Matt

Can't see it happening. With Smith gone at the end of the season, Colo is the outlier of the wage bill and would have to swallow a severe wage cut for a longer contract. I agree, can't see it happening either BUT to me it would just highlight the problems of having such a strict wage structure Without Colo we will be a poorer team, no doubt about it - he is worth the money he gets paid, value for money is what the management love to go on about and Colo certainly does provide value for money It's very hard to keep players to a wage ceiling of 40k a week when you have one member in the sqaud on roughly double that amount. Not only would you be paying his wages, but also the extra amounts to keep other players happy given the pay disparity.

Can't see it happening. With Smith gone at the end of the season, Colo is the outlier of the wage bill and would have to swallow a severe wage cut for a longer contract.

If the interest from QPR remains, I can see this being used as a good excuse to peddle him for a few million in January. "We offered a contract, but......"

Bollocks can he tackle. He can barely get 20 minutes into a game without picking up a booking.

Exactly- this whole discussion can be massively simplified by just ignoring the shareholder loans entirely and consider them as if they were share capital in the business. That's exactly what anyone valuing or buying the business would do.

I'm pretty sure the FA need to approve name changes.

Spot on. Probably not even 10 mins required. So there's little or no chance Ashley overlooked it? He may well have overlooked it because it was clear he paid no attention to the purchase and just fancied spending a few quid. In normal circumstances though, you would assume you have to pay it back and then change plans on the off-chance you don't.

When someone has the money and intent to buy... As proved previously... Not as many people around that we'd like to think... It would take a major idiot to pay more than what Ashley paid originally, which is why I think we're in for a painful long-haul. You can buy another club for half the price and race past us with a few transfers. Why else do you think there was a 10-year season ticket offer?

Because the club needs to be viable financial entity capable of running itself by itself without outside help. The club can not continue to be forever Mike's money pitt. That's not what he said. He's talking about acquisition costs, not running costs.

If the moment isn't right? Would that be the moment between 31 Jan and 31 August? And why do we need to see how they play this season- have we not scouted them already? Please tell me you don't really think that's the case. Ashley is bruised by his foolhardy decision to buy the club and his bumbling mismanagement. Now he is busy trying to turn it into a cash cow to sell on and to do that he needs a loyal customer base who will continue to put blind faith and club loyalty ahead of all other evidence. He will be a 'winner' if he somehow emerged with all or most of his money back. That's the aim.

Last 5 strikers we paid a transfer fee for: Leon Best, Feb 2010 Xisco, Sept 2008 Obafemi Martins, Aug 2006 Albert Luque, Aug 2005 Michael Owen, Aug 2005

These footballer's daughters scrub up very nicely.

That may well be intentional.

Ferguson wouldn't let him play in the UEFA Cup. As that was more or less half of our competitive games, it meant he had little chance of establishing himself.

He needs to keep things simple. He looks a tidy enough player that he doesn't need to resort to too many tricks on the ball, which cost possession a couple of times last night. Easily the best game I've seen for us- light years ahead of his baptism of fire at Peterborough two years ago.

Fair enough, you can look at it both ways. I still cannot fathom how a man who built a business worth over a billion could be so negligent to barely even look at the public accounts, never mind undertake due diligence. We've all been pissed one night and bought a load of shite online. Maybe this is the equivalent for a billionaire.

I'm not sure if you're saying funding the stadium with debt a good move or not. I think we were better off with a bigger stadium and £40m or so of debt on the balance sheet. As long as we were continuing to more or less fill the ground, that element of the business would be net cash positive. Interesting stuff on the other loans, would be interesting to know which forays into the transfer market they financed.

The stadium loan was only triggered by change of control, which is a pretty standard clause. With regards to the cash crunch, the club would still have found a buyer, but for significantly less than Ashley paid for it. Going back to the question earlier, that UV kindly skirted, what possible scenario do you suggest Shepherd could have had for paying off the stadium debt (and the extra £16m loan) when it became due in 2016? The change of control clause only brought the repayment date forward by 9 years. I'd be really impressed if someone could explain how Shepherd was planning to generate £50m of surplus revenue during that period (bear in mind that he constantly took out of the club during his tenure). The loan was amortising, therefore would have been fully repaid by maturity- I'm happy to be corrected here as I'm working purely from beer-addled memory- but I recall the balance reducing over the years. What should be noted is that the overall debt position worsened 2004-07 due to increasing overdraft. As for the 'what happens' question- I do not think we'd have survived the banking crunch and Barclays would have put sufficient pressure on the club to accept new investment or to sell the club to a new owner who would ensure they got their cash back. Banks were pulling overdrafts for fun in 08/09, we only kept ours because Ashley pledged personal security.

The stadium loan was only triggered by change of control, which is a pretty standard clause. With regards to the cash crunch, the club would still have found a buyer, but for significantly less than Ashley paid for it.

It was affordable because it was taken out to finance the expansion of the stadium to 52,000 seats and a significant increase in our corporate hospitality capabilities- this was drawing in considerably more than the cash required to service the debt. If net-net the expansion makes money, it doesn't matter what the position is for the overall business. You need to look at that in isolation as a sensible move for the business. We had not (as far as I am aware) plugged cash flow gaps with additional loans, although the club was in a very worrying position with regards to its overdraft (and only a banker's sneeze away from being in a very uncomfortable position)- which is why I still find it odd that Ashley paid so much for the club when it was headed for a very rocky 12 months cash-flow wise.

Thought I wouldn't be far off with 2014 so if in 5 years all debts aren't paid off then Ashley has proved himself to be worse than shepherd financially, that's amusing Because under Shepherd we were definitely going to be able to pay off the debt as it fell due.........? I think it was either 2016 or 2017 and IIRC the loan was amortising using a 'locked-box' approach from ST revenues. The pressure would have been more on cashflow in the intervening period. Our problem at the point we were sold was not the debt- it was well-structured and affordable- it was the size of the wage bill and the impact it had on the cashflow. It was leaking cash at an alarming rate. You don't need due diligence to realise that- we knew as much from the plc accounts!

By putting it this way, I'm slightly more at ease... We made him available for no fee, but that's not to say we specifically allowed him to talk to anyone he liked. It would be galling if we shift a player for nothing for whom we could have got a few million for, only to then refuse to bring in players because their current clubs wanted an extra million each.

That's a decent article for a local rag, also good to hear he's settling in nicely already. The lad who wrote that used to edit the student newspaper at Lancaster when I started there. Top feller.

Sibierski was embarassing in the PL, he could could barley keep his feet half the time. Did canny enough in the UEFA. Tried his heart out, but simply lacking in ability. We got rid of him when we did because he was finished. Viduka could have been a great player if he has actually given a toss. That goal against Reading with the one-two with Beye was class.

I was under the impression that Fulham are still heavily reliant on Fayed.