EXCLUSIVE with Graeme Bailey
Things have gone a bit quiet on Tony Bloom’s proposed investment in Hearts but the Brighton owner is looking to have it completed early this year.
Talk of the investment first started last year and it was even claimed Bloom wanted to pump £10million into the Jambos. The Tynecastle club confirmed talks were taking place with the English entrepreneur.
That came after Hearts announced a link-up with Jamestown Analytics, the data analytics firm founded by Bloom, which allows them exclusive Scottish use of the company’s algorithm for identifying talent, as well as in other areas for club improvement.
Jam Tarts fans have been hoping for and expecting news on the investment side of things but the 54-year-old likes to conduct his business quietly and that has been the case here.
Bloom aims for 20 per cent Hearts stake
While it has been widely reported that Bloom is looking to invest in the club and become a minority shareholder, the stake which he would take up has not been known.
Not the Old Firm understands the Brighton owner is hoping to buy up 20 per cent of the Scottish Premiership side and still hopes to have it concluded by the summer.
It is understood the Seagulls see Hearts as a nice landing spot for players coming from overseas who could perhaps develop playing in Scotland before making the jump to the Premier League.
A lot of English top flight clubs have admired what Chelsea owners BlueCo have done with Strasbourg and would like to replicate that.
Bloom recently bought a 19.1 per cent shareholding in Melbourne Victory but that is understood to be a side project linked to his Aussie wife and not connected to Brighton.
What Hearts have said on Bloom and Jamestown Analytics
Hearts have already been using the Jamestown model to recruit Elton Kabangu, Michael Steinwender, Sander Kartum, Jamie McCart and Harry Milne in January, and it looks to be bearing fruit.
They hope it will give them the edge in the transfer market and take the club to the next level.
Back in October, CEO Andrew McKinlay said: “We are allowed to use analytics .We are hoping to do something that can help us with the analytics from the first instance. There is chat about investment and that is more around FoH and others who hold shares. It’s exciting, it should be exciting and looking forward to having a bit more to say on it.
“The investment would be nice. I know there are numbers being talked about, but those numbers might be a bit wide of the mark. The investment is going to be great, it’s going to help, but it’s not the exciting bit of this. The exciting bit for me is access to the analytics. If you look at how analytics has been used at other clubs, and how successful it’s been at other clubs, you can’t help but be excited.
“When I first came into the club, we’d just been demoted. I remember saying I wanted to get us back to being the third force in Scotland. I got abuse because I wasn’t showing enough aspiration. I learned quickly. I’ve never said in an interview that we should be first or second. That’s always been on my mind.
“I’ve always struggled to think how you do that from a financial perspective. Unless something goes wrong with one of the other two, that’s a different thing. You’re constantly looking for something else that can allow you to close that gap because their finances are miles ahead.
“When analytics comes along as an opportunity, a chance to use it properly, we should get a standard of player that allows us to close that gap. And genuinely, hopefully at some point, challenge. Whether it’s in second place or maybe in time it would be lovely to be right up there.
“It would be brilliant for Scottish football. Whether it’s Hearts or someone else, we’re all dying to have more than two teams every year who can win the league. I see this as a genuine opportunity to do that.
“The analytics doesn’t just do recruitment. It can be very helpful with opposition analysis. We do a lot of that ourselves already. This adds another layer to these sorts of things.”
Insisting they wouldn’t become a feeder club to Brighton, he added: “One of the crucial things is the Foundation. They’ve been quite clear about their red lines for things that they wouldn’t want.
“What we won’t do is enter into anything which is a link up with another club or akin to a feeder. Which is why when individuals are talked about it’s not helpful because people then naturally think if an individual were linked to other clubs. The one thing I can say categorically is there are no links here to any other football club.”