quayside

I'm fully aware Hall wanted to sell and had done so for a number of years before Ashley came along, I've said so on numerous occasions. It was well known he wanted to sell long before anyone was predicting imminent financial meltdown (in fact in spite of freely available sets of accounts on the club website I don't seem to remember any of those predictions until after Ashley tbh). He managed to do so and attract potential buyers without appointing short term interim managers or putting the whole club in limbo over the Summer though. I mentioned the stock market value as that is the price Ashley had to pay to buy the club at the time. Whether the club was worth that figure was down to the potential buyer to decide, but it wasn't some arbitrary figure put on the club by the Halls, Shepherds and the other shareholders. The club was for sale, and it was for sale at the market value. If you are going to take the point of view that complaining about the running of the club is "pointless whingeing" if the club is up for sale, then you have to surely agree that it was pointless whingeing back then too. Really not sure what you're on about with the price rise once the "word on Hall's discussions with Ashley got out". Unless I missed it there was no hint of it until it was deal done with Hall. Ashley bought the shares off Hall for £1 per share, and he bought the rest for £1.01 per share. Hardly a rocketing increase. There's not much detail on the share price graph in the article you linked to, but it looks like a steep but gradual increase in shareprice throughout 2007 at a time when a large increase in TV revenue had been announced and Premiership football club ownership was becoming fashionable amongst those looking to make a name or a profit. I would imagine the graph would look similar for any other club on the stock market at that time. Ashley may have paid a few pennies per share extra, but saying it was "nowhere near £130 million" is simply not true. I believe Shepherd would have loved to have bought the club, the minor problem of him not having enough money to be able to afford it MAY have been one of his reasons for him "chosing" not to. Just guessing there though. The freely available sets of accounts did not include projections, hence the insolvent position and the full extent of the situation at 30th June 2007 was not known about by anyone outside the club until the accounts were filed in 2008. And 2008 was, of course, post Ashley. I have never defended the way Ashley sought to sell the club. Arguably he was doing what plenty of people had been urging him to do, but the effects of his doing it the way he did in the early part of the 2008/2009 season were nothing short of catastrophic. I don’t think his efforts to sell last summer made a lot of difference to anything much as it turned out. FWIW I think his decision making is getting better, but his PR through Llambias is still a disaster. The only market price of anything is the one that someone is prepared to pay and that was obviously the basis of the deal when Ashley bought in. The stock market is a reactive mechanism and as I said it simply responds to known or widely believed information, hence when a good or poor set of results are published there is a reaction. Similarly it reacted to it being known that there was a serious possibility of the club being sold, and it reacted on the news of Ashley’s negotiations with Hall. The only other clubs I can find whose share price reacted in the same way at that time were as a result of takeover speculation (Birmingham and Spurs). You say: “If you are going to take the point of view that complaining about the running of the club is "pointless whingeing" if the club is up for sale, then you have to surely agree that it was pointless whingeing back then too.” You’ve lost me with that. I just don’t see what your point is. I would guess everything is for sale at a price but is the club up for sale now? If it is it’s being kept very quiet. And who was whingeing about the club being up for sale back then? I was just making the point that it clearly was up for sale and the previous (majority) owners wanted out imo. I think Ashley paid over the odds for the club (entirely his fault) although you obviously don’t. Values of football clubs are highly subjective since most of them don’t make money but I don’t think we were worth twice the price that Lerner paid for Villa. Not that it makes any difference now. Maybe Shepherd could not afford the club on his own but he was certainly aware of the possibility of getting backing to buy it. And, as I said, he had had plenty of opportunity to do something like that. Oh and thanks for drawing attention to my “chosing” typo – classy

There are just a few people other than Ashley putting something into the club either directly or indirectly, and their combined contribution far exceeds Ashley's. Llambias for one would do well to remember this. So to paraphrase the above post - no one should complain about anything Ashley does because he bought the club and no one else is willing to pay the price he has put on it to buy it off him, so "whingeing" is pointless? Your choice, but not for me. The mere fact that the chanting is annoying Llambias and Ashley show that it is not in fact totally pointless. For now it may not have the desired effect of getting him out of the club, but at least it encourages articles such as this to counter the "Mike saved the club" spiel that's once again being pushed out to anyone who'll listen. BTW, I hope no one agreeing with BT's post was "pointlessly whingeing" about the old board (or even encouraging people to protest and boycott matches) when Hall was looking to sell but no one until Ashley was willing to pay the stock market valuation for the club. That would be a bit hypocritical wouldn't it. Not sure what your point is about the stock market value tbh. Stock markets react to known situations and known negotiations. The stock market value of the club was about half what Ashley paid for it until the previous board starting seriously touting it around. Remember Polygon and Belgravia? Belgravia even completed due diligence, and I can assure you from my own experience you do not go through that unless you are a willing seller. And even after that it got nowhere near £130 million until the word on Hall's discussions with Ashley got out. Just one further point, Shepherd had plenty of opportunity to buy it if he had wanted to. He obviously had his reasons for chosing not to. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6904072.stm

It's comments like this that make me about some of our support, football is emotive, but after 12-18months you'd hope that people would start to get a sense of perspective, particularly when other events in the footballing world unfold and shed some light on the underlying situation at every business. Footballing-wise, there have been some horrendous mistakes made, especially the attempt to sign Harry Redknapp (wtf?!) then the doomed appointment of KK; however, it is noticeable that their decisions are improving (even if it's just because they are making fewer of them). Business-wise, we can only really go off the numbers published at the end of every year, as we all know that the club have deliberately misled the supporters in the past. To date, the financial situation is improving, so I find it hard to fault Ashley for those decisions. So what's the problem with HTL's point??? The "whole series of bad decisions" made by the "inept wankers" led a lot of people to draw the conclusion that they were deliberately trying to destroy the club. The ineptitude is beyond question. Drawing the conclusion that were deliberately trying to destroy the club is laughable. 1. Did ashley deliberately buy the football club without understanding exactly what he was buying? 2. Did ashley deliberately appoint Keegan? 3. Did ashley deliberately install a system that would not possibly work with a manager of that temperament? 4. Did ashley deliberately back Wise over Keegan? 5. Did ashley deliberately appoint a bloody joke as a manager? 6. Did ashley deliberately appoint a coach as a manager? 7. Did ashley deliberately appoint Shearer as manager, a man has no previous experience, thereby showing his panic at the situation? 9. Did ashley deliberately put the club up for sale then withdraw it from sale more than once, undermining the entire football club? 10. Did ashley deliberately see a surplus of money from transfer dealings during Jan 2009? 11. Was the club relegated by 1 point at the end of that season? Whether the b****** deliberately set out to ruin the club is not the point because nobody said that anyway, but his actions have lead to almost total ruin of the football club and there is no excuse. It wasn't just his actions though, you can't simply ignore what went on beforehand under Shepherd where we borrowed heavily and sooner or later the belt would have to be tightened. You can't just roll Souness and Allardyce's time here under a carpet when so much damage was inflicted by these appointments. I never have. I know they were bad appointments, especially sourness. I've said so numerous times. I also know that those who are somehow supporting ashley now are the same people (like mandiarse) who were telling everyone to give sourness time to build his own team. I also remember that when I posted I didn't want the Board to back Sourness with money in the January window I was slated and told that the Board HAD to stump up the cash otherwise they would be confirmed as being s****. I do understand that people want to whinge on about the previous Board because we had a good team but didn't win the title, especially after only signing 3 players in 2003 when we should have apparently signed half a team, but everything Ashley has done has been far worse than anything done by the previous Board. So what? The previous board sold up and f***ed off with the money because they wanted to. No one held a gun to their head otherwise they could still be here now...and in fact if they wanted to invest some cash they could buy it back same way as Ashley did. But they won't because they don't want to put their money in Newcastle and neither does anyone else. Until someone does it's pointless whingeing at the only bloke who's putting anything in no matter how reluctantly he's doing it.

My point was not about the accuracy of what was said it was more about the PR aspect (or lack of it) .i.e. the way things are communicated. Telling the fans, who turn up in their thousands to support the team, that they are foolish, offensive and don't understand is not a great idea imo - whether its true or not. And maybe it would be a good move to thank the 28,000 season ticket holders rather than referring to their input as luck. He might actually get a few of the haters onside. Anyway that is just my take on it....

Yes - I've said on here a few times that I think they have been honest in terms of what Ashley has funded. There are ways and ways of getting that message across though. And Llambias wasn't here when KK joined, Mort did the work on that appointment.

Yes - the foot in mouth PR machine strikes again. For any die hard Ashley hater the statement "I don't think they actually understand what mike has actually done for the club. We have been honest" is just asking for it tbh. He does seriously need to be more careful with some of the stuff he comes out with.

And so on........

The season before Ashley bought the club we finished 13th with 43 points, with an expensively assembled squad - but of course the football was fantastic and the previous board appointed Allardyce to take it to an even higher level........

Maybe Aston Villa isn't the club we should be looking to follow from then. I'd love to see Spurs's accounts, despite what they say I just cannot see them having a low wage bill and making a profit. Spurs 2009 accounts are also available. Turnover £113m Wage bill £60m Profit £33m (which includes £56.5m profit on player sales - Berbatov to ManU and Keane's move to L'pool were a chunk of that) Not had a full year of Harry impact yet though in those accounts (assuming they run to March or June??) June

They are available now - turnover of £84 million for the year to 31st May 2009.

Maybe Aston Villa isn't the club we should be looking to follow from then. I'd love to see Spurs's accounts, despite what they say I just cannot see them having a low wage bill and making a profit. Spurs 2009 accounts are also available. Turnover £113m Wage bill £60m Profit £33m (which includes £56.5m profit on player sales - Berbatov to ManU and Keane's move to L'pool were a chunk of that)

Companies House website - costs £1. The parent company is called Reform Acquisitions Limited, company number 5891280.

Aston Villa’s 2009 accounts have been filed today. On turnover of £84m they racked up a loss of £46m. That’s quite a result Their wage bill is £70m, which is 83% of their turnover. Lerner funded it all of course and has now invested a total of about £260m in the club.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Caveat emptor; the first unseen (at the time) indication of Ashley's incompetence and now we can see where that has got us. However, my point is still that the decisions Ashley made (sacking Allardyce, appointing Keegan, sacking Keegan, havering when clarity was needed, appointing and letting Shearer go) were crap and brought us to this pass. All I want is him to behave in a way that increases the value of his investment and not treat the club as a toy; he appears to be doing that. In my humbles opinion, I think he was badly advised by people around him. Here we have a bloke who knew zero about football (which begs the question of WHY he bought in to it in the first place), but he was/is a very successful businessman. You don't garner the amount of money he has made by being a fly by night or a shyster. He obviously has business sense. However, his initial foray in football has been a disaster and I'm 100% sure that little by little he is learning and finding out that football is not your ordinary business. On the subject of NUFC though, my gut feeling is he will put people in place to run the club for him (if he decides to keep it). His business plan for the club is beginning to take shape (i.e. not being a club run on debt - though clearing up Shepherd's mess is going to be long and painful). It'll take time but it'll work. The club is being running on debt, more debt than ever. That is true but there is a huge difference between being in debt to an owner with deep pockets and being in debt to a bunch of external creditors with foreclosure rights imo. Entirely different risk. And the previous external creditors we had didn't miss a trick in triggering the change of ownership clause and hauling their debt in, good business partners they were...... and yes I would have done the same thing. Its fair to say the chances of Ashley putting himself out of business by calling in his loans in one go are slim. That doesnt mean the debts wont have to be repaid. For the sake of argument assume the loans have to be repaid, how do you see that being achieved? I can't see it. So you think Ashley is going to write off over a £100m? I don't think he's going to have much choice. So why doesnt he just do it? Whats he waiting for? Whats the point of having loans that are never going to be repaid? Why doesnt he just come out and say theres no way the club will ever be able to do f*** all if it has to pay me £140m so Im cancelling the loans? Answered that above. Perhaps you could answer it again and flesh out the bones. It sounded to me that you were suggesting he wont cancel the loans in case the club goes bust, and hell therefore be a creditor not a debtor when the clubs assets are liquidated. Though to be honest, Im not sure what you meant. He could convert the debt to equity and surrender the chance of getting any of it back at all. Plus the tax treatment is different if you write off a loan compared to if you take a hit on an equity investment. He'll structure it in whatever way suits him. I thought he was supposed to be naive ;-) As much as I appreciate your input on the murky world of accountancy I think a lot of people are barking up the wrong tree. Its the character of the man that will determine how he deals with the mess he has created. His motivations, his value systems, his ego, his connection with reality, his insecurities. Trying to second guess his intentions based solely on the intricacies of business law is folly. Perhaps the situation is a whole lot simpler than this (and many other threads of a similar vein over the last few years) suggest. If he can get his money back by screwing the club over would he do it? Well......no way will there be any naivete in how he sorts his tax affairs out, that will be done by professionals. But he wasn't answering to professionals or considering business law (or even business logic) when he bought us. So its unlikely that the decision on what he does with the club will also be governed by those factors. When he decides what to do with the club the most tax and business efficient way of achieving what he wants will be found. Its always the way with people like this. So I'm not sure we have a disagreement tbh.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Caveat emptor; the first unseen (at the time) indication of Ashley's incompetence and now we can see where that has got us. However, my point is still that the decisions Ashley made (sacking Allardyce, appointing Keegan, sacking Keegan, havering when clarity was needed, appointing and letting Shearer go) were crap and brought us to this pass. All I want is him to behave in a way that increases the value of his investment and not treat the club as a toy; he appears to be doing that. In my humbles opinion, I think he was badly advised by people around him. Here we have a bloke who knew zero about football (which begs the question of WHY he bought in to it in the first place), but he was/is a very successful businessman. You don't garner the amount of money he has made by being a fly by night or a shyster. He obviously has business sense. However, his initial foray in football has been a disaster and I'm 100% sure that little by little he is learning and finding out that football is not your ordinary business. On the subject of NUFC though, my gut feeling is he will put people in place to run the club for him (if he decides to keep it). His business plan for the club is beginning to take shape (i.e. not being a club run on debt - though clearing up Shepherd's mess is going to be long and painful). It'll take time but it'll work. The club is being running on debt, more debt than ever. That is true but there is a huge difference between being in debt to an owner with deep pockets and being in debt to a bunch of external creditors with foreclosure rights imo. Entirely different risk. And the previous external creditors we had didn't miss a trick in triggering the change of ownership clause and hauling their debt in, good business partners they were...... and yes I would have done the same thing. Its fair to say the chances of Ashley putting himself out of business by calling in his loans in one go are slim. That doesnt mean the debts wont have to be repaid. For the sake of argument assume the loans have to be repaid, how do you see that being achieved? I can't see it. So you think Ashley is going to write off over a £100m? I don't think he's going to have much choice. So why doesnt he just do it? Whats he waiting for? Whats the point of having loans that are never going to be repaid? Why doesnt he just come out and say theres no way the club will ever be able to do f*** all if it has to pay me £140m so Im cancelling the loans? Answered that above. Perhaps you could answer it again and flesh out the bones. It sounded to me that you were suggesting he wont cancel the loans in case the club goes bust, and hell therefore be a creditor not a debtor when the clubs assets are liquidated. Though to be honest, Im not sure what you meant. He could convert the debt to equity and surrender the chance of getting any of it back at all. Plus the tax treatment is different if you write off a loan compared to if you take a hit on an equity investment. He'll structure it in whatever way suits him.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Caveat emptor; the first unseen (at the time) indication of Ashley's incompetence and now we can see where that has got us. However, my point is still that the decisions Ashley made (sacking Allardyce, appointing Keegan, sacking Keegan, havering when clarity was needed, appointing and letting Shearer go) were crap and brought us to this pass. All I want is him to behave in a way that increases the value of his investment and not treat the club as a toy; he appears to be doing that. In my humbles opinion, I think he was badly advised by people around him. Here we have a bloke who knew zero about football (which begs the question of WHY he bought in to it in the first place), but he was/is a very successful businessman. You don't garner the amount of money he has made by being a fly by night or a shyster. He obviously has business sense. However, his initial foray in football has been a disaster and I'm 100% sure that little by little he is learning and finding out that football is not your ordinary business. On the subject of NUFC though, my gut feeling is he will put people in place to run the club for him (if he decides to keep it). His business plan for the club is beginning to take shape (i.e. not being a club run on debt - though clearing up Shepherd's mess is going to be long and painful). It'll take time but it'll work. The club is being running on debt, more debt than ever. That is true but there is a huge difference between being in debt to an owner with deep pockets and being in debt to a bunch of external creditors with foreclosure rights imo. Entirely different risk. And the previous external creditors we had didn't miss a trick in triggering the change of ownership clause and hauling their debt in, good business partners they were...... and yes I would have done the same thing. It’s fair to say the chances of Ashley putting himself out of business by calling in his loans in one go are slim. That doesn’t mean the debts won’t have to be repaid. For the sake of argument assume the loans have to be repaid, how do you see that being achieved? I can't see it. So you think Ashley is going to write off over a £100m? Depends if you believe the stuff being said about his recent efforts to sell and his willingness to sell for £100m or £80m all in. Some don't, but lets face it he wasn't going to get anyone to cough £210 million or thereabouts for a Championship club so I think I do believe it. Based on that he's already shown himself prepared to write off more than £100m to get rid.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Caveat emptor; the first unseen (at the time) indication of Ashley's incompetence and now we can see where that has got us. However, my point is still that the decisions Ashley made (sacking Allardyce, appointing Keegan, sacking Keegan, havering when clarity was needed, appointing and letting Shearer go) were crap and brought us to this pass. All I want is him to behave in a way that increases the value of his investment and not treat the club as a toy; he appears to be doing that. In my humbles opinion, I think he was badly advised by people around him. Here we have a bloke who knew zero about football (which begs the question of WHY he bought in to it in the first place), but he was/is a very successful businessman. You don't garner the amount of money he has made by being a fly by night or a shyster. He obviously has business sense. However, his initial foray in football has been a disaster and I'm 100% sure that little by little he is learning and finding out that football is not your ordinary business. On the subject of NUFC though, my gut feeling is he will put people in place to run the club for him (if he decides to keep it). His business plan for the club is beginning to take shape (i.e. not being a club run on debt - though clearing up Shepherd's mess is going to be long and painful). It'll take time but it'll work. The club is being running on debt, more debt than ever. That is true but there is a huge difference between being in debt to an owner with deep pockets and being in debt to a bunch of external creditors with foreclosure rights imo. Entirely different risk. And the previous external creditors we had didn't miss a trick in triggering the change of ownership clause and hauling their debt in, good business partners they were...... and yes I would have done the same thing. Its fair to say the chances of Ashley putting himself out of business by calling in his loans in one go are slim. That doesnt mean the debts wont have to be repaid. For the sake of argument assume the loans have to be repaid, how do you see that being achieved? I can't see it.

He had the money at the time but like most investors lost quite a bit when the global ecenomy dipped. Really? Shepherds only worth that now after getting his pay off from Ashley, Im pretty sure he didnt have the sort of money to buy the club outright back then, and as Quayside said thats only his interpretation that shepherd wanted to sell, Its not a proven fact You never truly know what people are worth but imo he probably could have launched a bid when the market value was about £50m or £60m. maybe with a bit of venture capital if needed, but I don't think he wanted to. Shrewd move as it turned out.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Shepherd didn't want to sell.. in his last few years as chairmen he was actually buying up more shares. There goes your theory. He did and he bought a load when the share price was about 40p and the stock market value of the club was about £50 million. He took his holding right up to 29%. Any more than that would mean he would have to make an offer to buy the whole lot Your interpretation is that he did that because he didn't want to sell. Mine is that he knew it was going to sell and he wanted the maximum stake he could have without having to launch a buyout. Was Shepherd the biggest single shareholder? I thought St James Holdings Ltd was. You are a bit mixed up. St James Holdings is 100% owned by Ashley and it owns the club now. Prior to St James Holdings buying the club Shepherd (and his brother) had 29% and the Hall family had about 41% iirc.

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Caveat emptor; the first unseen (at the time) indication of Ashley's incompetence and now we can see where that has got us. However, my point is still that the decisions Ashley made (sacking Allardyce, appointing Keegan, sacking Keegan, havering when clarity was needed, appointing and letting Shearer go) were crap and brought us to this pass. All I want is him to behave in a way that increases the value of his investment and not treat the club as a toy; he appears to be doing that. In my humbles opinion, I think he was badly advised by people around him. Here we have a bloke who knew zero about football (which begs the question of WHY he bought in to it in the first place), but he was/is a very successful businessman. You don't garner the amount of money he has made by being a fly by night or a shyster. He obviously has business sense. However, his initial foray in football has been a disaster and I'm 100% sure that little by little he is learning and finding out that football is not your ordinary business. On the subject of NUFC though, my gut feeling is he will put people in place to run the club for him (if he decides to keep it). His business plan for the club is beginning to take shape (i.e. not being a club run on debt - though clearing up Shepherd's mess is going to be long and painful). It'll take time but it'll work. The club is being running on debt, more debt than ever. That is true but there is a huge difference between being in debt to an owner with deep pockets and being in debt to a bunch of external creditors with foreclosure rights imo. Entirely different risk. And the previous external creditors we had didn't miss a trick in triggering the change of ownership clause and hauling their debt in, good business partners they were...... and yes I would have done the same thing.

Exactly, I really dont see why a lot seem to think he is naive, He's a chancer who got his fingers burnt because he wouldnt listen, and Llambias is only his mouthpiece I think you've both just defined naivete in the context of someone buying a business for more than £100 million in an industry he doesn't understand tbh

To be fair to UV he, like many others of us, appears to be more concerned about the actual nosedive into the CCC rather than a still notional threat of financial oblivion. And it is, and must always remain, notional; who knows what the previous owners might have done to protect their investment? On the basis it was a public company rather than them being "the owners" their options were fairly limited. This isn't difficult; if you own a lot of shares in a plc and the plc goes under you lose a lot of money. The Halls and Shepherd owned a lot of shares and therefore had a substantial interest in maintaining the club's viability. Or in flogging it off quick so someone else had to pay their bills. Shepherd didn't want to sell.. in his last few years as chairmen he was actually buying up more shares. There goes your theory. He did and he bought a load when the share price was about 40p and the stock market value of the club was about £50 million. He took his holding right up to 29%. Any more than that would mean he would have to make an offer to buy the whole lot Your interpretation is that he did that because he didn't want to sell. Mine is that he knew it was going to sell and he wanted the maximum stake he could have without having to launch a buyout.

I stand corrected on that, I used the higher £10m figure as that correlated more to the increase in the net debt as calculated on nufc-finances. The point remains that from the point of view of a lay person it is somewhat misleading to say we lost £33m in that year when we actually overspent in cash terms by £7.5m. Does the difference between the £90 million of trading losses (I assume you mean since the club was turned into a plc) and the £68 million of debt correspond to the net payments due on player transfers? Does the upfront payment of the sponsorship money come into it? Am I right in thinking the £22m funding shortfall in the accounts would have been addressed by the sales of Milner, Given and N'Zogbia who would have only shown up as a couple of million worth of assets on the accounts in 06-07? It's all about the timing as you say, but the 06-07 accounts took the full hit for Luque (£7.5m) even though he was actually sold in the following accounting period. Without that adjustment there'd have been £5m less of a loss in 06-07 and £5m more in 07-08 levelling it out in spite of the £18m increased TV money. As I said you do get mismatches in cash results and accounting results and 2005/2006 is also misleading since it was heavy on cash burn as we bought Luque and Owen. Not sure what you are implying with your question about the plc. The £90m of losses is not a figure I invented, it is in the balance sheet whether it goes back to plc days or not. I can’t answer your question about payments due on player transfers because the accounts don’t give a breakdown of the debtors and creditors in anything like that sort of detail. The treatment of the sponsorship income in the accounts would be to spread it over the period of the sponsorship deal .i.e. £20m over 4 years = £5m per year in the accounts. I thought you knew that but does that answer your question? A combined profit on Milner, Given and N’zogbia of £20m or thereabouts will be recorded in the 2009 accounts. What the cash requirement of 2009 was is anybody’s guess, especially given the payment terms on transfers, but I would expect an improved accounting result over 2008. If your point is that there was hidden value in the 2007 balance sheet then that’s fair enough but you would also have to look at some players who were overvalued – apart from Luque, was Owen ultimately worth his balance sheet value of £8.5m, or Barton his of £5m? And Babayaro was actually paid to go away in December 2007. I’m sure you will continue to try and make the case that everything was in good shape when Ashley took over. I suppose I could do a Rafa Benitez and say “the financial situation left by the previous board was absolutely fantastic and there was no issue whatsoever over it being a going concern and I wish I was as solvent” – but my lack of sincerity would give me away.

No argument with that. I've never bought into the conspiracy theories about his motives. He's not the first entrepreneur to make a lot of money in an industry he understands and think he could repeat that in an industry he doesn't understand - and he won't be the last.

Yours are actually overdue, they were due in at the end of February.