Wasn't sure where to put this but here seems as good a place as any. From Football365's mailbox today:
"The last email on this topic: What goes around, comes around
It’s cold, it’s wet (probably) and there is a team in Manchester who are bigger, better and putting their local neighbours firmly in their shadow. In fact it’s worse than that for the local neighbours. They are in a lot of trouble financially, their average attendance is so low they can’t fill a stand (nevermind a stadium), they have been relegated to the 2nd tier, players wages can’t be paid and club office staff are fearful for their jobs as Christmas is around the corner.
Then out of nowhere in steps a Knight in shining armour who gives the gives the club a loan. It’s enough money to cover player wages and also enough to give everyone at the club a nice Christmas bonus (a free large turkey for all) and the crisis is averted. The loan repayment was never discussed and in fact to this date it’s not been repaid.
A few weeks later though the problems are still there so the Knight steps back in, takes control of the club with another cash injection, this time it’s 10 times bigger than before and clears all the outstanding debts. After all he’s a wealthy businessman, who can afford this and, who just wants, “there to be sufficient room in Manchester for two good football clubs”
From this cash injection the club, that once was on the brink of bankruptcy, is now cash rich. They make great strides in bringing back the supporters with creative ticket pricing, they earn promotion back to the top tier, the rich owner buys a new training ground for the club and the clubs first Youth team is founded. The aim of that Youth team is to try to get as many Youth team players in the team as possible. The owner also successfully lobbies the Government to bring a train station close to the stadium in order to get fans to the ground easier from the large City on matchday.
Then disaster strikes as the stadium suddenly needs redevelopment (unconfirmed reports it was due to Uwe’s Grandad) however all is not lost as the big neighbours down the road respectfully offer use of their stadium whilst its rebuilt and then more good news as the local government hands out a grant to rebuild the stadium. The club returns to its home and slowly starts building history.
Now you’ll be easily forgiven to thinking that the above story is about Man City (apart from the Uwe’s Grandad part) as after all debts were cleared overnight and money was spent on facilities and youth set ups however this happened in 1931 and the Sugar Daddy businessman was James Gibson who I’m sure all Man United fans know as their Owner and Chairman from 1931 to 1951. Come on lads you know him after all he started the process that meant you’ve had a youth player in your matchday squad in every game since way back. For that fact alone you must remember that wealthy businessman who bought you and put you on the road to becoming giants.
So yes we’ve spent lots of money trying to catch up but we’re not the first and we won’t be the last. Man City are just doing what their neighbours did successfully many years ago so by my reckoning we’ve around another 50/60 years of this “City bought success”, “We did it the right way” from United fans before they completely forget about history.
Gavin"
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