The following article is based on the in-depth research of others. They have kindly allowed me to use it.
By Jason McKeown
In 1996, the German striker Fredi Bobic was part of the national team squad that won the European Championship in England. Bobic had been a peripheral part of the squad, only starting Germany’s opening game of Euro ’96. But it was still a great achievement for the Yugoslavian-born forward – and one that would have be watched from afar by one particular former team-mate, with a mixture of pride and envy.
Bobic had played alongside Edin Rahic. The future Bradford City co-owner emerged in the early 90s as a left winger of promise, turning out alongside Bobic for Stuttgart Kickers, who were then playing in Germany’s second tier. But whilst Bobic’s performances over this period earned him a move to top tier side VfB Stuttgart, Rahic’s time as a professional footballer would be over before it began.
He had ended up at VfL Sindelfingen in the third tier as a 19-year-old. Then, however, injury struck as the first of two ruptured Achilles initially stalled, and then finished, a budding career. He was 21. What might have been? It’s a question that eats away at thousands of people whose teenage dreams of making it as professional footballer were quashed by their early 20s. And it can leave a big hole in their life.
Rahic would reveal to the Yorkshire Post in April 2017, “Being forced to stop playing is probably the reason I bought Bradford City.”
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As Bobic’s career was flourishing, Rahic went back to school. He successfully gained a commercial qualification in Financial Accounting – Controlling at Mövenpick Deutschland GmbH, in Stuttgart. From there he achieved a Master’s degree in business economics (Dipl.-Betriebswirt FH) in Accounting – Finance Controlling (between 2000 and 2004) and in 2002 began working for RexRoth – a hydraulics company owned by Bosch.
Over a seven-year period with RexRoth, he was a Finance Manager and assistant to the Chief Finance Officer. At one stage he headed RexRoth’s Financial and Controlling Department, based in the Netherlands.
But as promisingly as his career in business was shaping up, a passion for football still burned inside. Over the 2003/04 season, Rahic joined the board at Stuttgart Kickers, helping to finance the club during a period of financial struggle. Perhaps even more significantly between 2005 and 2006 he completed an Executive MBA in General Management at HSG – University of St. Gallen. His time studying in Switzerland saw him meet and build up relationships with Urs Linsi, the former FIFA Secretary, and Martin Kallen of UEFA. It helped to stir his dream of owning a football club. He stated, “I’ve always wanted to know what’s going on behind the club, not on the pitch, there must be reasons why players are being pitched and others are not, why players are being bought.”
In the 2000s, Rahic’s football club ownership ambitions seemed more whimsical than serious, but a volatile few years for his accountancy career would focus his mind on football. First, in 2009, he joined HAWE Hydraulic as board member responsible for Finance and HR. Soon after, he became MD of the company. The man at the top. It didn’t end well. Under Rahic’s tenure, company profits fell by 77.4%. There may be very good reasons beyond Rahic for this downturn, but he departed the company in 2012, and his successor oversaw a quick recovery that has been subsequently maintained. You can draw your own conclusions.
Between 2012 and 2016, Rahic worked as a consultant for a firm he seemingly set up called Talenconcept. The nature and volume of his work is unclear.
It would appear that Rahic switched his attentions towards buying a football club. He spent some time working as a scout for Ralf Rangnick at VfB Stuttgart. Rangnick is the highly respected, heavily experienced German football manager, who in 2016 was approached by the FA about the England job, and interviewed for the position. Rahic might have hoped to do something with Rangnick, but Ralf joined the Red Bull organisation. He is currently sporting director at RB Leipzig and global sporting director of New York Red Bulls.
Instead, Rahic attempted to buy into Swiss side Grasshopper Zurich but found the cost too high. “I wanted to join Grasshoppers Zurich with their great talent factory. The idea was to play relatively fast with young kickers in European cup competitions. But they wanted an exorbitant amount of money.”
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Rahic’s next attempted club purchase was British, although North of the border to West Yorkshire. In 2012, Glasgow Rangers were reeling. Having fallen into administration, in June their bid to reach a CVA agreement failed and the club was liquidated, with the re-formed Rangers relegated all the way down to the fourth tier of Scotland. It needed a buyer.
Rahic teamed up with some investors to form a consortium based around former ‘Gers midfielder Jorg Albertz. The group of investors had been put together by Rahic in just five days, and they were one of the last three bidders for the basket case club, whose purchase price had dropped from 80 million Euros to 10 million in the space of three weeks. Rahic was pipped to the post by Sevco Scotland Ltd, fronted up by Charles Green.
Rahic later reflected, “With the Rangers I knew about the huge potential. Within five days I had a consortium together and we were one of the last three bidders before the club went under the table to an Englishman. But I’ve seen how you have to deal with such a thing. That you have to run a club with expertise, but otherwise like a business.” His attention remained on the UK. “In England, an incredible amount of money is flowing. The second division side, who wins the play-off final in Wembley and rises to the Premier League, has secured revenue of 250 million euros. I told some investors that could not believe it.”
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And so in-between 2012 and 2016 – whilst working as a consultant – Rahic’s strategy to buy an English club was developed. He carefully analysed clubs up and down the country, but became fixated by what he described as the Northern belt – clubs stretching across the North from Hull to Liverpool. All closely connected, guaranteeing numerous local derby fixtures and several Premier League academies that could be a cheap source of promising talent.
Rahic stated to the Yorkshire Post, “First, we looked at a map and London did not seem that interesting. There are so many clubs in the city that when you are a west London club, it can be difficult to get talent from east London. So, we decided against London.
“Looking at the rest of the map, it was clear the most interesting clubs were in a belt from Blackpool and Liverpool through to Hull. Basically, the north. There were some very interesting clubs in the north. But Bradford City stood out, as the club had done everything right to get the city involved.
“It was also a working-class club. Stefan and I are working-class so that appealed as well. And then there was the atmosphere.”
Rahic first made contact with Julian Rhodes and Mark Lawn in the spring of 2015, but discovered the Italian Gianni Paladini had got their first, and had just signed an exclusivity agreement with the City owners with a view to buying the club. Paladini hoped to be able to call upon the financial backing of his friends – some of the wealthiest people in the world – but ultimately he could not summon enough interest. The exclusivity agreement expired with no deal, allowing Rahic back in.
Bradford City’s 2015/16 season was played out with Rahic holding talks with Lawn and Rhodes, backed up by the financial resources of his new partner, Stefan Rupp. Rupp, whose crash proof helicopter seats company, Fischer Seats, earned him a fortune when he partially sold it in 2015, shared the same bank consultant as Rahic, who proposed that his two clients met up.
Rupp states in the Matter of Heart film, “Edin and I have the same bank consultant. And at some point, he called and said, ‘You know Edin Rahic? You know about his plans…He’s further along with his plans now, and he’s looking for a partner. I thought I’d call you, because I couldn’t think of anyone else crazy enough to invest their money in a project like that, other than you!’”
In November 2015, talks developed further and Rahic and Rupp attended Bradford City’s 0-0 draw with Coventry City on a cold Tuesday night. It was Rupp’s first-ever football match. But despite the lack of goals he enjoyed the match and the atmosphere. The negotiations continued to progress – the pair back in Bradford to see City’s March 2016 2-1 victory over Doncaster Rovers – and the deal was sealed in May 2016. City were purchased by the ER SportsGroup company, jointly owned by Rahic and Rupp.
Rahic has, of course, viewed the purchase of the club as a chance to instil his own philosophies and beliefs. He identified what he believes are flaws in the way English football clubs operate, and feels his model can exploit them and give City a competitive advantage. It hasn’t worked out that way, with his cost-cutting management approach sensible to his financial control background, but so far not proving conducive with bringing success to a club. Sooner or later, he must realise that his philosophies and core beliefs are not compatible with Bradford City.
Perhaps, with the appointment of David Hopkin, the penny belatedly dropped. After a week of rumours over Hopkin’s future, it is believed the head coach will go into January adequately backed and, crucially, with full control.
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The tailing off of Rahic’s business career underlines just how deeply welded he is to making Bradford City work. It is rumoured Rahic earns a large salary for his endeavours, and he has of course moved the family to West Yorkshire. If Rahic was to leave Bradford City, there’s probably not many other options for him.
But the big underlying question is how long the club can afford to go on like this? The club’s revenues have clearly dropped. It was on track to record a loss of £700k last season – and that was before Stuart McCall was sacked, triggering a run of events that saw season ticket and sponsorship revenue dip. Hopkin is clearly desperate to strengthen in January, and it falls on Rupp to inject more capital into the club. In terms of raising money by selling players, Charlie Wyke was arguably the last saleable asset. Tyrell Robinson’s off the field problems have eroded his transfer value. Shay McCartan could raise a few quid, but hardly a significant amount.
Rumours the players haven’t been paid this month have been denied. The scrapping of the Development Squad was to save costs. The first team squad is said to be subsidised by a favourable tie-up with Huddersfield Town that has allowed City to recruit Terriers players cheaply.
Whilst Rupp might be okay underwriting the club’s losses in the short-term, this is unlikely to remain the case forever. His investment was to make a return, not because of an obvious love of football. And right now it is questionable if he will achieve a profit, at least anytime soon. Whilst City remain in League One, revenues are limited – a drop to League Two will further scale back income. Equally, Rupp would be unlikely to let the club financially plummet, as it would affect the value of the business. Rumours of administration seem misplaced, given it would mean Rupp might have to write off millions. He is much smarter than that.
Rahic’s summer press comments about wanting City to have the opportunity to become a feeder club for a Premier League side caused a stir locally and nationally – at its heart, it would seem Rahic wants the opportunity to bring in top Premier League youth prospects, without having to pay a loan fee. A cheap way to build a football team, for an accountant who seemingly operates with the instinct of saving money. It is rumoured that Dougie Freedman’s presence at Accrington was part of talks to set up a tie-in with Crystal Palace similar to the one with Huddersfield.
The amount of non-playing staff who have left, not to be replaced, will have boosted efficiency, but clearly leaves the club a weaker organisation. There are, however, still some very good staff left at the club who work very hard. And your heart goes out to them working under a seemingly growing cloud of uncertainty. Rahic’s two-week holiday has been extended it seems. And at this point rumours are growing he won’t be returning to West Yorkshire anytime soon. If he does come back, you hope the time away has allowed him to reflect on the need to significantly change.
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In the short-term, Bradford City are in the midst of a relegation battle that the odds are against them winning, and the two-month wait for the January window to open might prove too long to limit the damage of current form. Meanwhile attendances are clearly dropping, and on the Kop at least there has been a notable decline in supporters willing to buy food and drink from the kiosks. No one – least of all Rahic and Rupp – wants to get relegated. But with the atmosphere so toxic, it’s difficult to see the strained relations between owners and supporters healing for everyone to come together.
Rupp is certainly not the bad guy in this story, and any attempts to paint him as the joint villain appear grossly unfair. He was sold a business idea and has injected his money and his enthusiasm, even though the sport is not really his passion. It’s not Rupp who has run the club dismally. Not Rupp who claims to know football. All that he has done is try to give the club the funding needed to be a success, only for others to miss-manage that investment. It will be hurting Rupp to see the club’s collapse, and you have to wonder if his faith in Rahic has been strained if not exhausted. But I don’t agree with tarring the pair with the same brush. On his own at least, Rupp and his considerable wealth can still offer a lot to Bradford City.
If Rahic and Rupp can’t salvage this collapse in their standing amongst fans, we’re ultimately left waiting for a change of ownership. For new leadership to emerge, that can not only halt the downturn but restore Bradford City to the progressive club it was between 2012 and 2017.
If Rahic and Rupp do still believe they turn it around, they must develop a better understanding of what Bradford City is all about, hire the right people to do the jobs, and slowly win back the trust of supporters who right now find it impossible to believe a word they say.
Things certainly can’t go on as they are. No one stands to gain. Not even Rahic, who has little else to fall back on.
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If you support independent, profit-free writing about Bradford City…
…you might also want to consider buying a copy of the new Bradford City book, Who We Are, written by Jason McKeown and published by Bantams Past. Details of the book and where to buy can be found here.
Categories: Opinion
widthofapost.com 
Another great article, show casing considered research. I understood that Rahic’s first degree was through an Open University course, rather than full time study.
The information in respect of the Bosch subsidiary rather than the highly successful parent business is as I understood it, and dare I say it not quite as prestigious as was originally reported.
What is very concerning is the reports in respect of Hawe Hydraulics, which seems to have suffered a serious downturn during his tenure. A pattern which seems to be happening once again at City. It is as though history is repeating itself, exceptionally worrying.
Your reminder that Rahic and Rupp have no established friendship, is informative.
Finally what is not clear, is just how Rahic could have amassed a substantial personal fortune, given his seemingly disjointed career history.
Very concerning.
Great points made. Does Rahic have a personal fortune though? I don’t think he owns much more than 10% of the club. So he paid £500,000 or so for the shares? And it sounds like he’s earning over £100,000 in salary as chairman. Unsubstantiated rumours suggest his wife is a highly-paid employee too, but that could be nonsense.
Is the specific ratio of the share ownership available publicly I wonder? Also, very disappointing that the club won’t release even slightly-detailed financial accounts. Without the fans they simply can’t survive at this level. We are essentially part-owners.
It is public info. Rahic owns 22.5% of the club.
They can and will achieve notoriety in Bradford. Shame but we need change and fast so we don’t heamorrage too many ST holders ….
Once again, a brilliant article, Jason. I’ve posed the question before, what is Rahic in it for? Pressure has to be brought to oust him. He is clearly fiddling whilst Rome burns. The pressure will probably come from Rupp who must now see he is carrying a lame duck. Is he in Bradford whilst Rahic is hiding in Germany, because a deal is being done. Is the pressure from Bradford businessmen and ex-players starting to build up? These are desperate times. It’s affecting the players who have lost confidence, and who are not up to it. If McCall was sacked because of results, Hopkins has been a disaster.
The feeling I’m getting is Rupp will look towards another invester buying out Rahic and an invester with solid background of running successful football club .
Bradford City must survive for Rupp to see any returns on his investment.
There is nothing wrong with selling players for profit just like Peterborough,Crewe have done over the years.
But you must satisfy the season tkt holders with squad good enough to mount serious promotion push throughout the season.
Over the years our club have sold players for good profits but the money was invested back into the 1st team squad.
Rupp only chance now is to back DH in January and next season get squad together capable of promotion surge.
If the club can get to the championship they’ll be more money brought into the club for Rupp to see any returns on his investment.
There are two key differences with regards to Peterborough.
One is that they are based ‘darn sarth’ so they have a much larger net to cast and will be able to attract players who might not want to go up north.
Secondly, they are prepared to spend several hundereds of thousands of pounds on non-leagye talent with great pedigree. Our owners won’t do that and have been too tight-fisted when it comes to looking for ‘value’, picking up PL youth rejects.
That’s not a terrible strategy but when you have too many of them, the likelihood is that you’ll have a squad not good enough for the league and that’s proven to be the case. You might find the odd diamond in the rough but most will likely not come off.
Yes you introduce youth very slowly with experienced lge1 players.
Unfortunately Rahic as underestimated the quality of lge1 football… it’s nothing like Germany lower level.
A great article and very informative. I must say I have very little sympathy for Mr Rupp. If City are relegated this season Rupp will likely own a Club where the outstanding debts are greater than the Market Value of the Club. In other words, he may have to pay a potential buyer to assume the debts.
In particular, the annual renewable Debenture which is held by a Bank and is a major source of Working Capital for the Club is possibly worth more than the adjusted Market Value for the Club following relegation. If this is the case, Rupp can expect the Bank to demand a seven figure cash pay down of the Debenture balance before renewing.
Avoiding relegation would significantly reduce these financial concerns and likely the cheaper option even with financial investment in January. However, it’s quite possible it will be too little too late and just add to the financial consequences due to mismanagement. City are likely to struggle to stay in touch with 20th place and safety over the next two months.
What if the plan all along was simply to asset strip? Rahic would be the perfect stooge for Rupp.
This would make perfect business sense…….buy a club in the black with a large season ticket income and a couple of players worth money…….use that money to pay off the purchase cost of the club in installments….pay yourself and your family large salaries……run down the club so that it is making significant losses and then write off your taxes against these losses. Then finally pay yourself back the share money you are owed writing that off as a loss and then walk away leaving the club to fall into administration.
This has happened so many times previously however is much harder to do if you are a british resident tax payer hence the money man being resident in Germany with his money registered in a protected company name. Sorry to be negative but for me the writing is on the wall.
Enjoyable read
The worrying part about that article if 100% true is the 77.4% downturn but then again his leadership at this club kinds of ties in. Rupp must have some backbone to make it this far in business, surely the man doesn’t wanna see his investment slither down the drain with a whimper, bad times ahead as ws’ll be cut we’ll adrift by January and pretty much unsaleable.
No. Sorry Jason but they can’t offer us anything, including Rupp who, as they say in N.America has fallen asleep at the wheel.
Rupp is completely culpable too.
Don’t forget what you said last year in your articles……. judge them after the close of the transfer window during the summer (after Wembley), in January (they will support Stuart) and then close season after he was sacked. WOAP belived how the transfer committee was a good idea. But each time we have been let down by their lies……
What did they deliver? How did they back Stuart?
It’s been remarkable how supportive WOAP has been of these two clowns considering what’s happened.
No. These two are poisen and sooner rid the better.
It looks like Simon Parker might finally start some objective reporting and take over the WOAP in saying how it is.
I bumped into a supporters trust member, who met Rahic, by pure chance yesterday, at Kings Cross station, London and we had a good chat albeit brief. The truth is indeed much stranger than fiction!
#RahicOut
#AndRuppToo
What the hell? You think we have been supportive of Rahic? I assume you do not read WOAP if you have missed article after article after article after article critising this ownership, for months and months, well before others. I got a hell of a lot of stick for it at the time.
Please read our stuff and if you think that is supportive then I don’t know what you expect. We are not a message board who are just going to write Rahic out.
And yes we did support the transfer committee approach and still do as a concept. It is just badly executed by this club but not in football.
A case of shoot the messenger if ever there was one. Simon P often gets it in the neck despite being a good jobbing journalist and a fair judge of club affairs. Patience and objectivity is not a commodity in ample supply amongst football fans so fair play to WOAP for getting it pretty much bob on. Rahic has become a pantomime villain to many and it is well to remember that blame can be attributed elsewhere (the “January Strikers” for example). Ultimately however the buck stops with Rahic. Really excellent piece of journalism …the best on WOAP for sometime. It would be interesting to know the source of information on ERs business background
Well I thought it was a very balanced report, explaining the background to the two owners. There was no assumption in it, just facts AND that’s what we need.
What we don’t need is the hysteria you get whenever you type #bcafc into twitter.
Now this is assumption but based on what I can see – Rahic is taking a back seat (a timeout) and Rupp has spoken instead. He has explained that they are backing Hopkin and that there is money available. The fact that since then Caddis is training with City (he is (or was) a quality wing back), suggests what he said is true.
As for Simon Parker, he could slag the club off but then he probably wouldn’t have a job for long!
Be real!
If Caddis is coming and he is still fit enough to play he is the kind of warrior we need fast
We all wanted the new regime to succeed and what they promised for the club was compelling enough to be given a chance to succeed. Accordingly it was right that people should have been patient.
Whilst Canadian Bantam speaks with a diploma in hindsight it’s worth highlighting that until the turn of the year by far the overwhelming majority of comments on this site were favourable about Rahic and prepared to give him benefit of the doubt.
It is clear that this shambles has been a failure of leadership and to be fair on Jason he has been critical and openly sceptical about what was happening at VP. Since the turn of the year the club has stumbled from one calamity to another and those leadership failings have become all the more apparent as Rahic has dug himself deeper into a hole. I believe WOAP deserves credit for having been responsible in its editorials, avoiding on the one hand negative slagging off and obsequious fawning on the other. Equally significant, the criticism has been constructive. WOAP has also played an important role in encouraging people to smell the coffee, notwithstanding that the happy clappers have remained enthusiastic to say otherwise that Rahic is a misunderstood individual.
The more fundamental point about supporter media – whether CG (which i edited thirty years ago) or WOAP – is that it relies not only upon the people who manage the outlet but the supporters who contribute to it. If you had felt that WOAP did not not accurate reflect the concerns of supporters like yourself then it begs the question why you did not offer your observations and criticism much sooner You could have put your head above the parapet and maybe even discarded your nom-de-keyboard to identify yourself.
Truth is indeed much stranger than fiction on occasions. So too things are not necessarily as black and white or as simplistic as some would like to believe. Ultimately you have the benefit of choice and maybe you should take refuge in the Cow’s Arse forum.
If you are in Bradford I hope that you can make it to the Darby event this evening. The good thing about real life forums is that you can say things to people in person and avoid the sort of misunderstandings that arise among the keyboard fraternity.
Width Of The Post offers balanced view … it has not and should never be like message board with abusive messages stuck on the website Etc.
Rahic & Rupp deserved the chance to impliment there philosophy on the club .. we all knew this was going to end up in total chaos
Well said John. I wouldn’t say that WOAP was favourable – I’d say simply it was “fair”. If you don’t want fair, if you want anti-Rahic rhetoric then don’t read WOAP.
John, why the dig at The Cow’s Arse? Is it because they were banging the ‘Edin Out’ drum long before you? No hindsight there, they weren’t daft enough to fall for Edin’s nonsense pretty much the minute he walked through the door, unlike a large proportion of City’s fan base, including you.
I know everyone is different but contrast Rahic with Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, the Leicester City chairman, who has sadly died.
This just reinforces what everyone has been thinking and saying for months. A deluded man with ideas above his station who is so egotistical he ALWAYS knows better than anyone with experience, education, passion, belief and heart, or at least IN HIS OWN HEAD! The time has come when either the penny has to drop or the axe will be wielded by Stefan. ER has single-handedly decimated and destroyed the core of our beloved club, as he seemingly did in business!
Th ONLY way it seems, for the club to be turned around now is for Stefan to completely cut all ties with Edin and bring in the right people for the job.
WOAP has been a beacon of light and hope throughout the last 9 months, since Stuart went. It has provided reasoned, perceptive and balanced judgements on the state of affairs at VP. Jason has done a great job in keeping us informed and being objective about the desperate state of affairs, into which the club has sunk. Another good and balanced article. Well done WOAP!
Well said.
Great research WOAP. I would love to know how Edin’s mind works, and how he’s managed to get this far without having the first clue. An MBA, and particularly an MBA from St Gallen is very dangerous thing for those susceptible to delusion.
Not that it matters, he’s obviously in way over his head, but I would love to know what talenconcept was. I remember at the time of the takeover hearing he was the head of a recruitment firm?
I too have very much welcomed the contribution by WOAP over the disastrous 2018 downturn. Time and again you have provided City fans with well-researched and well-argued commentary about what’s going on. The match reports and opinion pieces are generally bang on, whoever has written them. Ranting on Twitter and T & A’s website about ‘Rahic out’, though understandable, is not likely to get us out of the current mess. Rahic is the owner and has made a major investment and commitment of his family to West Yorkshire and it will not be easy for him to be removed. The weekend tragedy of the Leicester City owner sadly illustrates what we have been missing.
As for this article it is extremely helpful in describing Rahic’s serious interest in football club management and also his less than impressive track record. This combination of commitment and incompetence is what makes him so frustrating to deal with as a fan. His apparent ability to fall out with a wide variety of people – managers, players, employees, journalists and fans – points the finger at his weaknesses which seem to be at the heart of the club’s problems today.
We have to hope that pressure from those he might listen to (eg Rupp) will cause him to realise the game is up or to take a radically different approach, but I am not optimistic. Relegation will be a major blow all round – and certainly for Rahic’s ambitions. The reputational damage within the game from potential managers and players will make it difficult to climb back quickly unless something changes.
I am ,as always, impressed with what Jason writes. It is wrong to say that WOAP has not criticised the owners, because it has, but it has done so in a fair-minded way rather than using abuse. The writers of WOAP are true City lovers, and, as with me, it must really hurt to see the mess Rahic has caused.
Maybe I am wrong, but I feel the end-game is coming, and that the extended stay in Germany is significant.
Unless I am misinformed, I think company law allows Rupp to get rid of Rahic by means of a shareholders, not a directors, meeting.
Maybe that will happen, but no one knows.
Regarding Simon Parker, he always strikes me as a fair-minded and competent reporter, and we must remember that he has be be a bit careful in what he says. I seem to remember that David Markham was excluded from Valley Parade for being too critical.
I just hope that Rahic goes, but is then replaced by someone decent.
Jason has ALWAYS given a balanced viewpoint and very well written and researched too.If rumour the pair paid £6 million to purchase are true it shows just how stupidly naive Rahic is.I knew 2 years ago just 4 or 5 months into the new ownership all was creaking.Stuart has divulged in interview post sacking..Hardest year he had in football his first year back as manager.So many cannot be wrong who have walked,shown the door or simply never turned up.Nobody is playing for Mr Edin.To place Mr Rupp in the same category is simply wrong.He is merely to date a “financier”.He has backed the wrong horse.We can only hope Mr Rahic quietly disappears but given he was the prime mover in the acquisition its likely to be kicking and screaming.