Notts County Supporters’ Trust: Told You So.
It’s mean to say “I told you so”, I know, but it’s difficult to resist in the case of Notts County, as we learn that owners Munto Finance have put the club up for sale, with Sven Goran-Eriksson’s future at the club in doubt (Eriksson and executive chairman Peter Trembling are also reported to be leading a buyout bid).
This comes just over a week after the Football League renewed its inquiry into the still-mysterious backing of Munto Finance, and the Guardian also reported that the money Munto promised to pump into the club might not be coming after all.
Doubts have also emerged about the terms of the £5m guarantee of funds that Munto Finance produced that persuaded the Notts County supporters trust to sign over control of the club for a nominal consideration of £1. That guarantee, produced in May of this year, came from a company belonging to First London, a financial services firm.
The letter of guarantee is drafted in an unconventional fashion and may not easily be enforceable. An expert in contract law has raised doubts about the document. A corporate law partner at Olswang said: “The letter of guarantee is quite imprecise and confusing. It refers to the guarantee being able to be invoked if Munto does not make “investments” in Blenheim 1862 [the club's holding company that was majority owned by the supporters' trust] but it does not define when and how such investments must be made.
So the one guarantee supporters had managed to wrangle out of Munto might not materialise into anything. This was a club where supporters had the say in the direction of the club, as the Supporters’ Trust owned a 60% share of it: when the mysterious Munto Finance came along promising to throw cash at the club, they could hardly throw themselves at the feet of…well…they didn’t really know who Munto were actually backed by at all.
The Supporters’ Trust voted 93% in favour of the takeover and handed over their share for free, apparently only extracting what may now be a meaningless guarantee of investment from Munto. And for good measure, they also wrote-off £170,000 that they had painstakingly raised themselves and loaned to the club.
After the vote, Trust chairman Glenn Rolley said that “The Trust membership have exercised their democratic right and it is very clear where the overwhelming majority stand on the issue. They recognise that it is a magnificent opportunity to put Notts County back on the football map after so many years in the doldrums and have decided to give their full backing to Munto Finance. Time will tell whether the decision is the right one. But like everyone who cares about the future of Notts County, I’m genuinely excited about the way forward.”
The Supporters’ Trust had certainly had problems running the club, and apparently they saw no future if they did not take Munto’s offer, but after all the work they had done to save the club, was it really wise to hand over the club to the first bunch of bullshitters to come along offering a golden future? At least when the Trust ran the club, the supporters could vote bullshitters out. Now they’re owned by them, and can do nothing about it.
So hell, here’s my “I told you so” moment from this July, when I was still trying too hard to be kind and understanding of it all:
The club’s long decline began in the 1990s, before the Trust assumed control, but it’s clear Trust management did not find a way to move the club forward on or off the pitch. All the same, it’s a surprise supporters didn’t demand to at least know more about the backing of Munto before handing over control — they seem to have snatched off Munto’s hand out of fear they’d be left penniless without them. It’s understandable that years of frustration left supporters desperate for a fairy godmother, but we’ve seen too often these stories rarely end in fairytales; and perhaps the Trust could have played hardball to ensure the club’s future had more guarantees.
Either way, welcome to the rollercoaster. How long will Sven last?
Notts County fans are still holding out hope Sven himself is the white knight to the rescue. Unfortunately, they no longer have any say over the rollercoaster ride they put their club on. I hope it’s at least exciting.
About the Author
Tom Dunmore is the founder and editor of Pitch Invasion. Follow him @pitchinvasion on Twitter.
Email this author | All posts by Tom Dunmore
You might also like:
|
|
|
|
|
well you bunch of smart arse reporters you have done what you have set out to do so have the football leauge , you have fucked up notts county club and the supporters, you have acheived by your constant crap about the take over from the start , you and the football leauge are supposed to be good for football , no you are all full of shit, i think sven will stay and take the club up . your negative comments should see sven say fuck you all and lets get on with it i live in new zealand but im comeing home in febuary i will be going to watch notts play as i was there begining of the season , your i told you so stick it up your arse . and the football leauge to . notts for ever , i wait for your reply you dick head .
How about doing some research before spouting off? Our supporters’ Trust had us £400K in debt to HMRC, on the verge of administration and a couple of points off relegation to the Blue Square. Thus the fans were left with a choice of either (a) take Munto’s offer; or (b) go out of business.
Oh, you guys are doing a great job of proving me wrong with these thoughtful and informed comments. The first comment can fall on its own; as for the second, that’s the one argument supporters of the deal always trot out, but I’ve never believed it. Plenty of clubs have found ways out of worse jams, and there was no reason why Munto weren’t further examined before giving them everything they wanted. Not to mention the comments made by fans were full of wild optimism, not regretful caution.
But hey, keep the reasoned and thoughtful comments coming.
They are still in a better position than they have for many many years though……..
But they’re not….They have no idea what’s about to happen to them, how wages are going to be paid if Munto actually have no money and no-one saves them, and most importantly, the supporters no longer have any say. I’m very unsure how that’s better than before, however bad before was. They’re just left hoping another fairytale comes true, and impotently so.
Sure do seem to be a lot of really shady owner types hanging around the Football League these days. All that drama around Portsmouth, I don’t even remember all the twists and turns with that. With the Dubai meltdown, I imagine that has a ripple effect on potential owners from it and other Middle East countries.
That one cat with the long name who was looking into buying half of Liverpool recently, which country was he from? (Not asking rhetorically, my footballing news is very limited this year, it’s too hard to watch the news and see a million negative stories about LIverpool, so I just stick to the games — which brings its own special brand of agony lately.)
And count me as someone hoping things would go well at Notts County, the new people coming in brought some intrigue, and I can’t help but want to see such an historic club recapture some glory. Hope things don’t get too bad. I’m still curious to find out the real story about how the Sol Campbell thing went down.
Er … unfortunately you have no idea what you’re talking about.
You’re ignorance of what was going on is understandable. But you’ve done bugger all research into the state of Notts before the Munto proposed take-over, you’ve simply jumped on the band wagon to patronize people about trusting (no pun intended) mystery saviours.
The situation was much more complex than you mickey mouse article would suggest. Talk to the fans (over the age of 15). Find out why over half the board was kicked off or resigned before the Munto take over. Ask why the old VAT bill was left on Munto’s plate. Try not to assume the crap on message boards represents the knowledge, wishes, or perceptions of fans. Ask about the gagging order before the vote of confidence in the Trust chairman. And please, please, please, stop intermixing the term Trust with fans/supporters…
I’m certainly not going to explain it to you … you wrote the article so you’re supposed to have done the spade work … but you haven’t … you’re just spouting off inane sermons.
Personaly, I’m seeing my club potentially go down the drain after we had a gun to the head and had to make a deal with the devil we didn’t know, because we knew the other one a bit too well.
I stumbled across your ill thought-out, badly researched, ignorant article by accident via a news gathering service.
No doubt you’re capable of a witty internet retort … it’s the world you clearly live in.
I don’t intend to return to your crappy site to read it.
Not sure I understand the motivation behind either your article or your stance on supporter’s interest in football in general. You start off by saying “it’s mean to say I told you so, but then admit you’re about to. The whole article though, seems to be all about telling us ‘you told us so’. You re-inforce this by entering into and inviting banter from any Notts fan who dares to comment, whether they have a valid point or not.
If the whole article is to prove your intelligence and show a handful of internet using football fans:
a) You have great delight in predicting this outcome
b) You can beat any of them in an argument
then well done old bean, how proud of yourself you must be. There’s no bitterness here, by the way, Notts County will go on regardless, I just felt like commenting after being linked to this site and cringing at your nerdy, hidden behind a keyboard, persona.
If there’s any substance to any of these comments, it’s escaping me. How long does denial last? Many of us have been there when our club has been on its knees. The Trust, a democratic body, took the easiest way out possible. Insults and accusations of knowing nothing without presenting anything else to explain this isn’t anything but the same internet blather you claim this blog represents.
Sometimes it is okay to say I told you so.
“If there’s any substance to any of these comments, it’s escaping me. ”
- Because you haven’t researched the subject adequately.
“How long does denial last? ”
- There’s no denial, you don’t know the choice we had … and you haven’t researched the subject to find out.
“Many of us have been there when our club has been on its knees.”
Well done. Good job. Does your club have the record for the longest time in administration? Has your club been statistically quantified as the most stressful/depressing team in the league to support?
The Trust, a democratic body, took the easiest way out possible.
- Wrong wrong, wrong …. that’s ignorant and lazy. You write articles without the spade work!
Insults and accusations of knowing nothing without presenting anything else to explain this isn’t anything but the same internet blather you claim this blog represents.
- Rubbish … you wrote the article without doing the research. What you’ve written is wrong and it’s not the reader’s job to correct it. I came here by accident and was so annoyed by your ignorance that I was actually moved to the point of feeling I had to react to your nonsense. I have no interest in a debate with someone who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
“Has your club been statistically quantified as the most stressful/depressing team in the league to support?”
Please don’t tell me you’re using that marketing exercise for Littlewoods Pools as the basis for this claim…
“How about doing some research before spouting off? Our supporters’ Trust had us £400K in debt to HMRC, on the verge of administration and a couple of points off relegation to the Blue Square. Thus the fans were left with a choice of either (a) take Munto’s offer; or (b) go out of business.”
The amount owed to HMRC was actually in the region of £150k, but only came to light when HMRC had to serve Munto a winding up order for non-payment of tax.
“Ask why the old VAT bill was left on Munto’s plate.”
Because the Trust had negotiated that the bill could be paid in instalments, as they were awaiting appearance-related payments from Southampton for Leon Best and David McGoldrick. Payments that Southampton couldn’t make as they were in administration themselves. That payment would have arrived when the Saints exited administration – so why did Munto not make the VAT payments on time with the new restructured schedule? That’s not the fault of the Trust.
“The Trust, a democratic body, took the easiest way out possible. ”
“- Wrong wrong, wrong …. that’s ignorant and lazy. You write articles without the spade work!”
Well, yes and no. The Trust membership elected to take the easiest way out possible. The easy way was always to sell to people claiming to have lots of money (the fact they still haven’t proved to anyone that they have
Personally, I don’t know why the Notts County fans are so up in arms. All reports indicate that Peter Trembling is leading the buy out anyway, and he’s the man that Munto put in charge of the club anyway, and Munto wouldn’t have left any old chancer in charge, would they?
- Because you haven’t researched the subject adequately.
- There’s no denial, you don’t know the choice we had … and you haven’t researched the subject to find out.
You keep saying that…And then explaining nothing to educate me on it.
- Well done. Good job. Does your club have the record for the longest time in administration? Has your club
- been statistically quantified as the most stressful/depressing team in the league to support?
Brighton, 1996-7 is my experience. There is no statistical test for “suffering”, though, don’t be silly.
- Wrong wrong, wrong …. that’s ignorant and lazy. You write articles without the spade work!
Again….Explaining nothing else.
- Rubbish … you wrote the article without doing the research. What you’ve written is wrong and it’s not the
- reader’s job to correct it. I came here by accident and was so annoyed by your ignorance that I was actually
- moved to the point of feeling I had to react to your nonsense. I have no interest in a debate with someone who – doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
I just don’t understand this. Either make a point, or don’t bother commenting. What is your purpose here?
Sorry, have to close this thread due to a lack of civility in comments coming in.