ColonelBlimp

Derby: Appleby stroking fast and could come to completion: Bit premature from the Mirror but it’s better to take all precautions as this one has been building for a while. Dog walk imminent. More in paper tomorrow.
# reluctantnicko 

I was born and raised in far south west Wales, 75 miles away from the nearest major city, Swansea.  Being 9 when I started liking football, everyone there supported Man Utd.  Never one for following the crowd, being someone who also loves numbers (and the lottery having only recently started), I used a bingo machine and put ninety teams with numbers on them.  I picked out Derby totally at random and supported them every since - it coincided nicely with the beginning of the Jim Smith era.  
I had absolutely no connections with this City, and hadn't even visited there until I was 18 and able to go by myself.  
I moved away to work in London, and started going up here and there to games.  As my career progressed, I could afford to move out of the smoke.  With more money, and easy access to the M1, I got myself a season ticket and commuted to most home games and it gets me away from the wife for a few hours ? ).  I literally drive to the ground and home again - have never really actually explored the City itself.
I now have an array of teams nearby to support. Not sure I could, though.  If the worst happens, I think I will go with the phoenix.  When they rise to Lg1, like AFC Wimbledon did, I would regret not having supported them through it all.  
This afternoon proves to me what would be lost.  I'm bored bored bored.
 

I was born in London, and moved to Derby. Derby made me fall in love with football

Forgive me for barging in on your messageboard but I come in peace as a Bury fan. I have never posted on another club’s board before, this could be my first and last time. 
Firstly, the very best of luck. In cases like this it’s the fans, the innocents in all this, who suffer. We feel your pain, we too have been through the mill and beyond. 
Bury FC, the original club, were kicked out of L1 (having just won promotion) by the EFL in late August 2019,  about 3 weeks into the new season, our first half dozen fixtures were postponed so there was no record to expunge. The club was subsequently placed into administration. It remains in administration to this day but is effectively just a shell, awaiting ultimate liquidation with debts of over £12M. 
If scenario 1 above had happened we would have been reinstated at tier 6 in the pyramid. It didn’t, scenario 2 happened, and a “Phoenix” club called Bury AFC was formed by the fans and funded by the fans. It was admitted into tier 10 of the pyramid, the lowest level under FA auspices. Last season, the first full covid free season, it won promotion losing only one game. The highest home crowd was 1,885, not huge but enormous in a league where 100 or so is the norm. We ground share with Radcliffe AFC, another non league club within the borough of Bury. 
Bury AFC is not of course strictly speaking a Phoenix, but is referred to as such for ease of reference. It carries probably about 60pc of the original fan base. Not everyone has got on board but the majority have. The vibe is brilliant, partly as we are successful on the pitch of course, so never be afraid if this is your fate (it won’t be), you would still have a gas in “non league”, there are so many pluses compared to the EFL which make the match day experience highly enjoyable;  and with your fanbase you would quickly climb back up the pyramid. 

A highly unexpected turn of events happened more recently when a very small group of Bury fans emerged from nowhere with no mandate from anyone, but having apparently got strong connections with the Conservative Party. With the help of a wealthy businessman-fan now living in the USA, and with the financial help of the government which has provided up to £1M of matched funding (“levelling up”?), and the potential help of the (Labour) council, that group of fans (calling themselves Est 1885, the date of the founding of the original club) managed to buy the ground Gigg Lane, which had been subject to a charge for a loan of some £3.5M, and had fallen into a state of some disrepair. So Est 1885 have a ground but no football club, and Bury AFC are a football club with no ground (of their own). Talks are ongoing between the two with a view to a merger down the line. 
A word about the EFL. Yes as useless as a chocolate teapot but presumably facing the chop or severe reform following the government’s fan-led review. Remember the EFL is in essence the 72 clubs - it gets its power from the clubs, maybe it is useless because the clubs have only ever favoured light-touch regulation of themselves for obvious reasons, so have never given the EFL the powers it really needed to provide effective governance. 
So the very best of luck and whatever happens - there is no need to despair. 

Thanks for that.
Ahh, school trips to Butser Hill, Marwell Zoo
When I was at school in Hamble, Pompey fans were known as scummers, is that still the case? or do you call each other that ?Been a while, mind.
I've often considered Pompey and Southampton to be a little bit like Derby and Forest.
Have you renamed the M27 to be Harry Redknapp Way, yet?

Ooh that should do it - an urgent joint letter!

Portsmouth fan here in peace. 
I'm guessing that some of you will have seen that we have previous with Andronikou involved as an administrator with us; and fair to say that those of our support who remember him hold him in utter contempt. 
I sincerely hope you manage to rid yourself of Morris' tenure and are able to move on properly from all this without him having any control over any of the assets your club needs to move forward.
Look after yourselves - and hopefully when we meet next season things will be on a bit more of an even keel for you.

It’s nice to see some verse on here though  this is hardly Homer
(and it’s quite inappropriate, for welcoming an owner)
but if you play the bard again, next time please try to plan 
how many syllables to use, ‘cos then it might just scan 

Steve Morgan is our Chairman, he wears a philanthropic hat
He was a Housebuilder and then a Wolverhampton t**t
He bought us for a fortune; he thought us worth a punt
After Morris left us potless, the stupid f**cking c**t

I imagine this being one of those Scooby Doo moments, where it gets to the end of the caper and the real villain is revealed when a plastic face disguise is removed.  Chris Kirchner is @americanram.
It all bloody fits. Why were we so stupid not to see it over recent months? Larger than life character, loads of promises and positive contributions over the Atlantic via the WWW, pretends he’s married to Aly, but in the end proven to be a complete fraud with the ultimate no show. Well played Ryan. Bloody well played.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

Well, there's the problem for CK.
 
He needs to plop or get off the louvre.

The 'work' they've done is to keep the club running on a day to day basis despite the business being left in such a state that.. well a state that it needed administrators called in!
Don't underestimate that job in itself. There's a reason Administrators fees are as high as they are, and there's a reason Administrators don't tend to be at the top of everyone's Christmas Card lists. It's not a job you do to make friends. 
If another interested party comes forward now they benefit from the 'work' that's been done. They know the amount of money they need, there's an agreed (provisional) structure for how and when that money will go to creditors, there's an EFL approved business plan that can be used as a template, any new candidate knows what the budgets are going to look like, what's acceptable to the EFL. 
With a bit of tweaking everything is already in place for someone to stump up the money CK was supposed to pay and the club is theirs.
 
Up until recently there's been no veritable evidence that CK had no chance of getting the deal over the line. He's surrounded by entirely reputable people who have backed him up every step of the way.
Proof of funds is proof of funds. I doubt the checks made on this by the admins are any different to the checks any other admin would make. 
It's simply a fact that he has or had the money somewhere. That it appears to have gone missing now is a separate matter and I'd agree with people saying that there should have been some sort of 'test run' perfomed much earlier to prove that the money would arrive. It still remains though that there was no legal, no formal reason for anyone involved in the process to think he couldn't pay up - cynicism from supporters doesn't cut it, feelings don't come into it - there needs to be firm evidence presented as a reason not to proceed. 
The crux of the second half if your post is "if you believe MA's representatives".
That'll be a firm no. There's no point discussing MA further at this point except to say if you believe the PR that's coming from the biggest game player of the lot, we'll that's your prerogative. 
If the administrators are in it purely to line their pockets and drag everything out intentionally, why did they even bother go to the EFL with a bidder and the cross claim cram down thing to get a PB in place for January?
I suppose you could accuse them if doing that for show, to make it look like they wanted this all over months ago... but then you're not just calling them incompetent you're literally accusing them of illegal activity. 
If that's the case it will all come out in the wash, but they've been convicted already by Derby fans. 
If their fees are 'crazy' surely someone can prove that they aren't simply in line with what anyone anyone else would charge for the job? Mike Ashley refusing to pay someone their due doesn't make it any less due. 
None of this is to say they haven't made some big mistakes, but some of the stuff that comes out of people's mouths about the administrators while they simultaneously wax verbal about other parties (with their own agenda) and swallow every PR fluff piece designed to make them look like some sort of victim in all of this is... I don't even have the words tbh. 

Good Morning all, I hope you all slept well.
I spoke to my friend last night at 11-30pm, A little about my friend, He knows several ex DCFC directors, Had/Has business dealings with them and is an extremely good golfer and has a very good business, Yesterday at golf(no not with CK)he was with one ex DCFC director, This director fed him the information I gave and he said and I quote "I expect Steve Morgan to be the new owner come 5pm this evening".
Now this is where the fun starts, Q knew Monday afternoon there was an issue with the money but sat on it, They were blinded by CKs credentials and patter, Dawes breaks some news concerning wages being paid by someone at DCFC and not CK, The person who gave him this info was a senior DCFC player who was promised certain things, The player I do not know his name.
Q after Dawes revelations went into panic mode, My friend and Q knew of the wages not being paid to CKs employers on Wednesday, Some ex DCFC directors don't seem to be that impressed with CK, They think he's a braggart a little loud but likes to be liked, On a personnel note my friend thinks a little jealousy has crept in with how CK made his money...ie got lucky.
Q now have a mountain to climb, According to Dorset, Percy, Nixon, Dawes and anyone else who's reported the story they seem to be batting for their PB/Owner, Whether it be Morgan, Appleby, Ashley or even Kirchner who knows?‍♀️, Q and the EFL are at odds with each other and have been for several months, It looks like the EFL are trying to put all the blame on Q as the paperwork they saw for the fit and proper owner came from Q.
My friend said he stands by on what he was told yesterday, Most of us will have someone in our group that like to bluster and maybe give out a little BS, My friend is not one of those types, He's a genuine person who I'd stand up for and is not afraid to stand up for his mates.
Chins up all....Alf
 
 
 

Mike Ashley has done a lot of dealing with administrators and companies in administration, so if he thinks that they're unprofessional and not worth their fee, then that must be quite telling.

I want to make it absolutely clear that I would take Saudi money at Derby County, short of the leader of ISIS himself, I’m really not picky at this point. 

Kirchner may or may not pull it out of the fire. I doubt it, but like everyone else on here, I've nothing substantive to go on.
If he doesn't, and Mike Ashley steps in, with or without a 15 point deduction, I welcome him with open arms. Anyone virtue signalling about not going to games if he's in charge needs to give their head a wobble. He's a businessman in retail, possibly the most savage sector there is, and he's amazingly good at it. He's not trying to win popularity contests in his professional life.
How do you think he stacks up in the morality stakes of owners in the 92? Mid-table? Certainly more reputable than they've got down the road, or at his old club, or Man City, or (depending on your point of view) at Stoke. The list goes on.
You'd rather we went under? Well you can foxtrot oscar.

To be fair egg throwing is a more economical activity than mining coal.

Well, I'm all in for the Kirch.
It's going to happen, say goodbye to your misery, your negativity; Wave away thoughts of Mike Ashley or Andy Appleby or string-pulling Mel.
100% behind him.
 
(Chris, if you read this, I never wavered once, honest)
 

Well, I'm all in for the Kirch.
It's going to happen, say goodbye to your misery, your negativity; Wave away thoughts of Mike Ashley or Andy Appleby or string-pulling Mel.
100% behind him.
 
(Chris, if you read this, I never wavered once, honest)