Wandy

They are starting to show a few signs of 'bricking it' tonight Yep. They have been cocky as fuck over the last few weeks but their smugness is melting away as we speak. Already they are talking the North East down once again with their rancid "what top player will go there?" bullshit. Honestly, these cunts truly have found their level in the 3rd division.

With the takeover all of a sudden looking likely, this lot are now clinging to the belief that it will be a disaster for us because Amanda Stavely had a rough week in her court case and therefore is a hustler....whatever the fuck that means. Mackematics at its finest.

Can't agree more with this. In 35 years of following NUFC I have seen a lot of world class players but whenever someone asks me who is the best player I have ever seen in a Black & White shirt I always say David Ginola in his first 3 months at the club. Better than Keegan, Waddle, Beardsley, Gascoigne or Shearer. In those first few months he was simply unplayable.

The most enjoyable NUFC game since Fulham away last season. On another note...

As someone pointed out earlier, if there was little the buyers could do if turned down, this would have been rejected months ago Not necessarily. I have no doubt that they do want to pass it through but they know that if they do have to reject it then there will be no legal repercussions for them.

I have to say I have always thought that this commonly floated idea, that the PL could be hammered legally if they rejected it, to be founded on nothing whatsoever. It just seems that someone on the internet floated the idea and then everyone else ran with it. I also think there would be very little the buyers could do if they are turned away so, as irritating as Penn's negativity is to witness, he is probably right about this.

No, and by the end of next week. Regardless, if there is no announcement by July 1st I have already vowed to mentally check out of this farce and assume for certain that it will eventually be rejected. Then I can get on with forgetting about football for good. Until then, the small sliver of hope I have will keep me engaged and checking all of the news and forums. But I feel almost certain we have yet another devastating blow coming our way.

This will be the get-out that the PL need to reject the Saudi bid. This yank can fuck off, another Glazer who will use us entirely for personal profit. If this current deal is rejected thats me done. Just put us out of our misery you incompetent pack of cunts.

After feeling quite euphoric this afternoon, once it established that the report wasn't a completely devastating blow to the takeover hopes, I'm now coming down and starting to feel pessimistic again about the chances of this going through. It's now well establsihed that the PL are within their rights to make a decision either way, based on their O&D test, and I think they will think "better the devil you know" and side with Qatar. Desperately hope I am wrong but that sinking feeling is settling back in.

Please let the takeover be announced in the next few days to send them over the edge.....

My thoughts exactly. It will be identical to last year except this one actually made it to the O&D tests. So not identical then.... Identical as in we never really got to hear why that deal never came off. All we got was a newspaper interview from Ashley with him whining on & asking why a wealthy arab Prince could not just stump up a few extra million if he wanted NUFC so badly. There was no bin Zayed bid ffs.. it was obvious even at the time. Yeah right, that's why there was a thread about 500 pages long devoted to it.

My thoughts exactly. It will be identical to last year except this one actually made it to the O&D tests. So not identical then.... Identical as in we never really got to hear why that deal never came off. All we got was a newspaper interview from Ashley with him whining on & asking why a wealthy arab Prince could not just stump up a few extra million if he wanted NUFC so badly.

My thoughts exactly. It will be identical to last year except this one actually made it to the O&D tests. How can an owners and directories test just rumble on and eventually just fizzle out? It won't. But if they fail the test I suspect we will never get a full explanation of why.

My thoughts exactly. It will be identical to last year except this one actually made it to the O&D tests.

Who the hell would the PL have to answer to legally if they pass it through? The whole "must be legally watertight" stuff sounds like a prep for a challenge from the buyers IMO.

Said No all along (other than for a couple of days of false hope when NUFC.com chirped up) so I'm sticking with that. Not really arsed either way now anyway. Totally bored with it all. Think you are kidding yourself tbh. I am very arsed. Have devoted a huge amount of emotional energy once again following this saga, just like I did last year. And even though I feel certain of what is coming I am still dreading the heartbreak of experiencing it fall through. Just hope I can move on fairly swiftly and forget about football altogether.

Can we have a poll up to see how people think this will go? A simple yes/no to will it go through. I’m firmly in the no camp FWIW.

I think if anyone was likely to sue it would be Ashley. I imagine he is urgently in need of that £300m. Staveley wouldn’t be far behind him too if she loses that £17m. Having said that, I doubt that this could be dragged through the courts. More likely to see all parties shuffle away in embarrassment IMO but, even if there is a court case, I don’t see how that would help the sale of the club to the Saudis as the deal would be over and the club available again to be bought by a new party.

I'm not convinced by that last sentence given what comes before it... I'm probably being pedantic because I understand the sentiment and feel like we should be able to support a football team without feeling implicated in atrocities in the Middle East. But "I don't give a fuck, I just want their money" is the kind of comment on social media that's got the likes of Jonathan Liew frothing and generalising the wider fanbase as a set of people 'showing the middle finger' to anything that isn't solely to do with the progress of their team. Which I don't think actually is a fair representation; it's just emotion and frustration at the delay. I don't care if clickbait journalists are frothing either. In addition though, I'm afraid it might be an idea to accept that they are correct on this, and the wider fanbase are showing a middle finger to anything that isn't soley to do with the progress of the club. Like I say, I do care about human rights and want to live in a fair, progressive & unprejudiced world. But being owned by a regime who have a contentious record in human rights won't taint any ejnoyment I get out of NUFC being successful under them.

I couldn't give a toss if there are other interested parties or not. It's this current lot or bust. No other buyer will look to invest in us as heavily as the Saudis or try to grow us as significantly on a sporting level, and any American buyer will just be a glorified version of Ashley. No thanks. In my 35 years of supprting NUFC I have always believed we could be an elite club with the right people running it. I believe that those exact people have now finally turned up. If the PL reject this proposal from them then that's me done with football. With the way the game is now, no other other owner would bring with them the total committment to ensure that NUFC fulfills it's potential. If that now makes me a glory supporter then I am ok with that. I have done my time watching unambitious and parasitic owners dismantle this club and actively try to work against its potential. I have no more time or energy to follow the events of another takeover farce if this one falls through. I couldn't give a fuck about the human rights angle either. I don't care where Saudi Arabia are as a country in terms of human rights, where they have been or where they are going. I just want their money for us as a club and the investment they will bring to our city. That's not to say I don't care about human rights. I do. And if their relationship with NUFC improves their development as a country and makes them more civilised then great, but I wouldn't lose a second of sleep if it doesnt. This is what the vast, vast majority of our fanbase will be thinking too. And if being owned by the Saudis makes us the most hated club in the country then bring it on. It won't though. At worst we will be Marmite, in the way that Man Utd are. There is absolutely nothing to lose with this takeover going through. The club is currently dead, replaced entirely by SDFC. If this proposed regime somehow does not work out the way we hope and it ends in disaster then we will have lost nothing as the alternative would have been obscurity and an inevitable third relegation under Ashley.

Not a peep out of John Richardson now either? So much for the "deal approved, announcement imminent"....

Got to suspect something is up when this prick gives out good vibes for us. Probably double bluffing as he knows it will be blocked so wants to give us false hope.

This farce has now got the same "quietly fizzling out" feel as last year's fakeover. This time last year the big deadline was Rafa's contract expiration date and we all were pinning our hopes on a last minute announcement that the deal had gone through & Rafa was staying. Instead, what we got was the shell shock of no takeover, Ashley remaining & Rafa gone. This year the big deadline is now awaiting the decision of some ludicrous WTO report & whether the buyers will pass the piracy examination. I can see us getting the exact same kind of shock this month with no takeover allowed & Ashley here for a very long time. Grim.

I'm just trying to imagine the scene. The PL have completed their checks and are now on the video link to Yasir Al-Rumayyan... "Hello Mr Al-Rumayyan, we have concluded our investigation and looked at your proposal for NUFC and it is certainly very impressive. However, as you know, there have been several instances of televised PL games being pirated by an organisation in Saudi Arabia. We have consulted our legal team with regards to this matter and they can find no legal evidence that proves that you or anyone involved with the Saudi PIF contributed to this piracy. However, in our considered opinion, we believe there is no smoke without fire and on those grounds we regret to inform you that we cannot allow your purchase of NUFC. Many thanks for your interest though" Aye, righto.

Why would it be astonishing for a deal to fail on one of the reasons listed in the test itself for the deal to fail? Especially given that the test says they only need to believe that in their reasonable opinion? I'd be more astonished if it passed. I find it incredible that a group of people could go to so much trouble negotiating a deal to buy a club, investing countless hours of manpower - at a considerable financial cost - to strike a deal with the seller, and then risk a deposit of several millions of pounds not being refunded. All in the full knowledge that the deal could be scupppered and all of that invested money lost simply because the people running the PL can turn you away based on their "opinion". Then again, this is the world of football, completely out of kilter with the real world, so it is probably true.