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The Takeover Thread - Duchatelet Finally Sells (Jan 2020)

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  • Or develop it to include shops, restaurants, nightclub. Basically someone pays to take on the management and costs of the team and Roly gets to do his favourite bit, messi g around with property development around the club.
  • By the time we get the "facts" the deal will be done and it'll be too late to have done anything about it.
  • edited April 2017
    The thought of the Valley' freehold not being part of any sale is rightly giving cause for concern especially given that RD has previous.

    However as Airman says the Devil is in the detail if a lease is involved whether it be of short term at a peppercorn rent, a 99 or even a 999 year lease (akin to freehold).

    For me there are more positives to take out of these developments at this juncture with the club for sale, ambition to succeed, proper football people involved and hopefully the SMT gone.

    Of course we all want the ideal scenario to play out but now is the time to enjoy the fact that the Regime is prepared to loosen its grip on us pending further meat on the bones as to what the future holds.

    Tomorrow is another day, and on that note it's Coventry away providing a chance to make certain of our L1 status........COYRs.
  • edited April 2017

    My view too. If you take away the ground and traing ground, whst exactly does your 20m buy you? The prestige of being owner of a club in a tailspin, a fairly ordinary set of footballers, and the right to pay off ongoing debts. Plus being at the mercy of any future rises in the cost of leasing the ground the ex owner chooses to demand. Sounds a real bargain.

    A lease doesn't have to work like that. Commercial leases I have dealt with seemed to work entirely in favour of the tenant. The devil is in the detail.

    If RD is looking to retain The Valley but not Sparrows Lane it's almost certainly because he cannot recover his losses up front from selling the whole club. That's his own fault, but it's our problem.

    The protection it may offer him is against a buyer going bust without achieving their PL ambitions, which would trigger a further payment. But that still wouldn't give him the right to develop the site.

    We seem to be assuming anyone entering into such a lease is naive, which they might be but we cannot know at this stage.
    Not assuming they are naive (yet ). But what exactly does their 20m buy them. I see no tangible assets, and a look at our last ten years accounts will show they will need to put in more money on a day to day basis.
    Sparrows Lane is a tangible asset which he has just had revalued upwards. A lease on The Valley would have value, depending on the detail. It's worth remembering that technically the football club already leases The Valley from Charlton Athletic Holdings Limited.
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  • I think we are getting ahead of ourselves without knowing any of the detail. The current owner is well on the way to totally destroying the club. Get the facts before making the leap!

    Exactly,even if the Mail article was 100% correct, it doesn't specifically say that the ground wasn't included anyway.

    My view too. If you take away the ground and traing ground, whst exactly does your 20m buy you? The prestige of being owner of a club in a tailspin, a fairly ordinary set of footballers, and the right to pay off ongoing debts. Plus being at the mercy of any future rises in the cost of leasing the ground the ex owner chooses to demand. Sounds a real bargain.

    A lease doesn't have to work like that. Commercial leases I have dealt with seemed to work entirely in favour of the tenant. The devil is in the detail.

    If RD is looking to retain The Valley but not Sparrows Lane it's almost certainly because he cannot recover his losses up front from selling the whole club. That's his own fault, but it's our problem.

    The protection it may offer him is against a buyer going bust without achieving their PL ambitions, which would trigger a further payment. But that still wouldn't give him the right to develop the site.

    We seem to be assuming anyone entering into such a lease is naive, which they might be but we cannot know at this stage.
    Not assuming they are naive (yet ). But what exactly does their 20m buy them. I see no tangible assets, and a look at our last ten years accounts will show they will need to put in more money on a day to day basis.
    Sparrows Lane is a tangible asset which he has just had revalued upwards. A lease on The Valley would have value, depending on the detail. It's worth remembering that technically the football club already leases The Valley from Charlton Athletic Holdings Limited.
    But then what use is Sparrows Lane to anyone else? It's protected land, and who else needs a sports field complex?
  • For the dangers of separating the club from the ground look no further than our feathered "friends" down the road. Remember how Ron Noades sold the club to Agent Goldberg but kept ownership of Sellout? Led to the club almost going bust.

    Clearly the important thing is the details contained in any lease but I struggle to believe Douchbag will be anything but spiteful towards us.
  • So is that included in the 20m ?

    I'm not saying it's impossible there is is a perfectly sound idea here. But I hate the idea of RD having an ongoing concern at the Valley. And he's hardly a model of goid management here. He ran the club by removing all those with football knowlege and replacing them with morons like Meire.
  • 5 years to the PL sounds optimistic, given the competition out there, and the massive parachute payments many teams in the Championship now have. Since our title season, it's taken Sheffield United 5 years to get out of L1!
  • edited April 2017

    I think we are getting ahead of ourselves without knowing any of the detail. The current owner is well on the way to totally destroying the club. Get the facts before making the leap!

    My view too. If you take away the ground and traing ground, whst exactly does your 20m buy you? The prestige of being owner of a club in a tailspin, a fairly ordinary set of footballers, and the right to pay off ongoing debts. Plus being at the mercy of any future rises in the cost of leasing the ground the ex owner chooses to demand. Sounds a real bargain.

    A lease doesn't have to work like that. Commercial leases I have dealt with seemed to work entirely in favour of the tenant. The devil is in the detail.

    If RD is looking to retain The Valley but not Sparrows Lane it's almost certainly because he cannot recover his losses up front from selling the whole club. That's his own fault, but it's our problem.

    The protection it may offer him is against a buyer going bust without achieving their PL ambitions, which would trigger a further payment. But that still wouldn't give him the right to develop the site.

    We seem to be assuming anyone entering into such a lease is naive, which they might be but we cannot know at this stage.
    Not assuming they are naive (yet ). But what exactly does their 20m buy them. I see no tangible assets, and a look at our last ten years accounts will show they will need to put in more money on a day to day basis.
    Sparrows Lane is a tangible asset which he has just had revalued upwards. A lease on The Valley would have value, depending on the detail. It's worth remembering that technically the football club already leases The Valley from Charlton Athletic Holdings Limited.
    But then what use is Sparrows Lane to anyone else? It's protected land, and who else needs a sports field complex?
    You'd have to take that up with the auditors then. They signed off its value on an existing use basis recognising that.
  • Wouldn't surprise me that The Valley is included but Roland defers some of the price until such time as we reach the PL or until a set date in the future where they have to cough up.
  • Wouldn't surprise me that The Valley is included but Roland defers some of the price until such time as we reach the PL or until a set date in the future where they have to cough up.

    I think the idea that The Valley is retained as security against a later payment makes a lot of sense, but of course that doesn't mean it's what he's doing.
  • Anyone buying the club and not the ground is asking for trouble.

    If that's what happens, I'll have no faith in the nous of the new owners and will expect them to be in all sorts of difficulties within a couple of years.
  • cabbles said:

    Essex Al's flags removed - not abuse imo

    Essex_Al said:

    cabbles said:

    cabbles said:

    Henry / Al, take the side show offline or elsewhere please chaps, ta

    And Al, remember to message him rather than write it on his profile page.
    Great bit of moderation by myself there
    I just learnt you can't flag a moderator - liberty!
    :wink:
    Thank you for protecting me from those big bullies @cabbles

    I always knew you were the best mod!
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  • edited April 2017
    cafcfan said:

    razil said:

    Bit of a wild idea but perhaps a consortium is an opportunity for the fans to get a stake in the club

    Oh yeah, because that worked so well last time didn't it? We were all asked to stump up money and then Murray dicked us off. First, by taking the club off AIM, making the shares illiquid and then basically fucked us over completely for OUR money while keeping at least an opportunity for HIM to get some of his money back. He could have arranged for former shareholders/supporters to have had a charge over The Valley too couldn't he?

    Anyway, once bitten twice shy as far as that one is concerned. IMO the only way there should be fan involvement in financing the business is via CAST holding shares, not individual supporters. (Apart from anything else, there are onerous regulations in this country about offering shares to regular members of the public as opposed to sophisticated investors and/or high net worth individuals. No doubt the museum has got a copy of the prospectus from last time round if anyone wants to read it.)

    As for Roland retaining The Valley, I might be proved wrong but that is utter on-line speculation by a couple of dodgy no-marks based on some dodgy wording in a dodgy article in a dodgy newspaper. I don't think that is very likely at all. Of more interest is whether any new owners start off with a huge debt to Roland with Roland having a charge over the ground or whether that debt will be written off.
    Quite agree CAS Trust would be an excellent vehicle for share ownership. I've been saying that since I and others founded that organisation :)

    Perhaps 'we' would be better owning the Valley however if somehow that were achievable - something I've also said for some time.

  • Only one winner in all this financially it seems
    if mail Aussie scenario is right and the sale offered by the Belgian is of just the football arm...... Duchatelet.

    He is selling off the non profitable part (the football club) with its debt to him, but keeping the main asset.

    So net he will end up having bought the Valley for a price less than current value, be in a position to sweat that asset and sell parts off, whilst getting 3% interest on his loans to the sold football part?

    Probably the target set for Mire in the first place. Develop the ground whilst her being allowed a free hand for fun on the football side.

    But fans will win too because they will be gone from the football side and ambitious football owners could lead to exciting seasons. Premier league or bust? Just that that fun may be stunted as the Valley changes and the massive debt constrains football development.

  • kentred2 said:

    Only one winner in all this financially it seems
    if mail Aussie scenario is right and the sale offered by the Belgian is of just the football arm...... Duchatelet.

    He is selling off the non profitable part (the football club) with its debt to him, but keeping the main asset.

    So net he will end up having bought the Valley for a price less than current value, be in a position to sweat that asset and sell parts off, whilst getting 3% interest on his loans to the sold football part?

    Probably the target set for Mire in the first place. Develop the ground whilst her being allowed a free hand for fun on the football side.

    But fans will win too because they will be gone from the football side and ambitious football owners could lead to exciting seasons. Premier league or bust? Just that that fun may be stunted as the Valley changes and the massive debt constrains football development.

    Cannot see anyone taking on his loans, personally. If he retains the freehold of The Valley he will have to wipe them.
  • If and this is a big if, the club and the ground are to be separated there is a way to turn this to our advantage........We need to get Karen from West Ham to work out a deal that would be beneficial to the stadium owner and the tenant, she is more clued up than HM Government.
  • 5 years to the PL sounds optimistic, given the competition out there, and the massive parachute payments many teams in the Championship now have. Since our title season, it's taken Sheffield United 5 years to get out of L1!

    It does sound optimistic but it's a plan and five years would be the timescale needed to entice the required investment. Any longer and investors would start to think that's too long for the gamble.

    Can it be done though ?

    Football fair play rules seem to look like a hurdle if you are that ambitious to be wanting to throw money at it. Add in the unpredictability of football and I can't see why it looks like such a good investment opportunity.

    Current squad nowhere near being top two or even top six. Major team building.
    Manager who has it must be said been very disappointing. The results have been awful. I estimate that the squad we have should be mid table.

    For this plan to work I think any new owner needs to appoint a new manager with proven track record and successes at a high level. Costly to attract but without a very good manager everything else falls over.

    I'm not convinced that this takeover will happen. There is ambition and blind stupidity.

  • could any of the more knowledgeable on here tell me how much, to the nearest million, RD has actually spent on us. And if they can, factor in from an educated guess, the Lookman sale.

    Basically I want to know how much he's down to this point.

    I'm trying to get my head round the figures quoted so far like £20m upfront, but also the leaseback arrangement on the valley and how much that may have to be to placate him

    He can't still seriously be expecting an ROI
  • edited April 2017
    cabbles said:

    could any of the more knowledgeable on here tell me how much, to the nearest million, RD has actually spent on us. And if they can, factor in from an educated guess, the Lookman sale.

    Basically I want to know how much he's down to this point.

    I'm trying to get my head round the figures quoted so far like £20m upfront, but also the leaseback arrangement on the valley and how much that may have to be to placate him

    He can't still seriously be expecting an ROI

    I think £50m is a reasonable estimate, including the purchase price. You can treat 16/17 as financially neutral, given the player sales. Where it becomes difficult is if you allow for the fact that he effectively paid himself for the likes of Loic Nego, Reza, Tucudean, and then charged interest on that and on what is effectively the purchase price.
  • If the terms of the lease are well negotiated, it isn't necessarily the issue people are making of it. The answers will be in the detail. We don't know for certain if the leasing of the Valley is part of this anyway!
  • Any chance he can lease Sparrows Lane and sell the Valley with the club? We can always train on Blackheath.
This discussion has been closed.

Roland Out Forever!