If you want to be thanked by a grateful nation, don’t ever buy a failing football club, especially not in a city where the local team has a tribal following. That is the moral of the tale of Mike Ashley, who has just stepped down as chief executive of Sports Direct’s parent company.
Never mind creating, or saving, 20,000 jobs. Never mind fighting price-fixing by rivals determined to rip off impressionable young football fans desperate to own their club’s strip. Never mind being brave enough to invest in High Street stores which almost everyone else thinks are doomed. Ashley’s public reputation was always going to be dependent on the performances of Newcastle United’s footballers. If they didn’t win trophies – and they had never won the FA cup since 1955 nor the football league since 1927 – Ashley was always going to be bogeyman.
Until he bought the heavily indebted Newcastle United in 2007 few, indeed, had even heard of Mike Ashley
Until he bought the heavily indebted Newcastle United in 2007 few, indeed, had even heard of Mike Ashley.
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