Gao's plans for satellite club in Europe

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/sport/saints/16230056.Gao_plans_overseas_investment/

Thought this warranted a thread of its own. Initially I thought that our owner intended to buy European teams to expand his empire separately from Saints, but reading it in full it seems to be planned as a conjunct to Saints....giving us an opportunity to give experience to young players not quite ready for the first team, a place to park our failed purchases (not stated as harshly as that ), and a place to move players at the end of their careers (and presumably their contracts). Also talk of enabling us to bring in non-European players....don't fully get that, but presumably to give them time in Europe to qualify for the UK game. It is mooted almost as a Saints B team.

 

That’s interesting and on face value, shows a forward thinking plan to grow Saints.

 

Thanks for posting that, very interesting. Glad to see he is investing and the club are finding creative ways to invest in our infrastructure that will benefit saints long term.

Hopefully he can do it in a way that won't piss off the supporters in the country we put it in.

 

Someone's been playing Football Manager on their lunch breaks. Seriously though, it's similar to what Chelsea do with Vitesse.

 

Well it seems like a good idea just depends on whether they implement it properly.

 

Just shows how our predicament affected things behind the scenes....this and all other plans virtually went into lockdown after Christmas. Now it can all start again, but must have affected our credibility a bit. Can only imagine what it would feel like to Gao trying to get things off the ground in China whilst facing relegation in his first season. Powerful lessons learned we hope.

 

Bah humbug. Let's go back to just being a crap Third Division club like the old days. All this new fangled malarkey.

Issued on behalf of Fans Opposed to Young Original Upstarts (or simply FO YOU) which does not have a bloody hashtag or Facebook page, just to be clear.

This is just to get the ball rolling. Too much happy clappy consensus on this board since the Swansea game.

 

Hmm a Swiss team to blood our academy lads?....Young Boys perhaps?..

 

If it is anything like Football Manager then it will enable us to buy players from outside the EU and send them on loan there if they don't qualify for a work permit in the UK. I don't think I have ever heard of a case irl of a player failing to get a work permit though so I don't know if that is because clubs don't bother going for players who won't get one or that they are actually very easy to get.

Once Britain leaves the EU then I guess the rules will change and I assume it hasn't been decided how it will effect football

 

This sounds good... but shouldn't investment start at hime, before spreading wings abroad?

 

Switzerland is a Tax haven . Just saying .

 

Whatever brings better value really. Doesn't matter where. But we've apparently invested 60m in staplewood over the last few years.

If investing in a foreign club allows us to bring in and produce better players then I'm all for it. If it doesn't then it's a waste. All that matters to me.

 

If you mean by investment in the playing squad, that is clearly needed but a more short term Investment. A business/club can have longer term investments at the same time. Makes good sense.

 

Dutch or Belgium club I guess?

 

Andorra, Albanian? Maybe one in Eastern Europe as the Dutch or Belgian one might be a tad expensive. Or even in the Irish Republic.

 

And the tie-up between Manchester City and Girona.

 

Rather he invested money in our first team.

Sounds a money laundering scam to me.

 

Belgian and Dutch would mean we get around the non EU problem though. Don't know about the rest of the leagues

 

I dunno. This always seems like an idea that is awesome in theory, but maybe not so easy to pull off as a practical matter.

How are the other club's supporters going to feel about being treated like a feeder club? We seem to be having some trouble running one club competently, so how is two going to be any easier?

I'm not against it, but I don't think this should be our priority right now. The money is better spent fixing what is ailing Southampton. However, if Gao is going to be a sugar daddy and spend enough money on multiple clubs to make funding not an either/or situation then I suppose I withdraw my objections. Haven't seen evidence of that yet, though.

 

I think this will go very well indeed. What could possibly go wrong?