Reposting the link
and the content of the interview here as I got a 404 Not Found when I went Googling. Eventually tracked it down. I think it's a good idea to have it here. hope this is OK.
http://i-72.co.uk/2015/05/modest-measured-jim-phipps-on-the-bramall-lane-revolution/
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Foreign investors in British clubs are always going to have a hard time winning over the fans. Fact. Regardless of whether you’re in a position to pump in billions of pounds to challenge for the Premier League title, or you’re looking to transform one of the many Championship or League One ‘sleeping giants’ into the next big thing, football supporters are a naturally suspicious bunch when it comes to outsiders and their motivations. Perhaps it’s a siege mentality from living on this island for so long, but, more likely, it stems from previous examples of poor fan engagement, ill-advised off-the-field decisions and a lack of understanding into the heritage of both the club and the beautiful game itself.
So, in September 2013, when Prince Abdullah bin Mosaad bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, a wealthy Saudi royal purchased a 50 percent stake in Sheffield United, you can understand it if half of Bramall Lane was dreaming of the Champions League, while the other half were waking up in a cold sweat after nightmares involving a name change to Sheffield Soccer City Steelers. Thankfully for United fans, that was never on the cards. Prince Abdullah, and Jim Phipps, now co-chairman of the club, had been doing more than due diligence while looking at potential footballing investments, and as Phipps told me, they were also building up an understanding of how not to do it, based on some serious research.
Phipps said: “One of the things we were keen to do, was to avoid the mistake many foreign owners make when they assume ownership, which is to make decisions as though they understand English football. Our investment style is relatively humble; we’re ambitious people, but we realise we don’t know everything. Our study told us that a lot of fans perceived foreign owners as distant, remote and uninterested. They don’t experience the club the way the fans do. So, we’ve tried very hard to become fans, real legitimate fans who have a burning interest in the club. We acknowledge and listen to our fans to try and learn from them to keep the club on a track that’s true to the heritage.”
A study might sound a little cold and measured, but Prince Abdullah and Phipps are seasoned business people. They took their time, and Phipps is refreshingly open about the fact they looked at other English clubs before the opportunity with United came up. It’s a tough task to even be profitable in the Football League, so Phipps and his team had to be sure they were making the right call in choosing the club that would be their perfect fit, which eventually ruled out a certain club from Elland Road.
Phipps said: “We sat down and came up with about 20 parameters for any club we wanted to work with. We looked at a number of clubs and during 24 months before we did the Sheffield United deal, we looked at several clubs, including Leeds, Derby and other clubs. Leeds would have been a control deal, while Derby would have been a minority stake. The one we spent most time on was Leeds, but the club was going through a number of struggles, and also were in a complicated, semi-public negotiation involving Ken Bates and Gulf Finance House. It’s not our style to be involved in deals that are noisy, so that made us step back.”
Part of the criteria for investment was that the Prince wanted full control of any club, yet a chance meeting with Blades chairman Kevin McCabe opened the investor’s eyes, and led them to think about the value of British footballing expertise in any investment. A deal was struck for 50/50 ownership between the Prince and the McCabe family, with Phipps keen to avoid some of the pitfalls experienced at Hull City and Cardiff City, as well as taking positives from foreign investments at other clubs. The next step was to appoint a day-to-day leadership team capable of delivering on the club’s huge potential.
Phipps said: “We had initially wanted a club with complete control and not a minority shareholder, but after meeting Kevin, deeper thinking ensued and led to a study into why foreign owners often become vehicles of hatred. We looked at that and had no interest in becoming one of those. We wanted a club that had the potential to become a Goliath in the Premier League. In the best clubs, there might be some tension between the fans and owners, but that tension does not work against the team on the pitch.
We were very glad to have the McCabes as potential partners. Of course a 50/50 deal would tend by its very nature to put more power in the hands of management, because, as partners you don’t want to end up in a tiff, because how do you get out of it?! We have Mal Brannigan in the front office with Nigel Clough on the touchline. And we’ve turned over a lot of the decision making power to them. So it was different than it would be if we had taken complete control, but if we had been making all of the decisions ourselves, we would surely have made more mistakes. Mistakes in English football when you’re investing can be very expensive and they can have long term effects on the club.”
“My assessment is that we have been very lucky in choosing our partner and we’ve been able to keep the club out of debt since the day the deal was done. We have invested a sensible amount of money in improving first team football. We haven’t got exactly the results or the consistency of results we wanted this year. It’s been clear for weeks now that we will not achieve our goal of automatic promotion. Playoffs are the only way up for us now and we really want to make it into the Championship. We’re in the top six but, we’ve got a number of clubs behind us chasing hard.
So we’ve got our work cut out. Overall, we feel like we’ve made strong systematic improvements at the club. The academy, which we’ve invested in was important. That was part of our criteria, and we’ve learnt from other investors who have tried to do what we’re doing. Southampton etc. But we feel like we’re just on the cusp. Overall, the way came to this deal was the Prince’s lifelong dream to work in English football and get to the Premier League. He expects great things from the club and we have to deliver that for him.”
To level set, Phipps is the Prince’s Principal Advisor, and a hugely experienced international business attorney who was also a senior law advisor during the reconstruction of Iraq in 2008. From Baghdad to Bramall Lane may sound like a long stretch, but Phipps is keen to call out humility as one of the key attributes any foreign owner should possess if they want to be successful. But can you learn to be a Blade? Certainly Phipps’ affinity for the club seems genuine enough, but even though he’s fallen in love with the club he procured, he’s the first to admit, it will always belong to the fans.
“English football is its own animal and is distinct from football anywhere else; the way it’s structured, the way the Football League and Premier League relate to one another is distinct. There’s so much history. So, when you want to change something or do something different, you better have a sense for all the lessons that have been learnt before, and that takes a smidgeon of humility. It’s very likely that anything we can think of has been tried, so there’s a lot to take in. You can own the corporate vehicle that is the club, but you can’t own the club, because that belongs to the fans. It belongs to their collective memory about what the club is about, so you need to decide right up front that you’re going to embrace that and not try to make something different of it. To do that you have to be serious about your fans and they have to mean something to you, not just be the source of revenue,” he said.
Phipps went on: “Clubs have tried to change the names or the colour of the kits, and all you have to do is look at pictures on peoples’ walls, photos of their fathers and grandfathers with the shirt on. We all, as foreign owners, have to be self aware when we’re trying to do things that are at odds with heads and hearts of fans. We have to be mindful that what we own is the ability to make decisions as stewards of the club. Those decisions, however, can be at odds with where the hearts and minds of the fans are. But we would be fools to cross the fans lightly, because doing that would be to turn on the very thing that makes the club so attractive to us – the passion of its fans. Our club is about a passion level that is hard to comprehend. I’ve been caught off guard on a number of occasions about how strongly people feel about their club.”
Sentiment is certainly something that divided South Yorkshire, and most of the country, when Phipps offered former Blade Ched Evans the opportunity to train with the club following his release from prison. The co-chairman was forced to make an angry retreat after several sponsors and ambassadors threatened to end their affiliation with the club over the deal. Phipps is no stranger to the workings of the law and, while he believes Evans is ultimately culpable for the whole situation, he believes the footballing authorities and even parliament have a job to do in setting the boundaries for future cases.
Phipps said: “We were the first to try and open the door to him, just to let him train, and that brought down a hailstorm on the club at multiple levels. I think everyone, including Ched, realised that by and large he brought this on himself. But I do think the rule of law and not our passions should dictate. Currently there’s not a law or regulation in the books that authorises a lifelong sentence saying you can’t get your job back, because you’re a footballer. I believe with all my heart that footballers should be treated as equals before the law, whether at the trial stage, punishment stage or rehabilitation stage, they are no different.
As we reflect on what happened, we can all acknowledge that rape is a heinous crime, and there is a punishment for that crime. If that punishment isn’t severe enough, then change the law, but don’t make a special punishment for this one guy, to do that would be the essence of injustice. In this case we failed Ched Evans — the mob is imposing a sentence on him not provided for in law; but, when you’re sitting on the board of a football club, you have to preserve the interests of the football club above all else.”
Away from the Evans’ drama, and as discussed from the outset of this article, football fans do harbour a natural suspicion of foreign investors, and that can manifest itself in both positive and negative ways. But Phipps is a fan of open dialogue and knows its true value, even if that means having thick skin. He’s also convinced that he made the right choice in investing in the Blades, citing South Yorkshire culture as one of the biggest bonuses to come out of the deal.
He said: “The engagement by fans on Twitter and forums has been on the whole very positive and very valuable. The fastest way to learn what it means to be a Blade is to spend time with the Blades. It’s hard for me to admit but I spend probably about 20 hours a week reading what the fans are saying, responding and trying to get a sense from social media where the fans are on certain topics. Sometimes with social media it’s hard to get a balanced sense, as the nosiest sometimes drown out the discussion.
The other thing that has been remarkable has been getting to know our staff. At SUFC, we have an outstanding group of people. As collections of people go, it’s one of the best I have seen. Not all staff are fans of the club or even football fans, but there is such a high level of commitment to the club from all of our staff and the feeling around the place is so warm. The club has that South Yorkshire charm, where people are just nice to each other. It’s a fabulous place and a great fit for Saudi culture, where people are also warm and welcoming. For a fellow from California, it’s like home.”
But, sentiment aside, Phipps is a businessman and both he and the Prince are as keen as United fans to see progress both on and off the pitch. He’s satisfied with United’s position in the league, although he would obviously prefer to be in the automatic slots than the current play-off berth United hold. But, there has been no sign of any gungo-ho spending, and while boss Nigel Clough has been backed in the transfer market, and off the field the club has been kept debt free, there is no panic to throw the Prince’s cheque book at the challenge of getting into The Championship. Phipps is also committed to a Southampton-style model of success, developing an academy to sustain the club’s growth, but stresses he does not want to become a selling club, pointing to player power rather than necessity that led to Harry Maguire joining Hull City last season.
Phipps said: “Our intention has always been to back Nigel. His first transfer window last season, the club had spent most of its money for the year, so there wasn’t much activity apart from loans. His first window was in the summer, we achieved some things, but not our main objectives. Some fans believe it’s simple to get quality players to come down from leagues above, and it’s just a matter of money, but there are so many factors involved. We’ve been fortunate that we’ve been able to create circumstances whereby Nigel doesn’t have to sell players. We had the unfortunate situation with Harry wanting to take his chances in the Premier League with Hull, and that was a deal that we did even though we turned it down. But Harry came to us and said look I really want to take my chance at playing in the Premier League. And of course, he was one of our own, raised in the academy, so it’s very difficult to let him go.”
You only need to look around The Championship to understand that in this day and age, Clough is in an enviable position, with a board who do not interfere in either transfer or team selection. Phipps is much more concerned with allowing his expert management team breath and achieve success their way. He has one eye on the future and how he can transform the Blades into a global brand, once they are back in the big time – something he feels is just a matter of time.
He said:“I think we have all the ingredients off the pitch. The team we have put together is probably better suited to the style of play in The Championship. Buying a team in League One and trying to take it up has proven to be more difficult than I had supposed. Everybody is trying to escape, so it has a feisty nature. I think when we get into The Championship, and I do think it’s a when, not an ‘if’, I think we have proceeded in a way that will work for us. We haven’t just spent big to get out of the division. We’re taking a sensible approach to get the club up and the pattern we’ll follow is one that when we get up is to build a sustainable model to stay there. We don’t want to get promoted, spend a lot of money and then come back down.”
“In English football, it’s very difficult, if not impossible, to make a profit outside the Premier League. So, essentially every club is a player trading club to make up deficits. Every club also depends on great sponsors. One thing I’m excited about for when we go up is, I think Sheffield United will prove itself capable of attracting very interesting sponsors. I think our story is good, and I think our ability to grow the Sheffield United as a brand abroad will be substantial. The Sheffield rules are the rules which everyone in the world essentially plays by. There are so many football-firsts in South Yorkshire, so once we have developed that sustained head of steam and got ourselves into The Championship. Places like Turkey and Saudi Arabia, as well as Asia which the McCabe’s developed, as well as other areas. We have a vision and what we need now is sustained execution and more consistency in our execution. We beat lots of Premier League sides and I’d like to beat more League One sides!”
Money can’t buy me love, or so said The Beatles, but it’s clear that Phipps is in it much deeper than just for the dollars. He speaks passionately on wanting to revive the Steel City derby rivalry with neighbours Sheffield Wednesday, but also waxes lyrical about
The Sheffield United Community Foundation, a superb charity working in the areas of sport participation, education, health and social inclusion. Its key aim is to build links between the football club and the community using the appeal of football and sport in general. Led by former Blade Mark Todd, the programme uses sport as a motivational technique to candidates from a range of social, ethnic and racial backgrounds, to encourage, motivate and inspire positive behaviour and help them unlock their own potential.
The Community programmes are aimed at strengthening self-esteem, developing personal skills, promoting healthy behaviours and lifestyles, and in doing so improve academic achievement, enhance employability and increase the feeling of self-worth and wellbeing.
Sport, and football more specifically, runs through the veins of the people of South Yorkshire, and it’s fitting that Phipps, as a foreign investor, should place such a huge emphasis on the importance of the scheme to both the club and the local community. There’s a lot of tokenism and smoke and mirrors in today’s football world, but there’s something authentic and genuine about Phipps that suggests the Blade’s fans have got the right kind of foreign owners behind the wheel.
