Hearts owner Vladimir Romanov has had enough of football and the financial demands that his clubs make of him and is prepared to sell Hearts. I was discussing this with my taxi driver in Aberdeen yesterday and we agreed that there is no way that they are worth £50m, particularly when you have to clear an estimated £36m of debt. For that money you could buy a Championship club with every chance of promotion to the Premier League.
Hearts owner Vladimir Romanov has had enough of football and the financial demands that his clubs make of him and is prepared to sell Hearts. I was discussing this with my taxi driver in Aberdeen yesterday and we agreed that there is no way that they are worth £50m, particularly when you have to clear an estimated £36m of debt. For that money you could buy a Championship club with every chance of promotion to the Premier League.
So how does Romanov come up with this figure? He reckons the land is worth £25m. I do not know whether this is a realistic estimate, but if you sold the stadium (and there would be substantial demolition costs), you would have to build another one somewhere else, having upset the fans. Perhaps he thinks they can ground share with Hibernian which would show a lack of understanding of the rivalry between the two clubs.
He then values the team at £25m. Again, if you are thinking of the players and the brand, this is totally unrealistic. Hearts have a great history and potentially one of the Edinburgh clubs could challenge the Glasgow duopoly. What the club needs now is someone with deep pockets to deal with the debt and put the club on an even keel.
That is not going to be easy against the background of a deepening economic and financial crisis. Perhaps the best hope would be a consortium of individuals with links to Hearts and Edinburgh more generally. Unfortunately, the financial services sector in the Scottish capital has taken a big hit in the crisis while sorting out the tram fiasco has been preoccupying the local authority.