The Administration Thread

[PistoldPete]

1 minute ago, Oldben said:

I believe that Parliament found that there was more that the efl could have done to stop Bury fc going bankrupt, and made recommendations about chamges the efl should make, not sure any of those recommendations happened.

One recommendation was that owners shouldn't be able to take loans against large fixed assets like grounds, that appears not to have happened.

 

Licensing of owners. Did that happen ? no. Independent regulator? No.

Ironically , one recommendation was EFL to be more pro-active on FFP breaches. Problem for us was they tried to do us for things that weren't even FFP breaches, so we couldn't sell the club and ended up in a worse mess than if EFL had done nothing. 
 

[RoyMac5]

8 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

They can't continue with claims during administration. ANd which Parry emails are we talking about? he seems to have sent a lot. 

Yeah I agree about the quantity. I didn't know if when the claim was started mattered? 'Parry' seemed to be suggesting that by his mentioning of it.

[GboroRam]

1 minute ago, Stive Pesley said:

I keep trying to look at this objectively (for the sake of my sanity) and all I can deduce is that the EFL are talking about seeing "proof of funds" - which therefore must include the ability to pay the Boro/Wycombe compensation if they win in court after the club leaves administration with a new owner

Effectively blowing a hole in all the bidders plans - as none of them really want to budget for an EXTRA £50m or whatever - in the remote possibility of Boro/Wycombe winning their claims

And from the EFL perspective they have a duty to ensure that the new owners have a sound financial plan to keep the club trading

Plus - the EFL probably WANT to see these claims go to court and be quashed - for the reasons that Gboro states above, because let's be honest - if they win and the new owners have to fork out, the EFL has bigger problems than just little old Derby County!

I hope when it's all done and dusted that an independent enquiry is set up to look into the whole sorry saga from the day we were cleared of all the FFP charges. The EFL have made a continuing series of bad decisions from that moment on

 

 

 

I don't even see it as that. There's no case. There's no claim. How can they expect anyone to be in a position to fund a litigation that hasn't been tabled?

I think it's a member dispute that needs resolving, not a legal claim for damages. And there's a precedent how clubs deal with disputes, via mediation. Probably the administrators aren't prepared to risk everything on an appeal-free process, considering that the EFL seems to be prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to screw us over. However if they allow this, they really will be putting the cat amongst the pigeons.

[RoyMac5]

3 minutes ago, GboroRam said:

Doesn't he say that the EFL aren't holding up a sale? I read that as "once you've gone through the mediation process, you're welcome to sell".

Why didn't they set this out from the very beginning? It's ALL very murky.

[PistoldPete]

1 minute ago, GboroRam said:

Doesn't he say that the EFL aren't holding up a sale? I read that as "once you've gone through the mediation process, you're welcome to sell".

But that isn't allowed to be done  during admin is it ? They cant pursue their claims during admin it's against the insolvency rules.  Plus it  could take months. We need cash from the buyer now, even if it's only a deposit. 

[Gee SCREAMER !!]

Just now, Ghost of Clough said:

The club's total wage bill was equivalent to £14m per season in the months of September through to November, and it's got to be at least £1.5m lower following the 4 departures. I wouldn't consider that as high.

I was under the impression that the club generated an average of 25 million quid a year gross. After net deductions I'm kind of struggling to see how we are suddenly 6 million quid short of cash to the end of the season, even if that takes into account transfer payments due.

 

[LeedsCityRam]

2 minutes ago, GboroRam said:

Doesn't he say that the EFL aren't holding up a sale? I read that as "once you've gone through the mediation process, you're welcome to sell".

No, I think the holding up of the sale is purely based on how Quantuma are approaching the claims. I've just seen the Ian Redfern article on the previous pages since my last post - he explains their approach & the rationale behind the EFL response really well.

I've actually had an email from him this morning confirming the claims can be dealt with post-sale. The issue now I believe is whether the bidders want to take on the risk and/or whether they can be indemnified.

[kevinhectoring]

19 minutes ago, BramcoteRam84 said:

I expected I would be picked up on something without detailed knowledge of of the this area. So while I agree with you my statement was incorrect, doesn’t change fact administrators are entitled to reject any claim raised in administration period and they would have to go and pursue through insolvency courts and therefore not be considered as part of the debt. Yet the EFL is both not allowing the admins to reject the claim and seems to be inferring its a football creditors debt (though we don’t truly know if that’s the case)

Yes there are loads of outraged posts on here saying the EFl has caused this problem by claiming Boro is a ‘Football creditor’. (I don’t think it’s  the cause of the problem, but it makes it a bigger one )

The definition of “Football Creditor” I could find includes this: 

“80.1.3 any Member Club and any Club of The FA Premier League;”

Seems pretty clear (if I’ve got the right definition)

It’s tempting to say- well the claims are rubbish so Boro will never become a creditor. A very sensible proposition. The infuriating but unavoidable response by the regulator to that proposition is: “we can only come to that conclusion when the claim has been adjudicated by arbitration”

 

[PistoldPete]

2 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

I was under the impression that the club generated an average of 25 million quid a year gross. After net deductions I'm kind of struggling to see how we are suddenly 6 million quid short of cash to the end of the season, even if that takes into account transfer payments due.

 

I think revenue is well down still and most of the season ticket money is carried over from last year. That's the problem this year. Next year with players out of contract we will maybe get £15 m revenue and £7 m wage bill so could even make a profit.  

[Ghost of Clough]

5 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

I was under the impression that the club generated an average of 25 million quid a year gross. After net deductions I'm kind of struggling to see how we are suddenly 6 million quid short of cash to the end of the season, even if that takes into account transfer payments due.

Because income at the moment is pretty much limited to match days (about 200k per home match).

ST money, sponsorship, etc... all that money for the season has already been received.

[kevinhectoring]

31 minutes ago, i-Ram said:

I am a monkey Kev ?. I also have always caveated most of what I say too, based on either my limited experience or not having the full facts available.

Morris having the stadium is exactly the point I make now, and was making two weeks ago.

He owns (arguably) a £80m asset, on which there is some security to support loans from MSD to the club. Let’s call that debt £25m. So the surplus equity is £55m (again assuming an arguable current value of the stadium). He supposedly wants £20m more for the new owner to have the stadium, and therefore he would be giving up £35m of value he might be entitled to as owner.

A preferred bidder l understand is prepared to pay c£50m to satisfy the club’s creditors, which include MSD in full, football creditors in full (not inc. Boro and Wycombe), an agreed % to HMRC and 25% to unsecured creditors. 

If MSD are repaid as above the security they have on the stadium goes away, and Morris has an unencumbered asset now, which he still wants 20m for. The same preferred bidder as part of the process might be happy to cough up £20m to Morris - in all honesty he ain’t going to clear the debts without that agreement. But the preferred bidder doesn’t currently seem likely to want to pay anything if they could be at huge risk to more costs to Boro and Wycombe. So the preferred buyer might say to Morris, I will pay you £20m if you indemnify the club against any potential claims. I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago - the money Morris is asking for is held in escrow and will only be paid over to him if there if the LAP says there is no claim to answer (or say £10m is paid over to him if the Club has to settle the claim at £10m). Do you follow?

So as current stadium owner he has significant influence over the way forward, including if he wanted to repaying the MSD loan himself (it has the funds) and owning/keeping the stadium unencumbered. He could increase or lower his asking price to the preferred buyer, he could sell the Stadium to another third party if the MSD debt is cleared, or he could indemnify the position as I have outlined above.

Does this all make sense as I am beginning to think I am cracking up.

Your argumentation is yet again as deft and lightning fast as Festy Ebosele’s footwork. 

[GboroRam]

10 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

Why didn't they set this out from the very beginning? It's ALL very murky.

I don't know, it's just a wild guess. Maybe they can't get involved as it's a members dispute, so they aren't going on the record about any of it?

[kevinhectoring]

38 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

Except the admin team had said that the Boro and Wycombe claims didn't need to hold up the announcement of preferred bidder as the  new owner can pick those up. So that doesn't stack up with what BAWT has said. And

BAWT explains this. Of course the claims don’t NEED to hold up PB announcement. We just have this unfortunate issue that a PB would need a large flagon of bravery beer before agreeing to depart with £50m without getting cover for the claims. Read the note 
 

The note also says ( @i-Ram has picked up on this) that MM needs to get his finger out and defease the claims. Which (if Ashley does not sort them out) I agree with. In fact I’ve said it several times as you well know. So once again I am in total agreement with @i-Ram. ? 

[Mckram]

I also had a reply from Rick Parry.

Effectively he said P&S is not fit for purpose. The loophole to sell stadiums being an example of that. He also said that parachute payments don’t work because it means that other clubs can’t compete. So they acknowledge the issues at least.

Also said they don’t encourage disputes between teams and that there’s an arbitration process to deal with them which is objective and impartial and apparently works.

Finished that they don’t want to lose Derby but they have to follow their insolvency policy consistently.

Edited January 16, 2022 by Mckram

[Van der MoodHoover]

1 hour ago, RoyMac5 said:

I agree there is little concrete information out amongst the fans, but I still wonder about the 'against statute' bit from Admin. Difficult to see that being based around the scenario imagined by BAWT, but who knows.

Perhaps the admin unilaterally dismissed the claims and wrote them down to 0 as they were outside of the legal admin process? But didn't let anyone know in until they revealed their PL ans last week. 

And the ever neutral efl say you can't just do that, you have to go through some sort of process with these claims. 

Still smells like racketeering to me. 

[Sparkle]

22 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

I was under the impression that the club generated an average of 25 million quid a year gross. After net deductions I'm kind of struggling to see how we are suddenly 6 million quid short of cash to the end of the season, even if that takes into account transfer payments due.

 

Lack of ticket sales remember about 8,000 paid in August September 2020 for this years football currently happening so our current gates are equivalent to about 10,000- 12,000 paying customers recently 

[Simmo’s left foot]

23 minutes ago, Gee SCREAMER !! said:

I was under the impression that the club generated an average of 25 million quid a year gross. After net deductions I'm kind of struggling to see how we are suddenly 6 million quid short of cash to the end of the season, even if that takes into account transfer payments due.

 

Dont forget the season tickets money was mostly carried over from last season, so not much season ticket revenue this season. Bet our turnover this season is approx £23 million, down from £30 million pre covid. This time of year every clubs cash flow is reduced, hence the cup run always being seen as a good thing.

The coffers are currently empty!

[Miggins]

5 hours ago, PistoldPete said:

"There is way too much misinformation being peddled at the moment when the only focus should be on solving the problems."

And who has been peddling the misinformation? Who has been briefing Nixon , Percy, The Daily Mail, The Athletic and so  on with all this misinformation?

 

 

A bit behind here. So many pages in one day. Someone from the efl has been making mischief is my guess.

[CornwallRam]

43 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

Except the admin team had said that the Boro and Wycombe claims didn't need to hold up the announcement of preferred bidder as the  new owner can pick those up. So that doesn't stack up with what BAWT has said. And a restrucuring plan (if that is what it comes to and we don't know that it will) requires Court approval so it's not as if it doesn't go to Court... so what's the problem there? 

It actually does all tie up.

A restructuring plan involves starting a new company, transferring the golden share to that company and paying off whatever percentage to the creditors that can be agreed. The old company then folds, and all its liabilities no longer exist, including the claims of Wycombe and Middlesbrough. The administrators would effectively strike off those claims.

The EFL have ruled against this, believing that the claims should go through due process and not just be wiped away because the administrators cannot deal with them.

The EFL are saying that an exit from administration via a CVA is perfectly possible, so a preferred bidder can be named, it's just that the new owners will have to deal with the claims and pay any subsequent liabilities generated as if they were footballing debts. In a CVA the existing company continues, so it can still retain some of the old liabilities. 

It actually makes sense. The problem is, will anyone pay £50m for the club, £20m for the stadium and risk another £50m if they lose the case?

Peculiarly, the Boro and Wycombe cases aren't technically stopping us naming a preferred bidder, but appear to be the reason that no bidder is willing to sign up.

 

[Sparkle]

11 minutes ago, kevinhectoring said:

BAWT explains this. Of course the claims don’t NEED to hold up PB announcement. We just have this unfortunate issue that a PB would need a large flagon of bravery beer before agreeing to depart with £50m without getting cover for the claims. Read the note 
 

The note also says ( @i-Ram has picked up on this) that MM needs to get his finger out and defease the claims. Which (if Ashley does not sort them out) I agree with. In fact I’ve said it several times as you well know. So once again I am in total agreement with @i-Ram. ? 

Easily resolved Ashley agrees to buy the club but he only agrees to pay a peppercorn rent on the stadium - the hearing as such is heard and a judgement is made - if the parasite clubs win Ashley can put the club into Administration and the parasite clubs get nothing because we have nothing if Ashley won he can get the stadium of MM.