Just like in any sports movie worth its salt, the montage told the story best.

In early May 2017, Michael Eisner arrived at the Guildhall in Portsmouth, England, to face 1,500 fans of the city’s soccer team. His task was a delicate one: to persuade at least 75 percent of them to sell their beloved club, Portsmouth F.C., to “an ancient Hollywood executive” and his sons.

There would be, he knew, a degree of skepticism. Portsmouth’s previous experience with foreign owners suggested they brought nothing but trouble. First under Russian-Israeli, and then Emirati, Saudi and Nepali ownership, the century-old club had sunk all the way from the Premier League to League Two, English soccer’s fourth tier. It had flirted with oblivion; only a consortium comprising some 3,000 local fans, reaching into their own pockets, had saved it from extinction.

Facing those fan-owners, Eisner realized he had a tough sell. He knew it would not be enough to turn up to the Guildhall and “sit on a stool and pontificate.” A naval base on England’s south coast, Portsmouth is a tough, tight-knit sort of a place; being lectured by a mogul who had just jetted in from California with no prior knowledge of or investment in soccer would not go over well.