Jump to content

Important Update From 10000Hours


div

Recommended Posts


SG covered the situation on sportsound earlier. Nothing much has changed. There have been no actual bids for the club. The CIC didn't get into the position to actually make a bid and neither the KMG or the "other" interested parties have actually made a bid. SG is quite clear that meeting the asking price won't even mean the club is sold. It looks like the status quo is going to be around longer than Francis Rossi and co.

Does this mean the plans for the supporters bar are f"k'd for the foreseeable future or is there a way for The Kibble to make this happen without the CIC being in place?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

SG covered the situation on sportsound earlier. Nothing much has changed. There have been no actual bids for the club. The CIC didn't get into the position to actually make a bid and neither the KMG or the "other" interested parties have actually made a bid. SG is quite clear that meeting the asking price won't even mean the club is sold. It looks like the status quo is going to be around longer than Francis Rossi and co.

Does this mean the plans for the supporters bar are f"k'd for the foreseeable future or is there a way for The Kibble to make this happen without the CIC being in place?

Yup - off topic he did say that DL had been offered a two year extension to his deal. No hard questions from Chick Young as to whether £2M is a realistic asking price for 52% of the club - all Chick could say was that he found the CIC concept difficult to grasp but that he had pledged money towards it.

Off topic again there was some interesting comments about standing at grounds, it being unfair that the OF get away with it because of the number of fans they have and SG saying he thought some standing areas should be reintroduced but not at GHR as the ground was designed as an all-seater stadium.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For people who cant make the meeting on the 30th can you tell us the problem which stopped the deal completing?

If 10000Hours agree I am intending to cover the meeting on the 30th live on twitter so that those that cannot be there in person can at least see exactly what is said.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What an amazing statement, you spend days, if not weeks, posting inferences and implying that the proposed bid was going to saddle the club with debt and then try to throw out a smoke screen the moment anyone calls you out on the detail.

Proof positive of how many loonies have been virtually liberated from their cells by the internet.

There are alot of better posters on here than me ....Div,,,Tsu...Poz...Somner and Scott.......But you are a wank 77 and everyone knows it.biggrin.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some more on this now on the BBC site that I haven't seen mentioned;

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/15823882.stm

A community-led takeover of St Mirren is still on but the group has lost a significant amount of its funding.

Board member Richard Atkinson, who is heading the Community Interest Company (CIC) bid, said: "We've lost approximately one third of the funding.

"We still want to try and use a CIC and the involvement of the fans and the community to purchase the club.

"It's a large part of the funding. It was a key part of the proposition and it's not come through."

St Mirren chairman Stewart Gilmour is disappointed by the news but remains hopeful that the bid can be revived.

"We have come a long way," Gilmour told BBC Scotland. "We've cleared our debt and built a new stadium and training ground. It's a good platform to build on.

"I really think the community approach works for a club the size of St Mirren.

"We have vowed to do everything we can to ensure the right people are in control and we are not in a race out of the door."

Gilmour also confirmed that director Ken McGeoch is leading a rival group interested in taking over the running of the Paisley club.

Supporters and others interested in the CIC project will have a public meeting this week to assess the future of the bid.

"The only thing that is off is that one of the funders, unfortunatley after we've gone through the process, has come back to us with a negative in terms of contributing their money to the pot," Atkinson told BBC Scotland.

"But the other funders are still engaged in the process. There are still the 800-odd recipients and respondents to our offer engaged and hopefully we'll be able to establish just how engaged those community members and fans still are.

"If they are then I believe there is still a way in-which we can see the supporter-base take control of the governance and the community take control of the ownership of the club in the long term.

"We set ambitious targets, we haven't been able to fulfil them. We have to hold our hands up and say, 'it's taken longer than we thought it would'."

Falling revenues and an economic downturn have contributed to many clubs slipping further into debt and Scottish football in general is struggling to find investment.

But the Buddies are a rarity in that they have no debt even though they have moved to a new stadium and built a new training facility in recent years.

"No-one has tried to do what we were trying to do, which is using a fans group to take control of a successful football club that is debt-free, [with] new facilities and up for sale," Atkinson said.

"Normally the fans unfortunately don't get the opportunity to take part in owning their club until disaster is near striking in the case of most football clubs that end up being owned by the fans.

"What makes folk buy football clubs? It's a passion for the club.

Richard Atkinson Atkinson says community ownership is the way forward for St Mirren

"It is not the world's most sensible idea for an individual to come along, borrow money, buy a club, take money out the club to pay the debt and then end up owning the club. I don't think that's an acceptable approach.

"Football needs to return to its roots, which is by being owned by a broad cross-section of the fan-base and the community.

"I think it's the only thing that's sustainable, it's the only thing that guarantees not just sustainability for the next 10 years but for the next 50 years, the next 100 years of a football club's existence."

Gilmour put the club up for sale over two years ago and Atkinson remains convinced a community model represents St Mirren's best chance of prospering.

"I still believe it's the right thing for the fans and the community to own and govern the club," he added.

"We're working as hard as we can and going as fast as we can. If we're successful, we're successful. If somebody else comes along, makes an offer that's acceptable to those that are selling it, that might be what happens.

"But we're still here, we still believe it's the way forward.

"We hope that an engagement in the next week or two with the fan-base again through a public meeting to garner their support that they still believe it's the right thing to do and if it is then we'll carry on with supporter governance and community ownership, that's the plan."

The important point for me is that they still have £1.3m of the funding in place clap2.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some more on this now on the BBC site that I haven't seen mentioned;

http://news.bbc.co.u...ll/15823882.stm

The important point for me is that they still have £1.3m of the funding in place clap2.gif

I agree.

That's easily more than the club is worth. :rolleyes:

And so there should be plenty left over to fit and kit out a bar area after buying the club. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't know who 'Yul' is, but I'm awaiting his latest 50 paragraph post any day now. Perhaps he'll wait until the next meeting is over before posting? He could sit at the back, say fcuk-all, then go home and put the kettle on, crack his knuckles, take a slurp pf tea and start banging the keys. Save yourself - we know what your post will be in advance. Speak up at the meeting instead and let those on the stage and on the floor hear what you have to say.

Yul does not need 50 paragraphs - 3 words will do - YUL WAS RIGHT

Yul know it makes sense !

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some more on this now on the BBC site that I haven't seen mentioned;

http://news.bbc.co.u...ll/15823882.stm

The important point for me is that they still have £1.3m of the funding in place clap2.gif

Quite....some of the criticism directed at SG during the last few months has been disgraceful. Long may he reign.

I would think that this is a more realistic price, but if the BoD are in no hurry to sell, then why should they drop the price. I don't necessarily agree with that, but after all the years of sh*t, now that things are looking good on the pitch, maybe, just maybe they fancy hanging on a bit longer ? Who knows.

My only with "issue" SG was related to a private matter outside of SMFC. There can be no denying that under his stewardship, the club is miles better off than when he took over, and it's not always been plain sailing in between. The JC-era was probably as dire as it got on/off the pitch, yet somehow we are in a shiny new ground, with bespoke training facilities, all bought and paid for. Writing as someone who once watched Brian Martin and Victor have a contest at throwing giant weeds around a ploughed field at Abbotsinch, during what was a "training session", the structure that the club is in now is excellent.

I cannot be arsed trawling through the archived posts, but some people were having a dig at SG & Co for making a few bob out of the "payback" of the loans when the Tesco deal went through. I don't recall anyone on here sticking their houses/businesses on the line to bail SMFC out of the sh*te in 98, so if the BoD made a few bob from it, then so what.

Beyond the hideous PR disaster that was the 10,000Hours timeline, a lot of very good ideas have been generated. I sincerely hope that whoever buys the club harnesses these,and uses them. In these economic times, it is remarkable that almost 1,000 supporters were prepared to buy into a scheme to have some form of say on the running of the club.......and that is without really having a proper go at promoting it beyond the internet, through press/media campaigns, and family/kids/OAP membership deals, etc.

To me this demonstrates that there is the appetite for the St.Mirren support to genuinely get involved in large numbers in some form of fan ownership/representation. Just how this is structured/marketed in the future is for another day, but for small provincial teams, supporter-ownership schemes are the future, running in tandem with private/state backing, and are springing up at many FL sides in England, plus in some German and Dutch teams.

the sentiment/intentions were right, the PR and execution were poor. Doesn't mean that's the end of involving the fans, be it CIC/KMG/GLS/ anyone else with 3 initials.

Edited by Big Fras
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Given that the CIC remains the preferred bid from the selling consortium's POV then I suppose the big question is the missing money a loan or a grant?

If it's part of the portion that was to be repaid then I reckon that even in these hard times it'll be possible to secure a loan elsewhere, if it was part of the grant funding then the CIC bid is in a lot more trouble.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...