Rock of Gibraltar

Liam147

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Not a complete cock, just really young.
I've read a lot about this but I still don't think I have the story right.

My impression of the situation was as follows:
Fergie was gifted a stake in the horse, and when the horse was put out to stud it made a lot of money, which Magnier and McManus decided to withhold, claiming not to have given him anything.

This affected United as Fergie fell out with the pair and they withdrew their money from United, which was a substantial amount/decided not to invest a substantial amount of money in United.

From what I can gather United fans tend to have blamed Fergie for the whole affair, but like I say it went over my head a bit. How far off am I?
 
Fergie made a mistake in accepting their out of court settlement before the stud fees started coming in. He missed out on millions from it. But it was all overshadowing the team so it had to end.
 
Kid Cunto said:
They effectively handed control over to the Glazer's, didn't they?
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Well they both sold their shares to them if that's what you mean. Think they held about 30% of United and after that the Glazers had to launch a complete takeover.
 
Liam147 said:
Right, so I see how Fergie's missed out, I just aren't linking it to them two and the Glazers.
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Maybe the bad press from the whole saga soured relations at the club but I believe the Glazers' plan would have seen them buying them out at some point anyway, they had gradually been increasing their shareholding ever since they arrived on the scene in 2003. Those 2 selling their stake meant the Glazers would own the club. They did state that they wouldn't sell to the Glazers, they had all the fans onside in that, yet they did a month or two later for about £70m I think.
 
lem8sh said:
Fergies fault, ego got in the way.
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Used to think that, now I'm not so sure. I think SAF felt under-appreciated by the powers-that-be at United; for example, he was publicly outspoken about how they weren't paying him what he felt he was worth, and seems to have little time for Martin Edwards...maybe the ROG business was, to the boss, another instance where he felt 'robbed' by influential people at the club?
 
SteveJ said:
Used to think that, now I'm not so sure. I think SAF felt under-appreciated by the powers-that-be at United; for example, he was publicly outspoken about how they weren't paying him what he felt he was worth, and seems to have little time for Martin Edwards...maybe the ROG business was, to the boss, another instance where he felt 'robbed' by influential people at the club?
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The fact he felt he was entitled to 50% of the stud fees was ridiculous. And that was the root of the problem which then spiralled out of control. No one makes a fool of JP that's for sure.
 
Liam147 said:
I've read a lot about this but I still don't think I have the story right.

My impression of the situation was as follows:
Fergie was gifted a stake in the horse, and when the horse was put out to stud it made a lot of money, which Magnier and McManus decided to withhold, claiming not to have given him anything.

This affected United as Fergie fell out with the pair and they withdrew their money from United, which was a substantial amount/decided not to invest a substantial amount of money in United.

From what I can gather United fans tend to have blamed Fergie for the whole affair, but like I say it went over my head a bit. How far off am I?
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Fergie became pally with JP and Magnier. They gifted him a 50% share in Rock of Gibraltar a very exciting juvenile. But before Fergie ever had attained this share the horse had already won the group 3 Railway Stakes and had considerable stud value already. When the horse was retired aged 3 Fergie expected to be entitled to 50% of the stud fees as well which was frankly ridiculous.
 
It wasn't so much going into business with your effective bosses, it was the fact Fergie tried to sue them.
 
Didn't they buy shares at United after becoming pally with Fergie? There was a period where several shareholders were mentioned as possibilities for takeover and I remember they were among them. It was claimed it would give Fergie huge power at the club.
 
as usual there is a lot of confusion about what actually happened - you are best off reading some proper articles on the history rather than listening to myths from the internet

it was a very unstable period for the club and TBH no one really knows what exactly was going on in the background
 
Sixpence said:
Maybe the bad press from the whole saga soured relations at the club but I believe the Glazers' plan would have seen them buying them out at some point anyway, they had gradually been increasing their shareholding ever since they arrived on the scene in 2003. Those 2 selling their stake meant the Glazers would own the club. They did state that they wouldn't sell to the Glazers, they had all the fans onside in that, yet they did a month or two later for about £70m I think.
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From what I remember of it, the anti-Glazer faction (wasn't Gill amongst them) were banking very much on the Coolmore lads to act as a bulwark and keep the club safe from the Glazers. I know I had that hope at the time and was pretty upset when they did a u-turn and sold up anyway. The feeling was that this was payback for Fergie's lawsuit. Whether that's true is anyone's guess but I wonder what might have happened if the Florida parasites hadn't gained control.
 
This is one thing Fergie will not be be holding any punches in his new book.

Looking forward to it
 
Moriarty said:
From what I remember of it, the anti-Glazer faction (wasn't Gill amongst them) were banking very much on the Coolmore lads to act as a bulwark and keep the club safe from the Glazers. I know I had that hope at the time and was pretty upset when they did a u-turn and sold up anyway. The feeling was that this was payback for Fergie's lawsuit. Whether that's true is anyone's guess but I wonder what might have happened if the Florida parasites hadn't gained control.
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An alternate theory is that the PLC actually sought outside investors to protect against Coolmore taking over the club (they were the biggest shareholders but did not own the club and were not Fergie's bosses at any point) and that is when the Glazers appeared on the scene.

I think that initially, Coolmore had planned to takeover the club with the help of Fergie (although others say that they never planned to takeover) but after the fall out, it was clear that either Fergie or Coolmore had to go - their rift was destabilising the club and in fact I remember that Coolmore blocked the board from awarding Fergie a long term contract at one point and started asking a lot of uncomfortable questions about agents etc.

In the end, Fergie won the battle and stayed on but it was at the cost of the Glazers buying out Coolmore which gave them enough shares to takeover the whole club.
 
Rood said:
An alternate theory is that the PLC actually sought outside investors to protect against Coolmore taking over the club (they were the biggest shareholders but did not own the club and were not Fergie's bosses at any point) and that is when the Glazers appeared on the scene.

I think that initially, Coolmore had planned to takeover the club with the help of Fergie (although others say that they never planned to takeover) but after the fall out, it was clear that either Fergie or Coolmore had to go - their rift was destabilising the club and in fact I remember that Coolmore blocked the board from awarding Fergie a long term contract at one point and started asking a lot of uncomfortable questions about agents etc.

In the end, Fergie won the battle and stayed on but it was at the cost of the Glazers buying out Coolmore which gave them enough shares to takeover the whole club.
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I'll defer to you Rood on this issue because you're far more knowledgeable about financial affairs than I am. But as for the theory; wasn't it Martin Edward who sold his shares (or at least a good chunk of them) to Cool Expression? That's in the Independent piece but I do recall that snippet from about the time Edwards started selling.
 
Rich people bickering over money is so uninteresting that even when it affected the future of the club I still couldn't be bothered to read up enough to find out what it was actually about.

It's probably explained very simply in this thread, possibly even in the opening post, and I still can't be bothered to read about it.
 
Moriarty said:
I'll defer to you Rood on this issue because you're far more knowledgeable about financial affairs than I am. But as for the theory; wasn't it Martin Edward who sold his shares (or at least a good chunk of them) to Cool Expression? That's in the Independent piece but I do recall that snippet from about the time Edwards started selling.
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I cant remember the exact ins and outs off the top of my head, but Edwards had sold many of this shares at the time of floatation and Im sure that Coolmore bought mostly just from the open market or other smaller shareholders at the time, they slowly built up their stake over a period of time.
 
noodlehair said:
Rich people bickering over money is so uninteresting that even when it affected the future of the club I still couldn't be bothered to read up enough to find out what it was actually about.

It's probably explained very simply in this thread, possibly even in the opening post, and I still can't be bothered to read about it.
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well at least you bothered to open the thread, its a start !
 
The papers made a massive amount of one party or the other lying about what was agreed as regards stud fees etc. but the reality was far more likely that everyone went in assuming different things and nothing was ever really discussed or agreed. Basically a bog standard legal dispute with both sides feeling aggrieved based on their own unique backgrounds and viewpoints.

But that didn't sell as many papers.
 
Liam147 said:
I've read a lot about this but I still don't think I have the story right.

My impression of the situation was as follows:
Fergie was gifted a stake in the horse, and when the horse was put out to stud it made a lot of money, which Magnier and McManus decided to withhold, claiming not to have given him anything.

This affected United as Fergie fell out with the pair and they withdrew their money from United, which was a substantial amount/decided not to invest a substantial amount of money in United.

From what I can gather United fans tend to have blamed Fergie for the whole affair, but like I say it went over my head a bit. How far off am I?
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Basically, Magnier and Co bought Rock of Gibraltar, as they do with all their potential stallions. If good enough they go to stud at Coolmore. Normally, there are about 3 or 4 considered good enough every year. From a racing point of view, they mix up the ownership of the horses between coolmore members, rather than having ownership in one name.

With ROG, they gifted SAF named ownership of the hors, so he'd get his split of winnings and the horse won a lot of money. The only way SAF could possibly have retained ownership to stud rights would be to have a share in Coolmore or for Coolmore to buy him out, which would be a nonsense considering they bought the horse.

I think Fergie just misunderstood how this would work
 
Sixpence said:
Well they both sold their shares to them if that's what you mean. Think they held about 30% of United and after that the Glazers had to launch a complete takeover.
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Yeah, think that 30% took the Glazer's over the required 51% in the club if I remember correctly.
 
I wonder if this is featured in his new book. Might be interesting.
 
Kid Cunto said:
Yeah, think that 30% took the Glazer's over the required 51% in the club if I remember correctly.
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Yeah, that's what happened. And it was just a few weeks after it was claimed they wouldn't sell to the Glazers which made a lot of fans happy.
 
lem8sh said:
Well it was. How he could possibly have felt he was entitled to 50% stud fees is beyond me. Childish stuff.
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You talk as if you know what they had actually agreed whereas obviously you have no idea whatsoever

Brophs said:
The papers made a massive amount of one party or the other lying about what was agreed as regards stud fees etc. but the reality was far more likely that everyone went in assuming different things and nothing was ever really discussed or agreed. Basically a bog standard legal dispute with both sides feeling aggrieved based on their own unique backgrounds and viewpoints.

But that didn't sell as many papers.
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this is the most likely scenario, the problem was that it involved 2 very hardheaded people with neither side wanting to back down
 
ronnie dazzler said:
Basically, Magnier and Co bought Rock of Gibraltar, as they do with all their potential stallions. If good enough they go to stud at Coolmore. Normally, there are about 3 or 4 considered good enough every year. From a racing point of view, they mix up the ownership of the horses between coolmore members, rather than having ownership in one name.

With ROG, they gifted SAF named ownership of the hors, so he'd get his split of winnings and the horse won a lot of money. The only way SAF could possibly have retained ownership to stud rights would be to have a share in Coolmore or for Coolmore to buy him out, which would be a nonsense considering they bought the horse.

I think Fergie just misunderstood how this would work
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This post probably sums things up the best. Fergie was out of line end of story.

Maybe down to his own lack of knowledge on the breeding rights side of things but he simply wasnt entitled to a penny after the horse went to stud.
 
Rood said:
You talk as if you know what they had actually agreed whereas obviously you have no idea whatsoever
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You're the one who clearly has no idea. It's common sense, the "gift" was 50% ownership rights which was agreed after Rock Of Gibraltar won the Railway Stakes. The horse had already been highly successful before Fergie ever became involved with the animal and his potential stud value was already very big.

Fergie was "entitled" (which is a strange word considering he didn't pay a penny to acquire his stake) to 50% of the animals earnings on the racetrack (£1.16Million) and 2 stud nominations a year. How he felt he was entitled to 50% stud fees is ridiculous and his subsequent rejection of Magnier and JPs offer of 4 stud nominations a year for 10 years was unbelievable. He had been gifted something very valuable for nothing as it was.

He met his match in JP and Magnier thats for sure. In the end he took a one off payment of £2.5million and lost out in potential millions.
 
Like I said you have no idea what went on or what had been agreed and everything you say is just speculation.
 
No it's not its the public domain and was known within racing circles before the horse even ran in the Dewhurst which was the first time Fergies name was attached to it. 50% of racetrack earnings.
 
lem8sh said:
No it's not its the public domain and was known within racing circles before the horse even ran in the Dewhurst which was the first time Fergies name was attached to it. 50% of racetrack earnings.
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So you were privy to the private discussions between Fergie and Coolmore? I dont think so!
you are just repeating speculation from various books and articles on the subject - and if it was just 50% earnings then why did Coolmore eventually offer more and settle for more out of court?
 
Rood said:
So you were privy to the private discussions between Fergie and Coolmore? I dont think so!
you are just repeating speculation from various books and articles on the subject - and if it was just 50% earnings then why did Coolmore eventually offer more and settle for more out of court?
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Jesus Christ you just can't take any criticism of Fergie can you?
The bolded part makes no sense whatsoever. What do you mean offer more? Fergie received his 50% earning from the racetrack. Earnings which came to £1.16m, ain't bad considering he payed absolutely nothing to acquire his stake.

When it came to the stud fees it was Fergie who backed down and took the £2.5m one off payment. Rock of Gibraltars stud value was huge. He was never going to get 50% stud fees it was laughable and subsequently would have been laughed out in court.
 
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