Not particularly surprising...

[Robster]

That's the problem. I think even those who don't particularly want him out (there are still some) realise it's best we move on, but if it takes all fucking summer again then next season is going to be absolutely embarrassing. Hughton still in charge, and this squad as-is? We'll be slaughtered.

This thought haunts me every day at the moment

[The Prophet]

I love the way people are acting as if the article is the gospel truth. It wouldn't be suprising if Ashley put the club for sale and if he does I'll have very mixed feelings, but until it happens this is just like any other newspaper speculation.

[indi]

It's so obvious that the club's permanently for sale, which is why it amazes me how much whether they say that it's on or off the market affects things. Seemingly we were in "turmoil" before they "took the club off the market" and now we're supposedly not, despite it being obvious that nothing has really changed. The weirdest bit is that it does seem to work, there have been genuine effects from them saying that we're off the market and the club is now a much more stable place. Why anyone would feel the need to state the obvious to the press and risk a return to that turmoil is beyond me, just get it done, there's no need to tell the fucking media about everything.

 

Also, why do people think that certain clubs have found it easy to change ownership and we've found it so hard? There are obviously numerous reasons, but my guess is that the main reason is no-one fancies taking over a club that finds it so easy to slip into turmoil over almost anything. Why would you bother when you could buy some no-mark club like Birmingham for less money and have a bit of fun with very little risk? Stability is in everyone's interests because it makes a sale much more likely, so I hope this statement of the obvious doesn't fuck things up again.

[TRon]

We won't be sold and will spend all summer disrupting plans for next season. and repeat..

[Thespence]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

[Ronaldo]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start). 

 

 

3 year contract? You're out by 18 months mate.

[Guest neesy111]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

it does, because if they want their own man, they need to sack him

[Tooj]

What's wrong with the sale thread like?

[JH]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

it does, because if they want their own man, they need to sack him

 

I'm sure if they spend £100m on us, they can stretch to the £75 to pay off Hughton's contract.

[indi]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

Yeah, it's hardly going to be the deciding factor, is it.

 

"We best not take over that club, they've got a manager in place"

 

"Er okay, but so have all the other clubs."

 

"Fuck it then, stick it on black instead."

[Pilko]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

Yeah, it's hardly going to be the deciding factor, is it.

 

"We best not take over that club, they've got a manager in place"

 

"Er okay, but so have all the other clubs."

 

"Fuck it then, stick it on black instead."

 

[Skirge]

 

 

[jdckelly]

so on a sunday where there has been next to no football to talk about therefore the sunday papers already prone to making stuff up have even more column space to fill up and magically an article appears saying the club will be for sale at the end of the season with a source close to mike ashley exclusively telling the mirror of all papers this and people treat it as gospel truth?

while it may be true putting faith in an article from any sunday paper let alone from a sunday red top is stupid

[Dave]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

It's just more of that disruption though isn't it, getting rid of the manager early might piss the players off and ruin any spirit we may have. Alright that could happen anyway but it's just yet more evidence of Ashley not having a fucking clue about football. Any fucker could have told him that Hughton won't be good enough for the Premier League.

[Guest]

Well DUH!

 

He will o fcourse put us up for sale and will yet again manage to not fkn sell us.

So the transfer stories on Sunday are speculation, but this story is okay to believe? Until there's an official statement that he normally makes when this sort of story breaks I'll take it with a pinch of salt. Plus I think the reality is the club is always up for sale until an offer he deems acceptable is made, which we all know anyway.

[TRon]

Well DUH!

 

He will o fcourse put us up for sale and will yet again manage to not fkn sell us.

So the transfer stories on Sunday are speculation, but this story is okay to believe? Until there's an official statement that he normally makes when this sort of story breaks I'll take it with a pinch of salt. Plus I think the reality is the club is always up for sale until an offer he deems acceptable is made, which we all know anyway.

 

The question is, will he run the club properly or use the Up for Sale excuse to limp along like last season?

[Skirge]

Well DUH!

 

He will o fcourse put us up for sale and will yet again manage to not fkn sell us.

So the transfer stories on Sunday are speculation, but this story is okay to believe? Until there's an official statement that he normally makes when this sort of story breaks I'll take it with a pinch of salt. Plus I think the reality is the club is always up for sale until an offer he deems acceptable is made, which we all know anyway.

 

Will be shit aye .... BUT a safe bet really that he will try to sll us again

[indi]

We would be far more attractive to buy had that fat c*** not given Hughton 3 years contract instead of just letting him stay in charge until the end of the season. (Effectively enabling the new owners to pick their own man from the start).   

 

Being with or without a manager does not make the slightest bit difference to someone buying a club.

 

It's just more of that disruption though isn't it, getting rid of the manager early might piss the players off and ruin any spirit we may have. Alright that could happen anyway but it's just yet more evidence of Ashley not having a fucking clue about football. Any fucker could have told him that Hughton won't be good enough for the Premier League.

 

But he is seemingly good enough for the Championship and perhaps Ashley's hoping/thinking that whatever happens after that won't be his problem?

 

People are simultaneously slagging the club off for having a manager in place because it'll mean that any new owner will have to shell out to replace him and having Hughton a manager it'll be relatively easy/cheap to replace in place because he's not good enough for the Premiership - ignoring the fact that we're not actually in the Premiership. One thing that most people would agree on I think is that it's not a good idea to go for a long period of time without a permanent manager in place and I suspect that a lot of the people slating the club now, were also doing so when that was the case. Hughton is so obviously a compromise and it's one that's working out for us at the moment, so what's the big problem. Having said that I also think he'd not good enough for the Premiership and would like to see someone better in place at the end of the summer, but we're not there yet and a lot of things could and hopefully will change in the meantime.

[Teasy]

I presume we'd attract a similar amount of investment as Portsmouth in the team's current state.

 

Portsmouth are in so much of a worse situation then we'd be next season (if we're promoted) that its not even worth the comparison.

[midds]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

[Isegrim]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

 

Excactly. The moment someone turns up with the right amount of cash and minimizes Ashley's loss he will get presented the club on a golden plate (ok, in this case rather a tacky brazen one).

[TRon]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

 

Not desperate enough to lower the price to one that will actually get the club sold though. In other words not desperate at all.

[Matt]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

 

Not desperate enough to lower the price to one that will actually get the club sold though. In other words not desperate at all.

 

Exactly. Until the club is marketed at something like a reasonable price, we'll remain in Ashley's hands.

[madras]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

 

Not desperate enough to lower the price to one that will actually get the club sold though. In other words not desperate at all.

 

Exactly. Until the club is marketed at something like a reasonable price, we'll remain in Ashley's hands.

bit of this, bit of that.

 

he'll not be desperate to sell right now because he'll be able to get more should we get promoted. others won't want to show their hands to early in case they risk buying us now to get a cheaper price but end up with a championship club should we not get promoted.

 

it seemed he had a reasonable price that someone else agreed to but couldn't get the money together.

 

in my view he is desperate to sell but isn't so much on his uppers that he'll take less than what he thinks he can get.

[indi]

Don't believe for a single second we were ever 'off the market'. He's still desperate to sell and always has been for months and months.

 

Not desperate enough to lower the price to one that will actually get the club sold though. In other words not desperate at all.

 

Exactly. Until the club is marketed at something like a reasonable price, we'll remain in Ashley's hands.

bit of this, bit of that.

 

he'll not be desperate to sell right now because he'll be able to get more should we get promoted. others won't want to show their hands to early in case they risk buying us now to get a cheaper price but end up with a championship club should we not get promoted.

 

it seemed he had a reasonable price that someone else agreed to but couldn't get the money together.

 

in my view he is desperate to sell but isn't so much on his uppers that he'll take less than what he thinks he can get.

 

Spot on.

 

There's a big difference in wanting to sell and being prepared to sell at any cost. Everyone's assuming that he's waiting until the end of the season because he thinks he'll be able to get more money for a Premiership club, but given that he had an asking price last summer that attracted interest (suggesting it wasn't too far off the mark), but which wasn't eventually met, it seems more realistic that he thinks it's just more likely that people will be prepared to meet his existing asking price if we're a Premiership club.

 

People seem to want him to basically give the club away, ignoring the risk that, that would make it much easier for someone to afford to buy the club who couldn't afford to run it (they are not the same thing), we don't want to end up in the same situation as Portsmouth are, do we?