Sheffield United are hoping to build up a fan base in China after buying a football club called Chengdu Five Bulls.

Chengdu, which is more famous for giant panda breeding than steel, might seem an unlikely twin for the club, but Sheffield chairman Kevin McCabe reckons that "The Blades" could be a massive success in the Sichuan province, of which Chengdu is the capital.



Full 'Daily Telegraph' article (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/12/14/nblades14.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/12/14/ixhome.html)

This could prove to be a very good move for United, this area has great potential for investment!

The area itself has a population greater than the whole of London put together, and the locals are just getting to grip with the Sport, meaning that United could make mega-bucks from the deal, and have a strong financial pulling should it be needed, hence better players at the lane should they be promote, and an improved ground!

Chengdu's ground has a capacity of just over 40,000!

Mad!!!!

Do they fill that stadium Matt, 40K is **** loads!

This looks like a very good business investment- its like united buying a team in the championship of this country!

We sold petr kachuro to them a few seasons ago and we have now put hao haidong in charge of there team which is the chinese equivelant of gary lineker!!

The stadium itself is amazing, please check the image on the link below!

http://www.sinosoc.com/match/stadium/sichuan_guancheng.jpg

Chengdu reported an average attendance of 38,000 last season!

Matt

that looks an amazing stadium!!!

Yes, I'm sure United will make a very good 'feeder' club for the Chinese giants given a couple of years.

Originally posted by Tyto Alba
Yes, I'm sure United will make a very good 'feeder' club for the Chinese giants given a couple of years.

Is that sarcasm, or a complete lack of knowledge?

Shouldn't a team of Uniteds limited transfer funds be concentrating more on buying the players that could get them to the Premiership and also keep them there??
I'd be a bit wazzed off if I was Warnock and wasn't allowed money to buy a player I wanted after this bizarre deal.
Priorities seem to be in the wrong place at this time. This is the sort of deal you may broker once you've established yourself in the Premiership and have a decent amount of revenue coming in.

Originally posted by wibbles
Shouldn't a team of Uniteds limited transfer funds be concentrating more on buying the players that could get them to the Premiership and also keep them there??
I'd be a bit wazzed off if I was Warnock and wasn't allowed money to buy a player I wanted after this bizarre deal.
Priorities seem to be in the wrong place at this time. This is the sort of deal you may broker once you've established yourself in the Premiership and have a decent amount of revenue coming in.
Warnock has been told he has irtually unlimited funds for his use during the transfer window, we are 10m in debt but have saleable assests of 36m and promotion to the prem would be worth a minimum of 36m too- so that gives us a grand total of 62m in the black :D

someone has never done any sort of business studies...:rolleyes:


you are 10 million in the red, if you sold all your players and stadium you would be 26 million in the black but then the club would exist only on paper. And i doubt you have 36 million worth of sellable assets!

Your stadium is worth at most 5million (the possible value of the land), your players being generous say 10 million. taking account of your training ground, office equipment etc you might add another 2 million...
that gives a total of £17 million of assets...


and dont build your hopes up, the chinese market isnt as lucrative as you would think!

no- the players/ground are totally seperate- the 36m in assets is land that sufc currently own that can be sold off as needed- we are in partnership with scarborough developments or something like that- they are partners and are enhancing out 'off field' assests so we are not solely relying on gate reciepts/ tv money.

article here!!

http://www.yorkshiretoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=117&ArticleID=1283640

sorry- we own property to the value of £34 million- not £36 million- my mistake!!

And two members of our board are in the top fofty of the football richlist according to FourFourTwo (Kevin Mcabe and David Laver).

Though that doesn't mean we have vast reserves to spend. I would ber surprised if we spent anything over £5miliion if we reach the premiership.

Watched the game against Burnley - Had a bet that we'd win 2-0. They had to score 3 on that day!