How long, accountability ? (16 Viewers)

Oh I agree, the "trouble with that" is all conjecture. Richardson did get us into masses of debt. Richardson did sell Highfield Road. Richardson and McGinnity did totally F up the Arena 2000 project so that we ended up with nothing. And ever since we've been cap in hand (and apparently eternally grateful) to the Council for "helping" us out.

There are so many "nearly" moments in the project that may have saved us. The time the Portugese bank pulled out over the funding of the £21M shortfall. Unfortunately for us, the Council took that on.

I know hindsight is a wonderful thing, but if we'd stayed at Highfield Road then I'm pretty sure we wouldn't be in Northampton.

oldskyblue58 said:

Trouble with that Torch is that with the assets and liabilities relating to the Ricoh project excluded the debt of CCFC Group in 2005 was £28m and growing ....... just how long do you think it would be before they had to sell HR or go bust.

I agree Richardson and co got us to that situation and without that we might not have seen SISU.............. we might still be at HR, debt might have stopped growing, we might have still been in Premiership. But circumstances changed in 2008, debt was written off, opportunities were presented and taken or not...... and the decisions made knowing what Richardson & co had done were taken by SISU. Eyes wide shut?

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True, all those wonderful players people keep banging on about were part of the slippery slope we found ourselves on, I don't disagree. However, we owned our ground. It was ours. We did NOT need to move. And because we did we are where we are; with SISU, ACL, CCC, the Ricoh and Sixfields. There's no getting away from that.

Ashdown1 said:

The damage done to the club has been made primarily from paying players and staff way too much money, this now it seems can also include rent, management fees and debt interest. In short our expenditure has far exceeded our revenues for a long time. HR is a factor in that equation but not the be all and end all as we were losing money hand over fist way before that.

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fernandopartridge said:

The fans have never shown much appetite for supporting a longer term strategy of developing our own.

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Do we have a choice?

That wasn't the point. It happens now, it's happened today. People moan about lack of signings, permanent signings and seem genuinely confused why we can't get anyone "decent". You only have to look at our current situation and gates (yes, I know who's to blame) for that. And, if you look back in the past at players we did buy then the same lack of gates/income led to us paying out more than we get in. Regardless of whether you are a football club or a family trying to juggle your budget if you pay out more than you earn then you're in trouble.

The Gentleman said:

Do we have a choice?

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torchomatic said:

True, all those wonderful players people keep banging on about were part of the slippery slope we found ourselves on, I don't disagree. However, we owned our ground. It was ours. We did NOT need to move. And because we did we are where we are; with SISU, ACL, CCC, the Ricoh and Sixfields. There's no getting away from that.

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Like Evtuschok, Runar Normann, Tim Sherwood and Keith O'neill and David Bell for that matter !! However the list is long and depressing. If we had had a Pressley type manager instead of that moron Peter Reid then who knows where we could be now !

Exactly. But he was a name and previous boards were impressed by names. The one thing SISU have got right is Steve Waggot who seems to ignore "names" and goes for managers he believes will do the football club some good.

Ashdown1 said:

Like Evtuschok, Runar Normann, Tim Sherwood and Keith O'neill and David Bell for that matter !! However the list is long and depressing. If we had had a Pressley type manager instead of that moron Peter Reid then who knows where we could be now !

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While I would never claim BR and his cronies did a good job its very simple for me - the buck stops with SISU. This wasn't some local businessmen scrambling to save the club from going out of existence who didn't really have the money this was a hedge fund who through they could make money off us.

One of two things happened:

1) SISU did due diligence and saw no issues, therefore any problems we have now are caused by their mismanagement.
2) SISU didn't do due diligence or didn't do it correctly, again any problems we have now are down to them.

The only other option is that something was deliberately hidden from them but I'm fairly certain we can cross that off the list as they aren't exactly slow at taking legal action.

Ashdown1 said:

Like Evtuschok, Runar Normann, Tim Sherwood and Keith O'neill and David Bell for that matter !! However the list is long and depressing. If we had had a Pressley type manager instead of that moron Peter Reid then who knows where we could be now !

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His name was Eric Black,Score one more than the others.

torchomatic said:

Funny after that line you totally dismiss the damage done by previous regimes. The damage done by selling Highfield Road is irreparable and can be directly attributed to where we find ourselves now. Yep, SISU should have done this and shouldn't have done that, but if we hadn't have made the catastrophic mistake of moving to a new stadium then we'd all be saying "SISU who?"

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Why do we need to continually keep harping back to what other did. Christ almighty, some on here sound more like politicians every day blaming previous people for this and for that. For me this is just a get out for people who don't take responsibility. Caveats are for arse covering and nothing else, I use them all the time when compiling my reports.

Yes I know that it was crap that we sold HR, yes it shit paying so much rent for the Ricoh but they came in 2007. From there they had the opportunity to make great strides and they have failed catastrophically. I see where we are now is down to them. I look at Southampton when I think of our plight and try to compare where we are now. Saints new ground around 2001-02, 2005 relegated from Championship, 2007 Sisu link (how they dodged a bullet there), 2009 administration and relegation to L1. 2009 new owner Liebherr comes in. 2012-2013 playing PL football. This shows that from adversity if you have real investment and commitment from your owners, belief from the fans and good football then you can make progress so I am sick and fucking tired of hearing these excuses (that is what they are now) of how hamstrung previous people/owners have left us because if Sisu had showed the same vision as Southampton then maybe we wouldn't be in the shit we are in.

So in summary, yes Sisu are fucking accountable!

The Gentleman said:

Why do we need to continually keep harping back to what other did. Christ almighty, some on here sound more like politicians every day blaming previous people for this and for that. For me this is just a get out for people who don't take responsibility. Caveats are for arse covering and nothing else, I use them all the time when compiling my reports.

Yes I know that it was crap that we sold HR, yes it shit paying so much rent for the Ricoh but they came in 2007. From there they had the opportunity to make great strides and they have failed catastrophically. I see where we are now is down to them. I look at Southampton when I think of our plight and try to compare where we are now. Saints new ground around 2001-02, 2005 relegated from Championship, 2007 Sisu link (how they dodged a bullet there), 2009 administration and relegation to L1. 2009 new owner Liebherr comes in. 2012-2013 playing PL football. This shows that from adversity if you have real investment and commitment from your owners, belief from the fans and good football then you can make progress so I am sick and fucking tired of hearing these excuses (that is what they are now) of how hamstrung previous people/owners have left us because if Sisu had showed the same vision as Southampton then maybe we wouldn't be in the shit we are in.

So in summary, yes Sisu are fucking accountable!

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The thing is Gent, early attempts at reducing the rent were rebuffed until it got to the point where ACL had applied to put the club into administration and then offered a reduced rent. Do you not think it would have been more sensible to try this earlier?

oldskyblue58 said:

seem to have taken it on board a little better recently though haven't they?

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Yes, apart from the projections of doom and whining from mid January that we 'hadn't signed anybody'

Or the constant sniping about not 'signing players on permanent deals'

Skyblueweeman said:

Yeah, let's compares Apples with Oranges. That'll make things clearer.....

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It was actually a sympathetic NUFC fan that suggested to me this morning that there was a commonality between the clubs. Both bought out by someone trying to make a quick profit and now the fans and the owner hold each other in equal contempt.

However, good luck with the “we are more hard done by than you” attitude if you go looking for signatures to the petition amongst the Geordies.

Senior Vick from Alicante said:

Unfortunately SISU will never accept accountability for anything they do. They operate in the shadows and treat everyone like mushrooms, theirs only ever denial and their version of events. Everything thing else is collateral damage that is a by product of them reaching their goals, its a good job our Joy is supposedly God fearing and religious as good ol St Peter will be waiting with a long list for her. That's if some hedge fund has not moved it to another part of heaven of course. NOPM

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Sisu own heaven and Peter is an employee...

Apparently, it's rocket science.

Richardson sells HR and starts work on a stadium we can't afford.
Because Richardson and McGinnity piss all our money away we can't afford to finish a project that never should have been started
CCC step in with £21M. To repay this ACL charge us lots of cash.
December 2005. CCFC try and get a fairer deal
December 2008. We are on the brink of administration and SISU step in. SISU then mess it up.

I "harp" back to what others did because it FUCKING matters and contributes to the mess we are in now.

The Gentleman said:

Why do we need to continually keep harping back to what other did. Christ almighty, some on here sound more like politicians every day blaming previous people for this and for that. For me this is just a get out for people who don't take responsibility. Caveats are for arse covering and nothing else, I use them all the time when compiling my reports.

Yes I know that it was crap that we sold HR, yes it shit paying so much rent for the Ricoh but they came in 2007. From there they had the opportunity to make great strides and they have failed catastrophically. I see where we are now is down to them. I look at Southampton when I think of our plight and try to compare where we are now. Saints new ground around 2001-02, 2005 relegated from Championship, 2007 Sisu link (how they dodged a bullet there), 2009 administration and relegation to L1. 2009 new owner Liebherr comes in. 2012-2013 playing PL football. This shows that from adversity if you have real investment and commitment from your owners, belief from the fans and good football then you can make progress so I am sick and fucking tired of hearing these excuses (that is what they are now) of how hamstrung previous people/owners have left us because if Sisu had showed the same vision as Southampton then maybe we wouldn't be in the shit we are in.

So in summary, yes Sisu are fucking accountable!

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fernandopartridge said:

The thing is Gent, early attempts at reducing the rent were rebuffed until it got to the point where ACL had applied to put the club into administration and then offered a reduced rent. Do you not think it would have been more sensible to try this earlier?

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Like when Sisu bought the club, seems like a good time because without a tenant ACL would have been getting fuck all. Sisu had the perfect opportunity to re-negotiate then and they didn't so yes again, still their fault.

What commonality? I don't see them doing too badly with their owner. Still in the premier league, still have great players, still in their own ground, still have massive gates....

One man's meat is another man's poison.

RPHunt said:

It was actually a sympathetic NUFC fan that suggested to me this morning that there was a commonality between the clubs. Both bought out by someone trying to make a quick profit and now the fans and the owner hold each other in equal contempt.

However, good luck with the “we are more hard done by than you” attitude if you go looking for signatures to the petition amongst the Geordies.

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fernandopartridge said:

The thing is Gent, early attempts at reducing the rent were rebuffed until it got to the point where ACL had applied to put the club into administration and then offered a reduced rent. Do you not think it would have been more sensible to try this earlier?

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Fernando, ACL are blameless, didn't you know?
Get yourself down the Ricoh to support the u21's (Leicesters)!

RPHunt said:

It was actually a sympathetic NUFC fan that suggested to me this morning that there was a commonality between the clubs. Both bought out by someone trying to make a quick profit and now the fans and the owner hold each other in equal contempt.

However, good luck with the “we are more hard done by than you” attitude if you go looking for signatures to the petition amongst the Geordies.

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Have you signed or even looked at the petition? The wording is hardly 'we are more hard done by than you'....

Whilst I would hold BR and MM etc responsible for getting us into a position where we had to be bailed out, as a basket case, by SISU. The fact remains that SISU have made one unfathomable business decision after another. I run my own business with one guiding principle; I like to eat and pay my mortgage and if I keep my customers happy, I will be able to continue to do this. SISU seem determined to lose as much money as possible, whilst alienating as many of their customers and suppliers as possible.

can think of only one reason why they would wish to do this.

torchomatic said:

Apparently, it's rocket science.

Richardson sells HR and starts work on a stadium we can't afford.
Because Richardson and McGinnity piss all our money away we can't afford to finish a project that never should have been started
CCC step in with £21M. To repay this ACL charge us lots of cash.
December 2005. CCFC try and get a fairer deal
December 2008. We are on the brink of administration and SISU step in. SISU then mess it up.

I "harp" back to what others did because it FUCKING matters and contributes to the mess we are in now.

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So i am thick now? just a not so clever way of name calling, ironic from someone always bleating about name calling. In my post I acknowledge about HR and the rent. Southampton achieved L1 to PL in 4 years under Liebherr, what has CCFC achieved in 7 years under Sisu? All I said that Sisu are accountable and they are because with the right vision why couldn't we do what Southampton have done. If Sisu had managed to achieve PL in 7 years then believe you and me, their PR machine would be in overdrive to claim how accountable they have been in getting us to the PL so for me the same can be said for the position they have us in now. I wonder if we were in the PL like Southampton now if we would hear about HR, high rent, JR and Northampton, I very much fucking doubt it.

YOu said we shouldn't blame previous people for "this and that". You said that "it was crap" selling HR. I'm saying that despite the obvious fact that SISU have fucked up - and royally - there is much to answer for Richardson and his actions have contributed massively to where we now find ourselves. If you don't agree, then fair enough. But for me just chanting "it's all SISU's fault" is only half the story.

As for Southampton. I admittedly don't know their history or their finances. Do they own St Mary's or do the Council. If it's the council, what is the rent, etc?

The Gentleman said:

So i am thick now? just a not so clever way of name calling, ironic from someone always bleating about name calling. In my post I acknowledge about HR and the rent. Southampton achieved L1 to PL in 4 years under Liebherr, what has CCFC achieved in 7 years under Sisu? All I said that Sisu are accountable and they are because with the right vision why couldn't we do what Southampton have done. If Sisu had managed to achieve PL in 7 years then believe you and me, their PR machine would be in overdrive to claim how accountable they have been in getting us to the PL so for me the same can be said for the position they have us in now. I wonder if we were in the PL like Southampton now if we would hear about HR, high rent, JR and Northampton, I very much fucking doubt it.

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The Gentleman said:

So i am thick now? just a not so clever way of name calling, ironic from someone always bleating about name calling. In my post I acknowledge about HR and the rent. Southampton achieved L1 to PL in 4 years under Liebherr, what has CCFC achieved in 7 years under Sisu? All I said that Sisu are accountable and they are because with the right vision why couldn't we do what Southampton have done. If Sisu had managed to achieve PL in 7 years then believe you and me, their PR machine would be in overdrive to claim how accountable they have been in getting us to the PL so for me the same can be said for the position they have us in now. I wonder if we were in the PL like Southampton now if we would hear about HR, high rent, JR and Northampton, I very much fucking doubt it.

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Did the council own St Marys and did they have restricted revenues and high rent?

When SISU "bought" the club most of the shares were free,my uncle gave his up for nothing much to his regret.

So did my Dad. You have to look into why we were in such a state though, don't you?

diggerdaley said:

When SISU "bought" the club most of the shares were free,my uncle gave his up for nothing much to his regret.

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Grendel said:

Did the council own St Marys and did they have restricted revenues and high rent?

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Not just that, liebherr was a multi billionaire. When in L1 they could afford to pay 1.5m for Lambert, and offer big wages for others.

The Gentleman said:

So i am thick now? just a not so clever way of name calling, ironic from someone always bleating about name calling. In my post I acknowledge about HR and the rent. Southampton achieved L1 to PL in 4 years under Liebherr, what has CCFC achieved in 7 years under Sisu? All I said that Sisu are accountable and they are because with the right vision why couldn't we do what Southampton have done. If Sisu had managed to achieve PL in 7 years then believe you and me, their PR machine would be in overdrive to claim how accountable they have been in getting us to the PL so for me the same can be said for the position they have us in now. I wonder if we were in the PL like Southampton now if we would hear about HR, high rent, JR and Northampton, I very much fucking doubt it.

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I've said many times before, Southampton FC were similar to ours at the time of their woes. Saints fans look back on Rupert Lowes tenure with as much fondness as we do of Richardsons. They were close to going to the wall....we were close to going into admin. They narrowly missed out on SISU (directors might have wanted to much money from SISU), so it didn't go through. We accepted.

In the meantime, Saints were purchased by Markus Liebherr, a multi-billionaire who it was rumoured (not my opinion) to want to invest in the area to assist his business win new contracts on the South Coast. With that, he bought the football club. One investor, very transparent.

I agree...I look upon them in an envious manner. They were lucky, we unfortunately accepted SISU to make a horrendously bad situation, even worse.

WM

Two transfer windows, no major outgoings, management and backroom staff doing a fantastic job, team on the park by all accounts out of this world. Pressley (if he`s committed to us!) the style he is trying to instill, a group of young players nurtured to a particular style of play 2-3 seasons building that! "You Dont Win Nothing With Kids" Who knows?

Did we just get lucky with Pressley, you know Sisu picked his name out of the bag without a clue to his actual management skills, people have come in from places, positions, where you would have to question their decision making given the state of things with us, yet they have come, something is convincing them, more than just good timing.


The improvements to the footballing side, the last 18mnths can you seriously fault it, any other time in our history these guys, this team IDK the anticipation of something good may be about to happen, but it seems to be missed and lost in all the emotion and the hatred for Sisu, without a team the ground is useless, what a move, to think that I or anybody else has to think like that, but it is what it is and what it has done is blur all the good that appears to be going on.
Who would of thought that the team created by the people so despised by some could perform and do as well as they have, all things considered this season has been fantastic? no one could have expected anything like it.

Commitment off the pitch, commitment on the pitch, management, backroom staff and players deserve a big pat on the back.

Sisu may have got a lot wrong, it is obvious they are getting something right, like it or not, credit where its due just for once.

fernandopartridge said:

The thing is Gent, early attempts at reducing the rent were rebuffed until it got to the point where ACL had applied to put the club into administration and then offered a reduced rent. Do you not think it would have been more sensible to try this earlier?

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Source?

We've seen PWKH's report that there was "a couple of half hearted attempts" and the mention in passing in one board minutes. Hardly paints a picture of CCFC banging on the door begging for a better deal. We also have Sisu on record during the Brody era stating the rent is OK and that there were no issues with ACL whatsoever.

Excuse me if I don't get the violins out just yet. And that's ignoring the rather large point that at this point no-one is asking for £1.2m/year and it can in no way be shown to be the issue that caused our debt either. In fact the only people to ever mention it in public aside from Brody was Fisher, except now he's moved on to freehold of a stadium (taking the scenic route through "we need pie cash"ville) and you're still stuck on that.

Even leaving aside all of that. Surely even you can admit that the cost to CCFC of taking a ground share to "solve" this "problem" has hardly been effective.

May I also (AGAIN) point out that until you are complaining about the interest and management fees, that far exceed the rental of a Premiership quality stadium that provides revenue, that Sisu are charging with the same veracity you attack the council (and Higgs, but you always seem to forget their role) for "bleeding the club dry" I'll find it hard to believe you actually have the club's interests at heart rather than a narrowminded political point to make.

shmmeee said:

May I also (AGAIN) point out that until you are complaining about the interest and management fees, that far exceed the rental of a Premiership quality stadium that provides revenue, that Sisu are charging with the same veracity you attack the council (and Higgs, but you always seem to forget their role) for "bleeding the club dry" I'll find it hard to believe you actually have the club's interests at heart rather than a narrowminded political point to make.

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Management fees can be done in various ways.

Loans to companies owned by the Chairman or interesting payments to European scouts who had never heard of the football club are two that spring to mind.

torchomatic said:

Agree and disagree. Northampton their fault. Rent down to Richardson and his cronies. which leads to Northampton. Vicious circle.

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Try taking in the whole picture and then try to come to the same conclusion.

Firstly to your quote. Northampton their fault? Yes. Rent down to Richardson and whoever made the bid decisions at the time? Yes. Leads to Northampton? No.

When SISU took over just about all of the debts were wiped out. Yes the rent was high, but the stadium was built with debt. At the time interest rates were much higher than now. Why should the tax payer pay towards our football club having a new stadium? Interest rates came down but the loan was kept in the same place at a much higher rate than they could have got elsewhere as rates tumbled. The only problem with this is that lending criteria also changed. But the odds are something could have been done. Nothing was done though. At fault were CCC/SISU for not doing anything about it.

So the high rent took us to Northampton? No. Joy wanting to make a lot of money for her investors took us to Northampton. If it was as simple as the rent we would be back at the Ricoh by now.

So how have we gone from just about debt free to about 70m in debt in 6 and a half years? Are we really 70m in debt? If Appleton did his job properly we are. So where has it come from? We know that until they stopped publishing the accounts our club was paying nearly 4m a year in management fees and interest. So there could easily be 25m of the debt. At one stage we were told that our club was losing 500k a month. It has been much lower than that for a long time now, but when Appleton did his bit SISU had been with us for 6 years. 72 months. If we had done so bad every month the debt would be 36m. We hadn't, but if so the charges by SISU to our club and the poor quality overpaid players totals 61m. So some debt has appeared from somewhere that we don't have a clue about.

If we had paid rent of 1.2m for 6 years we would have paid 7.2m yet this is why we are in Northampton? They are making less money from gate receipts minus costs involved keeping us in Northampton than us playing at the Ricoh and paying 1.2m rent plus costs. The difference would easily pay to run our club these days......other than the approx 4m SISU charges our club. And as we all know they could move us back rent free this season and 100k......which is less than the rent in Northampton.......for the following two years. So no I can't blame our move to Northampton on the rent. That is why I blame Joy for wanting the Ricoh for a price that can't be done. And all to give money to her faceless investors.

And the old line from Joy and her puppets........we don't trust them :laugh: WTF have SISU done to deserve trust from anyone? Labo has just admitted that he has no proof at all for all these allegations he has been throwing at the council. So what is the JR all about then? Is it just another stick to keep beating us suffering supporters with?

Domino effect.

Is the problem people had with the £1.2m a year rent was that it was rent rather than a mortgage? If we had built the ground ourselves surely some of the cost would have come from finance so even if we'd owned the ground we still would have been making payments wouldn't we?

chiefdave said:

Is the problem people had with the £1.2m a year rent was that it was rent rather than a mortgage? If we had built the ground ourselves surely some of the cost would have come from finance so even if we'd owned the ground we still would have been making payments wouldn't we?

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The problem is many other clubs got a better deal from the council which made them competitive.

Whatever way you cut it that's the rub. Would Swansea be where they are now with our council - Answer no

They'd be playing in Merthyr, I reckon. I went to see them once and bought their fanzine "Dial M for Merthyr", the best title for a fanzine ever.

Grendel said:

Whatever way you cut it that's the rub. Would Swansea be where they are now with our council - Answer no

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And Shmeee has it spot on. How many that continually rant on about the rent of 1.2m for the use of a stadium as good as the Ricoh ever have a go at the 4m a year that SISU charges our club? And for what? The interest payments are for debts run up by themselves. Management fees? Fook me how many of us could have done a worse job than SISU? Start with a Championship club. Get relegated whilst running up debts of 70m........unless you want to call Appleton a liar or a fraud.