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He had t give up today, as otherwise he would have lost the club to RBS tomorrow. He was just trying to cause problems and gain media attention to try and interest other parties - but the deal with NES was signed and sealed by the board, acting on his behalf, so there was little he could do, even if some Arab had come in offering £500m for the club... Hicks will lose less money in selling to NESV than he would had the club gone into administration and under RBS control. I hope Gillett can sue Hicks for his losses, given Hicks wreckless decision to block the £500 million sale to DIC in 200 has caused million of pounds of losses for Gillett.

Hopefully now, we can start getting back to dealng with footballing matters, and it gives a couple of months rebuild squad morale for 2011!

Finally, it should be all over, and Hicks should be gone!

I shall wait till its gone through before I do my banana dance though lol.

BBC Sport Report

http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?c_id=bos&content_id=12766377&tcid=fb_video_12766377

A good video that Henry posted on his Twitter yesterday for LFC fans to help us understand who NESV are and what they have achieved.

Liverpool have confirmed New England Sports Ventures have completed their takeover of the club

After a week of drama off the pitch John Henry's NESV have finally completed their takeover of the club after Tom Hicks and George Gillett accepted defeat in their bid to prevent a sale.

American duo Hicks and Gillett lifted the final obstacle standing in NESV's way by removing the restraining order they won in a Texas court to block the proposed sale.

However, Hicks and Gillett have announced they plan to sue for "at least $1.6billion" for "an extraordinary swindle".

Hicks, who believes the NESV sale undervalues Liverpool, had been trying to sell his stake to Mill Financial, a USA-based hedge fund, so they could pay the club's debt to the Royal Bank of Scotland and scupper the takeover.

Mill Financial had approached the Premier League to take the mandatory owner's test on Thursday, but were rejected when the league told the fund they could only take instruction from the Liverpool board, led by chairman Martin Broughton, who have already agreed to sell to NESV for £300 million.

NESV's takeover means the Royal Bank of Scotland will be paid the £237million they are owed and the threat of administration is avoided.

Liverpool's board agreed to sell the club to NESV for £300million last week, but the deal was upheld as Hicks and Gillett opposed the deal.

The news ends Hick's and Gillett's turbulent ownership of the club after they gained control at Anfield in 2007


SKY SPORTS NEWS

Boston boys have bought it!

Although I am a bluenose I guess I'm kinda happy that it's been sorted out. What I am struggling to understand though is this...even though I own my house & do not wish to sell it, can someone who takes a fancy it force me through the courts to sell it to them for less than market value?

Please advise.

H&G handed the responsibility to oversee the sale of the club to the board of directors (Martin Broughton, Christian Purslow and Ian Ayre) in a legally binding contract, and thus relinquished their right to either take part or interfere with the sale. The board was setup by Barclays Capital to work in the best interests of the owners to obtain the best deal possible. There was almost certainly some clause in the contract whereby Hicks and Gillett could excercise a right to sack the board and regain full control of the club and sale, but not retospectively. The deal had been done/signed minutes before Hicks attempted to sack the board, and this was why it too was legally binding.

As I understand it, Hicks will be looking to sue these and not Liverpool FC for not obtaining the best deal on the table, though I doubt the lawsuit will get anywhere in all honesty.

This is why when Hicks trid to scupper the deal and sack the board retrospectively and render the takeover deal/contract null and void, the British High Court ruled that this move would be illegal, and warned Hicks not to appeal.

He got his injunction in Texas, but it had no jurisdiction in the UK and thus could not really be enforced. However the British High Court ruled he was required to remove it by 16:00 today, otherwise the deal would go through regardless (also, there may have been legal wranglings in the US which may have delayed the deal, especially with NESV being a US company). I think the primary intention for this decison by the high-court however, was in the interest of fairness, to give him time to consult his legal team with regards any options he had left.

He removed the injunction (which really was his signal of intent to give up with his legal dispute against the takeover by NESV) and thus the deal with NESV, which was already signed before Hicks kicked off, went through. He had little in the way of choice, because he should stand to make a smaller loss by selling it to NESV rather than watching it fall into administration and under the ownership of RBS tomorrow.

Im not a legal expert, but thats the way I understand it atm. Im sure there is more to it, but I think thats a basic outline.
I do feel the board have actively set out to seek the best deal for the club as opposed to the owners, which is why Hicks has his knickers in a twist... had he have had his own way, he would have sold us down the river, so long as he made profit from it. In this respect, I can understand his annoyance, but thats for him to deal with with or without the aid of courts etc...

Very informative reply Matt.

Now that its done and dusted and only time will tell how successful its going to be. Its about time this ridiculous rule of deducting points from teams who are in financial trouble was done away with. Whats the point, invariably it sends an already struggling team into a lower division where they can earn less revenue, possibly drive away supporters and sponsors.