I was just looking back through this thread for Barnseys last comment and it was the 29th September he said we should know within 1-2 weeks, any time now then.........
that's right, he's due another tweet saying "still on progress but taking longer than expected, will have an update by bonfire night"
It's disgraceful behaviour from Donald that there's nothing official coming out of the club. This is disruptive for the supporters and, presumably, the manager, players, etc. I've had generally positive messages that Donald is going but have also been told, by someone, he's clinging on. It's really tedious.
This is precisely why I don't buy the idea that its all a diversion tactic. If it was a diversion tactic you'd leak it to local and national press, Sky Sports, Talk Sport etc. Instead the only "leak" (in this scenario) has been to a few anonymous posters on the internet and Nick Barnes. It makes zero sense. If I was going to plan a campaign which kept the fans thinking there was a takeover, I'd want it to be well reported. And if people refused to report it, I'd put out a short statement saying talks are ongoing and no further update will happen. The club haven't even done that. So I can't see how it can be a diversion when they're not doing any of the diverting.
He must know that this seemingly endless uncertainty,fuelled by continued silence,about the future control,the direction and the financial position of the club is not good for our general wellbeing. I find it difficult to believe that the club couldn't issue a statement providing some kind of overall genuine intent, a guide as to progress and likely time frame ,without spilling actual confidential detail. I know it would spark speculation all over the place,but they've got that now anyway. Confirmation he has no regard for us.
We'll have to agree to disagree on that one a bit like, he's been right about a few things certainly but he's still talking about how the clubs own income was used to buy it by Donald which isn't true then or now. The parachute money was always going to be Ellis shorts and no one buys a business with liquid funds it would be mental, if you can buy something and only shell out 15 million but the assets are "worth" £40 million then anyone with reasonable sense would do that. He's right about their short term planning though and I'll give him credit for that.
To be fair, Donald said initially that the parachute money wasn't going to be Short's, that Short just had them as security so he'd only get them if Donald didn't make the payments to Short from his own pocket (which he assured us he would). That was obviously a lie. The fact is that no one knows what Short expected to happen to the parachute payments. He agreed a price for the sale of the club, without being in the meetings he held regarding it we can't say if he knew that the only way Donald would be able to afford it would be if he took the parachute payment from the club. I've heard someone say that Short thought he'd left the club in a good position because he'd wrote the debt off and left us debt free with two parachute payments to come which would help get us out of this league and back on the right track. He expected all the money for purchasing the club to come from Donald. That might not be true but ultimately he just wanted his money, there's no reason to assume he knew where Donald would get it, he'd apparently had to show £50m to the EFL so it wouldn't be a stretch to imagine that Short thought it would come from there!
That's probably Donald's biggest mistake, terrified of saying anything that makes him look bad, he said our keeper was worth 5 million then let him leave for free, he's said a lot of very stupid things.
I'm not saying its a diversionary tactic, because I don't think it is, but if you were planning one, doing it this way, via message boards etc is definitely the way to do it. If you go to the press and say 'we're in talks' when you aren't, you attract scrutiny. When the reported takeover fails, you are open to accusations of having ballsed it up. Especially after what happened last time. Little leaks here and there, planting little rumours in places, means you can raise the hope of the fanbase (and encourage them to buy merchandise, streaming subscriptions, tickets when fans are allowed back in, in anticipation of the takeover) without actually categorically saying that a takeover is happening. Gives you plausible deniability. All in all though, it would be easier to just say nothing.
I don't think you're wrong. I just think they'd be doing more of it. One journalist (who lets face it is a commentator, not a journalist) and a few posters on message boards. They've not even gone to "high profile" twitter folk.
