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Can the plan of the Share Liverpool FC Group to buy the club from its American owners work? It has already been welcomed by culture, media and sports secretary Andy Burnham who called the plan, headed up by football academic Rogan Taylor, 'a fascinating development'. Supporters of the scheme point to the success of fan ownership at Barcelona which has more than 100,000 fan members, while similar schemes operate at other Spanish and German clubs. Rogan Taylor agued, 'Large amounts of debt often devolve onto clubs newly purchased, but the fans know that in the end, it will be they themselves who have to pay it off through increased ticket prices and other schemes.' However, football economists would point out that in the past, the surplus from clubs was shared between clubs and the fans who benefited from low ticket prices and matches televised without charge. Now the surplus is shared between the clubs and the players and that is unlikely to change whoever is in charge.
The club is, of course, not up for sale and even it was the current owners might prefer to sell to Dubai International Capital. Indeed, judging from banners on the Kop, many fans would prefer a different foreign owner with deeper pockets. It is open to question whether fans will be prepared to pay £5,000 each towards the scheme: after all, that sum is not small change for most people. One member of the Sport and European Union Group commented that he expected any real radical mobilisation of fans to fall short, 'as the global fan base Rogan Taylor talks of will struggle to move beyond the current passive consumption of this glamorous brand. As long as the team's doing well, they'll be happy enough to keep tipping up for the odd shirt or tv subscription, but to stump up the kind of amounts to collectively buy the club will unfortunately be beyond the level of engagement they seek, or can afford.' An elected club president would also be under pressure to spend on players and it might all end in a financial crisis.
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