Danny Wright Fan Mailbag: What’s happening with the West Brom takeover?
Every week we’ll be asking West Brom fans on our Facebook account for questions that will be answered by editor Danny Wright. You can join in by following the West Brom News Facebook account and watching out for weekly mailbag posts.
It’s no secret that West Brom fans are fed up with Guochuan Lai’s ownership of the club with the Chinese businessman showing absolutely no interest or ambition since his takeover in 2016.
However, there have been glimmers of hope for Albion supporters with the Daily Mail reporting in January that Lai is “desperate to sell” the Black Country club, which has attracted attention from elsewhere.
Since then, it’s all gone a bit quiet and in our latest edition of the West Brom fan Q&A with West Brom News editor Danny Wright, we’ve been asked what the state of play is in regards to a potential takeover.
Takeovers are never a speedy process and any potential buyer is likely to be holding out on paying Lai’s asking price due to West Brom’s perilous position in the Premier League. With nine matches left to play, Sam Allardyce’s men are 19th, 10 points shy of safety and have the worst goal difference in the top-flight. Lai might want a Premier League price for the Baggies – but he’s only going to get Championship offers due the present situation.
Earlier this month, the Daily Mail offered a bit of an update on the situation regarding Lai’s ownership (whether he is the actual owner is another subject that can be read about here or listened to on the brilliant Liquidator podcast). Matt Hughes reported on March 12 that “West Brom are back on the open market” after an exclusivity period with a potential buyer passed due to a failure to agree on a price with Lai. It is understood there’s friction between Lai and chief executive Xu ‘Ken’ Ke over the valuation of the club, which is bound to slow things down even further.
In a nutshell, nothing huge has happened and we’re no closer to seeing Lai sell West Bromwich Albion now than we were when reports started to emerge about his willingness to make a sale. I understand the frustration with this but it seemed to take an age for Jemery Peace to pass over ownership to Lai and you only have to look at Newcastle to see how difficult an agreement can be.
Hopefully, there’ll be some movement once the club is officially relegated but if that happens, it has the potential to disrupt recruitment and the possible appointment of a new manager. Either way, the sooner and quicker it’s done the better.
In other West Brom news, Kevin Phillips expects this £7million-rated ace to quit the Albion in the summer.
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