WITH the news surfacing that former Chief Executive Rick Parry has been offering advice to FSG since they came to the club as part of an outside “think tank” it makes you wonder what the current incumbent, Ian Ayre’s private views are on the subject. As we all wince at the memory of a self-serving egotist who’s first instinct was always to save face rather than putting the club first we can only hope that John Henry and co. treat his musings as a blueprint for learning from his mistakes.
His main positives were that he brought in Gerard Houllier and Rafa Benitez who turned currency into trophies, despite him, and not because of him. His meddling and blundering cost the club as his transfer methods were reactive in a market where you need to be on the front foot all the time. We missed the boat on a lot of top names which were earmarked by the managers. Steven Gerrard almost left the club after his heroics in Istanbul as Parry hmm’ed and haw’ed about offering him the new long term contract which he craved. I am sure he would have been jettisoned out of the club much sooner if our captain traded his colours from red to blue.
Then, when it was the time to sell the club, Parry assured us that OUR club will be transferred to a safe pair of hands and an ownership which would fund us to Premier League glory, when we were not far off it at the time. We all know the horror which was to follow with promises broken and court cases fought and won for the existence of Liverpool FC. The realisation that his decision to sell the club to a bunch of cowboys whose sole intention was to strip the assets of the club for their own gain must have hurt Parry, a lifelong Red but I’m sure his £4.3 million pay-off (and new Ferrari!) was enough to ease the blow when he left in 2009.
His replacement, Ian Ayre, breezed in with a renewed air of professionalism and direction for the club. He realised very quickly that the LFC business brand was not maximising its potential. In his four years heading up the club’s commercial interests, our annual revenue has shot up from £134 million to £184 per year. This year’s account will also include the revenue streams from the mammoth Standard Chartered sponsorship deal which he brokered. This progression has been wide reaching at the club where our catering, retail etc were outsourced to third party companies, now Ayre insists that they are now dealt with in-house.
Liverpool FC had been in need of a major internal shake down for some time now, with financial opportunities passing the club by for so long, we have had to witness the likes of Manchester United, Real Madrid and Barcelona maximise their commercial potential off the pitch thus financing success on it. The model we are creating at the club certainly gives us reasons to be confident as to where the club is heading. There are two obvious vacancies in this new Liverpool model with a Director of Football role still part of the grand plan to go with the new man in the spotlight. The owners are no doubt going through this process with pain staking detail in a mission to find a management dream-team who will share our hopes and expectations for the future. We are in the position to do this with a modern set-up because of Ayre, and despite Parry.
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Parry didn’t do a great job IMO… To think gerrard was so close to leaving when he is our best player!!!! There should have been no hesitation in that new contract. Is it true we nearly bought ronaldo but were quibbling over the fee? I’m sure we missed many great players in his time at the club? Mind you we have missed out on marko Marin and gylfi sigurdsdon so far this summer. Two players that would improve our creativity in midfield… We need this new structure in place before the euros!! Fingers crossed….
We really were a SLEEPING giant. Too fast asleep to stop our slide. I can’t imagine for a second man utd slipping so far from the perch that was once ours and ours alone. If we had the right structure in place imagine if lfc had one just four more titles in twenty years. That would have seemed paltry at the time but lfc would be on 22 titles. Instead we have 0 it really is unbelievable . Fsg have shown they are very quick learners they are shaking the giant from his sleep .
All Parry had to do was google Tom Hicks to find out what he did to Corinthians. Instead they took him on Gillette’s word – Unbelievable!!
Parry has a lot to answer for and the fact he got rich from selling the club that almost led to administration is diabolical!!
I blame Parry for all the heartache this club has had to endure these past years.
Under his guidance Moores sold the club to the clowns Hicks & Gillette.
Had he done his research properly. – it was easy to see at the time- we would have been sold to DIC.
Under DIC we would have been on par with City, and the UCL may have been Red this year, instead of blue.
Parry made numerous madenning decisions. Examples are:
The sale to H&G…. No due diligence on Tom Hicks says it all!…. A quick look on Wikipedia would have shown that all he was ever after was a quick buck; and that previously he destroyed Corinthians in Brazil after buying them.
His refusal to allow Rafa to restructure the non performing Academy until rafa gave him the ultimatum in 2008.
Parry cocked up the £7m deal with Alves when he was at Sevilla, and somehow negotiated the Pennant £6m purchase a week later! What a difference that could have made.
Parry was responsible for shutting all club shops the day after winning the Champs League in 2005. 250,000 people in the streets and nobody could be any official merchandise!
Buying Robbie Keane, when rafa didn’t want him!
The list goes on.
Whilst ayre was conspicuous by his absence in the Suarez affair, so were FSG!, and at least he has bags of commercial acumen and common sense!
Doesn’t matter who’s to blame in the past
it’s what happerns in the futre that counts
and till those who run realise it s quailty in the
playing staff wich rafa tried to do this club that. We all love is going no where come f s g
sort it out we need quailty alround
Argh Rick Parry described by a female friend as more likely to bring on nausea than morning sickness. ?The man is a world class buffoon and while I thank him for Rafa and Ged (pre heart problems) he simply caused me to agree with hicks who tried to sack him basically because he was crap at his job (and he wouldn’t vote his way). I hope FSG realise following this idiot’s advice would be/ is highly dangerous.
i think Rafa is the best choice for lfc.his first season he rafa brougth charmpions cup and fa cup,he took lfc to two charmpions league final and two times semi-final he came seconed in the leauge.so i believe rafa is the man
I don’t think Parry intended to make all the stupid mistakes he made, but it does give some indication of the problem with giving the chief executive or a director of football the last say. The general trend of successful English clubs suggests you need to get a good manager and give him ultimate control of all football matters, like Fergussen, Wenger or our very own Bill Shankley and Bob Paisley. Remember those famous words “directors are only there to sign the cheques”. Give the guy a budget and some guidelines and let him do his job. If it is true that the board want 3 directors of football and a young yes-man, I have a bad feeling we won’t be seeing champions league football at LFC for quite a while. These guys have invested a lot of money though, so I hope they know what they’re doing!