Derby finally accept 21 point deduction.

[NottsRam77]

On 10/10/2021 at 09:45, PistoldPete said:

I don't really understand this story.

 

My understanding is that the 12 point deduction is an all or nothing thing. According to the rules as I understand them, If covid was the most proximate cause of the administraton then the deduction should be zero  points. If it was not then, it should be 12 points. No other ifs or  buts or mitigating factors that could reduce it in half. 

 

Unless .. we are saying .. we haven't got time to fight this through the courts or tribunals, let's do a deal now and get certainty.  

 

Also EFL asking for our books over six years.. haven't they had them already?   

 

 

And with which form of accounting ? 
 

the perfectly legal one that they signed off twice ?

or theirs? 

[JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta]

I think this is a waste of time, but if by some absolute miracle we get the deduction removed or reduced the boiled piss from the rest of the teams and their fans in the division would be absolutely glorious.

Mr Pop would explode like a stick of dynamite.

[NottsRam77]

5 minutes ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

I think this is a waste of time, but if by some absolute miracle we get the deduction removed or reduced the boiled piss from the rest of the teams and their fans in the division would be absolutely glorious.

Mr Pop would explode like a stick of dynamite.

It really wont be hard 

our financial position is largely immaterial 

It carries some relevance obviously but 

was the reason we went into admin because we were running close to the wire or that we had 20m in revenues that had been budgeted for slashed off our accounts

That same 20m will be on each of the previous 6 years accounts

so covid wipes off 2/3s of a companies revenue and isnt the reason (be it Derby or southern electric) they go into admin?

I think its harder to argue against it tbh 

 

 

 

 

best regards

mel lol

Edited October 11, 2021 by NottsRam77

[MuespachRam]

13 minutes ago, angieram said:

You were saying? 

A broken clock is right twice a day..

[atherstoneram]

8 minutes ago, NottsRam77 said:

It really wont be hard 

our financial position is largely immaterial 

It carries some relevance obviously but 

was the reason we went into admin because we were running close to the wire or that we had 20m in revenues that had been budgeted for slashed off our accounts

That same 20m will be on each of the previous 6 years accounts

so covid wipes off 2/3s of a companies revenue and isnt the reason (be it Derby or southern electric) they go into admin?

I think its harder to argue against it tbh 

 

 

 

 

best regards

mel lol

Our financial position is very material and will be vital in the run up to when Covid struck. Covid might be a factor why the club went into administration but not the cause. We don't know the state our finances were in prior to Covid striking or how indeed the club was being run.

The players were not paid on time one month,MM's fault whether he was expecting the Fake Sheikh to pay them or not,until the deal is signed and ratified by the EFL it's still the owners responsibility,the EFL will have a far greater knowledge whether a deal was close or not.

How long has MM just been putting money into the club to keep it ticking over,did that start when he decided he was looking for a buyer (over Two years now) we don't know but the EFL will.

How long have we been owing money to HMRC again we don't know.

How many agreed transfer payments were missed if any? again we don't know.

All these factors will no doubt be submitted by the EFL to the arbitration panel to make a judgement.

[Ghost of Clough]

49 minutes ago, Woodley Ram said:

I'm not sure if I agree with you here.

Wigan's administration was at the start of Covid (July 2020), so the effects would have been no where near as damaging. On 4 June 2020, the owners sold the majority of Wigan Athletic shareholdings to Hong Kong-based Next Leader Fund, who didn't invest.  Their main issue was the new owners and not Covid. Wigan would have gone into administration even if Covid never happened.

You could argue that Derby were able to service their debts and operating overheads and had been doing so until Covid. This took £20m out of the coffers and Derby (unlike Wigan) had a whole season and a bit in closed stadiums before administration (September 2021).

I do agree that we would have been less likely to go under without the debt, that said our debt is lower than a lot of others clubs such as Reading. Our overheads are also small, wages are probably £15m per season unlike 2-3 years ago. Also our FFP/P&S is not as high as people think it is, Reading (sorry to mention them again) overspent by £10m's more than Derby.    

Gibson's argument is personal, if not why has he not sued half the clubs who were promoted and why didn't we sue QPR when they went up. Nothing will happen with Gibson and his legal challenges.

I don't see what Derby are doing as any different to what anyone else would do, certainly other clubs such as SWFC, BCFC have appealed and had points reduced and Reading are in the process of trying to negotiate a lower deduction. 

People need to have a look at the debt levels of all clubs as well as operating expenses as they seem to think Derby have the biggest debt, biggest FFP overspend and biggest wage bill. Non of that is accurate by a long way.   

Indeed. Debt rumoured to be lower than Mr Pop's Bristol, and Gibson's Smoggies.

Wage bill supposedly in the Preston/Wigan/Millwall/Hull range now

[Ghost of Clough]

51 minutes ago, angieram said:

 

I can't see it being successful in all seriousness. Two of the main reasons being: us buying players during the period, us not selling players during the period.

Last summer we bought Jozwiak and Byrne for fees. Marshall, te Wierik, Ibe, Kazim all on frees plus Clarke on loan. This summer we signed Allsop, Jagielka, Stearman, Morrison and Baldock. 
We know about rejected multi-million pound bids for Buchanan and Lawrence just days before going into administration. If we were so close to the edge at that point, why didn't we sell?
 

[jono]

8 minutes ago, atherstoneram said:

Our financial position is very material and will be vital in the run up to when Covid struck. Covid might be a factor why the club went into administration but not the cause. We don't know the state our finances were in prior to Covid striking or how indeed the club was being run.

The players were not paid on time one month,MM's fault whether he was expecting the Fake Sheikh to pay them or not,until the deal is signed and ratified by the EFL it's still the owners responsibility,the EFL will have a far greater knowledge whether a deal was close or not.

How long has MM just been putting money into the club to keep it ticking over,did that start when he decided he was looking for a buyer (over Two years now) we don't know but the EFL will.

How long have we been owing money to HMRC again we don't know.

How many agreed transfer payments were missed if any? again we don't know.

All these factors will no doubt be submitted by the EFL to the arbitration panel to make a judgement.

I think we have to stop trying to say this or that was the cause.

Tragedies happen when multiple things go wrong at the wrong time. 

You could argue the signing of Anya or the employing of Pearson, or the Bryson Hughes were the cause .. none of which would be true.

BUT ... when you have a series of bad outcomes from a series of choices and events events and one of those is Covid 

None of those events would have caused administration when taken as a unique happening. .. it was a series of events, all of which were contributory to the end result. 

 

 

[mike93rh]

I love how much people want Nixon to be wrong, because I agree the man's a p***k and I hate the publication who pays him. 

 

But he's right more often than not and often the first to give us new info. 

[NottsRam77]

29 minutes ago, atherstoneram said:

Our financial position is very material and will be vital in the run up to when Covid struck. Covid might be a factor why the club went into administration but not the cause. We don't know the state our finances were in prior to Covid striking or how indeed the club was being run.

The players were not paid on time one month,MM's fault whether he was expecting the Fake Sheikh to pay them or not,until the deal is signed and ratified by the EFL it's still the owners responsibility,the EFL will have a far greater knowledge whether a deal was close or not.

How long has MM just been putting money into the club to keep it ticking over,did that start when he decided he was looking for a buyer (over Two years now) we don't know but the EFL will.

How long have we been owing money to HMRC again we don't know.

How many agreed transfer payments were missed if any? again we don't know.

All these factors will no doubt be submitted by the EFL to the arbitration panel to make a judgement.

Was the payment issue not because of the botched alonso takeover? 

[GB SPORTS]

1 hour ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

I think this is a waste of time, but if by some absolute miracle we get the deduction removed or reduced the boiled piss from the rest of the teams and their fans in the division would be absolutely glorious.

Mr Pop would explode like a stick of dynamite.

I can hear him Fizzing from here. 

[NottsRam77]

15 minutes ago, jono said:

I think we have to stop trying to say this or that was the cause.

Tragedies happen when multiple things go wrong at the wrong time. 

You could argue the signing of Anya or the employing of Pearson, or the Bryson Hughes were the cause .. none of which would be true.

BUT ... when you have a series of bad outcomes from a series of choices and events events and one of those is Covid 

None of those events would have caused administration when taken as a unique happening. .. it was a series of events, all of which were contributory to the end result. 

 

 

Bad signings are one thing 

a company having 2/3s of its revenue wiped off is another 

[Bald Eagle's Barmy Army]

30 minutes ago, atherstoneram said:

Our financial position is very material and will be vital in the run up to when Covid struck. Covid might be a factor why the club went into administration but not the cause. We don't know the state our finances were in prior to Covid striking or how indeed the club was being run.

The players were not paid on time one month,MM's fault whether he was expecting the Fake Sheikh to pay them or not,until the deal is signed and ratified by the EFL it's still the owners responsibility,the EFL will have a far greater knowledge whether a deal was close or not.

How long has MM just been putting money into the club to keep it ticking over,did that start when he decided he was looking for a buyer (over Two years now) we don't know but the EFL will.

How long have we been owing money to HMRC again we don't know.

How many agreed transfer payments were missed if any? again we don't know.

All these factors will no doubt be submitted by the EFL to the arbitration panel to make a judgement.

The Administrators have had long enough to decide if an appeal is worth it or not. Now they've appealed, this tells you everything you need to know IMO. 

[atherstoneram]

2 minutes ago, NottsRam77 said:

Was the payment issue not because of the botched alonso takeover? 

You might be right but it doesn't matter who it was in the scheme of things.

[vonwright]

Think we'll struggle to win this one, but it's an interesting question and I don't blame the administrators for trying.

On the written reasons for rejecting Wigan's (similar) appeal the EFL dwelled a bit on their interpretation of a "force majeure" event re football clubs (which are almost always run at a loss, and often on the whim of a rich owner prepared to underwrite losses).

First, we are satisfied on the evidence we have seen that the Insolvency Event arose because Mr Kay, the effective owner, made a commercial decision to choose to go back on promises of continued support and stopped putting money into the Club. That cannot be regarded as a ‘Force Majeure’ event.

"In circumstances in which it is by no means uncommon in football generally and in the Championship in particular for a Club to depend on external support from its ultimate owners to bridge the gap between income and expenditure (at least without disposing of assets such as the playing staff), it is, we consider, a normal business risk that an owner will lose interest or run out of money and/or choose to deploy its resources elsewhere. This is what happened here."

I guess we need to clear a pretty high bar here. It's true that one key difference is that we had the same owner before Covid devastated our revenues (and he'd proven willing to sustain losses in the past). The problem we are likely to have is that our finances were a train wreck even before Covid, and that Mel ultimately chose (rather than was forced) to walk away.

It would also set a _very_ dangerous precedent for the EFL given that it's probably the threat of a 12 point deduction that is stopping other clubs following us into administration.

 

Edited October 11, 2021 by vonwright

[atherstoneram]

2 minutes ago, Bald Eagle's Barmy Army said:

The Administrators have had long enough to decide if an appeal is worth it or not. Now they've appealed, this tells you everything you need to know IMO. 

And it's their right to appeal,they are trying to sell the club,whether the appeal succeeds or not we will find out in time.

[NottsRam77]

9 minutes ago, Bald Eagle's Barmy Army said:

The Administrators have had long enough to decide if an appeal is worth it or not. Now they've appealed, this tells you everything you need to know IMO. 

Agree totally

Do u mean the INDEPENDENT experts in their field administrators? 
 

Read between the lines people

mels words: its all about covid

 

Independent admins first statement:

this club has been badly affected by covid 

this was always the plan

im not saying its a good one

but it was the plan

 

Edited October 11, 2021 by NottsRam77

[Woodley Ram]

24 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

I can't see it being successful in all seriousness. Two of the main reasons being: us buying players during the period, us not selling players during the period.

Last summer we bought Jozwiak and Byrne for fees. Marshall, te Wierik, Ibe, Kazim all on frees plus Clarke on loan. This summer we signed Allsop, Jagielka, Stearman, Morrison and Baldock. 
We know about rejected multi-million pound bids for Buchanan and Lawrence just days before going into administration. If we were so close to the edge at that point, why didn't we sell?
 

you have not mentioned players going out, Bennett, Whitaker, Bogle, Lowe all for fees. The incoming this year has been free's on minimal wages. the outgoings of Wisdom, Waghorn, Marriott (wages) would be higher.

The wage bill has been dropping for the last few years and did again this year. our outgoings on wages are now small. I think where we are different to some of the others is that we have some commercial debt which has to be paid back. Other clubs only have soft debt (the owner) that they do not.

I think that the question is. Would we have survived (including Mel pulling the plug) if Covid didn't happen. If the answer is yes then we get 12 points, if no then we have a chance. This will be strongly contested by the EFL who no doubt will say without Mel's money before covid we would have been in the ****, so the reason you have failed is Mel is not paying not Covid 

[Retro_RAM]

From my understandingly in administration the only outgoing should be essential costs of keeping the lights on as a football club, which is why you see unfortunate layoffs if not deemed essential to this.

They are accountants with the aim of getting the club a new owner. Whilst Mel appealing something like this would have come off as just another Mel vs EFL d*ck measuring contest, the administrators must have found something to prove administration was genuinely the cause of Covid and simply not just another excuse from Mel.

A reduction to the point penalty would increase our saleability after all and administrators would not spend 300k frivolously, so we'll see...

[G STAR RAM]

On 10/10/2021 at 11:19, RadioactiveWaste said:

I can't see us getting anywhere with it. I can understand trying and obviously covid is a factor, but did covid directly stop Mel Morris from writing the cheque every month to cover the losses? That's what'd have to be convincing to win this.

Mel Morris and The Derby County Football Club Limited are completely separate legal entities.

His personal wealth should not come into the equation on this matter. 

The argument has to be that the £20m loss of income is what forced us into administration. 

Given that the debts are rumoured to be somewhere between £50m and £60m, I think we may struggle to convince people that Covid was the main factor.

There is also the issue of at what point in time Mel Morris decided that he was no longer going to finance the club, we know that at March 2019 he had given assurances that he would fund for at least 12 months.

From that point onwards if he can convinve the EFL that the business plan was sustainable then we might just have a case.