I don't think you even have to think about it. Of course Roland did more damage and is still doing so. I have to admit that I am gobsmacked that anybody would see it differently.
More shocking is the amount of people who agree with this poster!
It's a series of poor ownerships and mismanagement that has brought us here. Sandgaard and Duchatelet have both contributed to this, but I believe both did what they thought was right in the beginning and both spent a lot of money.
It was the debacle in the middle of those who caused the most amount of damage, Matt Southall, Tahnoon Nimer, Paul Elliott and Chris Farnell.
For me it starts with allowing Dowie to spend over his budget then doing the same with Pardew, but this was all a long time ago now.
This is fair but the debts were wiped in 2010 and there have also been opportunities to stop the rot in 2012 and 2019 that were not taken.
Good people, as well as bad ones, will always make mistakes, but the club failed to reverse the damage when it was well placed to do so. The Spivs had no money and were dishonest borrowing it and Duchatelet was a greedy fool.
I don't think you even have to think about it. Of course Roland did more damage and is still doing so. I have to admit that I am gobsmacked that anybody would see it differently.
More shocking is the amount of people who agree with this poster!
It's a series of poor ownerships and mismanagement that has brought us here. Sandgaard and Duchatelet have both contributed to this, but I believe both did what they thought was right in the beginning and both spent a lot of money.
It was the debacle in the middle of those who caused the most amount of damage, Matt Southall, Tahnoon Nimer, Paul Elliott and Chris Farnell.
For me it starts with allowing Dowie to spend over his budget then doing the same with Pardew, but this was all a long time ago now.
This is fair but the debts were wiped in 2010 and there have also been opportunities to stop the rot in 2012 and 2019 that were not taken.
Good people, as well as bad ones, will always make mistakes, but the club failed to reverse the damage when it was well placed to do so. The Spivs had no money and were dishonest borrowing it and Duchatelet was a greedy fool.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
I have followed this club for probably longer than you so don't be such an arsehole.
I can confirm @golfaddick has been going for the past 60 years.
I am not sure any of us wish to revisit the Duchâtelet debate. I could ….page, after page, after page…..but no.
Mismanagement has indeed extended over 17yrs.
Yet any transgressions are of a very different hue. Indeed it would be very wrong to ignore the significant cash injection & debt postponement made by ex directors in 2009/ 2010. How we burned through the player trading receipts and PL parachute payments in the preceding years is difficult to comprehend but the commitment to the club and exceptional altruism should never doubted.
Similarly one can understand the intent of restructuring the business under Baton 2010 Ltd which legally separated the ownership of The Valley and Sparrow Lane Training Ground from the club. The principle of common ownership ultimately proved to be no protection.
For the avoidance of doubt there was & remains no fiscal comparison between the business transferred into new ownership in 2020 (twice) and that of 2014 or 2010 let alone 2005. Which bit did you miss?
In the intervening period the fabric of the club, its culture and its raison d’être were manipulated, exploited and corrupted. The farcical judiciary exchanges of 2020 spelled out the reality. The vultures were there for a reason.
Go to Companies House. Read the numbers. THIS IS NOT THE SAME BUSINESS.
The Slater/ Jimenez proposition recklessly hung the entire talents of Chapple, Varney & Powell and club future solely on the tenuous links to the Peninsular development.
With no Plan B and no such links appearing the BVI Trusts were done & gone
It would be foolish to think such hyperbole did not extend to Staprix NV involvement. It’s St Truiden template was there for all to see. You will know they remain our landlords to this day.
Through such corporate vehicles the club was funded against the commercial equity, then the perceived inflated « investment » equity in the long term leasehold/ freehold assets of The Valley & the Sparrows Lane Training Ground.
Operationally Staprix, beyond a) the Liege dalliance b) failed player trading,c) post Ms Meire abdicated its corporate responsibility to render itself no more than bankers. Year on year trading debt roll up continued to Jan 2020 whereon the long term leasehold/ freehold assets were taken in lieu of the accumulated debt.
The football equivalent of the Marie Celeste (level 9 clubs presented more executive presence), Belgian eccentricity & parochial arrogance abused the very industry in which we operated. It matters. No really ……..it matters.
You are entitled to malign the subsequent miscreants of your choosing but the January 2020 sale was simply one company’s exit plan. Who;
forced through the sale in line with Belgian tax deadlines?
terminated an annual operating trade deficit of circa £8m?
retained trading hooks into the clubs’ ongoing trading financials?
How did we trade from Jan-Sep 2020 with no new investment? How much did Staprix leave in the till? You really think Southall, Nimer, Amis capable of constructing this deal?Based on? There was one agenda and it had nothing to do with the health of CAFC.
As with ESI Ltd, Clean Ocean Capital and the latest groupjust what today do you think you are asking people invest against?
There is no equity*, no long term leaseholds/ freeholds just a Golden Ticket, the niche football leaseholds and player registrations with their own contractual liabilities.
(* Buying freehold commercial (restricted use) premises valued at £30m for a £50m development price does not deliver equity. It delivers a £20m hole)
If this is not the same business, and it palpably isn’t, how can you endlessly default to previous performance expectations?
From 2017 as the Duchâtelet selling rumours mounted and protests grew ever louder the club presented as the definition of a distressed business. It could not trade out of its debts.
Analysts in global investment markets have for decades scoured every industry & commercial sector for distressed business opportunity. Do they get paid? Yes. Market intelligence research, preliminary due diligence, business analysis, and business & investment plans come at a cost.
Invariably any notable remuneration comes with the success of any venture, but there is no greater error than to assume you know why anyone does anything in business.
As of today the club is in its 3rd iteration of a business recovery. The 1st exploded on landing. The 2nd proved horribly naive. Such is the nature of rebuilding a new business. Every takeover is a recipe for rushed assessments, misplaced assumptions and just plain simple mistakes.
Yet none post 2020 destroyed this club. Each, to this point, has simply proved remarkably unremarkable in steering their rescue missions to the shores of a viable, sustainable, successful enterprise.
In truth there was little wrong with the investment theories or business strategies they sought to pursue. The oversight was not understanding the business at its core was palpably unable to carry the implementation of any such thing.
You are entitled to your opinion. I have no idea whether these new investors or the new SMT will prove able to move this club forward but no - you don’t get to dump 17 years of shit on the door step of people who have yet to be in control of the building for 6 months.
After 12 executive administrations and 19 managers in 18 years I genuinely tire of people trying to get a business, which has palpably failed for over a decade and a half, to run before it can walk.
The most basic analysis of the nature and calendar of events since January 2023 position the expectations of some as beyond all reason.
RD was certainly capable of putting together a better squad than anything we've had since, but there was damage done elsewhere, obviously.
Southall was worse as all he did was steal from us, give money to his mates and buy copious amounts of snacks.
Sandgaard whilst well intentioned was absolutely clueless with anything football and put us in the worst shape we've been on the pitch for a while.
This new lot. Jury's out, but I think they at least know what they are trying to do with the footballing side. But obvs it's not going that well at the moment.
But nice to chat xxx
Don't forget the London apartment, his wife and last but not least The Bitches!!!!
One detail which I've never really understood is why Roland suggested/insisted that the EFL bought the club just prior to the ESI sale.
Because he wanted to stop losing money. It wasn’t any deeper than that.
his premise was that he bought the Club on the believing he could operate it at Break Even, based on the fair play rules, EFL subsequently changed the EFL rules and he felt that EFL were therefore responsible for the losses he was making and should take over the club.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
I have followed this club for probably longer than you so don't be such an arsehole.
I can confirm @golfaddick has been going for the past 60 years.
“Similarly one can understand the intent of restructuring the business under Baton 2010 Ltd which legally separated the ownership of The Valley and Sparrow Lane Training Ground from the club. The principle of common ownership ultimately proved to be no protection.”
@Grapevine49 I won’t comment on your analysis, much of which I agree with, but you are wrong that the establishment of Baton 2010 separated the ownership of club and ground. The ownership had been divided since the early 1990s - the football company and the property company were each a wholly-owned subsidiary of the plc. Holdings Ltd was set up to protect the assets from the football club’s financial fragility in 1992. Baton was simply an alternative private holding company of which they each remained a wholly owned subsidiary until 2020.
In fact, the club and ground were also separated from 1982-1992, so the “club” hasn’t owned the ground since Michael Gliksten quit as chairman.
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
I wouldn’t underestimate the damage they did behind the scenes. About a dozen senior people were either forced out or walked on the business side; the club was hollowed out.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
Whether it was Sangaard, ESI, or whoever, the fact remains that we are now a club that does not own it's ground or training ground.To me that is a big.problem.
Yes, but the title of your thread says that Sandgaard was worse than Duchatalet.
If you are going to start an arguement at least get your facts straight. I see you only joined here in 2022. You might want to reprise yourself of our recent history before starting threads you seem to know nothing about.
I have followed this club for probably longer than you so don't be such an arsehole.
I can confirm @golfaddick has been going for the past 60 years.
I totally believe TS arrived with the best of intentions and imo without him I doubt we would actually have a club today. He came here and spent money in good faith unfortunately he was a mug and lacked any understanding of football. The people around him who imo should have protected him let him down badly and allowed the fool and his money to be parted, hence Kirk, Aneke the list goes on. Football is awash with dodgy characters who are more than happy to take a few quid to put a word in with the “mark” to get deals done. He burned a fortune on a pile of shite on the advice of gods knows who and I think he realised he was out of his depth
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
I wouldn’t underestimate the damage they did behind the scenes. About a dozen senior people were either forced out or walked on the business side; the club was hollowed out.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
This is all fair - they were not good people and turned the culture around the club toxic. But as fans on the outside looking in, it's hard to not think that that could've all been remedied in the short to medium term if they had sold the club to someone with good intentions in 2013. Instead, we got Duchatelet.
As a fan with no skin in the game back then, links to club employees etc, I can't look past the fact that they sold it to him and that's the biggest problem that persists over 10 years later.
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
I wouldn’t underestimate the damage they did behind the scenes. About a dozen senior people were either forced out or walked on the business side; the club was hollowed out.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
This is all fair - they were not good people and turned the culture around the club toxic. But as fans on the outside looking in, it's hard to not think that that could've all been remedied in the short to medium term if they had sold the club to someone with good intentions in 2013. Instead, we got Duchatelet.
As a fan with no skin in the game back then, links to club employees etc, I can't look past the fact that they sold it to him and that's the biggest problem that persists over 10 years later.
It’s also a function of the fact he couldn’t be bothered to do due diligence and they were desperate, due to holding out too long for a property deal that was never happening anyway.
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
I wouldn’t underestimate the damage they did behind the scenes. About a dozen senior people were either forced out or walked on the business side; the club was hollowed out.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
This is all fair - they were not good people and turned the culture around the club toxic. But as fans on the outside looking in, it's hard to not think that that could've all been remedied in the short to medium term if they had sold the club to someone with good intentions in 2013. Instead, we got Duchatelet.
As a fan with no skin in the game back then, links to club employees etc, I can't look past the fact that they sold it to him and that's the biggest problem that persists over 10 years later.
It’s also a function of the fact he couldn’t be bothered to do due diligence and they were desperate, due to holding out too long for a property deal that was never happening anyway.
We were always reminded that Roland knew all and anyone who didn't listen was a fool, a direct quote from the Belgian directed at Chris Powell. Whatever Dutchelet thinks he will never realise his inflated asking price for the freeholds but then again perhaps he never intended to and was just happy get out of the way and sit the freeholds in his estate and continue to lease to whoever owns the Football club.
I totally believe TS arrived with the best of intentions and imo without him I doubt we would actually have a club today. He came here and spent money in good faith unfortunately he was a mug and lacked any understanding of football. The people around him who imo should have protected him let him down badly and allowed the fool and his money to be parted, hence Kirk, Aneke the list goes on. Football is awash with dodgy characters who are more than happy to take a few quid to put a word in with the “mark” to get deals done. He burned a fortune on a pile of shite on the advice of gods knows who and I think he realised he was out of his depth
Pretty much how I see it.
How ever frustrating he turned out to be, I think it's so important to point out the differences between TS and his intentions, and that of Southall etc.
You can knock Cash/Slater/Jimenez as much as you want but that title winning season was one of the best in my 37yrs of following. I don't know who introduced them to the club as it did seem a bit random, but what a great season that was (and the following one too actually). A distant memory now sadly. I'm sure there were a few off field issues with staff/infrastructure etc that I'm not aware of, but that was a high point on the pitch in more recent times.
Re Tommy, a fool and his money are easily parted. A man with good intentions, but no idea what he was doing! Without him we might not be here today though tbf. COYA
Edit I agree with @paulsturgess that we seemed an attractive proposition to a potential buyer at the time, from the outside looking in anyway.
The pre Roland ownership made errors but when he took over the club was still in a reasonably / potentially healthy state. Loss making clearly but so is every club outside of the premier league - ultimately we had a reasonable supporter base, decent ground and training ground and incidentally an excellent manager and some good players in place. The failings of the previous 8 years were perfectly retrievable with somebody willing to swallow a bit of loss/ investment, and by no means terminal at that stage.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
I wouldn’t underestimate the damage they did behind the scenes. About a dozen senior people were either forced out or walked on the business side; the club was hollowed out.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
I get that. But at that stage, to a lay person anyway, the situation was fairly quickly and reasonably easily rectifiable. It certainly isn’t now.
Another way to look at it, is the package on sale in 2014 to RD , would be a pretty attractive purchase proposition to many in today’s market. I struggle to conceive of a way in which the club today can be made into anything resembling a palatable purchase for anyone with half a brain, let alone an attractive one. Hence we’re now destined for abyss, barring a miracle which is essentially a cryptocurrency billionaire from Sidcup.
You can knock Cash/Slater/Jimenez as much as you want but that title winning season was one of the best in my 37yrs of following. I don't know who introduced them to the club as it did seem a bit random, but what a great season that was (and the following one too actually). A distant memory now sadly. I'm sure there were a few off field issues with staff/infrastructure etc that I'm not aware of, but that was a high point on the pitch in more recent times.
Re Tommy, a fool and his money are easily parted. A man with good intentions, but no idea what he was doing! Without him we might not be here today though tbf. COYA
Edit I agree with @paulsturgess that we seemed an attractive proposition to a potential buyer at the time, from the outside looking in anyway.
The football in 2011/12 had very little to do with Jimenez and nothing to do with Slater. Jimenez’s main contribution was to insist on signing two or three players that Powell didn’t want and didn’t play. The “owners” were nowhere to be seen at the club; it was led by Varney and Kavanagh. I never even met Jimenez until December 2012 and I was part of the senior management team based at The Valley for the previous two years.
That said I absolutely understand the operating loss was covered and the players and staff paid (all with borrowing), so it’s not unreasonable for fans to credit the people with ultimate responsibility for that at the time. They rode off the experience in the building and kept out of the way. Fair enough.
The problem came in the summer of 2012 when they tried to appoint their own replacements because Varney and Kavanagh wouldn’t entertain what they were doing financially. But don’t imagine for a minute that these people cared about Charlton, the supporters or the staff, or contributed any management.
All you need to know about them is in the court judgement.
Comments
Mismanagement has indeed extended over 17yrs.
Yet any transgressions are of a very different hue. Indeed it would be very wrong to ignore the significant cash injection & debt postponement made by ex directors in 2009/ 2010. How we burned through the player trading receipts and PL parachute payments in the preceding years is difficult to comprehend but the commitment to the club and exceptional altruism should never doubted.
Similarly one can understand the intent of restructuring the business under Baton 2010 Ltd which legally separated the ownership of The Valley and Sparrow Lane Training Ground from the club. The principle of common ownership ultimately proved to be no protection.
For the avoidance of doubt there was & remains no fiscal comparison between the business transferred into new ownership in 2020 (twice) and that of 2014 or 2010 let alone 2005. Which bit did you miss?
In the intervening period the fabric of the club, its culture and its raison d’être were manipulated, exploited and corrupted. The farcical judiciary exchanges of 2020 spelled out the reality. The vultures were there for a reason.
Go to Companies House. Read the numbers. THIS IS NOT THE SAME BUSINESS.
The Slater/ Jimenez proposition recklessly hung the entire talents of Chapple, Varney & Powell and club future solely on the tenuous links to the Peninsular development.
With no Plan B and no such links appearing the BVI Trusts were done & gone
It would be foolish to think such hyperbole did not extend to Staprix NV involvement. It’s St Truiden template was there for all to see. You will know they remain our landlords to this day.
Baton 2010 Ltd begat Slater & Jiminez (& BVI trusts) begat Staprix NV begat …Due diligence anyone?
Through such corporate vehicles the club was funded against the commercial equity, then the perceived inflated « investment » equity in the long term leasehold/ freehold assets of The Valley & the Sparrows Lane Training Ground.
Operationally Staprix, beyond a) the Liege dalliance b) failed player trading,c) post Ms Meire abdicated its corporate responsibility to render itself no more than bankers. Year on year trading debt roll up continued to Jan 2020 whereon the long term leasehold/ freehold assets were taken in lieu of the accumulated debt.
The football equivalent of the Marie Celeste (level 9 clubs presented more executive presence), Belgian eccentricity & parochial arrogance abused the very industry in which we operated. It matters. No really ……..it matters.
You are entitled to malign the subsequent miscreants of your choosing but the January 2020 sale was simply one company’s exit plan. Who;
How did we trade from Jan-Sep 2020 with no new investment? How much did Staprix leave in the till? You really think Southall, Nimer, Amis capable of constructing this deal?Based on? There was one agenda and it had nothing to do with the health of CAFC.
As with ESI Ltd, Clean Ocean Capital and the latest group just what today do you think you are asking people invest against?
There is no equity*, no long term leaseholds/ freeholds just a Golden Ticket, the niche football leaseholds and player registrations with their own contractual liabilities.
(* Buying freehold commercial (restricted use) premises valued at £30m for a £50m development price does not deliver equity. It delivers a £20m hole)
If this is not the same business, and it palpably isn’t, how can you endlessly default to previous performance expectations?
From 2017 as the Duchâtelet selling rumours mounted and protests grew ever louder the club presented as the definition of a distressed business. It could not trade out of its debts.
Analysts in global investment markets have for decades scoured every industry & commercial sector for distressed business opportunity. Do they get paid? Yes. Market intelligence research, preliminary due diligence, business analysis, and business & investment plans come at a cost.
Invariably any notable remuneration comes with the success of any venture, but there is no greater error than to assume you know why anyone does anything in business.
As of today the club is in its 3rd iteration of a business recovery. The 1st exploded on landing. The 2nd proved horribly naive. Such is the nature of rebuilding a new business. Every takeover is a recipe for rushed assessments, misplaced assumptions and just plain simple mistakes.
Yet none post 2020 destroyed this club. Each, to this point, has simply proved remarkably unremarkable in steering their rescue missions to the shores of a viable, sustainable, successful enterprise.
In truth there was little wrong with the investment theories or business strategies they sought to pursue. The oversight was not understanding the business at its core was palpably unable to carry the implementation of any such thing.
You are entitled to your opinion. I have no idea whether these new investors or the new SMT will prove able to move this club forward but no - you don’t get to dump 17 years of shit on the door step of people who have yet to be in control of the building for 6 months.
After 12 executive administrations and 19 managers in 18 years I genuinely tire of people trying to get a business, which has palpably failed for over a decade and a half, to run before it can walk.
The most basic analysis of the nature and calendar of events since January 2023 position the expectations of some as beyond all reason.
But close enough.
“Similarly one can understand the intent of restructuring the business under Baton 2010 Ltd which legally separated the ownership of The Valley and Sparrow Lane Training Ground from the club. The principle of common ownership ultimately proved to be no protection.”
In fact, the club and ground were also separated from 1982-1992, so the “club” hasn’t owned the ground since Michael Gliksten quit as chairman.
what Duchatalet did from then on rapidly eroded all of this, culminating in him separating stadium and club in a bid to cover the awful losses and mismanagement he had overseen. For this reason he is responsible for the trail of ill-educated, braindead criminals and shysters that have followed and what he has done is therefore very likely terminal. I fear it will take a miracle to recover us from the state we’re in now. Miracles do happen though.
They enabled a culture of bullying internally, they threatened people’s families and they lied to fans. “Made errors” doesn’t cut it. And that’s before we get to allegations of criminality.
How ever frustrating he turned out to be, I think it's so important to point out the differences between TS and his intentions, and that of Southall etc.
Re Tommy, a fool and his money are easily parted. A man with good intentions, but no idea what he was doing! Without him we might not be here today though tbf. COYA
Edit I agree with @paulsturgess that we seemed an attractive proposition to a potential buyer at the time, from the outside looking in anyway.
Another way to look at it, is the package on sale in 2014 to RD , would be a pretty attractive purchase proposition to many in today’s market. I struggle to conceive of a way in which the club today can be made into anything resembling a palatable purchase for anyone with half a brain, let alone an attractive one. Hence we’re now destined for abyss, barring a miracle which is essentially a cryptocurrency billionaire from Sidcup.