Serc
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Probably worth starting a new thread now that everything is back on again, and information is starting to come out about this 3rd offer.
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...-knight-in-shining-armour-20110225-1b8ns.htmlTinkler set as Knight in shining armour
Brad Walter
February 26, 2011
NATHAN Tinkler will immediately pay up to $5 million to cover Newcastle's debts and has assured members that the Knights would not change their name, colours and logo or relocate to another city without their approval if he was to gain control of the club.
The assurances are contained in a 100-page document outlining the mining magnate's offer to buy the Knights, although the wording of some sections were still being formulated by lawyers from the two parties yesterday to ensure there can be no misunderstanding of the terms of the deal.
Tinkler has also committed to underwrite a minimum of $10 million in sponsorship revenue for the club until 2021 - a guarantee expected to cost him more than $3 million in the first year of the deal as the Knights' sponsorship income is about $7 million.
Any profit made by the club will be put into junior development and should Tinkler, who has an estimated worth of $610 million, go broke the Knights members will be able to buy the club back for $1.
''Nathan won't take a cent out of the club and that is what upset him so much this week, the fact that some people were suggesting he was somehow going to make money out of it or that he was trying to dud the Knights,'' a source close to the deal said of Tinkler's decision to withdraw the offer on Monday before re-submitting it on Wednesday night.
''He just wants to do it for the community and to ensure Newcastle has a good football team.''
Much of the confusion about the deal revolved around the headline figure of $100 million - Tinkler's offer to guarantee the Knights $10 million in sponsorship revenue per year for 10 years. Some people had mistakenly thought Tinkler was paying $100 million to buy the club, a figure that would have dwarfed the $3 million Russell Crowe and Peter Holmes a Court paid in 2006 for a 75 per cent stake of South Sydney.
In fact, the two deals are similar, which is not surprising as Tinkler Sports Group chairman Ken Edwards was the boss of ANZ Stadium when the Rabbitohs, under Crowe and Holmes a Court, negotiated a 10-year, $10 million deal to play at Homebush Bay until 2017.
''Half the fun of privately owned clubs in the NFL,'' says Souths chief executive Shane Richardson, ''is the eccentricity of the owners and it's the same with people like Russell, Nathan Tinkler and Eric Watson at the Warriors.
''You've got to run a club as a business but you have got to have a passion for the game. I don't know Nathan Tinkler but he hasn't robbed a bank, he's a self-made millionaire, he's a race horse owner, he's Newcastle born and bred, his father was a truck driver, so he doesn't look like a bad bloke to me.''