Source: Team_Talk
Henry: Plenty wrong with Reds
John W Henry insists NESV did not buy Liverpool on the cheap, and admits the new owners have a "huge amount of work to do".[LNB] New England Sports Venture finally wrestled the club off Tom Hicks and George Gillett on Friday.[LNB]Henry and one of his business partner's Tom Werner attended Sunday's Merseyside derby for their first taste of English football as owners.[LNB]Speaking about NESV's £300million purchase, Henry disputed claims that they got the club for less than they should have paid.[LNB]"I know some people are saying this was a cheap price for the club but there is no way we look at it like that," said Henry.[LNB]"As you do due diligence, if you are really diligent you are trying to find everything that's wrong - and we found plenty.[LNB]"There is a huge amount of work to do here and it will take a long time. There were big financial issues but in the end we decided we really wanted to compete at this level.[LNB]"We have to be smart, bold and aggressive because it's a great challenge. There were lots of reasons why we could have decided not to go through with this.[LNB]"There were many times we thought it was too big a challenge but this club is worth it - and we are excited by that challenge."[LNB]Henry accepts there is plenty of hard work to be done if Liverpool are to reclaim their place amongst the elite.[LNB]"What am I thinking? How much work this is going to be. How steep the learning curve is going to be. This is not going to be easy," he added.[LNB]"We realise the challenge that lies ahead if we are going to go toe to toe with the other big clubs.[LNB]"We are not asking for a long honeymoon. This is a contact sport we are in and the going can get rough sometimes. We realise that.[LNB]"We are not going to make any promises but we are going to listen and consider."[LNB]NESV, Liverpool and their major creditors Royal Bank of Scotland were accused of an "epic swindle" by Hicks, claiming the club had been severely undervalued.[LNB]Henry, whose history with the Red Sox suggests there will be significant investment to come over the coming months, denied that was the case.[LNB]And although he may not be the wealthiest new owner in the world, he is basing the business plan going forward on making money and not wasting it on interest payments as the previous owners did.[LNB]"There were big financial issues but in the end we made a decision we really wanted to compete at this level," Henry told the Liverpool Echo.[LNB]"I know some people are saying this was a cheap price. There is no way we look at this as a cheap price for this club.[LNB]"I don't have 'Sheikh' in front of my name but we look at revenues in sports as being the ability to send out a strong team on the field.[LNB]"When we arrived at the Red Sox, the New York Yankees were a juggernaut and it wasn't that much of rivalry.[LNB]"I believe we turned it into a rivalry where we have gone toe to toe with the Yankees even though they have got a much higher revenue.[LNB]"They keep going up but we have gone up faster.[LNB]"When we looked at Liverpool, the first thing that struck us was there are opportunities here to really build a winner.[LNB]"The revenue potentials around the world - it is a global football club - and especially with the financial fair play rules, it is really going to be revenue that drives how good your club can be in the future.[LNB]"That is one thing that we think we are good at."
