A takeover is obviously what we all want on here. However I would say with this still rumbling on and on we are potentially ignoring other bidders as MA wants his big pay day. I'd suggest most on here would be happy if we could get Leicester / Everton type owners in to steady the ship and push us forward. In summary I think I'd prefer option 3: new owners that can sail through the odt and have enough cash behind them for us to compete in the top 10
Option 3 isn't even on the cards unfortunately. 1. You need a buyer. 2. The buying process from expressing an interest takes around 12 months. If another buyer comes along great
Remember the utter elation of finding out PIF were buying us? Back in those opening months of 2020. we heard the Human Rights murmurings but most of us said to ourselves, what can I do about all that, that’s for statecraft, and since when has football worried about the smell of the money. And we got SO excited - there’d be some checks by the PL we heard but we looked beyond that and we’re playing little movies in our heads of who might be signed over the next years, what the football might look like, which managers would suddenly find NUFC irresistible, European competition becoming a possibility, challenging for silverware. That’s where our heads spent the opening weeks and months. And then it began to chill, the wait started to feel unnaturally long, it started to feel like something was off. But many of us said to ourselves that it’s not uncommon that some glitch might occur, and with Covid in the mix we talked ourselves into calming down and saying ‘give it the extra month or two, it’s only to be expected. must have been what, 4-5 months of keeping yourself grounded and patient. Then the Saudi Public Investment Fund, PCP Capital Partners and RB confirmed they’d withdrawn their offer due to the “unforeseeably prolonged process” to gain approval from the Premier League. Virtually one year ago. we’ve seen no statement from PIF since then. We can assume that they might still be hanging around in some way in the background because they haven’t contradicted our Amanda or taken umbrage at the implications she makes that they are still a possible. but the unforeseeably prolonged process has now been - at the door of the arbitration hearing - prolonged by half a ****ing year …. If I turned up at some courtroom without some paperwork I’d expect to told to toddle off home and get it, or make a call and have it faxed. Nobody would say tell you what, make sure you’ve got that with me within the next 0.5% of a century. And if they did then I’d expect the other party in the proceedings to shout ‘WtaF!’ so I can get on board with the view that the club supports the length of delay for arbitration…. But have no idea why. And there is still a total absence of any first hand comment from PIF that they are interested. i don’t like it. It’s sucking the joy from my bone marrow. I suspect, but would have no evidence of, PL corruption. But if that’s happened then I’d expect some leaking, proper leaking that demanded a lawyers response from the PL - not Twatter leaking which is made up fantasy ****. I don’t want to analyse black and white pictures of deck chairs from a seaside town or start slaughtering chickens and picking through their entrails for signs. I need more than some iffy faith that it might go our way; it hasn’t so far, and it isn’t now. Just endless ****ing delays. giving up will feel like I’m letting the PL crush me with their ****ing amateur rules and their suspected protection racket……… so - I’ll stay in the “Let’s see the fight through to a conclusion” camp - but not the “it’s happening” camp. I HATE the PL.
People just don't have patience these days. A few months or even years isn't long in business. This will go through an then nobody will care how long it took... Time takes care of itself and cannot be stopped.
You meaning the people claiming this is all smoke and mirrors? I agree.....but then again we're spending eff all, the club's saying nowt, and Ashley's deflected attention away from his usual mismanagement.
Yes mate I mean I can understand why people have lost belief it will happen, but the guys suggesting it's all fake so that Ashley doesn't buy or loan a cm are being silly. Ashley has spent around 100 million over the past 2 seasons and covid is also a big issue for most clubs financially. The situation is real and we just have to see what happens. I can't say 100% it will happen or that it's off, but what I can do is see the possibility as a big plus given the alternative is there being zero possibility, no buyer and facing Ashley for potentially another decade. This idea that another buyer will pop up and buy the club is fantasy not this situation.
I also keep reading the fans saying at least we know Ashley is now a willing seller! Hes been a willing seller for 14 years, but nobody apart from the Saudis have managed to offer him the amount he's asking for. I'm sorry, but I doubt there's much chance of there being a sudden influx of buyers suddenly offering him the amount within the next 6 months. Even if one did it would take a year to get the deal done btw..
patience is subjective though… I was patient in the beginning, then it looked over so we had a little bit of focus on the season, then there was talk of arbitration, so we started waiting again, more patience, then a High Court case needed patience, then there was a 3-4 month wait for arbitration to start, with nobody, literally nobody, able or willing to give us a start date…. More patience…. Then the first concrete information about a start date for arbitration was released … telling us it started for a few hours and was then postponed for 6+ months, more patience. At some point a human being ought to ask themselves am I being patient, or am I being a mug? Open-ended patience, with no target date to focus on, is very hard…. Made harder with the absence of official comments; imagine how much easier this patience would be if PIF released a friendly “keeping our fingers crossed as we’d love to come back to the table” statement. There’s too many unknowns. However. See it through… it must all end at some point. And if it doesn’t have a happy ending then we can start focussing on how to find and publish personal dirt on Masters and Hoffman
Did you read the Mail article about that where the judge stated his concern that the investigation into the FFP breach by Man City had been going on for 2 years without it getting any further forward and then wink g 3 league titles in that time. So basically the Premier League just sticking it on the back burner hoping it goes away as it’s a top 6 club. Surely another avenue to use in the CAT case unless they already are.
I agree and I feel like I've had a psychological victory in myself by simply stripping away all the theories and unknowns. I've simply looked at the bare bones of the situation and concluded this situation is very positive compared with the only alternative which is that there's only Ashley and no potential sale on the horizon at all. It's going to conclude and if there's one thing I've learned it's that time passes quickly.
