The man behind the brand...
Monday 15th September 2014
Garry Cook has agreed to be the second guest of the Manchester City Disabled Supporters Association http://www.mcdsa.co.uk
We will be meeting on Monday 15th September, doors open at 7:00pm for a 7:30pm start. The room will be confirmed closer to the date as if we are playing at home in the Champions League that week, our usual room will need to be made ready for UEFA to use on the day of the match.
Garry was appointed as CEO at City by Thaksin Shinawata soon after he took control of the club. City had always been a local club, owned by local owners and supported in the main by local fans. Thaksin's dream was to transform the club into a global brand so as he could attract some of the worlds best players and get the club back to the top of the league, winning all the major trophies. Garry had built his reputation working in America for Nike creating "Brand Jordan" a collaboration between Nike and superstar basketball player Michael Jordan.
Garry's first job was to recruit a new manager following the controversial dismissal of Sven by Thaksin. Mark Hughes was approached and quickly appointed, Garry said at the time "I am delighted to welcome Mark on board, In our view he is the brightest young manager in the game and he was our number one target for the manager's job."
New players quickly followed with Jo and Tal Ben Haim joining us as the new big names. Shaun Wright-Phillips returned to the club that made him a star and two relative unknown's were brought in to tighten up the defence in the form of Vincent Kompany and Pablo Zabaleta....
Thaskin's time at the club was never far from controversy and as a result of his money being frozen he needed to sell the club he had bought in 2007 for £81.6m. Garry's enthusiasm for the City brand helped secure a reported £200m sale to Abu Dhabi United Group in 2008, a company set up as an investment vehicle by Sheik Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan who is a member of the Abu Dhabi Royal Family. Despite employing Khaldoon Al Mubarak as Chairman, Sheik Mansour chose to retain Garry in his role as CEO. On the same day as the takeover was completed the club spent a British transfer record of £32.5m to bring Brazilian Robinho in from Real Madrid on what was the last day of the transfer window.
In the next transfer window further players were recruited to strengthen the team with Wayne Bridge, Craig Bellamy, Shay Given and Nigel de Jong all joining. The big name target that Garry very publicly pursued failed to materialise when AC Milan "bottled it" and pulled out of the sale of Kaka.
City finished the season in 10th position, so further players were purchased to drive the dream of getting us the trophies the club desperately needed to grow the global brand. Gareth Barry, Roque Santa Cruz, Stuart Taylor, Emmanuel Adebayor, Kolo Toure, Joleon Lescott and Sylvinho were all recruited together with keen golfer Carlos Tevez. To mark his arrival a large poster went up on the border of Manchester, facing towards Trafford with the words "Welcome to Manchester" and a picture of Carlos with arms out wide. This was the birth of the "noisy neighbours" as we started to rattle the cage of our closest rivals from Trafford. News media from all over the world were now paying us attention and images of this poster were seen globally.
The marketing of the club moved up a gear with further large posters appearing including new Manager Mancini leading the team in a poster close to the ground and colours from the new kit being painted over night on to a wall on Oldham Road. The ticket office was moved indoors as Garry didn't like seeing fans queue in the Manchester rain and the facilities at our training complex in Carrington went through a full upgrade to ensure our players had the best available facilities for training and dancing to the Harlem Shake...
Garry left City in September 2011 after allegations regarding an email sent to a players mother. Unfortunately this was not his first gaff, so the british press turned on him and his position at the club became untenable. The work he did though in building the brand will never be forgotten and the team that year went on to win their first trophy in 35 years when they beat United in the semi's and Stoke in the final of the FA Cup, bringing down another famous banner that ticked away in the Stretford End.
Garry is now Managing Director of the Ultimate Fighting Championship the world's leading mixed martial arts organisation. We ask though that you refrain from bare knuckle fighting at our meeting in an attempt to impress him.
