It’s Daniel Levy doing what he does best, which is being a bell end. He always ends up selling, but he typically gets the deal he wants.
He will always add 20% on to the price he wants, knowing he will be negotiated down on the upfront, and have the total built up with add-ons.
I posted on here a few years back that I’d been in a boardroom with him, and I don’t trust him at all. In my case we were pitching a £1.2m outsource, it was all priced, negotiated, budgeted for, and ready for signature, then he got involved at the 11th hour.
We went down to London to to meet him and some of the Exec and he basically told us he wanted the contract at £750k, but couldn’t justify why apart from “that was his price”.
We just left, withdrew our proposal, and focussed on closing a couple of deals outside of football that were less high profile but more profitable.
Just grade A arrogance on his behalf, other member of his Exec who had worked on the deal for 6 months looked shocked, so he clearly didn’t loop them in on what he was planning to say.
My personal opinion on this is that City will give him an ultimatum, and pull out if he doesn’t agree to it. I don’t think we are likely to be bossed by him, our Exec team want full control.