Breaking News Interview with Justin Rees for the Guardian Australia

[crangoner]

Australian IT millionaire buying struggling English football club says it makes ‘perfect sense’

Justin Rees forms consortium to invest in 117-year-old Southend United while travelling around Europe on gap year

www.theguardian.com

 

[Strykr]

Starting to like the cut of his jib.

Been a while since we had proper businessman at the club.

Also you cant underestimate the impact kev and his team have had in helping this to happen. Imagine if rees came over and chocolate Brown, southampton Sol or ipad boy molesley were in charge..... (shudder).

 

[Che's Left Foot]

“There’s a 117-year old football club that was big, and is about to be extinct. If I can look back when I’m 70 and think, wow, I helped prevent that, I’ll be very happy.”

Marry me

 

[tommy tucker]

Sounds the guy knows what he is letting himself in for .I'm sure that when the whole consortium get going .The club will go from strength to strength.

 

[Holy Joe]

Interesting article. Sounds like he'll be relatively hands on. Interesting how the consortium was formed, appears he didn't know any of them a few months ago.

And he's never visited Roots Hall! He's in for an eye opener! **Edit** he has visited RH just not for a game

 

[TheSouthendUnitedRunner]

Really interesting article.

I really don’t know much about Rees, but the more I’m finding out, the more I’m likely what he is about and what he has to say.

 

[tommy tucker]

Interesting article. Sounds like he'll be relatively hands on. Interesting how the consortium was formed, appears he didn't know any of them a few months ago.

And he's never visited Roots Hall! He's in for an eye op

 

[Holy Joe]

Other thing that I just thought of - he said he heard about our plight on the BBC. Wonder if that was one of the articles on the protests? Like to think they raised the profile enough to attract a buyer!

 

[tommy tucker]

Interesting article. Sounds like he'll be relatively hands on. Interesting how the consortium was formed, appears he didn't know any of them a few months ago.

And he's never visited Roots Hall! He's in for an eye opener!

i would guess as all the concortium are southend fans .And as one has been heverly concerned with southend united for some years .He would have told ress what th club is like .And the state the ground is in .

 

[lreed567]

I like the idea he sees it as a exciting challenge to turn the club around, and wants the club to be self sustainable, pretty much what we all want. If what we've heard is true then RM has to contribute 20mill to roots hall (believe that when we see it) the management and playing staff are great too, kev isn't going to want to spend fortunes and has proven he can work with no money, we are also probably 3 or 4 good players short

 

[Smiffy]

"The bid only came together in the past three months. The other five in the consortium are Southend fans who Rees met through the club after he initially expressed an interest"

I'm still confused how this lot managed to find themselves in a room together thrashing out a deal to buy us. Has someone gone out and hand picked this lot and got them around the table? Or were these 6 interested as individuals, but all agreed to join forces? Someone must of pulled it all together....Tom, Gary?

How does an Aussie travelling across Europe, bump into 5 blokes he doesn't know from Hong Kong, Rayleigh, Southend etc and suddenly they all decide yeah let's buy a dying NL club?

It's bizarre, but I love it. I'd like to know the full story once the deal is done. Could be a perfect one for an opening fans forum, with a beer.

 

[Leigh_Seasider]

I like the sound of him. We just need to pay our bills and we don’t need to sign superstars, we’ve already proven we can unearth a gem or two or produce our own. We’ve already got a great football set up and a great management team. Having actual Southend fans involved is great too, hopefully work will be done to really connect with the local community and improve our reach and reputation. It all sounds good.

 

[GIBBO]

What a ****ing man. RONALD RAT take note!

 

[united we stand]

Other thing that I just thought of - he said he heard about our plight on the BBC. Wonder if that was one of the articles on the protests? Like to think they raised the profile enough to attract a buyer!

That is a really good point, but I’m not sure that the timings line up?

 

[united we stand]

Interesting article. Sounds like he'll be relatively hands on. Interesting how the consortium was formed, appears he didn't know any of them a few months ago.

And he's never visited Roots Hall! He's in for an eye opener!

It states he met Kev at roots hall.

He may/may not have watched a match at roots hall

 

[Rob1920]

He sounds very entrepreneurial, a force of nature in the business world. I would suggest once his mission is complete and he’s got us back established in L1, rebuilt stadium, finances stable etc., he’ll move on to another project. But that’s fine, we’d all be eternally grateful and he’d always be a shrimper.

 

[Seagull!]

Sound like a terrible man. Probably a closet Col U fan.

We want Martin back…...we want Martin back

On a serious note, imagine if he hadn’t seen the story on the BBC. Would the rest of the consortium have somehow managed to get it over the line?

 

[Holy Joe]

It states he met Kev at roots hall.

He may/may not have watched a match at roots hall

I read in an Echo article that he would be making his debut at Roots Hall on Oct 21 - guess I've misunderstood!!

 

[Spaceman Spiff]

It states he met Kev at roots hall.

He may/may not have watched a match at roots hall

I think it was an Echo article yesterday that said he’s only been to two away fixtures - Daggers the first I believe. Just think, some of us would have been standing / sitting next to him! Very much doubt he would have been in the directors area. If only we knew that our (touch wood) saviour was right there watching us hand Daggers their *** on a plate.

He’s aiming to be at Roots Hall for Solihull - and I wouldn’t bet against the takeover completing by then if it’s possible.

 

[Avl1983]

I like the idea he sees it as a exciting challenge to turn the club around, and wants the club to be self sustainable, pretty much what we all want. If what we've heard is true then RM has to contribute 20mill to roots hall (believe that when we see it) the management and playing staff are great too, kev isn't going to want to spend fortunes and has proven he can work with no money, we are also probably 3 or 4 good players short

I was wondering with this, is it less that Ron has to actually hand over £20 million to us and is it more that RM will wipe that amount off of our debt balance? Don't we owe apparently him something in the region of that amount for rent for Roots Hall that he has never officially charged us for and has always said he would wipe off?

If RM simply has to wipe the debt balance off the club when he gets to a certain stage of planning, like it's a prerequisite that he has to wipe that amount of debt off of the club before he can move to phase 3 for example. That way if he never gets to phase 3 then he can try to get the money back from the club, and if he does then he makes a fortune from the housing, either way RM will get his money which I could see him agreeing to but he wouldn't have to actually hand over £20 mill which to me seems very unlikely.