West Ham set to sign £8m defender, former Tottenham midfielder poised to join West Brom for £10m and ex-Arsenal winger hooks up with Bury January 19, 2017 West Ham are poised to bolster their defensive options by signing wantaway Southampton skipper Jose Fonte for an initial fee in the region of £8m, which could rise to £10m with add ons. The Hammers are set to stave off late interest from fellow Premier League side West Brom for the 33-year-old Euro 2016 winner, [...]
Manchester United replace Real Madrid as richest club in the world in Deloitte Football Money League January 19, 2017 Manchester United have been named the world’s richest club after they ended Real Madrid’s 11-year stranglehold on top spot in Deloitte’s Football Money League. United’s 2015-16 revenues of €689.0m (£515.3) – an all-time record for a football team – lifted them ahead of both Real and Barcelona for the first time since 2003-04. Neighbours Manchester [...]
Not so sunny: Low demand pushed profits down for Caribbean travel group Elegant Hotels January 17, 2017 Elegant Hotels faced a tough year as profits fell during 2016 due to the weak pound and lower demand for luxury accommodation. The figures The Caribbean travel group, which owns six upscale hotels and a beachfront restaurant on Barbados, said revenue was down 5.2 per cent in 2016, at $57m (£46.3m). Adjusted pre-tax profit for year to [...]
Oxfam is wrong to imply free markets make the rich richer at the poor’s expense January 17, 2017 Every year Oxfam releases statistics comparing the wealth of the global poor and the global rich, showing a stunning, often widening, gap between the two. They heavily imply that the poor are getting poorer while the rich are getting richer – but only half of this is correct. The lot of the world’s worst off [...]
Here are 29 reasons to be cheerful on Blue Monday January 16, 2017 It's Blue Monday, the day officially designated as the most miserable day of the year. Yes, it's raining and yes, you may well be off to see the divorce lawyers today – but that's no reason to be sad, daddy-o. Here are 50 reasons to turn that frown upside-down… 1. The FTSE 100 is on [...]
Goodbye Piccadilly: A short history of the Piccadilly Circus advertising billboards January 16, 2017 On only a handful of occasions in its 100-year history has the hotchpotch of billboards at Piccadilly Circus been intentionally switched off during peacetime. Most famously, when Winston Churchill died, and later, Princess Diana. The advertising space, recognisable around the world, is symbolic of the national mood; it wears black when we mourn. But today, minus [...]
Who owns the UK’s railways? Well, not British firms in many cases January 11, 2017 The sale of the C2C rail franchise – labelled by consumer groups as the best network into London – has once again sparked concerns that Britain's railways are being taken over by foreign, often state-owned, firms. National Express' sale of its final franchise in the UK was part of the FTSE 250 firm's strategy to target [...]
National Express flogs C2C network to Italian firm keen to get foothold in UK rail market January 11, 2017 Transport giant National Express has exited the UK rail market, flogging its final franchise to an Italian firm with grand designs to take control of Britain's rail networks. The C2C franchise, which operates trains in East London and South Essex across 26 stations, has been sold to Trenitalia in a deal worth £70m. Read more: National Express [...]
President Xi loves football, but China’s spending spree won’t last long says ex-Manchester City man Sun Jihai January 9, 2017 Premier League clubs need not worry about losing their best players to the China, says former Manchester City defender Sun Jihai who predicts a slowdown in spending from the emerging football power. Chinese teams’ spending has exploded as some of the country’s richest men acquired football clubs in the wake of President Xi Jinping revealing [...]
In pictures: Crossrail’s tastiest discovery yet January 9, 2017 The massive project that is Crossrail has unearthed a more appetising insight into London's history than the 3,000 plague victim skeletons at Liverpool Street A tasty treasure trove of condiment bottles from a former Crosse and Blackwell factory in the heart of Soho have been excavated after digging to create the Elizabeth Line around Tottenham Court Road. Londoners familiar [...]