Director of Fantasy Mark Allen thought he was in another movie when he was contacted directly by the esteemed Chairman.
The Impecunious Kind told the ex-Citeh chap to get the Jamie Murphy deal over the line and he sanctioned wages up to £25k per week.
What had started as high-Level spin suddenly had substance.
I had suspected that King was being capricious and that was confirmed to me this morning.
Moreover, the headline figure of around £1m is rather misleading, to say the least.
The idea that Sevco can stump up that sum straight off is simply not true.
Of course, it generates feel-good copy for The People and the stenographers are happy to oblige.
Sevco attempted to sign the winger at the start of the season, but the £1.2m valuation was too rich for their dignified blood.
Now, with half-season gone we are expected to believe that they have been able to access a similar sum up front.
I’m told that the structured payments for the Murphy deal are “highly complicated”.
For the avoidance of doubt, at time of writing, Murphy remains a Brighton and Hove Albion player and the embarrassing haggling continues.
Of course, it would be hilarious if Sevco had initially offered NOTHING up front to the English club and had only offered to pay the first tranche in May when the Season Ticket monies arrive.
When Mark Allen told the Serious Professional about King authorising the Murphy transfer there was a free and frank exchange of views
On the other hand, the acquisition of Sean Goss on a low-cost loan deal from QPR emanated from the non-King faction of the Blue Room.
The latter made financial sense, the former reeks of King not having any fucks to give.
I’m told that the sensible ones in the in the Sevco High Command have once more asked their esteemed chairman to Do Walking Away for the good of the Holding Company Vehicle.
He flatly refused.
Quite frankly, they don’t believe that the Impecunious Kid will pony up what he promised he would.
Consequently, Sevco is now cash flow critical.
According to the published accounts of RIFC by now NOAL (King) should have stumped up £2.9m.
So far that hasn’t happened.
Moreover, the non-King faction in the Blue Room don’t expect to see it.
My understanding is that the world-class football administrators at Hampden have been brought fully up to speed with the situation at Sevco.
Moreover, those highly professional chaps from Campbell Dallas had a sit-down on Wednesday with the Serious Professional.
I’m sure they’re not worried about the situation as Mr King would have furnished them with bomb-proof documentary evidence apropos the existence of the necessary funds.
Yes, yes, I’m sure about that.
I mean it would be a terrible realisation for them to have to admit that they had been played by a glib and shameless liar.
hi guys what ever happened to the WiFi suppliers that were taking them to court does anyone know?
What if the “soft loans” are actually secured? What if admin 2 is already very nearly a Pre Pack? Admin and buy back whilst getting rid of most of their debt and more importantly D C King….?
“Admin 2”?
They have never been in administration in their short history
Perhaps the Serious Professional needs a new moniker! Does he not have the B*lls to resign and tell all?
I’ve read your musings for a while now and it’s clear you exaggerate the financial problems at zombie HQ to the extent you are losing all credibility. They might not be cash rich but someone in the blueroom keeps putting their money on the table and your predictions of impending doom are made to look ridiculous.
You’re asking someone to predict exactly how much debt RIFC plc will have on the day it announces admnistration – which is quite naive and ridiculous. It is clear from the accounts that the plc requires constant soft loans and that the pool of people prepared to make such loans is shrinking fast – read the accounts. As such, the board are happy to run anincreasingly insolvent buisiness until someone or something stops them. In theory, they could run up debts of billions if someone if daft enough to keep dribble money in.
But the point is the debt is rising and rising and the day will come when there is simply no money left to pay players and staff and utilities and the police and then the game is up – or before that – someone owed money might demand their money in court. Then the balloon will pop. You are being told that the balloon is getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger – and there is no logical dispute to that – but you claim the balloon will never pop no matter how big it gets – and your reasonong is that the balloon won’t pop because it hasn’t popped yet. Do you see the prblem with your arguement. If not – come back and comment the the day after it has popped and give us all the benefit of your analysis.
Andy, I understand your point my friend but when Phil continuously posts about the problems at Sevco over a short period of time as he has now then you can be assured that the end game is quite close unless there is a masochistic benefactor arriving to fanfare from the submissive Scottish media.
Either that, or the glib and shameless liar pulls a rabbit out of the bag…can you see that happening Andy?
TBF phil has always said,unless the directors inject funds. They have done. Now to the tune of £16M in soft loans.
Reading this I’m reminded of that time Dave King sent a warning out to any club that tries to make life difficult for sevco he would go after them. At the time we all laughed but it looks as though it was enough to make a lot of folk shit themselves. Sevco seem to fk about with every rule in the book but not one club chairman or even the SPFL will so much as say boo to them in fear of King and the backhanded black arts he would use on them.
Has no one apart from myself figured out what King can say that would pull them all down with him yet?
Really?!
Hasn’t anyone thought this stuff through in the interim?!
It’s staring us straight in the face, ffs!
Enlighten us Mr.M with your blindingly obvious info. on his glibness.
Vaguebook
Do you understand what the phrase
‘They’re all in on it’ means, Guano?
Surely King is exceeding his official authority over the Murphy deal. No laughing at the back but there must be some Corporate Governance that either prevents one officer sanctioning deals that dont have board approval or sufficient delegated authority. They truly are a total clusterfuck
Until the board get rid of GASL as chairman, he acts as an ostensible agent of Newco with the power to enter legally binding contracts.
Ha ha ha Phil, it’s been a while since I’ve consumed any tabloids but I really wish it would all just happen. Kind regards Jimmy
Listen Phil I’ve been waiting patiently along with everyone else for it all to go tits up. In spite of all predictions, insights and analysis the reality is a new assistant manager and two signings one on 25 grand a week and a substantial transfer fee. Maybe the truth is that investor fund’s have been secured with share issue to follow. Jimmy
Maybe the truth is that you are credulous.
Keep taking the tabloids.
The simple truth is that the company has been surviving on “loans” of 10 to 15% of turnover for the last 4 years. Those loans now more or less equal the value of the company and it would appear the well is running dry. However there is still some liquidity in the company and we just don’t know if anyone has loaned another few hundred thousand to see them through another month. Until one of the loanees wants they money back or someone with a big outstanding debt takes them to court the show can go on with a public face of “nothing to see, business as usual” right up until they announce an administrator event.
Matthew 12 22 -28.
A house divided against itself ..
I am going to find a little bit of sympathy here for the SFA. They have never had to confront a situation like this before.
Sure rules have been bent here and there, a bit like diving in the box, part of the game, but never have they had to confront actual criminal behaviour.
Football and the rules that make it a sport depend totally on trust and instead of quarantining a club who have broken trust since the 1st EBT in 1999, they have been welcomed in with the same untrustworthy mindset that has caused so much damage to themselves and Scottish football with a now criminal mindset at the helm.
If DK cannot prove funds available then the accounts submitted to obtain a domestic licence are undependable and the SFA can review their decision to award a domestic licence and threaten to withdraw it.
Sure that will damage the game in short term but such an attitude is necessary to protect all clubs (including the one acting outside the laws of the game) in the long term.
The problem is there does not appear to be any leadership at the SFA (or SPFL) with the fortitude to do the right thing.
Auldheid, love your work over the years, but on this particular occassion I have to disagree.
The SFA are much too far down the slippery slope for that I think. If they wanted to show strength and integrity, there have been many opportuniites to do so with cast iron arguments, indisputable evidence and the ability to call in reinforcements from higher authorities to deflect mass hysteria – UEFA, FIFA, HMRC, CoS, JR and more. Not least were the awarding of a non-existent “associate” membership to Sevco and acceptance of the wonderful “imperfect registration” acid trip.
The SFA and SFPL and now compromised so deeply that any attempt at unwinding the facts would consume the individuals, the governing bodies, Scottish football and much of Scotland’s global reputation in an unprecedented firestorm. Potential former allies would be forced to feign outrage and condemn to the maximum to contain their own damage.
IMHO – the best that the SFA and SPFL can do now is put their heads between their knees, kiss their arses good-bye, and hope for the best – because everything else is out of their control.
Auldheid, can you maybe tell us who the men who ‘really run the SFA. are, that Stewart Regan mentioned after Ashley’s court case where it was shown Dave King hadn’t been passed as a Fit & Proper Person at all?
Stewy squealed something along the lines of ‘We only work for them!’ but no one seems to have noticed it at the time, myself aside?
(This question is open to anyone who might know what Regan was talking about, as I can neither get an answer from him nor anyone else I’ve asked.)
The biggest problem in all of this pantomime goes back to the summer of 2012 when Charles Green threatened the football authorities with the very real possibility that there would be no football played by a team at Ibrox for the forthcoming season of 2012/2013. The authorities realised there were sponsorship deals at stake, which affected their own existence, and the credible threats on their safety. The authorities believed that Scottish football needed a Rangers in any guise and could ill afford to lose their “name” from the roster or their travelling fans buying tickets for away games. They succumbed to these fears.
Had everyone stood firm and applied all laws of the game and made it abundantly clear that the new rangers were the spiritual successors to the previous club at Ibrox then nearly all of the other Scottish clubs fans appetite for their pound of flesh would have been satisfied. (The other regulatory issues like resolution 12 would not have gone away, but that was always about the authorities, not about Rangers) and the real Rangers fans would still have turned out in numbers for their “new” team.
They should have started lower than the did, but even at that, had they started slowly they would not be in this predicament. Six years have passed in the blink of an eye. Six years of slow building and the authorities would probably have their “strong Rangers” in the SPFL top division. But they stood back and watched the rangers fans be fleeced by various incumbents of the blue room. The rangers fans have all too willingly lined up to be fleeced in their desperation to try to unseat Celtic and their domestic dominance.
Six years of acrimony, upset, lawsuits and endless infighting could, and should have been avoided. Six years and they are no further forward other than the division they are in. The authorities still don’t have the “strong Rangers” they crave and they won’t have one because they allowed this monster to mutate on their watch.
A slow build approach would have still seen a rapid rise through the lower divisions and, perhaps, a year or two behind “schedule”, but the new incarnation would have arrived in the top division with a young team full of experience from the battles of the lower leagues sprinkled with some quality older heads and they would have made a fist of it. Their desire for instant success means that the only way this will ever happen is if they get a third shot at it, and let’s face it, even at that they will demand instant success and their “rightful place” and will not learn lessons from mistakes past.
He’ll mend them.
Hell mend them!
And that is what they call a wrap.
All done and packaged perfectly.
Any truth in the rumour doing the rounds in the Lincoln Inn in Knightswood that Murphy is buying out his contract?
King has only one game plan ,and its the same one as he has had since his return.
He lost in the region of £20M first time around and he wants it back , simples. He’s not going to give it up , he’s not going to put anything else in ,he’s not here to invest , he’s here to try and recover, regardless, end of.
In the light of King’s evident inability to speak and tell the truth at the same time..
Can you believe the alleged investment sums from that era?
Did he invest 20M or did he “invest” Zero Millions?
He is a convicted fraudster on a grand scale.
He is a known liar.
He is a market manipulator.
He is a financial conspirator.
He was in bed with David Murray and we’re supposed to believe that he was duped.
He was a director at that club during the EBT years.
He was a director at that club during the Faux Administration.
He was a director of that club during the engineered Liquidation.
If you base your opinions upon anything that King says or does then you I should check your rear end for a donkey’s tail.
Surely the only option left available to the supposed ‘sensible’ faction within the RIFC Boardroom is to call for an immediate emergency AGM and attempt to oust King from the Board. Otherwise, he is going to continue to not give a flying F and an Insolvency event is a given (if it is not already too late).
However, that manoeuver can only work if they can get a majority of the shareholders to vote him out. Anyone got any calculation of the relative strength of the voting block shares held by King and his potential allies vs what the sensible lot may be able to muster? If that fails (or would be a waste of time) then they are truly F’ed.
It takes a long time for essentially honest, decent people to accept the reality of the casual cruelty a sociopath can dish out – without a care – without losing a wink of sleep – even when it causes obvious self harm.
It would appear that even now, the frogs of the board believe they can negotiate with some germ of human empathy in the heart of the scorpion.
Forget it boys! He is destroying your dreams and hopes, because that is what scorpions do, That is all scorpions know. That is what scorpions live for. That is what scorpions are.
I have never seen a BoD so inept and spineless.
Who exactly has negotiated the deal for Murphy? Was it behind the back of the BoD?
Who signs the cheques? That would certainly require 2 signatures neither of which would be King’s.
Has the Board never heard of the word, “NO”?
They deserve everything they get.
King can pull his NOAL loan anytime and cause liquidation overnight (sting them) so they are pussyfooting around him – hoping that things will work out – somehow – anyhow – if they can just get him to think their way – see sense. King wants other people to fund his day dreams of CL finals, gloabl celebrity and global leaders sucking up to him – maybe a knoghthood or two – is a Nobel prize too much to ask.
The sooner the board wise up and deal with the reality of King’s insanity the sooner they will – oh hang on – it’s already three years too late for that – they are totally fucked – with no options left to avert a colossal shit-bomb. The board members should each be thinking very carefully and clearly about how they are going to protect themselves agaisnt the SMSM attack dogs – and the nutters they rabble-rouse – when they get blamed personally and absolutely for King’s latest corporate clusterfuck.
and how are they funding Jimmy Nick and the new loan signing ?
Well duh, with the millions and billions* they’ll rake in from the sales of Alves, Pena, Morelos et al. Bit of a bugger Forest sacking the Magic Hat and potentially scuppering the billions the sale of Foderingham would have fetched.
*21st century inflation-linked version of the sprinkles that go well with jelly and ice cream, formerly known as hundreds and thousands.
Phil ,
What is Kings end game in all this ?
The destruction of the “Rangers” name in the Planet Fitbaw ?
If I can’t have it , nobody else is getting it ?
Surely a prepacked administration with the SPFL & SFA complicit, must be resisted.
Creditors must unite to resist this as they will get shafted again.
The team on the field will limp along until the end of the season but
ST holders will turn their backs on the tribute act, slashing the value of the ‘match day experience’ and any income expected.
No European football if they manage to get out of administration and start season 18/19.
Developing ice cream & jelly situation.
All of this reminds me of the Third Lanark situation. Remember them? They were a well run club until a certain individual took control of them, ousting the board in the process. He then proceeded to cost cut and run the club into insolvency and liquidation. To kill the club off, he contracted to build a new stand when the club was on its knees. The contractors pushed the club into administration when they were not paid.
It was rumoured that the entrepreneur had a plan. This plan surrounded the ground, Cathkin, prime real estate. Selling the ground to developers would have returned a handy profit together with an exit strategy from the club. As it happened, these plans were thwarted by a) the council, and b) the death of the entrepreneur.
Could this be the plan? It depends on who owns the ground and on what restrictions may have been placed on it. Fantasy? Maybe, but this whole scenario is full(fool?) of fantasy!
Rebus
The Albion car park is about the same size as Ibrox, isn’t covered by a listed, asbestos riddled, expensive to demolish football stadium, and is valued at about £5 million. It’ll cost more than that to demolish the stadium, making the land pretty much worthless if not used to host football matches.
Happy New Year to you Phil, I wish you a prosperous 2018
From your latest piece it seems that The Honest Chairman has given a huge middle finger to his comrades in the Blue Room and is no longer interested in their going concerns about the financial troubles in Govan,The Honest Chairman seems determined to take his Blue Room comrades and Sevco down with him for when the cold shoulder kicks in, I’m sure in the long run it’ll work out fine as The Honest Chairman is a man of “Huge” wealth off the radar and his comrades will have nothing to worry about, saying that though they may have to dig out their hats and scarves if The Honest Chairman won’t do walking away.
Not sure how serious professionals, unless High, could not see Glib’s lies coming a mile away …