rallyboy

Through injuries and loan agreements Pompey now seem to be losing a few of those players who shouldn't have been playing at all. It will now be interesting to see how good they look with the youth team approach forced on every other club that has suffered financial problems. Karma. Has the balance between football rivals ever tipped as much and as quickly as this one seems to be doing?

mine's gone, as did my opportunity to post replies when I needed to because I'm mean - good luck all.

I have one spare ticket at cost - A good one in Block 134. Post a contact on here if you need it.

They weren't meant to be paying loan fees. More importantly there were a couple of VERY unusual instances of players buying themselves out of contracts thus becoming available as an unregistered player for Pompey to sign. On another day the passing of money from club through player to second club could be defined as 'a transfer', bypassing the ban. I suspect they have been cheating the system, and AA has the evidence, it just depends on whether his boss wants him to reveal it. So yes, it does appear that they are Cheats.

Funny that -I thought the O'Hara contract was so binding that even the court-approved (!) administrator can't cancel it to protect creditors - do we now discover that it can be re-written at any point? Another drum of worms spills out across the Fratton Park lino. Harry will say - 'they're a great club, great fans, he's a great player, I would help if I could but my hands are tied, it's with the guys upstairs, it will be a fantastic occasion, they are a very difficult team to beat, Avram's doing a tremendous job'. Harry will mean - 'feck off, I'm manager of Spurs and I don't care what happens to anyone else, the weaker your excuse for a team is, the happier I am'. And on this occasion, he will be right.

how on earth could they get it to £100M??....Staggering if true. An ambitious new owner would now need to find £100M to clear debt, £10M for the land, £50M for players, £10M for training ground, £100M for a new stadium, £100M for two years wages, so by 2012 they will be overcoming points penalties and bouncing back to the Premier League with a decent squad and a new ground. Cost - £370M though they could cut corners and do it for only £280M? By then the tv money will kick back in, the revenue streams will open up with the bigger capacity and the business will be solvent! Unless of course they fund this amazing turnaround through borrowing....... Alternatively you could just buy a controlling interest in Manchester United. With the money that has already gone through the club it now means they paid approx £175M for a 1-0 win over a bankrupt mid-table championship club - what great value for money!

the arms dealer will only sell back the land when he has £30M in his hand, he's immoral not stupid. As for AA spending weeks deciding who would be the best new owner and after an exhaustive elimination process he decides that the man who he's working for is best? The taxman is watching. Does this mean Storrie will be back soon?.... As Grant was quick to point out the other week, this adversity has kick-started their season and created a siege mentality - they really have created Fortress Fratton.

So they value Tommy Smith the same as Mr Richard Lambert do they? Next stop Deluded Central - mind the widening gap between reality and Fratton. Has AA tried to sell O'Hara yet? Harry won't be pleased, unless he gets a cut. In future if I ever feel low I shall just recall the gem - 'The club hope to raise almost £30 million in player sales' and the world will fill with laughter once again. Not much word from Avram on the mass clearout, maybe he'll be able to rebuild from the lower leagues, I hear he's keen to splash out on local youngsters. (second airing for a top joke!)

Though it doesn't help a sinking ship much, if they have altered rules mid season the Prem has dropped a clanger. Palace could have been saved by that one player sale that was mid-completion when the rug was pulled. We could have taken a million for Rasiak or Saga or both, if given the opportunity, and we could have stumbled on. Other clubs have been left to rot with no special favours. So if they give any club assistance by bending rules it shows clearly that the Premier League is no longer related to the Football League and is run under a different set of values. And before any dim person points out that they are two different competitions, yes we know that, but there must be continuity or you might as well have teams promoted from the F1 constructor's championship or the national ping pong alliance to the Premier League - the game must be the same if you have relegation and promotion between them. If this half-baked approach continues the FA should seek clarity from the two different competitions and see if they can still work together. If not, the Prem can break away and people can pay to view Wigan v Stoke for the rest of their lives with no relegation from this 'elite'. If the big three want to breakaway for more cash let them - they can play each other ten times a year and call it a season. There comes a time when a line has to be drawn. It's time to bring some discipline and continuity back into the four divisions - adjoining divisions with very different rules doesn't work.

this sounds like the last resort of a desperate business. Knockdown prices for players new owners can't use for five months? Buy a car now, loan in to a lunatic for 20,000 miles, then it's all yours!... I don't see many players there I would gamble more than £250K on. This is short termism in it's crudest and most damaging form - as a business plan it's right up there with chucking future revenue down a black hole. AA is certainly working to an unusual agenda. And on that one I loved the blue few forum comment about how AA was doing nothing at all for the fans, he was just helping creditors.....funny that.

Bale crosses to Crouch, there's some people in caravans, they think the season's all over....it is now!

Sadly I fear Pompey won't be implicated in the drugs trade, their controllers are too busy maiming children with landmines, selling machine guns to terrorists and laundering filthy cash. There are only so many days in the week and your core businesses have to take priority. It would be funny though if the little Fratton gang's offences escalated sharply from tax evasion to drug running. Have we sorted that extradition treaty with Hayling yet?

Sorry Rebel you are all over the place mate - Storrie said the squad value was about £38M, and he should know as he's been fecking up football clubs for two decades. or was that just the figure he came up with when working out his percentage?...... And as for Leslau - a fortune worth £200M? - is he looking to lose all of it in one hit? - they need a billionaire not a millionaire.

it seems odd that there hasn't been news of an enquiry or defence for these offences. Has the club just confirmed that things have been done illegally, or has AA brought it to the Prem's attention and quietly accepted the punishment? The News is pretending it hasn't happened at all. Odd. Most clubs would have put out a pr defence campaign of some sort. If they have been fined £1M it's progress - it means that at last they have officially been found guilty of cheating.

A Premiership club fined a million pounds for irregularities? That is a massive story, you only get a suspended £25-50K fine for most offences. I do hope it doesn't stop them getting points penalties as per every other case. This seems to have been decided with minimum investigation of the accounts, there must be more to come. No doubt AA will fight it all the way, or talk about it anyway. I'm sure Grant thinks it unfair that the company is punished for breaking company law. And I thought they had overplayed Dindane into their ownership three months ago, so they owe £4M on him already.

so today we have established that even in admin, Portpin is still controlling the club's finances, and we also now know that the administrator's reputation in financial circles is shot to bits. An administrator with accusations of forging documents and lying to court hanging over him is an astonishing appointment, unless he was hand picked for that very reason... Perhaps he isn't a clueless idiot and his odd mistakes are being made intentionally. So what has actually changed since they entered admin? Chanrai is still in charge, he controls the talks with the Prem and potential sellers. The squad hasn't been weakened by cost-cutting, a handful of token redundancies were made and dressed up as a big cull. They are still trading insolvently. Other than being slightly further adrift nothing has changed, and only one creditor is any better off. This whole 'semi-admin' state looks like another scam to creep them closer to a tv cheque. And Grant is an idiot, more of an embarrassing uncle than an inspirational leader. Everytime he opens his mouth something ridiculous seems to spill out, he must stop for his own sake, he's making a fool of himself. His reputation as a coach is plummeting with every press statement.

'it wouldn't surprise me if you get a call from the Government, who want to look into the financial structures of football'. Yes Peter, it won't be the actual 'government' but I'm sure several of their departments/agencies will be calling for you to help them with their enquiries into criminality. And Storrie in charge of a new fit and proper person test?... Has there ever been a madder idea? Chocolate radiators, frogs as hats? Not that I think he is a little mental but I'd like him to name the club that tried to prise him away from the trough last summer - I'm not sure that they exist. Peter Storrie - the man who makes Rupert look like a financial expert and a dignified professional. Can we have another Grant prossie-bothering moment soon, I'm getting a bit bored with old Pete.

it would be more of a news story if Avram announced he was going to be fielding a legally-assembled side that they could afford to pay. And if he goes for the weak option will we tell the difference from his strongest side that was wiped out at Anfield? I know he got to the Champions League final but I think the last time he had a semi was when the team coach drove through Horton Heath.

Grant is taking the same attitude to the league as Storrie arrogantly took to the court and the taxman. Launching an attack on the authorities from a very weak position when they can do you massive damage is suicidal. That illegal FA cup run could still end abruptly in a court.

a genuine challenge to the handful of educated blue few on here - show us a rough workable budget to take your club forward for the next year incorporating restructuring and clearing the debt. We've all had a look for 431 pages and none of us can get the figures to stack up, are we missing something? I remember surveying Saints financial results five years ago and the loss of Prem money made the future look bleak. Luckily I was wrong and apart from the small matter of the two relegations, administration, and a few weeks staring desperately into the abyss, we were financially bouyant throughout the whole post-Prem, pre-Markus period, it was fun, fun, fun, all the way. I believe the likes of Leeds, Norwich and Charlton also adjusted really well and found bouncing straight back to the Prem to be a piece of p'ss. So, what's the master plan, how much do you think a new owner will have to write off to steady the ship?

Worryingly I can now see them starting next season without penalties - but panic ye not, they won't have got away with it!... The big-hearted Prem could pay off the taxman using their vital future income, to protect the league from tax hassles, not for the benefit of the club - huge funds could be pumped through the company to creditors, not into it. A new owner will have to clear football debt and that will be an expensive price for a company that just lost its main revenue stream and comes with restructured debt baggage. 'No one will buy them' we all shout! But we all know that even though the business is shot to bits, an idiot who can't be bothered to read the small print always rides into town and then discovers the debts on his second day in charge. So as long as any irregularities go away, which they could if the Prem hand HMRC their £18M, they could start next season on 0. BUT unable to compete on transfers or wages for a very long two or three years. Minimum investment to try and keep the club in the football league - £40M? Amount required to take those 390 loyal supporters back to the promised land - £150M? Number of redundant staff Utaka could pay on his own? - 400. The sums still don't stack up - buyer beware.

Storrie is funny, he's convinced himself that he's still in charge and continues to put out press releases about his former job. Life is great in Storrie World, but we need to tell his missus - he only has a yoghurt and an apple in his briefcase, he isn't going to work anymore, he's sat in the car at Farlington all day reading the papers. That's why he won't let you watch the telly.... AA needs to tell him where to get off because he can't take a hint, though his bleating must be a further obstacle to a sale. More laughs to come.

my how we laughed at those weather jokes and the '-10 in Southampton' tee shirts. Funny how some jokes come back to bite you, rip you to bits, and send you into the lower leagues for a generation.

that's a nice batchelor pad he has there, bright and airy, neutral decor, sea views, beautifullly furnished. It didn't look anything like a seedy crackhouse. Many people peddle made-up stories about strikes, but I didn't know anyone was silly enough to have themselves branded with said myth. And the minibus? Equipped with toilet bucket, porn at the press of a button, beer and 'smokes' - what more could a football fan want, other than to go to the game when he gets to the relevant town - and to have some memory of the day when he sobers up. The travel club have been missing a trick all these years. Well I'm off into town in a mo, just putting my £360 clown shoes on, slipping into my grubby waistcoat, I'll have a sh=t in a bucket on the train, smoke some pot, watch some fat germans fiddling with dogs, then I'll be ready for the game, if I can be bothered to leave the pub. Or I might just have a pizza and a stroll up to Hampshire's top football stadium - difficult choice.....

He has really given the taxman a kicking today, HMRC has run off with his tail between his legs and will have to settle for 100p in the £ whenever he demands it, and has been awarded costs, another great court victory against the odds for plucky Pompey! I think AA should fight the deduction all the way. Go on admin boy, you have the moral high ground, the whole of football is behind you, it's not fair, go contest it, football should be decided on the pitch, by correctly registered players etc - well don't worry about that last one, anyway drag it out for a couple of weeks, please. If you could get a tracksuit with your intitials on it might help with your team talks. Any coach with bottle would invite you to get the feck out of his team meeting and get on with your job but you are obviously well qualified to advise on all trades from finance to zonal marking. And just when we thought Chainrai didn't do irony he comes out with this quote about the group bidding to buy...'He hopes these aren't a bunch of chancers.' Mmmm. Where's Storrie when you need a laugh? I'm missing his version of world affairs, though Grant has stepped in to his shoes and does some great stand up - go on Avram, tell us the one about how your league record makes Adams and Hart look like coaching legends yet you still get people measuring you up for a statue - or perhaps the one about 250,000 people loving the club, and how 390 of them made it to Liverpool - spin that into a positive storrie! The fans have abandoned ship. Storrie and Grant - the saviours of Pompey, AA giving footballers advice. Nice.