Chapter 838: The Secret Investment

At night, when the lights came on, Southampton's Glory Square was crowded with people, and everyone was still immersed in the joyful atmosphere of the team's 4-0 victory over Arsenal in the afternoon and winning the Community Shield.

In the seaside box of Wangjiang Pavilion in the square, Yang Huan was warmly entertaining Klaus Michael Kuhn and others.

The trip to Staplewood in the afternoon left the Hamburg fans with nothing but shock and amazement.

Even Klaus Michael Kuhn spoke highly of the Saints.

If Guardiola's Barcelona is a phenomenal team, then Southampton now is a phenomenal club!

A team relies on players and tactics, but a club is not just about players and tactics, it also includes operations and management.

And everyone knows that even when Barcelona achieved its peak performance, the operation and management of the Spanish Super League giants was still a mess.

Before this, many people in the delegation would have opposed such a statement, thinking that it was too high an evaluation of the Saints. However, after Staplewood's inspection, they were unable to refute it.

So, when they saw Yang Huan again, looking at this young Chinese man in his early twenties, their feelings were obviously completely different from when they met at Wembley Stadium at noon.

At the very least, there was less contempt and more admiration in everyone's eyes.

After three rounds of wine and five dishes, all the polite chatter was over and the conversation got down to business.

"Master Huan, I'm very interested to know how you position the hamburger?"

Klaus Michael Kuhn is obviously a very straightforward person, quick and decisive, without any dragging of words.

Yang Huan was sitting next to him. After listening, he glanced at the people sitting around the round table and found that everyone had stopped eating and chatting and was looking at him, obviously waiting for his answer. He immediately smiled.

"I'm afraid it's not appropriate for me to say this. It's not my turn to say this, right?"

The subtext of what Master Huan said is that I am a small shareholder, there are only two people on the board of directors, and I don't have much say.

If one day you fan representatives get unhappy and join forces with the board of directors, wouldn’t I be finished?

Kuhn knew that Master Huan's words were somewhat provocative, but he didn't take it to heart.

"Master Huan, let's put it this way, if you were in charge of Hamburg, how would you run it?"

Yang Huan raised the corner of his mouth and thought to himself, this is finally interesting!

"That depends on how far I, as the master, can go." Young Master Huan replied calmly.

Kuhn and Otto looked at each other and saw the helplessness in each other's eyes.

This Young Master Huan is really aggressive!

But, it’s no wonder when you think about it, who made Khoff and others such a scumbag?

"Then please tell us in detail, Master Huan!" Alexander Otto said with a smile.

Yang Huan also smiled and nodded, saying, "In my opinion, the reason why Bayern Munich is the only dominant team in the Bundesliga is mainly due to two issues, namely the so-called fiscal policy and management system of balanced revenue and expenditure."

There is no need to say much about the fiscal policy and management system for balancing revenue and expenditure. The literal meaning is easy to understand.

As for the so-called fifty plus one system, it is not what the fans understand it to be, that is, a private individual cannot hold more than forty-nine percent of the shares.

This is wrong!

In the DFB's rules, they mean that clubs must maintain more than 50 percent of the voting rights.

It's voting rights, not controlling rights!

In other words, you can sell all the shares in the club, as long as you have the voting rights.

This season, Yang Huan acquired Hamburg and placed Thomas Recke and Beiersdorf on the board of directors. Both of them have considerable actual power, but when it comes to voting rights, it is very low.

Another situation is like RB Leipzig. After acquiring Leipzig, they simply hired several local German employees to form a puppet board of directors and hold the voting rights of the club.

But everyone knows that this is taking advantage of a loophole, because what can these German employees vote on?

Isn’t it the capital behind the scenes that has the final say on everything?

The same situation also occurred in the transaction where Belgian billionaire Roland Ducharette acquired Carl Zeiss Jena.

This is how the world is. Every rule has loopholes.

Here, we must mention the attitude of the German Football Association and the origin of the so-called fifty-plus-one policy.

The Bundesliga football clubs have many similarities with the La Liga, and they both adopted a membership system at the beginning.

However, after entering the 1990s, with the popularity of television broadcasting, the football economy developed rapidly, and the emergence of the Bosman Act led to increased player mobility and frequent transfers.

Under such circumstances, the corruption and inefficiency brought about by the membership system have restricted the development of Bundesliga teams.

It can be said that the current Hamburg is almost a model of the Bundesliga teams in the 1990s.

The financial revenue is good, but the team is not competitive and is deeply in debt crisis. Even the most important foundation of football, that is, youth training, is done quite poorly.

It can almost be said that the entire German professional football league at that time was like this.

Therefore, in those years, there were almost no good young training talents in German football, which directly led to a talent gap in Germany.

In the 1994 World Cup, Germany was eliminated in the quarter-finals and lost to Bulgaria.

Although Germany won the European Cup in 1996 with the help of Klinsmann, Bierhoff and others, it was soon defeated 0-3 by Croatia in the quarter-finals of the 1998 World Cup.

In the 2000 European Championship, the German team ranked last in the group stage, with one draw and two losses. In particular, the loss to England and the 0-3 loss to Portugal were considered a disgrace in the German football world.

Therefore, this made Germany, all of them, make up their minds and launch a massive reform of youth football training.

But matching the youth training reform is the club restructuring.

Everyone realizes that the membership system is no longer suitable for the current professional football world.

Except for Real Madrid, Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao, all other La Liga teams have completed the reform.

The German Football Association is relatively conservative and has adopted a fifty-plus-one policy, allowing clubs to sell shares and retain more than 50 percent of the voting rights, which is a more compromising approach.

Therefore, Dortmund went public in 2000, and Bayern Munich successively sold shares to Audi and Adidas.

On the contrary, Hamburg, due to its ample financial revenue, has retained its membership-based management model, which has been the root cause of Hamburg's deteriorating situation in the past decade or so.

"The balanced fiscal policy has forced all teams to tighten their belts and spend as much as they earn. This has certainly ensured the healthy financial operation of the league, but it has also created another problem."

At this point, Yang Huan took the initiative to reveal the mystery, "That is, the strong will become stronger, and the weak will become weaker. Over time, even the mid- and lower-level teams will lose their aggressiveness."

This is not difficult to understand.

Just like Bayern Munich and Hamburg.

Bayern Munich's annual financial revenue is as high as more than 400 million, which can ensure that they can offer high salaries that no other team in the Bundesliga can offer, introduce the best players in the Bundesliga, and even introduce the best superstars in Europe, to ensure their dominance in the Bundesliga and competitiveness in European football.

But burgers?

How much does one Javi Martinez cost?

Can I buy a burger? Can I buy it?

Think about it again, when Bayern Munich treats the entire Bundesliga as its own player processing factory and makes great strides in European football, and continuously increases its financial revenue through excellent management, other Bundesliga teams can hardly catch up. Over time, who will still have the ambition to compete with them?

"Looking at the current Bundesliga, Dortmund is one of the few teams with ambitions, but so what?"

Yang Huan shook his head and sneered, "Dortmund's financial revenue is not too bad in the Bundesliga, but compared with Bayern Munich, it is far behind. So if they want to poach Gotze, they can poach Gotze. If they want Lewandowski, they can poach Lewandowski. Can Dortmund resist?"

Yang Huan said this not to criticize Bayern Munich.

In fact, this is a very business-like behavior.

Isn’t there a saying?

The business world is like a battlefield, where it’s a fight to the death. You need to strengthen yourself and weaken your opponents.

After hearing this, Kuhn and others all agreed.

This is indeed the case in the Bundesliga right now. No team has the ambition or the strength to challenge Bayern Munich's dominance.

"Master Huan, what you said is absolutely correct, but have you ever thought about it? The other teams in the Bundesliga are now in a stage of accumulating capital. Once they have completed the capital accumulation, who dares to say that they will not have the strength and ambition to challenge Bayern Munich in the future?"

Kuhn's words were very unique, and even Yang Huan kept nodding after hearing them.

"Yes, Mr. Kuhn, you are right, but capital accumulation always takes time and a long process. I don't believe that with the current management level and business model of the Bundesliga teams, their management can have such a long-term plan. What I see is more of muddling along."

Although Kuhn was not very willing to admit it, he knew that what Yang Huan said was indeed the truth.

For the current Bundesliga teams, except for Bayern Munich and Dortmund, other teams can't see any hope of going further. So let me ask, who would be willing to work hard and fight for an invisible hope?

From this point, it is not difficult to see that although Yang Huan is not impressed with the management level of the Bundesliga team, it also reflects his confidence in himself and his team.

"I'm in an awkward situation in Hamburg right now!"

Yang Huan waited until Kuhn and others had digested his words before continuing.

"I really want to make a difference at the club, but I am being held back everywhere."

After a pause, Young Master Huan let out another long sigh.

"You guys know Dr. Howard Hamilton, right?"

"Yeah!" Everyone nodded.

The experts at Southampton Data Analysis Research Center are awesome.

"Tuchel told me before that Hamburg had problems with physical training and wanted to find an expert in this area. Dr. Howard Hamilton introduced Shad Fawcett, the current American physical trainer of the German national team."

Shad Fawcett?

Kuhn and others obviously know nothing about this. This man is not famous at all.

"This guy was hired by Klinsmann from the United States with a large sum of money. He previously played for an American rugby club and is very good at physical training. He played an indispensable role in the German national team's victory in the World Cup this year."

"Really?" Kuhn was a little surprised.

He didn't expect that there was such a powerful person in the Hamburg team, and he didn't even know about it.

Looking at Alexander Otto and others, they all looked confused.

Yang Huan was not surprised by this, because if he was not an expert, who would know?

"But did you know that when Shad Fawcett arrived in Hamburg, he wanted to make some adjustments to the club's training facilities and plans? As a result, when the board heard that it would cost money, they immediately shook their heads like windmills and directly called a halt. How could they continue to work?"

As he spoke, Master Huan felt a bit sad for Shad Fawcett's wasted talent.

Kuhn frowned when he heard this, and a hint of anger flashed in his eyes.

Obviously, they think that the management's approach is too messed up!