Jonson Clarke-Harris

If that had happened quickly,after being involved due diligence since the early part of this year, I might have agreed with your "hope".
But hasn't.
Just another cock up..

It's a right kerfuffle!

As I understood it there was some sort of disagreement between Eddy Jennings and David Sams which resulted in his dismissal. A trade union quickly became involved and were able to show that the club had acted improperly with the result that compensation had to be paid.

I post a lot about lack of financial discipline but there seems to be a lack of any kind discipline at the club. Apparently David Sams is not the only employee who had to be compensated due to the club acting improperly on employment matters and the attitude seems to be "we do what we like and if it costs us who cares". You only have to look at what is happening with the South Stand to see another example of this and the training ground is yet another with legally binding planning conditions set by the council seemingly being completely ignored.


    

I’m not defending Wael, Tom or the Al-Saeeds here but a bit of evidence from that pod cast says that probably wasn’t the case.

DMAC had Liz prepare all the paperwork and reminded us about the 15 min extension. Both make the claim that according to EFL system the extension was requested at 23:01 and the registration lodged at 23:17 missing both deadlines. They can see all of that information themselves.

As Liz alludes, it’s a bit of graft uploading that document, why would we lodge an extension and all the paperwork if we had no intention of completing the deal?

I put it down to the acting club sec and our CEO making an almighty fumble rather than double crossing anyone intentionally or getting cold feet on the deal.

The club had done the same process a dozen times already, presumably without any issues, so it's not like they didn't know the process, if they were struggling to complete the form why didn't they ask "Liz" for some assistance/guidance over the phone?

As far as the extension I thought it was clear we never even asked for one?

Yes, I also heard the timescales which Liz Elsom gave and Darragh MacAnthony say he "felt for the lady who was doing the paperwork at the Bristol end" so the Peterborough people definitely do think it was simply a case of Rovers staff being too slow in filing the documents.

But isn't it just a little bit suspicious to miss the extension deadline  and then to miss the registration deadline by 17 minutes ?  If you know for sure you've missed a very precise deadline what purpose does it serve to submit the paperwork late once let alone do it again for a second time ?  The only reason I can think of would be to attempt to demonstrate to others that you had tried to complete the deal.

Many Gasheads are saying that whatever the reason the deal didn't go through we should move on and learn from the experience but how many times have we heard that before ?  The fact is we never learn we merely retreat back into the cosy world where things carry on just as before and I think many Gasheads are now concerned that the new owner may not have realised the enormity of the task he faces. If it's true that we were about to spend about £1.5 million on giving JCH a three year deal how does that square with what Hussain Al Saeed said three weeks ago ?  There was no ambiguity in that interview because he made it clear his aim was not to give the manager more money to spend but instead to develop the team and infrastructure side by side because he didn't want to "rush" into trying to achieve promotion.

You seem much more open minded these last few weeks so what do you think is going on ? 

 
Edit. extension deadline missed by 1 minute

The only other reason was to appeal the following day.

I don’t think anyone is being deliberately disingenuous, it doesn’t help anyone and they would gain more respect and kudos for saying they pulled the plug due to X reasons.

Would we really taxi JCH all the way up as well? What would be the point in that?

I know you hold members of the board in complete disdain Swiss and are very suspicious of them but I can’t help but think you’re barking up the wrong tree here.

Above anything else, no one wants to look inept and incompetent and by the sound of it, that’s exactly how we sounded when DMac and Liz were describing the saga and not having a club secretary, I would imagine when the pressure was on, we crumbled.

The board comprises four people but we know that only two matter when it comes to decision making. Disdain is not the word I would use nor am I suspicious of their motives but I do believe they have proven themselves to be incompetent. And it may be that they are sufficiently incompetent to think they could do a £1.5 million value deal for JCH without getting the green light from the majority owner. So, IMO, the possibility remains that the plug was deliberately pulled at the last minute.

But what do you think of the situation with the new owners ?

With the benefit of a further three weeks experience at Rovers do you think Hussain has changed his mind and is now fully behind Wael & Joey’s plan to “go for it” with £800K or more sitting in the war chest ready for a January spending spree ?

Or do you think they have been working hard behind the scenes and will shortly announce major changes to the way the club is managed ?

Whoever was responsible for the missed deadline won’t be on Barton’s Christmas card list this year. I fully expect the outcome of the missed transfer to played out in the Month’s to come, and not on the pitch.