Fowllyd

This has been posted on the thread in the Lounge, but it's worth putting here as well I think: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/feb/21/bonuses-chaotic-portsmouth-brink-collapse Frightening numbers in there. And, as a bonus (arf!) note that Redknapp's claim that the money can't all have gone on wages is directly contradicted in Storrie's interview on ESPN Storrienet - oops, sorry, that should of course be Soccernet.

I know a lot more about road bikes than off-road ones, but if it's anything like the one you've given a link to then it's a very fine piece of kit indeed. Even if the components on yours aren't of the same standard it'll still be very good, as it's clearly a high-quality, double-suspension frame. And it's massively unlikely that anyone would fit low-end components to a high-end frame. Are you planning on using it (and if so what kind of use would you put it to?) or selling it? Not that I'm interested in buying, just that it would seem a little pointless to use something of that sort for pootling round town! For more about the bike itself, look here: http://www.santacruzmtb.com/bullit/ A serious piece of kit...

Desperate attempt by Storrie to influence the impending court hearing. We've seen it all before.

Well, given that the Old Bailey's full title is the Central Criminal Court I guess many Pompey supporters could get there in their sleep. And yes, it would be wonderfully fitting if a bunch of them turned up there on the 1st March. Shame that their case won't be heard there, but then you can't have everything, can you? :smt046

Maybe he's a dyslexic Mormon!

If I remember things aright, the £1.8M figure was simply the shortfall on a particular month's salary payments, which then had to be made up with the assistance of the good Mr Chainrai (or was it somebody else - so easy to lose track). The actual figure for monthly salary payments was, and almost certainly still is, considerably higher. True, two players went during the January window, one of whom (Kaboul) would certainly have been on a fair old whack; but more players have since joined on frees, so that will have notched the total back up a little.

I really did try to resist doing this, but... Might that be the whole new level a certain Mr Storrie was referring to a few months ago?

PES, that's an interesting - and downright scary - post. However, both of the two links I've quoted here come up in Hebrew - the second only comes up at all after inserting a \ in the url. The other four say plenty about Israeli gangland activity and Shlomo Narkis, but I can't see anything there about the Gaydamaks. I'm not saying there's no connection, just that there's nothing in those links to indicate one.

MLG's right - that's not irony. You've been spending too much time with John Motson I think.

It may be no more than gossip, but... :smt044 all the same. And, let's face it, it's very easy to believe!

Sounds about right to me. Vantis will have produced all the figures and some commentary; Storrie et al will have added a few bits about the plethora of potential - sorry, definite, nailed-down (well, you'd have to be, wouldn't you?) buyers just itching to rescue the giant club and its famous, best-in-the-world fans.

You're right, it was not referred to as a window until the present rules came in. Before that we had transfer deadline day, after which no further transfers were permitted until the end of the season. I can't remember exactly when deadline day used to be set, but I'm sure if I check back later someone will have enlightened us.

Here's a possibility (entirely speculation on my part, I hasten to add): It was mentioned in a Guardian article that Vantis had been brought in to Pompey some time back by Tanya Robins, and that when Azougy (who was, of course, never a director at all ) realised this he immediately gave them their marching orders. Might it be the case that Robins, as FD of PFC, feared that the company may be trading insolvently, and called in accountants - specialists in this field - to investigate? Realising what was going on, Azougy got shot of them as quick as he could. Robbins then resigned as a director, as she could see the way things were headed. As a director she could be liable; as a manager she can't. As I say, pure speculation...

The hell they are - the PFC/Storrie mouthpiece is ESPN Soccernet. The Guardian's been pretty good in its reporting of the shenanigans down the road; it has been far from uncritical and certainly hasn't reported all of Storrie's utterances as if they're gospel truth.

If the information in the statement of affairs is inaccurate, then serious questions would be asked of the firm that produced it. You've said that you're sceptical about Vantis, but the simple fact is that they are an accountancy practice, and if they are found to have broken the rules governing accountants, they will be in very deep shít. Producing a deliberately sugared report on Pompey's behalf could not possibly be worth the damage to their business that the discovery of such an action would bring about. Mero's comments about nothing much happening today are based on the fact that the statement is due to be delivered at 4pm, and that nothing further will happen until the court and HMRC have had a good look at it. That won't happen during business/court hours today, hence his comments. You might note that he's clearly not confident about what will happen after today...

Hamster on a boat, eh? Cue Tales of the Riverbank music and Johnny Morris. Must be me age...

It will NOT be the same club. The present-day Newport County is not the same football club that played in the Cup-Winners' Cup all those years ago. To you it will still be Pompey, but to everybody else it will be a new club. If indeed the trophy room contents are bought from the receiver (and bear in mind that there will most certainly be competition for them) then they will be merely the property of a new club, not trophies that club has won. If I were to buy a few old medals on eBay, I would own them - but I couldn't remotely claim to have earned them. The only dewy-eyed visions, I fear, are your ones of the future for Pompey.

I can only admire your optimism - though it's a moot point as to whether it's more a state of denial on your part than optimism. If liquidation does happen (and I'd say it's the most likely outcome by several streets) then there'll be nothing there to qualify for parachute payments, nor indeed anything else. Remember - we're not talking about administration here; that possibility vanished some time ago. Put simply, liquidation means that PCFC will cease to exist. The PL won't go handing out money to a new company purporting to be Pompey. Nor will the Football League be willing to allow a brand new club in at any level. So it'll be non-league, starting pretty much from scratch. Any potential new investor/owner coming in now will have to stump up a large part of what's owed up front; to HMRC and Chainrai for starters, with all the footballing and other debts and Gaydamak also needing to be sorted sooner rather than later. They'll then have to subsidise a business which is running at a large loss on day-to-day trading (this is clearly the case, as the last five months' wages have been paid by a mixture of cash injection, loans and player sales). And I just can't see all that happening.

Quite apart from the clear historical inaccuracy (which has been very well covered in other posts), I don't know how anybody could believe the S.C.U.M. part of the story. It's blindingly obvious that this is an acrostic rather than an acronym - in other words, somebody has tried to think of words to fit the letters of 'scum' and come up with Southampton Company of/City Union Men, rather than the other way round. Possible/likely acronyms are often considered when a name for something is being thought up - for example, I've no idea whether the management of what's now Northumbria University really thought of Central University of Newcastle upon Tyne as a possible name when the Poly became a university, but if they had done they'd have thought better of it pretty quickly. If the originators of this myth had been able to come up with a more convincing acrostic, it might have been rather more believable as an acronym. Incidentally, I have been told the S.C.U.M. story by someone who clearly believed it to be true. Then again, he was a London-born Man Utd supporter living in the north-eastern end of Hampshire,who swore blind that he'd been at the famous 6-3 game at the Dell and that it was definitely that match where his team wore the notorious grey strip which they changed at half time!

As a matter of interest, just what do you think will happen? Do you really believe that Storrie has buyers lined up, raring to part with their money to save Pompey? Because, as far as I can see, that's the only way that Pompey will escape being wound up. There's simply no other way out.

Personally, I'm quite prepared to agree with you that PCFC and the earlier PFC are the same entity in footballing terms. So I wouldn't argue that the earlier trophies and all the history don't belong to Pompey as they are now. BUT: if Pompey are liquidated, as seems extremely likely, that history ends at that point. Yes, a new team will arise from the devastation, I'm quite certain of that. And, in a sense, it would still be Pompey - hell, it may even be able to call itself Portsmouth FC. But the new club will not be somehow the same as the one that's been liquidated, nor will it have any claim on the history and trophies that the old club had. As for likely crowds, I agree with many on here - you're being hopelessly optimistic. Had the worst happened to us last summer, and we'd restarted as a new club in the Blue Square somewhere, I wouldn't remotely have expected the kinds of crowds you're talking about for the putative New Pompey.

Yep, I think it's a pretty safe bet that acting fast means taking less than two months about it!

As an aside, it was revealed recently that West Ham have already borrowed against the next two years' season ticket income. So it's certainly possible that Pompey have done something similar but with the Sky money. And, as you say, for a £17M loan you'd be wanting more than £7M worth of security.

Ah yes - having re-read the original quote I agree with you. Hard to say exactly where the FA and whoever else would slot a new Pompey team, but League 2 is distinctly fanciful. I'm sure potential fan base and so forth will be taken into account, but I've no idea how anybody will predict what actual attendances might be. The history of a professional club in the city will make a difference there when compared with the likes of Dudley and Croydon though. Time will tell and all that. To be honest, I'll be quite disappointed when it's all finally over, as I've enjoyed this thread a hell of a lot!

I can well imagine that it is. After all, a company called Portsmouth FC Ltd does indeed still exist, and would just need to be bought from (or donated by) its current owners to the new club emerging from the ashes of Pompey. So that makes perfect sense. Plus, of course, the current owners of PFC Ltd will be very eager to get it off their hands, given that they're being constantly pestered and threatened for debts which should really belong to PCFC Ltd!