners and Champions League participants in that time by initially spending modest 6 figure fees on players and selling them on for big profits.

As far as I can tell they haven't loaned a player from Brighton for two years and they've only ever sold one player to them (Undav for €7m). They aren't having to give Brighton reserves a game to their own detriment, and they aren't being used to purchase punts to develop into future Brighton players either. 

It is absolutely correct to be asking why, and any Hearts fan should be sceptical of anyone selling magic beans, but the USG case study suggests this is at least worthy of consideration.

[VincentGuerin]

6 minutes ago, DC92 said:

 

The reporting suggests it is independent of Brighton and is instead a recruitment link-up with Bloom's data company. It is 100% correct to be sceptical of that, but it's worth looking at Union Saint-Gilloise where Bloom has been involved since 2018.

On the face of it that has been an unqualified success on the pitch. They've gone from lower leagues, to title challengers to title winners and Champions League participants in that time by initially spending modest 6 figure fees on players and selling them on for big profits.

As far as I can tell they haven't loaned a player from Brighton for two years and they've only ever sold one player to them (Undav for €7m). They aren't having to give Brighton reserves a game to their own detriment, and they aren't being used to purchase punts to develop into future Brighton players either. 

It is absolutely correct to be asking why, and any Hearts fan should be sceptical of anyone selling magic beans, but the USG case study suggests this is at least worthy of consideration.

Any Scottish club linking up with an English club need to be mindful of FFP and Work Permit regulations. It's not comparable to a link up with a club abroad, as it has obvious uses and abuses that you don't get with an EU-not-UK club.

The reasons to be sceptical are so numerous, and a lot of them line up with the questions Hibs fans refused to ask when it was their turn.

I honestly think most of our fans will be up for it though. It'll be the usual "get to the next level" stuff, and it'll end in tears and recrimination.

[Hoose Rice]

7 minutes ago, DC92 said:

 

The reporting suggests it is independent of Brighton and is instead a recruitment link-up with Bloom's data company. It is 100% correct to be sceptical of that, but it's worth looking at Union Saint-Gilloise where Bloom has been involved since 2018.

On the face of it that has been an unqualified success on the pitch. They've gone from lower leagues, to title challengers to title winners and Champions League participants in that time by initially spending modest 6 figure fees on players and selling them on for big profits.

As far as I can tell they haven't loaned a player from Brighton for two years and they've only ever sold one player to them (Undav for €7m). They aren't having to give Brighton reserves a game to their own detriment, and they aren't being used to purchase punts to develop into future Brighton players either. 

It is absolutely correct to be asking why, and any Hearts fan should be sceptical of anyone selling magic beans, but the USG case study suggests this is at least worthy of consideration.

He had the majority shareholding in USG when he got involved with them.  He would be mucking about with Hearts initially with nothing to lose.  A wee curiosity hobby with nothing to lose at all with Hearts. 

[Tony Wonder]

18 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

But that's the problem.

2 years of bringing in some good players, our fans go all starry eyed, and suddenly we're part owned by Brighton.

f**k that.

So he's going to claim for 2 years that we aren't going to be affiliated with Brighton, deliver a successful model, get our votes and then pull of a Scooby Doo style mask and reveal we have been ran by Brighton all along?

I honestly think if the goal was to have us aligned with the other clubs they'd just say so up front and try to sugar coat it. Far less of an issue than spending years trying to hoodwink a support.

I also think we are in a good position that Budge isn't stupid, she knows what Hearts fans think regarding FOH and her legacy is entangled with it.

It's completely fine to be sceptical, I think it's also a bit churlish to dismiss things out of hand when there's not really any details to go off of yet.

Any shares sold would have to meet a 90% threshold in terms of an FOH vote. It's a pretty high bar required. 

[Tony Wonder]

28 minutes ago, Hoose Rice said:

If it's successful shares are bought, which means in an ideal world you want to sell shares to the guy and before that being dictated who to sign with someone that has no attachment to the club as to who the club signs.   It is different from our deal as Foley has no input at all as to who we sign. 

At face value, it's access to their data analytic teams, I'd like to think it's not being dictated who we sign rather than access to far more information to make decisions with.

Maybe not though, we'll see. There's not much actual information to go off just now other than a small article without much detail.

[VincentGuerin]

3 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:

So he's going to claim for 2 years that we aren't going to be affiliated with Brighton, deliver a successful model, get our votes and then pull of a Scooby Doo style mask and reveal we have been ran by Brighton all along?

I honestly think if the goal was to have us aligned with the other clubs they'd just say so up front and try to sugar coat it. Far less of an issue than spending years trying to hoodwink a support.

I also think we are in a good position that Budge isn't stupid, she knows what Hearts fans think regarding FOH and her legacy is entangled with it.

It's completely fine to be sceptical, I think it's also a bit churlish to dismiss things out of hand when there's not really any details to go off of yet.

Any shares sold would have to meet a 90% threshold in terms of an FOH vote. It's a pretty high bar required. 

I don't think it's about hoodwinking us. I think it's probably caution on both sides.

If I believed that what was really on offer here was access to Bloom's company's product and that's that, then that would be fine.

But the lad is talking about a £10m investment. We're back to Hibs last winter. What's that money for? A club in Scotland has no real way of being worth that level of investment without giving something we don't want to give.

I see no feasible end goal here other than a chain agreement. Otherwise, what's the point?

All the points I made about Hibs back in January (and stand by) then apply to us.

[Dons_1988]

3 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

I don't think it's about hoodwinking us. I think it's probably caution on both sides.

If I believed that what was really on offer here was access to Bloom's company's product and that's that, then that would be fine.

But the lad is talking about a £10m investment. We're back to Hibs last winter. What's that money for? A club in Scotland has no real way of being worth that level of investment without giving something we don't want to give.

I see no feasible end goal here other than a chain agreement. Otherwise, what's the point?

All the points I made about Hibs back in January (and stand by) then apply to us.

Aye, I don’t really know anything here but generally if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is. 

These guys aren’t handing out large investments for no return, whether that be finance, influence or whatever else. 

[Tony Wonder]

1 minute ago, VincentGuerin said:

I don't think it's about hoodwinking us. I think it's probably caution on both sides.

If I believed that what was really on offer here was access to Bloom's company's product and that's that, then that would be fine.

But the lad is talking about a £10m investment. We're back to Hibs last winter. What's that money for? A club in Scotland has no real way of being worth that level of investment without giving something we don't want to give.

I see no feasible end goal here other than a chain agreement. Otherwise, what's the point?

All the points I made about Hibs back in January (and stand by) then apply to us.

I don't disagree with the fact people don't want nothing for nothing. But if he wants the votes he'd have to be pretty transparent in what he expects to gain from it, so I'd be willing to listen to that personally.  If it isn't a satisfactory answer I'd not vote for it.

Budge explicitly said a few months back, I'd imagine with the full knowledge of this being in the pipeline,  that the first question they've asked anyone approaching with investment is "what are you expecting to get from it?". So she will at the very least know the optics on that answer will be in full focus.

[VincentGuerin]

2 minutes ago, Tony Wonder said:

I don't disagree with the fact people don't want nothing for nothing. But if he wants the votes he'd have to be pretty transparent in what he expects to gain from it, so I'd be willing to listen to that personally.  If it isn't a satisfactory answer I'd not vote for it.

Budge explicitly said a few months back, I'd imagine with the full knowledge of this being in the pipeline,  that the first question they've asked anyone approaching with investment is "what are you expecting to get from it?". So she will at the very least know the optics on that answer will be in full focus.

I'm aware I'm out of step with the majority here.

We saw it with the Hibs fans, and I expect our support to be broadly similar.

If we get offered a good chunk of cash and access to better players (leave the veracity of this for another day), most fans will want to go for it. This would be the same at any club.

I am just fundamentally opposed to it. We should not have any other club with an influence at our club, and I just don't see any way an adult can look at this and say that's not where this leads.

Already seen some of my mates on the text saying things like "It's ok if it's a minority share" etc. I don't think it is ok. I don't think 1% is ok.

Edited Monday at 20:26 by VincentGuerin