pedg

Another for the 'you could not make it up' collection http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1253019/Punch-Portsmouth-Jamie-OHara-KOs-team-mate-Michael-Brown-training-ground-melee.html Punch-up at Portsmouth! Jamie O'Hara KO's team-mate Michael Brown in training ground melee Portsmouth's troubles boiled over on to the training ground on Monday when a practice match erupted into fisticuffs between midfielders Michael Brown and Jamie O'Hara. With the cash-strapped club's future hanging in the balance this week, the tension was palpable at their Eastleigh training complex and Brown was making his presence known with over-zealous tackles. But when he jumped in on O'Hara, the Tottenham loanee punched Brown to the ground. Team-mates rushed to break up the melee, with Brown coming off worst with a black eye.

http://backofthenet.markwatsonthecomedian.com/2010/02/22/portsmouth-awarded-three-points-for-trying/ Portsmouth awarded three points for trying FA blesses cotton socks Portsmouth’s survival prospects have been given a boost after the FA awarded them three of the spare points they recently confiscated from Crystal Palace, despite Pompey’s 2-1 defeat against Stoke on Saturday. FA chief executive Ian Watmore explained his decision on the basis of the fact that Portsmouth ‘needed it more’ and that they ‘tried really hard’. ‘Portsmouth have had a rough time of it lately,’ Watmore told reporters, ‘But they keep plugging away, god love ‘em. They looked so downcast after the final whistle. Seeing Frederic “Squeaky” Piquionne being comforted by Angelos “Tufty” Basinas and Hayden “Chunky” Mullins, it just broke my heart. So I got on the phone to the FA Executive Committee, and they were all in tears too. We decided the best thing to do would be to reward all the hard work those brave young men are putting in with three lovely points. ‘Besides’, he added, ‘those points have been burning a hole in our pocket ever since we confiscated them off Crystal Palace due to persistent Neil Warnock. It’s nice to see them going to a good home.’ The League has previously awarded discretionary points to West Bromwich Albion in the 2005 Christmas raffle, to West Ham United in 1996 because of Portuguese winger Dani’s lustrous hair, and to Stoke City in 2008 out of fear for their lives if they refused.

'confirmation' of the 3 buyers. Sounds like they are taking one each or something?? http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/p/portsmouth/8527495.stm?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Late night people... http://twitter.com/NickSzczepanik "i'm now hearing that Portsmouth talks cd go on till 11 - isn't that when banks in the Cayman and Br Virgin Islands close?"

Besides the South African group bidding for control, Soccernet has been told: "There are three or four interested parties they are talking to and the talks will go on through the night and then continue tomorrow." Besides 'show us the money' what exactly can they be spending so long talking about?

In line for an OBE for services to the fertilizer business if you ask me...

http://www.wsc.co.uk/content/view/4766/38/ Well written article though obviously not read this thread. "Certainly nobody wants to see Portsmouth die."

http://twitter.com/NickSzczepanik I'm told 'frantic' negotiations are ongoing to get the Portsmouth sale done after Balu Chainrai set a deadline of end of business today When is end of business today? Is it sort of about now?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/p/portsmouth/8528172.stm Remember the claims the club was surprised when he resigned... He claimed his lawyers have been advising him to walk away from the club "for the last week or so" but his mind was made up when current owner Balram Chainrai and chief executive Peter Storrie emailed him to stand down. Club sources initially said they knew nothing of Al Fahim's plans but later confirmed they had received and accepted his resignation.

One would guess that Chainrai has spent a while (as has been rumoured on for some time) looking for someone who could manage them in administration so I think if he does get them put into admin they will have someone lined up to do the job.

As no one has gone into admin in the premiership its a grey area so I think they are just making up 'rules' as they go along. After all who heard of the "club in crisis" rule till it was mentioned as a way of helping them?

Suspect if Chainrai can put them into admin he will be a very popular person at PL headquarters. More chance of pompey playing all their games and then rid of them next season. Hopefully it will be made clear that the -9 points will be carried over to next season if they would be relegated without them as then they would still have an incentive to win games.

http://twitter.com/MikeCjournalist Portsmouth Football Club will apply for administration today.

Void bet as it has already been used by him today I think. http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=745491&sec=england&cc=5739 D-day is March 1 and time is running out as Storrie said: "It's going to be a hectic few days. I am heavily in discussions and not been off the phone all day today again. The next couple of days could prove crucial, its going to be a very busy next 48 hours."

Got a hero. Very happy with it. As ever if you wait for the next greatest version of something there will always be a newer even greater version scheduled to come after it. If I was buying now would probably go for the desire. Find the Sense UI good and the virtual keyboard is great as its very good a figuring out what word you were trying to enter rather than what you did enter!

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/interstitial.php?wURI=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.arabianbusiness.com%2Fblogs%2Fimages%2F2010%2F02%2Falfahim-letter.pdf&wAd=206720516&wTime=60000 Resignation letter. Playing the 'don't sue me, no one told me anything, and if they did I could not check it' card

Hope the trust has a few good lawyers on board...

How many of there "Highly prized assets" can they not at the moment sell and who will be out of contract so can walk away at the end of the season? Surely the book value of these players is now zero?

See he is pandering to the fans with the "Why don't they leave us alone and go and pick on a team with bigger debts?". Did the interviewer not mention these other teams PAY THEIR BILLS!

Story.. "If you want to know where the money has gone, look at the accounts. It's no secret Well we could but you don't appear to have filed any for a while. I assume the ongoing fine from companies house is included in the SoA? --- plus includes the new snippet... The South African consortium, spearheaded by a sports orientated investor, has lodged proof of finances with the lawyers and will, on Monday, lodge those proof of funds with the banks.

Its all a bit unclear on Chainrai's ownership (about par for the course). As I understand it there was an agreement he could have the shares if al mirage defaulted on the debt and he had an undated share transfer document to go with it. Now either this has been signed and Chainrai holds the shares or it has not been sign but al mirage has given up the shares to be held in trust and the document has not been signed. Whether the latter is feasible I don't know? Would such a transfer have to be recorded somewhere or is that not required in this case?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/7287759/Portsmouth-check-out-potential-buyers.html The club face a winding-up order in the High Court a week today over £12 million of unpaid tax, but if the prospective takeover does not happen, owner Balram Chainrai will have to consider voluntarily taking the club into administration before then. The unidentified consortium, which is thought to be multinational and include South African backers, has given the club a letter of intent and indicated proof of funds via lawyers. Chainrai will seek evidence that the unidentified suitors have the money required to meet the club’s £5 million-a-month running costs, as well as to service more than £70 million of debt, before entering into a deal. The players’ wages, totalling more than £3 million including tax, are due this week.

That's what the council want but not sure it would stand up to legal appeals, especially if there was no club in residence.

http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11661_5968205,00.html "The ball is very much in their court to show us they have the actual funds. "We've gone through too many things over the last year, people that have come in who have said they have the funds to take the club forward, when they haven't. "This is all about proving to us, the board and the owner, that the money is there to take the club forward. "To be fair to them they have provided proof of funds through a lawyer but we need to see it from a bank. We need to see it, the Premier League need to see it, everyone needs to see it. He added: "Bank information will come through their lawyers, proof of funds from the banks, if that happens then it will be all systems go tomorrow. I really hope that will happen but at the moment it's out of our hands and in the South Africans'."

How about this chap? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Motsepe In 2008 he was 503-rd richest person in the world, by the Forbes World Billionaires List. In that same issue of Forbes magazine, it was noted that the source of his wealth was not through any entreprenial zeal but through his association with the ruling political party the African National Congress (ANC). ... But for all the adulation, in South Africa such success comes with a price: being labeled an oligarch. Even many blacks have complained that the country's 1994 transformation from apartheid to democracy has benefited only the elite few. The criticism stems from laws that require substantial black ownership in certain industries, including mining. A handful of politically connected individuals have grown enormously wealthy as a result. One of Motsepe's sisters, Bridgette Radebe, who's married to transport minister Jeffrey Radebe, heads a mining company and is said to be among the wealthiest black women in the country. "It's called crony capitalism," says Moeletsi Mbeki, 62, brother of South Africa's president and an outspoken critic of the race-preference laws. "It's an anticompetitive system." Sounds like he would fit the bill as a pompey owner. (No idea if it is him, random google searching had his name in the same twitter as portsmouth but think it was not a statement of possibility not fact http://twitter.com/OfancyMcGape)