vonwright

5 minutes ago, ThePrisoner said:

What is (probably) a load of hogwash here from Nixon.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/17625146/wycombe-compensation-derby-middlesbrough-agreement/

Couhig's made some odd noises all the way through this (at some point coming close to suggesting he doesn't expect to actually win any money). But in some ways he a more difficult problem, if a smaller one. I think Gibson had a huge problem with Morris but I think he also understands the value of a club like Derby to the people who live there. Not sure Couhig does (might be doing him a disservice, they do have team sport if America after all...)

26 minutes ago, BucksRam said:

Accord - An agreement that settles a dispute, generally requiring an obligee to accept a compromise or satisfaction from the obligor with something less than what was originally demanded. Also often used synonymously with treaty.

Suspect that word was chosen deliberately. I assume here Mel was obligor. 

Either way, this seems to be great news and on a Friday too

"Accord on a resolution" made it sound to me like they might not have all the details thrashed out, but they have enough sorted out to know that the club and/or its new owner won't be liable. 

And frankly, that's all I care about. If Mel's having to pay Gibson £100million and hand-wash his car every week, so be it. Don't care. Let get the club sold and move on. 

(PS I suspect we'll find out a lot more via inevitable leaks to journalists, sooner or later.)

59 minutes ago, rsmini said:

 

Bridgen is spot on really. Football writes its own rules which turns out to mean, in a situation like ours, potentially no one gets any money (including the taxpayer via HMRC) because speculative football claims (not debts) have to be protected at 100pc of whatever their value turns out to be, whenever that is decided.

From a business point of view - we are talking about saving a stricken business here - it makes absolutely no sense. You are asking far too much of investors ("Buy this ruined business for £30m, but oh by the way we might decided you need to cough up a further £50m further down the line, depending on the results of an internal panel re: supposed wrongdoing that you had absolutely nothing to do with".) There's a reason administration law doesn't work like this in other industries. And surely football clubs are supposed to be more worthy of protection from liquidation - not more exposed to it by rules like this?

By all means increase the points penalty for administration, tighten FFP rules, whatever. God knows we need it: there are so many examples of clubs treading a very thin line, shifting huge debts around, selling things to themselves, etc etc. And then they get into trouble. 

But don't force those clubs out of business by imposing rules that simply don't exist in any other industry. 

1 hour ago, vonwright said:

Really struggling to follow Parry's "logic" about how the two things are connected.

"You [the EFL] failed to impose your rules well enough or quickly enough." 

This may be true, I have no idea, but the rules were eventually applied, Derby taken to a hearing, and appeal launched when Derby won, and ultimately a points sanction applied. If Boro are honestly saying "All this should have happened the same year! We would have been promoted!" well good luck with that, but your beef is clearly with the EFL.

"You [Derby] cheated and therefore won more points that you would have done otherwise, denying us a place in the play-offs as a result."

This may be true, I have no idea (although I suspect its hard to prove in a court of law), but how on earth is it connected with the first claim? 

If the EFL's "slowness" in enforcing its rules cost Boro promotion, what's changed? Why aren't they proceeding with the claim against the EFL as well as suing us for "damages"? Surely the legitimacy of one claim doesn't depend in any way on the legitimacy of the other?

In why case, why exactly have Boro dropped their claim against the EFL? Would the EFL have prevented them going after us otherwise? Was this a formal condition? And isn't that morally and/or legally a bit ropey?

Think they should be pushed on this point - forced to say out loud the implicit part.

A far quicker way of saying all this:

Do Middlesbrough considered themselves to have dropped their claim against the EFL, or settled their claim against the EFL?

If the former: why?

If the latter: what were the terms of the settlement? To be given permission to do something (seek damages from Derby) they wouldn't otherwise have been allowed to do (sounds dodgy)? To receive tacit support for their claim (sounds dodgy)?

40 minutes ago, kevinhectoring said:

Looked at the Parry comments - they confirm Gibbo bullied EFl into bringing the proceedings against us. That’s why I posted this morning that EFl was woeful in allowing Gibbo and his vendetta to drive their policy. That was then. Now is now 

Really struggling to follow Parry's "logic" about how the two things are connected.

"You [the EFL] failed to impose your rules well enough or quickly enough." 

This may be true, I have no idea, but the rules were eventually applied, Derby taken to a hearing, and appeal launched when Derby won, and ultimately a points sanction applied. If Boro are honestly saying "All this should have happened the same year! We would have been promoted!" well good luck with that, but your beef is clearly with the EFL.

"You [Derby] cheated and therefore won more points that you would have done otherwise, denying us a place in the play-offs as a result."

This may be true, I have no idea (although I suspect its hard to prove in a court of law), but how on earth is it connected with the first claim? 

If the EFL's "slowness" in enforcing its rules cost Boro promotion, what's changed? Why aren't they proceeding with the claim against the EFL as well as suing us for "damages"? Surely the legitimacy of one claim doesn't depend in any way on the legitimacy of the other?

In why case, why exactly have Boro dropped their claim against the EFL? Would the EFL have prevented them going after us otherwise? Was this a formal condition? And isn't that morally and/or legally a bit ropey?

Think they should be pushed on this point - forced to say out loud the implicit part.

33 minutes ago, Tyler Durden said:

To be fair respect them for coming on here and trying to misguidedly progress their own views, I don't have any issues with them continuing posting on here though I was always told that it was wrong to mock the afflicted......

Bottom line is the claim. The guy starts from the belief a £40m+ claim for unproven and unprovable 'damages' held over a stricken club is perfectly reasonable, honestly intended, etc etc. I'm sick of arguing about that: we just need this to go to court or some sort of fast-track arbitration. If Gibson's going to insist on this course of action, despite the fact it's probably killing the club, then he needs to make his case in a formal setting. If he is really only interested in justice, and doesn't want to hurt the club, he should see the need to get this done as quickly as possible. 

Amazing.

(And not allowing us to sign Ebosele on a long term contract is costing the club a potential £10m or so in summer. Cheers EFL for definitely having our survival at heart!)

8 minutes ago, vonwright said:

Feels like we might need more legs in midfield. Love the guy but the game is passing Bielik by a bit. He's clearly not 100pc but is probably suited to three in midfield anyway (especially if Bird is playing too)

I know nothing. 

Ebosele is special.

This team has incredible character.

That's all really. 

Feels like we might need more legs in midfield. Love the guy but the game is passing Bielik by a bit. He's clearly not 100pc but is probably suited to three in midfield anyway (especially if Bird is playing too)

WHAT WAS THAT FREE KICK

Just now, BoroWill said:

Gibson's claim began long before your administration and could have been sorted before it. Mel Morris delayed this and the cynical side of me says he put you into administration to get away from both the HMRC debt and our claim.

And again: there is no precedent for a claim like this (clubs don't sue each other for P+S breaches), it is entirely speculative (based on completely unproven "losses"), and he does not need to pursue it now it is preventing a sale that would save the club.

He absolutely bears some responsibility if we get liquidated.

12 minutes ago, BoroWill said:

It is nobody but Morris' fault that you are in administration. Entering administration was a voluntary action taken by him.

Again: it is Morris fault that we are in administration. It is very largely Gibson's fault we can't get out, and might face liquidation.

This is not a bad guy/good guy situation. It's just two incredibly rich men showing the world how you kill a football club.

Just now, Maharan said:

To be fair, you would expect there to be some kind of formal communication with the various parties beyond some loosely worded open letter. Let’s be honest 

Well, I think the onus should largely be on the EFL to find creative and constructive solutions. The germ of one has been presented - does the EFL have no role in actively pursuing it, and refining it into a form all parties could accept? Rather than sneering and leaking, basically.

32 minutes ago, IslandExile said:

But.....but ....but didn't Rick Parry comment on it on the day it was released?

It needs to be handed over in a bound folder, printed on one page, Arial 12pt, single line spacing, signed for by a board member, or nothing can happen.

They are the rules and the EFL must follow the rules for the good of the game (they do however very much hope Derby can be saved, and encourage other parties to come up with pragmatic solutions).

Just now, RoyMac5 said:

They've offered to provide tea and biscuits for any meetings held?

They planned to do this. But Morris wanted chocolate digestives and Gibson wanted Hobnobs so they panicked and rang Nixon and said "Of course we wanted biscuits but it is all very, very complicated and did you know that Mel Morris regularly forgets to feed his pet rabbit?" 

29 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

 

What does this mean? It's more incredibly limp posturing by the EFL. They are the ones who are supposed to be facilitating a solution. Morris' statement gives the outline of a solution. He's not technically involved in any of this any more, unless he chooses to involve himself. Instead of briefing this, why not just get on with trying to get Boro and Middlesbrough to agree what is in effect High Court arbitration, seeking a commitment from Mel that he will act as guarantor for any losses to the club, and seek agreement from the arbitrators that they won't stop the club being named as respondent? 

What are the EFL actively doing to try to find a solution, other than briefing journalists about how this is all other people's fault, and all other people's responsibility?

(EDIT: Just seen the follow-up tweet. It seems the other parties are indeed moving along with this while the EFL sits and snipes on the sidelines.) 

14 minutes ago, BoroWill said:

Long time since I posted on here but I logged in to agree that this is by far the most sensible solution that all sides should be pushing for. Morris is the root cause of your problems and our (and Wycombe's) ire. He shouldn't hide behind the convenience of UK company law to avoid having to fix the mess he made.

I'm aware that you will all have strong views on Gibson but I'm 99.9% certain he would support this kind of arrangement, he doesn't want your club to go out of business. 

Morris is the reason we are in administration. Gibson is the reason we can't get out of it. 

Expediting his claims and getting them heard may be the pragmatic solution, but let's be clear: I (and most Derby fans) think these claims are spurious, completely unprecedented (no club has ever "sued" another over P+S breaches), motivated by personal malice, and being exploited by Gibson to mete out his own personal "punishment" to a club facing liquidation.  

14 minutes ago, The Scarlet Pimpernel said:

So, in effect we (Derby in administration) are powerless to speed up the sale of the club. We are completely tied up in a thousand knots.

I don't think it is a thousand knots, though, just one or possibly two big ones.

The main one is these claims - it simply isn't acceptable for the EFL to say "Ah well the earliest we can hear them is the end of May, by which time you'll be out of business, but that's just the process!"

Whether it's the Morris solution, or some other form of expedited hearing, these claims need to be dealt with in a court or hearing as soon as possible. The EFL should be doing everything in its power to achieve that, not limply sitting on the fence and finding problems rather than solutions, and therefore aiding and abetting the destruction of one club to suit the agenda of another.

This is basically the story of the Gordian knot, but instead of Alexander the Great we have Rick Parry going "Well the thing you have to understand about knots is they are very complicated and what we really need to do is just sit here staring at it for a while and hope it untangles itself."

1 hour ago, kevinhectoring said:

There was apparently a solicitor on RD last night who confirmed MM’s whacky scheme would get thrown out.  
 

Someone on here suggested something different : that Gibbo sue the club in the HIgh Court and MM should bear the cost. This is perfectly doable and equivalent to MM giving the club an indemnity. It might need EFl consent tho’
 

Yep, this latter suggestion is the "pragmatic solution" all sides should be pushing for. If Boro, WW or EFL say no, they need to be pushed very hard indeed on why: they get everything they claim to want, and Derby gets a fair chance of finding a buyer (which Boro, WW and EFL claim to want too, let's not forget!). If Morris says "no, no, I didn't mean that" then he too needs to be called out: his offer was essentially worthless.

Basically having a proposal like this is very clarifying: do all these different parties really mean what they say?

1 hour ago, kevinhectoring said:

Magistrates, magistrates clerks, judges, judges clerks, recorders, coroners, arbitrators, they can all make decisions influenced by statutory purpose. It’s why the law was changed some years ago to allow evidence of parliamentary debates to be admitted in legal proceedings -  so that the judge could be informed of parliament’s intention. I think our amortisation decision was probably wrong on a strict reading of the EFL rules but probably in line with the purpose of the rules  

You might have a point when it comes to sentencing btw 

It just isn't what happens in anything like the way you describe - and not just for sentencing. No magistrate ever says "Well the letter of the law says x but I'm finding you guilty because the intention of the law is y." And it doesn't happen in higher courts either. Yes, judges might consider the intention of the law if they need to resolve some tension or ambiguity, but that's a world away from using intention as a starting point, or ignoring the law, or "stretching" the law (your words), or simply inventing a law that doesn't exist. You should not (contra your example) be any more likely to be convicted if you are "a menace to public safety", and nor should you be. It might affect your sentence, and so it should. Both those things are entirely in accordance with the letter of the law. 

I'm baffled that you think this happens - do you perhaps live in Russia or China? - let alone that you think it's a fine and acceptable thing for courts (or the EFL) to do. 

16 minutes ago, duncanjwitham said:

I'd say that's 100% corrupt, or at least an utterly insane way to run an organisation. If you want to argue that the EFL should change rules after someone has fond a loophole, to stop it being exploited in the future, then fine. But you are basically arguing that the EFL should be able to retrospectively change the rules at any given time and punish clubs for having broken them before they were changed.

You may as well argue that a magistrate can fine drivers purely for doing 30mph in a 30-zone because it's near a school and he thinks they should be doing 20.

Also, magistrates don't do this. They are actually tediously predictable in their application of the rules, and rely utterly on their clerks to tell them what the law says they should do and why. And rightly so. 

21 minutes ago, duncanjwitham said:

There seems to be some misunderstanding of the EFL's position on all of this.  So, to my understanding this is where they stand...

1. Any disputes between clubs have to go through arbitration, no independent legal action against each other of anything.
2. The EFL do not get actively involved in arbitration, other than setting the basic ground rules. They don't review claims, block illegal claims or anything. They want to be completely independent of it all.
3. If claims are illegal (i.e. against EFL rules), unfounded or whatever, that's a matter for the arbitration panel to decide at the time, not the EFL beforehand.
4. Any financial awards resulting from arbitration are football debts.
5. All football debts must be paid to exit administration and remain a league member.
6. Claims cannot be squashed out of existence (or anything similar) as a result of exiting administration they need to be properly resolved through arbitration or settled/dropped outside of that.  Basically they don't want clubs to be able to escape from paying genuine football debts by insolvency policy trickery.

Not saying I agree with all of that, but I think that's what they're thinking.

Think this is spot on. And while the EFL seems happy for us to go to High Court to challenge these principles (specifically 4, 5 and 6) what we really need is to deal with the claims themselves. 

If it is at all possible to take those claims out of the equation for potential buyers, that would be a huge forward step. Seems like Morris' offer would potentially do that - but it does need to be binding on him, and I don't know how you'd do that. As someone said above it would need some sort of guarantees from Morris. 

I'm not 100pc sure of the nature of the claims - ie are they claims for financial loss/damages under general law? Or specific EFL rules? And if so which ones? That's probably relevant to what the court could or could not do

38 minutes ago, ilkleyram said:

Yes, except private members clubs cannot ignore the law of the land, can they (genuine question).  They’re not allowed to discriminate on grounds of sex or race, or pay lower than the minimum wage, or sack people unfairly or not pay their income taxes or the duty on cigarettes or alcohol. So where lies the difference?

They can't do any of those things. I suppose the difference is, they would say, is that the are not preventing Derby exiting administration as per law. They are only saying if they do that they won't be welcome in the club. And they'd say that doing that isn't breaking discrimination law, for example, or tax law or minimum wage law. It's just enforcing membership rules. I think the onus would be on us to name a specific law they were breaking. 

I mean, is the 'football debt' rule itself written into law, or is it just something clubs agree to abide by? 

I have no idea who would win a case, by the way, and have no expertise. I also feel it is ridiculous that 'footballing claims' like this would be given the same status as 'footballing debts'. And I believe the EFL should update its rules to better fit both administration law, and the fact clubs in administration shouldn't face such potentially crippling, speculative 'damages' claims that act as a massive barrier to them ever getting sold.

Just feel it might be a bit of a red herring and that settling the status of the debts (or better still passing that responsibility to Morris) is the priority. 

10 minutes ago, curb said:

But of course they won’t, this is the EFL we’re talking about after all.

Well perhaps but we (and the MPs) at least need to put focused pressure on the EFL on this point. Even if we accept there are a number of obstacles to a sale, this removes a massive one at a stroke. MFC and WW get their claims heard in an impeccable legal forum. And Morris is potentially liable, not the ruined club he left behind. We need to push them on this because (assuming it is at all legally possible) then explaining why it's a bad idea is going to be very, very hard for them.

2 hours ago, duncanjwitham said:

Not sure it was ever clarified, but I’ve always understood that as take us to court if you want to challenge the football creditors ruling, or just go through arbitration if you want the claims deciding. I don’t think they were offering to let us have the claims themselves decided in court.

That's my understanding, too. They are willing to let the court consider: 'Is the EFL entitled to have rules stating that it can kick out a club that fails to respect 'football debts', or in this case 'football claims' - ie claims that would become 'football debts' if substantiated at an EFL hearing? Can it do this even though it basically means treating these claims differently to how claims like this are treated by law?' And the court might say they are fine to do that: this is a members' club which can have whatever membership rules they want. In which case the company (Derby County) could still push ahead with a sale and ignore the claims (as per law), but the EFL could then kick them out (for breaching EFL rules). As long as that is the case, no one is going to buy the club. 

It might be worth seeking a ruling on that, but we might well lose. In any case, the issue we really need settled is: 'Do these specific claims have any merit and are Middlesbrough and/or Wycombe owed any damages?'

I don't think the EFL were offering to have that heard in court. They like to keep such things house. 

To which I would say: okay EFL, but these are unique circumstances. Derby's very existence is as stake and if Morris is willing to take the financial risk if the matter is heard in court, then why not? Doesn't it give everyone what they want, while also (crucially) actually giving Derby some chance or survival? Isn't it putting the potential financial burden where you want it to be (on the reckless former owner) and not on the stricken club? If the EFL is serious about being flexible and 'pragmatic', if it is serious about wanting to save Derby, and if Middlesbrough and Wycombe don't want to kill the club either - they should agree. 

If M&W refuse because 'these things are usually dealt with in house' - not good enough. We will all suspect they basically mean 'It is easier for us to control the process and keep squeezing until you burst'.

The EFL needs to put very public pressure on them to accept this as the 'pragmatic' solution everyone claims to want.