Nick Leeson interview from Guardian (UK)
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/sport/20...ay_laughing_al.
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Leeson gets Galway laughing all the way to the bank
With the new League of Ireland season starting tonight, it's worth noting how Nick Leeson has repaired a struggling club - and his reputation.
Barry O'Donovan March 8, 2007
Comedian Ardal O'Hanlon often jokes that he'd love to do an interview with Neil Armstrong and never mention the moon, just for kicks. Well, what if we were to mention the name Nick Leeson and not (OK, maybe briefly) draw attention to a certain financial institution which he bankrupted to the tune of over a billion dollars? What if there were a story which painted him in a slightly different light?
A couple of years ago, Leeson became commercial manager, then general manager (think Peter Kenyon with a lot less money to spend) of Galway United in the west of Ireland. And he's only gone and made them the best-run club in the country. Hell, they even turned a small, almost six-figure profit in 2006 (profit being a word that provoked laughter of the gasping for breath kind when mentioned as a possibility in Irish football to a bunch of owners and directors at the end of last year). And we're not dishing platitudes around willy-nilly here - the bestest this and the bestest that - because Galway are officially the finest run club in these parts.
You see, for the shiny new league that gets under way tonight, there was an application process where clubs were measured by on- and off-field criteria (it was a 50% split) and then divided into two divisions. Galway finished third in the second division in 2006, and their record for the previous four seasons wasn't up to much, but they got voted into the top division by clocking up a whopping 389 points from 500 in the off-field side of things, the next closest being 374. Champions Shelbourne ended up with 278.
So despite losing three times to Dundalk over the campaign and finishing two points behind them, they made the move up on the back of their excellence away from the pitch - the off-field stuff was mainly scored on finances, infrastructure, attendance potential, plans for the future and such like. Leeson's area, in fact.
Some of the facts and figures are impressive, even if it's a bit like praising Middlesbrough for being great to watch in comparison with, say, Watford. Galway are heading into year three of a five-year plan that is pretty much Leeson's baby: there's a separate committee with different expertise for finance, for marketing, etc.; they've brought attendances up from lows of 300 a couple of years back to an average of 1,100 and sell-outs of 3,200 at the end of last season. Hardly all Leeson's work but then again club director Niall O'Reilly has labelled him the "brains behind the operation" and the "glue that binds the whole structure together" in a genuinely thankful bout of back-slapping.
O'Reilly also reckons Leeson is as good as there is at dealing with and twisting the arms of sponsors. He's popular with the fans because he works round the clock for the club, he's enjoying it all and, if the background brings a little profile, what harm.
And it's the thinking outside the box, small and large scale fundraising schemes that have Leeson's, ahem, fingerprints all over them. The five-a-side tournament that's been on a few summers now, where locals get a chance to play against teams of some local and national celebs. The Black and White ball that's on this Friday, with Mario Rosenstock (he of those Jose Mourinho takeoff songs fame) as entertainer, has sold about 600 tickets at €150 a pop. The trips organised across the water to big games - they've taken in Man Utd-Celtic, Man Utd-Chelsea and have plans for the Manchester derby and Sunderland-Wolves. The link-up with Sunderland will mean Roy Keane bringing the team to Galway for a friendly in August - the week of the Galway races. All simple enough ideas for sure. But are many other clubs in Ireland doing anything remotely similar? No.
There's a spanking new stand going up right now with 1,500 seats that Leeson intends filling in the next couple of years. Only a couple of weeks ago, he spoke of Galway having a state-of-the-art stadium in less than 10 years, a ground that'd generate enough income to run itself and not rely on gate receipts once every fortnight. He's drawn up the budget for the coming year (around the €1.1m mark if you're asking) and if there's an element of a gamble, it's that relying on attendances here is a tricky business.
Chances are that the coming season could be a struggle on the whole old-fashioned winning-more-games-than-the-other-teams side of things, though Galway have made a few nice signings in Shane Tracey, Stephen O'Flynn and Regi Nooitmeer. Still, when the champions are on life support, others are struggling with taxes and wages or are part-time and others need large business investment and ground sales to flash the cash, it's good to know that getting by is possible through clever marketing and hard work. And Leeson running a tight ship.
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