A huge rumour has been sweeping around Liverpool FC this week. Ooredoo, the new name for Qatar Telecom has reported this week that they have received a tender from Liverpool FC with regards to sponsorship.
Whilst initial talks were dismissed by those close to the club, all major news outlets confirmed the story on Sunday evening adding weight to the rumours from reliable sources.
Whilst Liverpool are already in advanced stages with Standard Chartered with respect to renewing their sponsorship, Liverpool have privately expressed appreciation that major potential sponsors such as Ooredoo are interested.
Ooredoo told Al Jazeria recently:
“We want to sponsor the stadium as well as the club’s kits. Our goal is to reach the Asian markets where the Premier League has an enormous fan base.
“It is a dual interest, Liverpool needs the money to compete with the European heavyweights and we want to expand our brand to reach new markets via football.”
Ooredoo, the Arabic word for ‘I want’ is the newly branded Qatar Telecommunications which has significant reach in the Middle East and wants to expand more in Asian markets. Ooredoo has assets worth over $25bn and $4.2bn dollars cash in hand.
This type of deal is certainly no rich man’s pet project for Ooredoo, the company have significant debts (over $10bn) and sales this year reported to be $9.12bn therefore there is a need for them to expand in growing markets such as Asia and further capitalisation of the markets in the Middle East; however the debt to annual revenue ratio is certainly healthy and by no means a cause for concern.
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Liverpool have made significant strides to increasing its global reach of late with a number of Asian tours confirmed and indeed required by the current sponsors Standard Chartered. The club has also adopted a strategy of becoming one of the largest club’s online, a goal which it achieved in January this year.
There’s a huge benefit to such a potential injection of cash to any club, and with the rumoured transfer budget set to be around £20m plus sales this summer Liverpool could certainly do with a further injection of cash into the playing squad.
However such deals could mean a renaming of Anfield which is likely to spark tension amongst the fans, yet with the club confirming they wish to redevelop Anfield rather than move to a new ground this was always certain to have long term implications with respect to naming rights and the commercial model the club needed to adopt going forward.
This could also add pace to the long term project of improving the playing squad currently underway as Liverpool would now be able to attract and afford better players.
Whilst all of this is encouraging, it must be remembered this is merely rumour at this stage. Some sources have suggested it could simply be a tactic in order to get more out of the existing sponsors Standard Chartered.
With the Suarez incident last week sparking fears of potential sponsor implications it will be a huge relief to the club that major worldwide brands are interested in Liverpool FC.
Follow me on twitter @JohnRitchie84
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Good for LFC
what liverpool need now is money to turn thing around like man-city
well said as long as we are Liverpool who cares get the cash badly needed
yes oooo dats owk ……weldone COUTINHO world klas player..!
I’ll believe it when it happens.
I read somewhere earlier, OOREDOO have denied this.
It would be nice to splash some cash ynwa
Sponsorship yes but ANFIELD should remain
It would be amazing if liverpool had some extra money for some players they some cash for top four next year
Total fabrication, a “spokesman” leaked this report and Ooredoo and Liverpool FC have come out to deny the speculation. I’m affraid we will again be dealing in the bargin bin but feel next season we already have a team to challenge. YNWA
anfield will always be remember for its old glory, now Liverpool! Qatari cash injection to reclaim Reds lost glory
are u a poet sound gd tha
I am an old fan, supported LFC all my life, I think the one to be blame is always to be is Mr. Moore, who for waht ever own reasons, he sold our club to the Americans, and he missed on a big time for selling it to the Arabs, look at MCFC, too late, just too late..
Ooredoo do dat don’t dey doe
Renaming Anfield for the sake of £200m…. Is it worth it? Have we honestly got the point in our time where we are going to sell to the devils?
Surely, what FSG should do is sell their stake in the club? Thank you for rescuing us when we needed you but now we need to move forward and to move forward we need investment, but we dont want you renaming Anfield.
Do not let me see u on here saying we dont spend enough on players or need a new stadium go back to livin in the 80s.
we need cach injection asap if we don’t sides like west ham everton Sunderland ect will be above us year and we will Neva get top 4 again if we don’t get the mega cash injection
Fsg should do one . Get lost and sell up
They won’t spend what’s required and are flipping clueless about football
You have no idea either ever heard of financial fair play well thats why they spend what they do and its plenty.
You fools that complain that the club needs better players and a better stadium well here is their chance yet u fools dont want it renamed u cant have it both ways.
Please FSG get the cash. We are fliiping get linked with mediocre players like Reading’s Pearce as centre back !!! We are really going the opposite way.
Grab the cash and buy some quality players and let’s aim for top 2 finish every season like we did in the 70s and 80s.
Yeah let’s sell our soul for the sake of cash! Let’s change the ground’s name and let more arabs demolish the wonderful game! We’ve not got enough Abramovichs and Etihad and Emirates or yanks!
All you *IDIOTS saying we need a MEGA cash injection in order to compete are just as clueless about football as the yanks at the club! Look where Dortmund and Bayern are now! No privatisation of clubs in germany nor any big money spendings on players. Yet there are two german clubs going to Wembley on may 25th