ACTUAL POLL thread - how do you feel about potential Qatari ownership?

How do you feel about Qatari ownership

  • Total voters
    1,893
The fit and proper test allowed a club to be taken over by a guy who mutilated a journalist. The flimsiest front up to that point was enough for them to not only turn a blind eye, but to remove their eyes completely.

The PL like UEFA and FIFA have one interest. They'll sell anything to anyone for £.

The only time they'll actually act against these types of owners are through government intervention in extreme cases, such as Abramovic and Chelsea.

The PL should be viewed with nothing but contempt.
 
Figgins said:
no idea; I corrected your mistakes



What official?

I don't get the relevance of his father being ex PM / head of QIA.
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His personal net worth is around $1bn, from what I've seen, it's not really been disputed anywhere.

Him being a member of the ruling family and his dad being former QIA head and PM, the rest of
the money is probably going to be easily got.

But from where?

Private individuals who are also members of said family?
 
Oranges038 said:
His personal net worth is around $1bn, from what I've seen, it's not really been disputed anywhere.

Him being a member of the ruling family and his dad being former QIA head and PM, the rest of
the money is probably going to be easily got.

But from where?

Private individuals who are also members of said family?
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There is a huge amount of gap filling. The Al Thani house was reported to have about 20,000 people in it during the 1990s. The notion of being in the ruling family is a stretch. Again, I ask what relevance is the QIA now and his father being ex PM. Is his father independently wealthy?

Sheikh Jassim personal wealth, to my knowledge, isn't fully understood. Where did this $1b come from?
 
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redcucumber said:
There's a big difference between being owned by capitalist business types and a nation state.
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of course

My point is no matter which way it goes there will be a large section of our support unhappy with whatever we end up with.
 
Rood said:
Of course there is official info - the reputable sources of BBC, FT etc cite this as a private bid.
https://www.ft.com/content/c92a7489-42f0-45a6-bd86-10e342d7dd43

Now obviously that doesn't make it true but that is the official line so it's daft to tell someone to prove it.

As you say, all the rest that is speculation and opinions from journalists who are primarily sports based and know absolutely feck all about business and finance.
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In a non condescending way, I’m not sure you understand what you’re saying. Why would a ‘private’ bid be proof of this not being state backed?
 
tomaldinho1 said:
In a non condescending way, I’m not sure you understand what you’re saying. Why would a ‘private’ bid be proof of this not being state backed?
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What do you think a 'private' bid means?!
Really didn't think we had to get into such basics

And I haven't claimed it's proof of anything, I think you need to go back and read how this conversation flowed as you are obviously lost
 
BooloBiibshe said:
Manchester United are currently owned by a family from the most corrupted country in the world. A country that created all terrorist groups in the world ( biggest one being Alqaida). But you don’t see it like that because the media doesn’t show you their shenanigans or you don’t just wanna see it and blame counties like Qatar. America destroyed millions of people’s lives, they killed kids man, women, people in wedding ceremonies. Let’s talk about what they did to Iraq and Afghanistan. The difference between USA and all those wealth Muslim countries combined is like A to Z in terms of human rights. You only want the glazers out just because the way the run the club and you will hate the Qataris for being Qadari no matter how successful they will make the team. Some of you don’t even feel shame when you talk about human rights like there is no Muslim members in this Forum.
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this may be the most idiotic post I’ve seen on this forum.
 
Figgins said:
There is a huge amount of gap filling. The Al Thani house was reported to have about 20,000 people in it during the 1990s. The notion of being in the ruling family is a stretch. Again, I ask what relevance is the QIA now and his father being ex PM. Is his father independently wealthy?

Sheikh Jassim personal wealth, to my knowledge, isn't fully understood. Where did this $1b come from?
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Forbes I believe is the source.

I'm not going to get bogged down in the family history here. Let the guys assess the bidders and if they can verify the sources and everything else is in order and these guys win, then so be it.

Feck all I can do about it.
 
Rood said:
What do you think a 'private' bid means?!
Really didn't think we had to get into such basics

And I haven't claimed it's proof of anything, I think you need to go back and read how this conversation flowed as you are obviously lost
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I’ll allow you to explain those basics then…
 
Oranges038 said:
Forbes I believe is the source.

I'm not going to get bogged down in the family history here. Let the guys assess the bidders and if they can verify the sources and everything else is in order and these guys win, then so be it.

Feck all I can do about it.
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The Forbes thing is based on publicly available info (e.g. he owns 3% of Deutsche Bank) but the vast majority of the family wealth is private so it's undoubtedly a massive massive underestimate.

On the same page that Forbes say he's worth $1.2bn, they say he has a $300m yacht. He also bought one Picasso for $180m but these are only the few assets that Forbes actually know about so it's pretty easy to work out that they are way off.

The Sunday Times say he's worth £2bn so already double of Forbes, but still likely to be many multiples higher than that.

I've looked at the history of the deals he's been involved in while managing a $200bn fund and no doubt he would have taken a commision on every one of these huge deals (Harrods, the Shard, Sainsbury's, Barclays Bank etc). Plus there is a whole raft of financial institutions where he or his son sit or have sat on the board. It's pretty clear to me that they would have no problem financing a bid for the club without needing state funds.
 
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red thru&thru said:
So, will the PL let a person takeover a club with state backed funds?
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Sure.

There is no rule against state ownership. Many want there to be one, but per now there is none.

Same for UEFA as far as I know - it isn't illegal for a nation-state to own a football club.

The issue for/with Qatar in this particular case is that UEFA don't allow a single "entity" to have a "decisive influence" (as the owner) of more than one club in the same competition.

Qatar already own PSG. Hence, they cannot just let QSi/QIA purchase Manchester United (unless they plan on withdrawing one of those teams from the CL).

EDIT If you're asking: would they allow X to buy a PL club with partial funding from a nation-state, the answer is again: yes, sure.

But no single owner can own more than 30% (I think it is) of more than one club.

The rules, per now, don't distinguish between owners in terms of "state" and "private". There's no difference. The issue is about owning multiple clubs (or if you will, too big a stake in multiple clubs), not the nature of the owner as such.
 
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How much is SJR prepared to invest in the transfer market and club evolution?. Pointless in him getting the club if he is going to keep things as they are and invest minimal in the market and do a Glazers pt.2 by selling in a few years for equity increase value.

Clearly very deep pockets are needed to help us move up and forward and I'm not sure if SJR and his debt engineered take over will be able to do as required.

Is he going to create more debt upon more debt to pay the required transfer fees and development bills?.

How is his track record at Niece - I hear it not very good?.
 
Rampant Red Rodriguez said:
How much is SJR prepared to invest in the transfer market and club evolution?. Pointless in him getting the club if he is going to keep things as they are and invest minimal in the market and do a Glazers pt.2 by selling in a few years for equity increase value.
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I don't like Jimbo one little bit myself, but it's extremely unlikely that he has anything like that in mind.

For him, this is about his legacy. He isn't doing this with the intention of doing a "Glazers pt.2".
 
Chesterlestreet said:
Sure.

There is no rule against state ownership. Many want there to be one, but per now there is none.

Same for UEFA as far as I know - it isn't illegal for a national state to own a football club.

The issue for/with Qatar in this particular case is that UEFA don't allow a single "entity" to have a "decisive influence" (as the owner) of more than one club in the same competition.

Qatar already own PSG. Hence, they cannot just let QSi/QIA purchase Manchester United (unless they plan on withdrawing one of those teams from the CL).

EDIT If you're asking: would they allow X to buy a PL club with partial funding from a national state, the answer is again: yes, sure.

But no single owner can own more than 30% (I think it is) of more than one club.

The rules, per now, don't distinguish between owners in terms of "state" and "private". There's no difference. The issue is about owning multiple clubs (or if you will, too big a stake in multiple clubs), not the nature of the owner as such.
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While it is true that UEFA in theory have rules against owning 2 clubs, in practise Red Bull drove a coach and horses (and maybe an F1 car too) through the UEFA rule book when RB Leipzig and Red Bull Salzburg both competed in the same Champions League season:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/40348340

So the precedent has been set that a bit of a boardroom reshuffle and a few empty promises is all it takes to get around thes rules.
I note that INEOS dont seem worried about any conflict with OGC Nice either.

But it could still be the case that Qatar are doing this to avoid any conflict issue.
 
Rood said:
While it is true that UEFA in theory have rules against owning 2 clubs, in practise Red Bull drove a coach and horses (and maybe an F1 car too) through the UEFA rule book when RB Leipzig and Red Bull Salzburg both competed in the same Champions League season:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/40348340

So the precedent has been set that a bit of a boardroom reshuffle and a few empty promises is all it takes to get around thes rules.
I note that INEOS dont seem worried about any conflict with OGC Nice either.

But it could still be the case that Qatar are doing this to avoid any conflict issue.
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Yes, true.

(And one might add that there are powerful figures lobbying for the rules to be changed as we speak.)

The fact that Jim owns Nice has been a non-factor so far in these debates (in this particular context, I mean), which is (as you suggest) interesting. Because surely it is not impossible that a United owned by INEOS might end up in the same competition as Nice.
 
Rayman96 said:
Considering that everything he said is basically true, its far from being the most idiotic post on this forum.
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Again, the issue many of us have is that we don't believe for a second that this isn't a state bid. The Glazer's are not the US state and Jim Ratcliffe is not the UK. Nobody would want those states to own United either, it's absolutely true that those states have done a lot worse than Qatar but those states aren't bidding so it's a pointless comparison.

Also does Fulham's owner, who is a Muslim born in Pakistan get this level of scrutiny? Accusations of Islamophobia or racism have some truth, there definitely are some posters who have crossed the line, but a lot of it is nonsense to defend a bid from a state who treat migrant workers deplorably (is that not racist of them?) because people want Mbappe and don't give a feck about anything else.

It's also funny to see Al Qaeda mentioned (I'm not sure what the Glazer's have to do with them). If we pretend for a second that this is a private bidder who is being backed by his daddy then guess whose daddy the High Court claimed a couple of years ago was transferring money to an Al Qaeda affiliate?
 
Rood said:
But it could still be the case that Qatar are doing this to avoid any conflict issue.
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However...this, yes.

Because Manchester United and PSG are about as high-profile as you can imagine.

Like I said in the other thread (or was it this one?), it doesn't make sense for Qatar to blatantly and openly own two of the biggest clubs in Europe under the current rules. It would attract a lot of attention/scrutiny they probably want to avoid.

Better to do it more subtly, i.e. via this "ninety two" thing.
 
Rood said:
The Forbes thing is based on publicly available info (e.g. he owns 3% of Deutsche Bank) but the vast majority of the family wealth is private so it's undoubtedly a massive massive underestimate.

On the same page that Forbes say he's worth $1.2bn, they say he has a $300m yacht. He also bought one Picasso for $180m but these are only the few assets that Forbes actually know about so it's pretty easy to work out that they are way off.

The Sunday Times say he's worth £2bn so already double of Forbes, but still likely to be many multiples higher than that.

I've looked at the history of the deals he's been involved in while managing a $200bn fund and no doubt he would have taken a commision on every one of these huge deals (Harrods, the Shard, Sainsbury's, Barclays Bank etc). Plus there is a whole raft of financial institutions where he or his son sit or have sat on the board. It's pretty clear to me that they would have no problem financing a bid for the club without needing state funds.
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I'd be very surprised if he has 5.5 to 7bn as quoted ready to go, to do this all by himself.

If he does and it's all above board and in no way being funded/backed by the state, then fair enough.

Will see when it comes down to it.
 
BooloBiibshe said:
Manchester United are currently owned by a family from the most corrupted country in the world. A country that created all terrorist groups in the world ( biggest one being Alqaida). But you don’t see it like that because the media doesn’t show you their shenanigans or you don’t just wanna see it and blame counties like Qatar. America destroyed millions of people’s lives, they killed kids man, women, people in wedding ceremonies. Let’s talk about what they did to Iraq and Afghanistan. The difference between USA and all those wealth Muslim countries combined is like A to Z in terms of human rights. You only want the glazers out just because the way the run the club and you will hate the Qataris for being Qadari no matter how successful they will make the team. Some of you don’t even feel shame when you talk about human rights like there is no Muslim members in this Forum.
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I imagine that there are a lot of Muslim posters who are ashamed of Qatar and wouldn’t want them representing their religion.

Certainly the way they treat homosexuals and women.

I am British and would not want my country owning Man United. I am ashamed of my countries’ government. Surely most good people would be horrified at Qatar no matter the religion.
 
Figgins said:
Some of the myth busting came from annual reports. Come on you can do better than write "all arguments"



Yep, it's just a few that try to shame people. There was me thinking humanity was a species that isn't static in thought. Perhaps i'm wrong.
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I am conflicted about many things. Human rights abuse and homophobia is not one of them. I am against them.
 
RORY65 said:
Again, the issue many of us have is that we don't believe for a second that this isn't a state bid. The Glazer's are not the US state and Jim Ratcliffe is not the UK. Nobody would want those states to own United either, it's absolutely true that those states have done a lot worse than Qatar but those states aren't bidding so it's a pointless comparison.

Also does Fulham's owner, who is a Muslim born in Pakistan get this level of scrutiny? Accusations of Islamophobia or racism have some truth, there definitely are some posters who have crossed the line, but a lot of it is nonsense to defend a bid from a state who treat migrant workers deplorably (is that not racist of them?) because people want Mbappe and don't give a feck about anything else.

It's also funny to see Al Qaeda mentioned (I'm not sure what the Glazer's have to do with them). If we pretend for a second that this is a private bidder who is being backed by his daddy then guess whose daddy the High Court claimed a couple of years ago was transferring money to an Al Qaeda affiliate?
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Its nigh on impossible to identify where every single cent of a Multinational/Qatari/Russian etc bid comes from and its impossible to identify exactly which people and societies were damaged in the gathering of these vast sums. I also would never condone the evils that have occured in the gathering of these vast sums. Call me cynical but the world is beyond corrupted and we all have to make a judgement.

Should I then stop supporting my boyhood club? What about my local Starbucks or McDonalds? Should I sell my diesel powered car? Stop eating meat perhaps? We all have to draw the line somewhere but people are passionate about football because its an escape. I'm not going to condemn any football fan for wanting to continue supporting his or her own team but yes it is a little strange that people have to justify their decision in such strange ways.

Moutaz and Ramez al-Khayyat, two Qatari businessmen brothers syphoned money to Al Qaeda.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/...two wealthy,extensive funds to the terrorists.
 
Figgins said:
Again, stating Qatar want to buy is speculation. It's not speculation Shiekh Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani wants to buy





i don't need to show you anything, you made the statement " Do you want that Qatar bid" there is zero evidence Qatar are bidding Shiekh Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani is bidding
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Jesus Christ
 
Rood said:
Of course there is official info - the reputable sources of BBC, FT etc cite this as a private bid.
https://www.ft.com/content/c92a7489-42f0-45a6-bd86-10e342d7dd43

Now obviously that doesn't make it true but that is the official line so it's daft to tell someone to prove it.

As you say, all the rest that is speculation and opinions from journalists who are primarily sports based and know absolutely feck all about business and finance.
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You cannot be an independently wealthy billionaire in Qatar without having connections to the state.

If you don’t understand that, there’s no helping you.
 
FriedClams said:
this may be the most idiotic post I’ve seen on this forum.
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Without explaining why my post is idiotic?

Wumminator said:
I imagine that there are a lot of Muslim posters who are ashamed of Qatar and wouldn’t want them representing their religion.

Certainly the way they treat homosexuals and women.

I am British and would not want my country owning Man United. I am ashamed of my countries’ government. Surely most good people would be horrified at Qatar no matter the religion.
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There is nothing wrong the way we treat our women. We treat them with respect, love and affection. We marry them, not make them our girlfriends. They are modest and no one talks about how hot or sexy they are and the harassment they face is almost zero.

Homosexuality is prohibited not only in Islam but other religions as well. When the same sex have a relationship they can’t have kids so they have to adopt other people’s children and make them to have to dads or mothers instead of a mom and dad. They call themselves husband and husband or wife and wife which doesn’t make sense. Men walk different and always want to act like a woman or sound like a girl even though they say they are men. The most problematic and argumentative relationship is the same sex relationship.
 
UnrelatedPsuedo said:
You cannot be an independently wealthy billionaire in Qatar without having connections to the state.

If you don’t understand that, there’s no helping you.
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What are you on about?
Of course he has connections to the state, who on earth said anything different?!

I guess you don't understand plain English
 
Oranges038 said:
I'd be very surprised if he has 5.5 to 7bn as quoted ready to go, to do this all by himself.

If he does and it's all above board and in no way being funded/backed by the state, then fair enough.

Will see when it comes down to it.
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I reckon he's worth a lot more than that but in any case, no one (not even a state) is going to invest that kind of money in straight up cash

There is always going to be finance packages, consortiums and banks involved
 
BooloBiibshe said:
Without explaining why my post is idiotic?


There is nothing wrong the way we treat our women. We treat them with respect, love and affection. We marry them, not make them our girlfriends. They are modest and no one talks about how hot or sexy they are and the harassment they face is almost zero.

Homosexuality is prohibited not only in Islam but other religions as well. When the same sex have a relationship they can’t have kids so they have to adopt other people’s children and make them to have to dads or mothers instead of a mom and dad. They call themselves husband and husband or wife and wife which doesn’t make sense. Men walk different and always want to act like a woman or sound like a girl even though they say they are men. The most problematic and argumentative relationship is the same sex relationship.
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Interesting.
 
Wumminator said:
I genuinely am interested in how some people who have been backing the Qatari bid are going to speak about this quote.
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There is no connection whatsoever between that ignorant quote and Sheikh Jassim's bid
 
Rood said:
There is no connection whatsoever between that ignorant quote and Sheikh Jassim's bid
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It is literally someone from the area talking about the ruling beliefs of the land?

I actually cringed reading that post and the “we” all the way through. I hope he does not think he speaks for all Islamic viewpoints and can we make certain that before another poster is warned that the Caf does not want any people stereotyping based of those horrible quotations.
 
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