by Festus Sowah

Created on: May 30, 2008

The future of Liverpool FC in a nutshell:

Hicks wins his battle with Gillett and buys the club outright
Hicks sacks Rick Parry, the Chief Executive
Rafael Benitez, the manager gets his one year contract extension as promised by Hicks
Liverpool wins the Premier League by May 2010

The gloves are off in my beloved team. Rick Parry insinuated some time ago that Tom Hicks, one of the co-owners of the club was acting in a way that was not in tandem with Liverpool's culture of not airing their dirty linen in public. Small wonder, when all Hicks was doing was rightly highlighting the limitations of the leadership of Parry, which saw Liverpool fall way behind their rivals, Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea in terms of strategic direction. Hicks is right. Rick Parry has put his heart and soul and failed into making Liverpool the best club in England, if not the world. He seems to be out of his depth in dealing with the evolving nature of the global game. One suspects that even if Gillett won the battle for ownership, Mr Parry is on his way out.

Hicks seems to be a man who tells it as it is. With time, Liverpool fans will come to appreciate that and would love him for it. He has one thing going for him. He seems to get on well with Benitez, whom the fans love. Once the stadium is built and the revenue starts rolling in, Benitez will have more funds to strengthen his squad. He has done remarkably well on a relatively lower budget than his main rivals. The manager has also been working behind the scenes, acquiring and developing young players who will form the nucleus of the first team in the foreseeable future. The gap he has needed to close has been wide indeed. In 2006/07, Liverpool were 21 points behind the English champions Manchester United at the end of the season. In 2007/08, they finished 11 points behind the team from Old Trafford who were once again winners.

What the club is undergoing is a manifestation of Hick's concerns. How can a club sell shares on a 50-50 split between two extremely successful businessmen who were used to making the decisions in their respective empires? This was inviting trouble from the outset. Something had to give. What is happening at the club now is a normalization of that error. There should be one majority shareholder. Hicks will win the battle as he seems to want it more.

Liverpool FC are a successful team. They are ambitious for more success, however, they are in line to become the 1st ranked club team in Europe if they can maintain

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