nmc
Well-Known Member
Poor value....? I think we were pretty much bankrupt - so any offer was acceptable.
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Colin Shindler
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Poor value....? I think we were pretty much bankrupt - so any offer was acceptable.
pace89
Well-Known Member
It’s a poor imitation of the Dammed United. Essentially Shindler rehashes the main concept of the Dammed United without the originality, observation of character and wider social commentary that David Peace achieved.Just picked up his book on Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison from a charity shop. Has anyone read it and if so is it any good? I know he’s not a respected figure on here but wondered if he might cover this period in our history accurately and fairly :-)
It’s readable as it’s about City and brings some life to a great period in our history. As I recall he does treat that period fairly (although the drama may be exaggerated a bit), but from an artistic and creative perspective it has little merit.
BillCarlisle
Well-Known Member
I am reposting this just to put in context my remarks below.
I remember soon after the takeover a radio proramme (R5?) in which Schindler and David Bernstein discussed the takeover. Bernstein made a very strange remark. He said "City are being taken over by mysterious men from the East." What could he have meant by that? AbuDhabi and the UAE as a whole were hardly a mystery; they had been extremely active in outward investment all over the world, in real estate, agricultural land, and services. Indeed, in the same edition of The Times in which the takeover was analyzed in detail, there was a major spread on AbuDhabi's investment in agricultural land and a story that they were negotiating to buy or lease a tract in Khazakstan which was the size of Wales. They were a British ally, with a close military/arms relationship to us. Not mysterious at all. Bernstein also criticized the takeover on the grounds that the shareholders had received poor value. Well, that would be for them to judge and refuse the offer.
Just sayin'.
It was a nonsense remark by David Bernstein as all us shareholders had already sold our shares to Thaksin. There was therefore no value to be had. Just shows how some people can put a negative spin on things.
Prestwich_Blue
Well-Known Member
I think Bernstein was talking about the Shinawatra takeover, not the Abu Dhabi one.It was a nonsense remark by David Bernstein as all us shareholders had already sold our shares to Thaksin. There was therefore no value to be had. Just shows how some people can put a negative spin on things.
BillCarlisle
Well-Known Member
I think Bernstein was talking about the Shinawatra takeover, not the Abu Dhabi one.
The OP seems to me to be referring to the Abu Dhabi takeover, hence my comments. Either way, as an earlier poster said, City were pretty much broke. That goes for both pre-Shinawatra and post-Shinawatra. Our shares were almost worthless so I still stand by the fact that there was no "value" to be had. I reckon that most of us were just happy that someone was saving the club from going headlong over a cliff !
Prestwich_Blue
Well-Known Member
Abolsutely. We had no assets as such and were eating cash, mainly John Wardle's, at the time of the Thaksin takeover. I recall Franny Lee at that time saying that the shares should have been worth double what Thaksin was offering. That's why I'm sure he was talking about that, rather than Abu Dhabi's takeover. In June 2008, when it looked like the club was going into administration over the £15m second instalment on the summer 2007 transfers, Bernstein said to those of us who'd been involved in the Supporters Trust that we could pick what was left up for no more than £2m if the worst happened.The OP seems to me to be referring to the Abu Dhabi takeover, hence my comments. Either way, as an earlier poster said, City were pretty much broke. That goes for both pre-Shinawatra and post-Shinawatra. Our shares were almost worthless so I still stand by the fact that there was no "value" to be had. I reckon that most of us were just happy that someone was saving the club from going headlong over a cliff !
BillCarlisle
Well-Known Member
Abolsutely. We had no assets as such and were eating cash, mainly John Wardle's, at the time of the Thaksin takeover. I recall Franny Lee at that time saying that the shares should have been worth double what Thaksin was offering. That's why I'm sure he was talking about that, rather than Abu Dhabi's takeover. In June 2008, when it looked like the club was going into administration over the £15m second instalment on the summer 2007 transfers, Bernstein said to those of us who'd been involved in the Supporters Trust that we could pick what was left up for no more than £2m if the worst happened.
Yep, I remember Franny saying that. Mind you, seeing as how he owned more than a few shares himself, to quote Mandy Rice-Davies, "he would, wouldn't he ?". Lol.
TueartsOHK
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I was hoping this was an RIP bump.
In all seriousness I’m never reading anything from this clown.
ha ha sorry to get your hopes up !
Mad Eyed Screamer
Moderator
His book on the Summerbee's was good.ha ha sorry to get your hopes up !
I, therefore, slightly distrust the motives of these people. Can Schindler, hand on heart, say his despising of our owners (his words) has nothing to do with the fact they are arabs and he is a major historian of Israel?
I didn't see this thread at the time, so apologies for going back nearly four months, but just to pick up on this. There are in fact two Colin Shindlers who are academic historians and the one who's a specialist in the history of Israel isn't the one who's the subject of this thread: https://www.soas.ac.uk/staff/staff31810.php
I actually like several of the Manchester-born Colin Shindler's books. As MES says, the one about the Summerbees is very good, as is the one looking at the fates of the 22 players in the City v United 1963/4 FA Youth Cup semi-final, notwithstanding the shameless populism of the title (it was called 'George Best and 21 Others'). I thought 'Manchester United Ruined My Life' had a degree of charm and I seem to remember the accompanying TV documentary being viewed very favourably at the time by Blues. And 'The Worst of Friends' was, I thought, a readable and convincing fictional portrayal of the breakdown in the relationship between Mercer and Allison, albeit that reliable sources report that the title upset the families of the two men.
I don't agree, to put it mildly, with his view on the current regime at City and I think that he imputes many ills to the regime at our club which apply more or less universally throughout the modern game. For that reason, I haven't felt any urge to seek out 'Manchester City Ruined My Life'. I also think he's a guy in his seventies who's maybe excessively prone to nostalgia for a football era that was almost certainly never as wholesome as he recalls. But I personally don't regard him as an enemy of MCFC on anything like the level that David Conn's reporting in the last month shows Conn to be.