Three days after John's talk with Sean, they were finally standing on Gartree Road outside of Leicester airport. Leicester was as cold as London but John's mood has improved since arriving to Leicester.The air was cleaner than London and even with the bitter cold, he felt better. He picked up the familiar Leicester Mercury newspaper from the news stand outside the airport.
"Here, Mr. Murtough and Mr. Baker", a man approached them as they were waiting.
"Hello Jim", Sean replied, "John, this is Jim. He is an excellent driver. He drove me around the last time I was here."
"Hello Jim" greeted John to the young cab driver as he entered the car.
The car started as John made himself comfortable on the backseat and started reading the newspaper.
'Milan Mandaric to purchase Leicester City F.C.?' read the headline in the sports section of the newspaper.
"Hey Sean, we have to hurry up, Mandaric's move to purchase Leicester is gaining traction." said John while looking at the newspaper.
"Don't worry, deals aren't completed on the newspapers." Sean said confidently, "Besides I have found that the club chairman, Mr. Clark is against that move. He may not have had much choice until now, but I am sure I can get him on our side."
John had been an ordinary person in his last life, so he didn't know the tricks and games at that level. So he chose to trust Sean's judgement regarding the matter.
They finally arrived at the hotel they were staying at.
"Mr. Baker, if you want to travel anywhere in Leicester, do give me a call."
"Of course, Jim, I will."
After checking in, they immediately started to plan on how to approach the deal to buy the club. It was mostly Sean explaining and John soaking in the knowledge. They had agreed to 6-7 million pounds as the acceptable evaluation for the club. Sean had agreed to broker this deal for a fee of 300,000 pounds. John could've paid Sean in club shares but he wanted all the club shares under his control.
It was then determined that the whole takeover would take somewhere around 25 million pounds of money. Because even if the club was valued at 6 million they would need to make further promises to invest in the club over the coming time.
John had no objection to this as he had already planned to invest heavily in the club.
After that started a series of meetings and negotiations that was mostly handled by Sean. As Sean told John earlier Mr. Clark was opposed to Mandaric's move. So he heavily tilted to their side after they made the bid. But to convince everyone, it takes a long time. Bids from both sides kept increasing, but there was no drastic increase from any side.
Meanwhile John decided to invest in the stock market. Even if he was no business whiz, he still remembered the major stocks that grew in the coming years. He was big on cryptocurrency in his last life that led to many losses and contributed to him being broke. That's why he knew quite a bit about crypto but there was still time in the launching of bitcoin madness. So he decided to invest 10 million pounds in the stocks he knew would grow around this time.
Finally after over 4 months of exhausting negotiations, their determination bore fruit. Milan Mandaric had finally given up after John's group made a bid of 8 million pounds. It exceeded the club's value by quiet a bit and along the line Sean had even tried to dissuade John from increasing the bid and convince him to try other clubs but John was resolved.
So on 3rd April, 2007 it was concluded that John Baker would be the new owner of Leicester City F.C. and 8 million pounds would be paid to club's shareholders. It was further promised by John that he would invest 9 million in the coming transfer market and 7 million to improve the club's facilities to achieve the club's ambitions to reach the Premier league. A sum of 2 million will also be invested for the benefit of the community.
John was overjoyed at finally being the owner of the club he loved.