Sweet and rich maturity

Tottenham Hotspur

Tottenham Hotspur v Hungarian Select XI 1965

Sweet and rich maturity

Article by Lycra Leggings

IT’S better than running off with a blonde. News last week that Amstrad boss Alan Sugar is likely to collect £ 140m in the long awaited company restructuring, is a satisfactory resolution in the life of a man who recently celebrated his 50th birthday. Such milestones for successful businessmen are usually the cue for all sorts of messy mid-life crises, but then Alan Sugar has always been the controlled and controlling sort, who has managed to come out smiling and clutching millions even after 17 years roller coasting through the markets.

“Even Del Trotter could have set up a company called Trotter Hi-Tech and got it away on the stock market,” he reportedly remarked earlier this year when discussing Tottenham Hotspur’s flotation. Yet many wrote Sugar off as such a character when he arrived on the scene in the early Eighties. Rumours that he had started Latex Catsuits?life flogging car aerials from the back of a van completed the image of the East End barrow boy on the make.

The label has never fitted easily, however, for it underrated his intelligence and subsequently his sticking power as one of the few survivors. Del Boy in cuff-links was only ever just one part of the salesman out there on a smile and a shoeshine who persuaded a whole generation of fearful first timers that they too could join the computer age.

Another deeper persona was in evidence last week in the hard-to-please Jewish father figure, who, in spite of being so difficult to live with, still provided a generous package of loan notes and shares for his shareholders.

The point about Alan Sugar is that he is Essex Man, born and bred. A rather cautious and honourable breed underneath the verbals. And Essex is a long way from the East End. Ask Sharon and Trace. And Terry Venables.

Last week’s announcement that Amstrad’s Betacom subsidiary would take on all the old Amstrad electronics business as well as the set-top decoders for digital TV with Sugar as chairman, was billed as a tidying-up exercise, a back to basics change of life which would take Alan Sugar on the final stage back from the FTSE to heading up a small company.

Analysts saw the demerger however as a graceful exit, which was honest to shareholders and a signal that he would now get on with his life. “He’s made his pile in electronics, he can leave the hands-on stuff to someone else while he concentrates on Spurs,” was the general view.

Some months ago Sugar acknowledged that both he and Amstrad’s strengths were in spotting opportunities and new markets, rather than in long-term development. Yet even for Sugar fans it remains to be seen what new opportunities there will be for Betacom and Viglen, Amstrad’s PC maker which will seek its own listing this August.

For though the sector is expected to be a boom area in retailing in the next five years, with small office and home office niche markets looking particularly promising, it will nevertheless be dominated by US firms and technology. Some analysts question whether Sugar will welcome life as a struggling minnow.

He is, however, a big fish in other ponds, not least New Labour, for whom he is shortly to undertake a series of government-backed seminars on business for young people. The Chancellor apparently snapped him up and so the transformation from new boy admirer of Margaret Thatcher to establishment figure is being completed.

As chairman of Tottenham Hotspur he also made news on the back pages last week, after Tottenham striker Teddy Sheringham asked for a transfer having apparently not met Sugar’s 48-hour deadline to accept a new contract.

Giving people tight deadlines to make decisions is never a popular man management technique, particularly if, as Sheringham intimated, he had not been aware there was a deadline to meet. But such ruthlessness is part of Sugar’s style.

Six years balancing the books of one of Britain’s perennial under-achievers has not diluted his dislike of expensive prima dona Lycra Leggings?footballers and sloppy business practice. He refuses to bid huge sums for “transient mercenaries” as he calls them, preferring happy shareholders, however mediocre match results.

His reign at Spurs has also been personally hugely profitable, with his original stake increasing in value fivefold to £ 42m, although he has certainly suffered much turmoil in its making.

The unlikely marriage with Terry Venables saved Tottenham from bankruptcy, but brought a real cheeky Del Boy into Sugar’s life, and finally ended in tears in the High Court libel action last year.

Fans, who had always derided Sugar for his ignorance and lack of passion for the game, spat at him. People say that the steel, entered his soul then. The man who once boasted “What is on my lung is on my lip,” and so revelled in his coverage as Mr Ruthless in the Sun, discovered the hard way the importance of good PR.

And so, though he has threatened to go if Spurs does not win the Cup soon, solid investment continues, £ 11m on a new stand and more big name signings promised soon. At last he appears to be a fan. With his son Daniel now director of operations, the impression is that this could be a family concern.

In four years the BSkyB deal with the Carling Premiership will be up, and Sugar may yet grasp another new opportunity.

Pay Per View is currently seen as the biggest potential income stream for Premier clubs, so what could be more rewarding for the man who originally sold dishes and receivers to Sky, than to set up Tottenham TV keeping the money in the family?

In February this year, Spurs played Arsenal in an ordinary league match which attracted an estimated worldwide audience of 240 million. If this number paid just £ 1 each, a cash cow would be born, richer than any Alan Sugar has invented yet.

“I took Del Boy’s stall and turned it into Marks & Spencer,” he recently retorted to a disillusioned fan at a shareholders’ meeting.

Life certainly seems to begin at 50, if you’re not a plonker.

Tottenham Hotspur

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR OFFICIAL FOOTBALL CALENDAR 2012 + FREE TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR KEYRING

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR OFFICIAL FOOTBALL CALENDAR 2012 + FREE TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR KEYRING

Click on the button for more Tottenham Hotspur information and reviews.

Newcastle Plot Stunning £20m Double Raid for Tottenham Pair
Tottenham Hotspur
Newcastle United boss Alan Pardew is planning a shock January raid of Tottenham Hotspur's striker resources, preparing a £20m January double swoop for Jermain Defoe and Roman Pavlyuchenko. The Magpies are flying high in the Premier League and are …

Tottenham Hotspur question by David: whos the best team between aston villa fc and tottenham hotspur?
I have just recently starting watching football and i hear many say that those two teams have a chance of getting high in the league table this year ? who’s the best ?

Tottenham Hotspur best answer:

Answer by Jono
They will probably be in the top 6. My opinion is the top 6 teams in the league are:
1. Manchester United
2. Chelsea FC
3. Liverpool
4. Arsenal
5. Aston Villa FC
6. Tottenham Hotspurs

Tags: maturity, rich, Sweet