Barnsley owner Paul Conway insists he can break the stranglehold of Celtic and Rangers as he sets his sights on adding to his group's football empire

If I’m understanding this correctly the “in the know” starting position is that no-one will pay the value Rangers place on our provenly good players because they play in what is considered a football backwater, but if this guy owned Hearts or Hibs the world would be beating down his door to pay top dollar for ‘talent”.
Seems logical.
 
Except your whole existence relies on selling your best players not keeping them to increase chances in future years. It may click one year like a Leicester but realistically it also may not work and you get relegated.
 
Barnsley owner Paul Conway insists he could break the stranglehold of Celtic and Rangers if the SFA allowed him to purchase a majority stake in a Scottish club.

Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts and Hibs are paying Deloitte to conduct a strategic review of the national game.

And dual ownership rules will be one of the areas placed under the spotlight in a quest to attract new money to the Scottish game.

Conway’s Pacific Media Group already own Barnsley in England, AS Nancy in France, KV Oostende in Belgium, Den Bosch in Holland, Esbjerg in Denmark and FC Thun in Switzerland.

Their attempts to add Partick Thistle, Livingston or Dundee to the stable collapsed last year when the SFA capped the ceiling for owners of other clubs at 24.9 per cent.

Conway’s PMG acquired Oostende and turned the £1.7million purchase of Scotland defender Jack Hendry into a £4m profit from Club Brugge three months later.

He believes if they could apply the same data-led ‘Moneyball’ approach to transfers to a club in Scotland, they could finally give the Old Firm a run for their money.

‘If we had a Scottish club we could challenge the duopoly of Celtic and Rangers, 100 per cent,’ Conway told Sportsmail.

‘Look at our Belgian example. With the lowest budget in the league at Oostende we finished fifth. We have a team now which is aged 24 to 27, we are competitive again this year - and why is that? It’s because our biggest cash flow source is player trading.

‘Think about it and the biggest shopping market in the world is just a few miles south of the border. So if you have a bunch of young attacking players, you can buy a medium-sized club and, through the trading profits, you can be competitive.

‘The way it is set up now, you have the Old Firm who have control of the league and no strategic investment is going to come in to these other clubs.

‘Part of the problem is that the Old Firm, as I understand it, don’t want to encourage inward investment because they have an anti-competitive duopoly.

‘You pick Hearts, Hibs or any other middle-sized clubs and they obviously can’t compete because of the difference in the matchday revenue.

‘But that can be fixed immediately if they are generating £10m to £15m of transfer profit like Oostende.

‘We got into Belgium and in our first year the transfer revenue was two times what we paid for the club the year before.

‘We sold Jack Hendry. We also sold Arthur Theate to Bologna in Italy for £6.5m after we got him on a free the year before.

‘So, if you bring in some strategic investor to recapitalise a team outside the Old Firm and these teams are generating transfer profits, guess what? The league is going to get a lot more competitive.

‘And that will dwarf anything you can do to make commercial improvements to the league. It will also give you a chance of greater TV rights.’

The aim of the Strategic Review led by Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts and Hibs is to double the revenue available to Scottish clubs from £27m to more than £50m.

Aware of potential investors waiting in the wings, the American-based owners of four of the clubs want all options placed on the table - and dual ownership will be one of those in Phase Two of their study.

Warning that Scottish football will be left behind after Holland relaxed their rules enough to allow PMG to buy Den Bosch this summer, Conway added: ‘I will talk to anybody about this. Tell those clubs to give me a call or whatever works.

‘I spoke to the American guys at Dundee before. But I’m happy to talk to anyone about ideas for change.

‘We looked at probably four opportunities to buy a club in Scotland and eventually gave up. It just doesn’t work for us or anyone like us and we grew so fed up we moved on to four other countries.

‘We now have clubs in England, France, Belgium, Holland, Denmark and Switzerland.

‘Scottish football is falling behind. And you either get on this bus or the league continues to suffer compared to the other leagues.

‘The Dutch league opened up to strategic investors in January and if you are an American investor you are certainly going to go into Holland way before you go into Scotland.’

ok
 
I can't see it happening, nor can I see any other team outwith us and them winning the league in my lifetime.

I'd definitely welcome a more competative season though.
 
Well, given that Barnsley are within touching distance of the champions league I am genuinely worried by this.

Also, anyone that says their name before ours is for the watching
 
You wouldn't get half of that fee for Hendry if he was playing in Scotland to the exact same level, that is the difference.

Not happening.
 
Agree with most of what he's said but I think it would be a bad thing for us as the likes of Man City and others would be all over this. Scotland would be a perfect fit for Man City to buy a club and use as a feeder club.
 
Conway’s Pacific Media Group already own Barnsley in England, AS Nancy in France, KV Oostende in Belgium, Den Bosch in Holland, Esbjerg in Denmark and FC Thun in Switzerland.

None of these clubs have done anything of note in their respective countries so why does this cocksocket think he'd come up here and break up the Old Firm dominance?
 
People suggesting he pumps more money into the club's he buys and turns them into powerhouses aren't reading the article I assume. It literally talks about his business model and making teams competitive for cheap.
 
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Barnsley have obviously improved over the last couple of seasons, but improving Barnsley is quite different to what he is suggesting he could do in Scotland. Den Bosh currently 16th in the second division, not convinced Ajax, PSV, Feyenoord et al are worrying.
 
Conway’s Pacific Media Group already own Barnsley in England, AS Nancy in France, KV Oostende in Belgium, Den Bosch in Holland, Esbjerg in Denmark and FC Thun in Switzerland.

None of these clubs have done anything of note in their respective countries so why does this cocksocket think he'd come up here and break up the Old Firm dominance?
They've only purchased the clubs fairly recently so it is going to take a bit of time before they start seeing the rewards. Their strategy isn't about pumping money in, it's about making the clubs self sustainable and profitable and reinvesting those in the team. So a slow burner.
 
It would be great for the game but we'll be sharing league titles with that lot f or a long, long time.
 
Unless salary caps are brought in or rules regarding set quotas of youth players, no team outwith Rangers/Celtic will ever win the league
 
Barnsley owner Paul Conway insists he could break the stranglehold of Celtic and Rangers if the SFA allowed him to purchase a majority stake in a Scottish club.

Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts and Hibs are paying Deloitte to conduct a strategic review of the national game.

And dual ownership rules will be one of the areas placed under the spotlight in a quest to attract new money to the Scottish game.

Conway’s Pacific Media Group already own Barnsley in England, AS Nancy in France, KV Oostende in Belgium, Den Bosch in Holland, Esbjerg in Denmark and FC Thun in Switzerland.

Their attempts to add Partick Thistle, Livingston or Dundee to the stable collapsed last year when the SFA capped the ceiling for owners of other clubs at 24.9 per cent.

Conway’s PMG acquired Oostende and turned the £1.7million purchase of Scotland defender Jack Hendry into a £4m profit from Club Brugge three months later.

He believes if they could apply the same data-led ‘Moneyball’ approach to transfers to a club in Scotland, they could finally give the Old Firm a run for their money.

‘If we had a Scottish club we could challenge the duopoly of Celtic and Rangers, 100 per cent,’ Conway told Sportsmail.

‘Look at our Belgian example. With the lowest budget in the league at Oostende we finished fifth. We have a team now which is aged 24 to 27, we are competitive again this year - and why is that? It’s because our biggest cash flow source is player trading.

‘Think about it and the biggest shopping market in the world is just a few miles south of the border. So if you have a bunch of young attacking players, you can buy a medium-sized club and, through the trading profits, you can be competitive.

‘The way it is set up now, you have the Old Firm who have control of the league and no strategic investment is going to come in to these other clubs.

‘Part of the problem is that the Old Firm, as I understand it, don’t want to encourage inward investment because they have an anti-competitive duopoly.

‘You pick Hearts, Hibs or any other middle-sized clubs and they obviously can’t compete because of the difference in the matchday revenue.

‘But that can be fixed immediately if they are generating £10m to £15m of transfer profit like Oostende.

‘We got into Belgium and in our first year the transfer revenue was two times what we paid for the club the year before.

‘We sold Jack Hendry. We also sold Arthur Theate to Bologna in Italy for £6.5m after we got him on a free the year before.

‘So, if you bring in some strategic investor to recapitalise a team outside the Old Firm and these teams are generating transfer profits, guess what? The league is going to get a lot more competitive.

‘And that will dwarf anything you can do to make commercial improvements to the league. It will also give you a chance of greater TV rights.’

The aim of the Strategic Review led by Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United, Hearts and Hibs is to double the revenue available to Scottish clubs from £27m to more than £50m.

Aware of potential investors waiting in the wings, the American-based owners of four of the clubs want all options placed on the table - and dual ownership will be one of those in Phase Two of their study.

Warning that Scottish football will be left behind after Holland relaxed their rules enough to allow PMG to buy Den Bosch this summer, Conway added: ‘I will talk to anybody about this. Tell those clubs to give me a call or whatever works.

‘I spoke to the American guys at Dundee before. But I’m happy to talk to anyone about ideas for change.

‘We looked at probably four opportunities to buy a club in Scotland and eventually gave up. It just doesn’t work for us or anyone like us and we grew so fed up we moved on to four other countries.

‘We now have clubs in England, France, Belgium, Holland, Denmark and Switzerland.

‘Scottish football is falling behind. And you either get on this bus or the league continues to suffer compared to the other leagues.

‘The Dutch league opened up to strategic investors in January and if you are an American investor you are certainly going to go into Holland way before you go into Scotland.’
Don't trust anybody who says celtic before Rangers ;-)
 
Why doesn't he just buy Rangers or Celtic, play moneyball there and win the champions league?
That was my exact thought, got to be a better investment surely, maybe winning the Champions League is a bit ambitious but if you have money to invest in Scottish Football the OF is where any sensible investor would go.
 
His plan sounds good until you factor in that transfer from Scottish clubs for a large fee are still relatively rare, with a few exceptions. Our record transfer received was nearly 15 years go.
 
“‘We looked at probably four opportunities to buy a club in Scotland and eventually gave up. It just doesn’t work for us or anyone like us and we grew so fed up we moved on to four other countries

We are run by rank amateurs in Scotland. Donkeycaster and diddy club crash barriers. They are the biggest part of the problem
 
I’m slightly surprised nobody’s tried this already. The investment required in Scotland would be tiny compared with doing it in England.
 
I hope this isn't the future of football, where companies own groups of football clubs, like property developers with houses. It is sickening, tbh.
 
He’s got a half dozen no mark mid table European teams and a 2nd tier team from the arsehole of England in his portfolio and suddenly he’s going to win the league with…..Partick?

Ok bud
He's probably gave the same speech every time he targets a new club
 
Full of patter. Aye very good on taking Oostende to 5th. Theres a world of difference taking a small Belgian club to 5th and taking Partick, Livi or Dundee to a title infront of 2 clubs that dwarf any Belgian side in stature.

This "moneyball" thing is fine for improving clubs to levels they may not have been capable of. Its not a means of beating bigger wealthier clubs though. You only need to check out the league winners across Europe every year to see that.
I stopped reading when I saw the list of clubs they have

They have mediocre clubs in mediocre leagues not winning anything and somehow this is grounds for breaking the OF duopoly? Aye right. About as reasonable as the logic that Rangers fans posting on FF about a Celtic match will directly impact the outcome of the title.
 
There is 30m reasons to win the league going forward potentially
I think if you look at the models at other clubs it’s a bit different to breaking the duopoly in Scottish football. Yes there is potentially 30m if the league is won and that brings automatic champions league … but how realistic is that? How much invested is needed? I think it would be a hell of a lot before any reasonable return would be seen.
 
Barnsley and Oostende both finished 5th last season, which is pretty impressive for both clubs.
 
Barnsley you say?

This is about him making money off of transfer fees, not improving the game up here, what's to stop the Man City owners taking over us or the rotten mob then?
Us the Rangers support, after 2012 and the fat lad Nobody will get near us that aint Rangers men
 
Two examples in England spring to mind; Peterborough has operated this way since Barry Fry sold the club - it's run "properly" but generates fortunes from player trading. As a result the team bobs up and down the divisions routinely.

Then you have Brentford which works in a similar way and (for now at least) seems to be flying. For the likes of Livingston it could be made to work, but has to accept in a tight league like our Premiership they could easily have a bad year and crash out. Then you see if (a) the owner wants to fund them back up again, or (b) players want to pass through the Championship for at least a year. Somehow I doubt it.
 
Barnsley you say?

This is about him making money off of transfer fees, not improving the game up here, what's to stop the Man City owners taking over us or the rotten mob then?
Formalising city’s feeder club across the city may be why the league will suddenly be open to dual ownership.
 
“Part of the problem is that the Old Firm, as I understand it, don’t want to encourage inward investment because they have an anti-competitive duopoly.”

Nonsense.

I think Rangers would certainly welcome more investment into the game. It’s one of the reasons we’re confronting the SPFL.
 
He can buy into a Scottish club all he wants and it would be good to have another club with some money behind them. However, I think the amount he'd need to spend, amongst many other factors, would be obscene to get the results he wants.
 
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