LONDON — Inside his familiar confines of the Cask Pub and Kitchen in London, Tony Evans takes a sip of his pale ale and thinks for a second.
“Anfield could charge much higher prices for tickets and still sell out,” he said, then nodded his head, quite certain in his decision.
Evans, who followed Liverpool as a superfan in his twenties before he came to be a well-known journalist in England who has covered the team for years, can picture Anfield, the home to Liverpool Football Club, holding 60,000 people instead of its current capacity of 54,000 and charging higher prices.
He can picture Liverpool as the premier global soccer superpower.
“Liverpool is positioned to catch up to Real Madrid,” Evans says.
A few hours earlier, back in Liverpool’s London office, a small, 30-person remote headquarters nestled just off a side street near the University of London, Billy Hogan said he’s hoping for the same thing.
“My responsibility has been helping to drive the commercial side,” said Hogan, the Boston-born chief commercial officer of Liverpool FC. “At the end of the day, it’s very similar to Boston. The mindset is to run a sustainable business and build the revenue profile to invest back into the team and put that investment back to work.
“The global reaction shows the size and power of the Liverpool fanbase is truly incredible.”
Liverpool is taking over the sports world. With an ownership group led by John Henry, Tom Werner and Mike Gordon, the same group that owns the Red Sox, the Reds are on the heels of an impressive Premier League season in which they lost the table by a single point to Manchester City, but saved the season with an incredible run to a Champions League title.
It’s their first notable trophy since 2005, and though the drought was far shorter than the one that once existed in Boston, it was no less worrisome to the hardcore fans. For a Liverpool team that got used to winning trophy after trophy in the 70s and 80s, going without a major title from 2005 until 2019 had become a thorn in their side.
The pain started with the previous ownership group that was “literally going into administration and going through a stress sale,” Hogan said. “The club was in a tough place from a management standpoint. So there’s a lot more to fix at Liverpool than the Red Sox when they first came into the Red Sox.”
Henry and his ownership team bought the club in 2010 for a reported price of £300, though Evans said the more accurate number is about £218. Recently, Evans said, the rumored asking price for a Liverpool sale would be near £2.5 billion. It’s a crazy asking price, in his mind, but shows the strength of the club since Henry has turned it around.
At first, Henry’s team had failed miserably. Former manager Brendan Rodgers was seen as a bad choice by many. And the team’s over-reliance on analytics while bargain shopping for players was a mistake chalked up to an overzealous American owner who thought he knew more than everyone else.
“Ownership had to rebuild trust,” Evans said. “They thought they could out-wit the football executives in England. They couldn’t.”
Similar to the Red Sox under Henry and Co., Liverpool started spending big money to land star players from around the world. With top-tier talent and Jürgen Klopp leading the way on the sidelines, the Reds were a force this year, going 30-7-1, though their 97 points came one point shy of a title.
But as Liverpool has become a major success, it’s forced Hogan and others around Fenway Sports Group to reminds fans of the Reds and the Red Sox that these two entities are entirely separate.
When Liverpool wins, that’s good for Henry and Co. But that doesn’t mean the money made from Liverpool is going to be siphoned into the Red Sox. Just like it doesn’t mean that a Red Sox World Series title creates money going toward Liverpool.
“I think the first, most important point, is that the two organizations are run as their own organization,” Hogan said. “Fenway Sports Group as an ownership group, sits over all the different properties that we have. Whether that’s the Red Sox, Liverpool or 50 percent in Roush Fenway Racing, Fenway Sports Management, NESN, there are different organizations within the enterprise.”
Just like when the Red Sox spend $217 million David Price, that’s not lost money for Liverpool.
“More and more people are starting to understand,” Evans said. “A portion of Liverpool fans thought it was, ‘us or them.’ Which is a ludicrous idea. Nobody can doubt that FSG’s commitment is to winning. There’s never been a moment that I thought they put the Red Sox ahead of Liverpool.”
The two teams are completely separate, but are learning from each other.
After the Red Sox saw incredible success from the addition of seats atop the Green Monster and the preservation of the age-old Fenway Park, Liverpool did the same with the addition of two levels of seats on one side of Anfield, increasing its capacity by 8,500 in 2016. The stadium was first built in 1884.
“I think the history of protecting what was unique about Fenway and developing it, but at the same time keeping the charm and what makes it so special, probably gave us the confidence that it was possible to do it at Anfield,” Hogan said. “Obviously you have to make sure the building can do it. Provided it could be, we felt confident it was a good opportunity to do that.”
It’s been a smashing success for Liverpool. But Hogan says the secrets to success for Liverpool aren’t always the same as those for the Red Sox, and vice versa. He and his college buddy from Trinity College, Red Sox president Sam Kennedy, swap ideas here and there, but mostly in an informal setting, Hogan said.
What works for the Red Sox doesn’t always work for Liverpool, and vice versa. And the business operations remain completely separate.
But the fans should be able to relate to one another. The stadiums have similar stories. Liverpool will continue its run of playing exhibition games at Fenway Park this year in July, and now the Red Sox are coming to London to try to connect with baseball fans on this side of the Atlantic Ocean.
“It’s funny, we had talked about it years ago when we first acquired the club, that it would be great to bring the Red Sox across,” Hogan said. “I was pleasantly surprised how quickly the games sold out. There’s a great buzz around the city about it.”
Hogan is hoping Liverpool fans will hop on the Red Sox bandwagon.
“You see more Red Sox hats, certainly,” Hogan said. “And I think there’s an interest level. Generally speaking, people understand the connection. I think when the Red Sox win the World Series, there’s not a connection to Liverpool but the fan base probably takes notice of it, just like I hope the fanbase of the Red Sox notice we won the Champions League.”
And there’s one more connection.
“Boston has an Irish influence too,” said Evans, a Liverpool native. “Just like Liverpool.”
