Notts County ; a warning for our Trust plans

PragueAddick

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/sep/25/notts-county-qadbak-takeover

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/sep/24/russell-king-notts-county-qadbak

Its all starting to become a bit clearer what is happening there, and what in particular Sven is doing there. Money , of course, but not so much his salary. Oh no. Much more. The key para from the second article is this.

In a separate development it emerged that Eriksson had been promised a paper fortune by Willett and his father, Peter, who is a director of Notts County, if he worked on a separate company of which they are the sole directors.The former England manager was handed a substantial shareholding in a Zurich-registered company called Swiss Commodity Holding AG, whose directors are the Willetts. Like Sol Campbell, who quit the club on Tuesday, Eriksson was asked to work as an ambassador for the company's many interests overseas.

In other words this is not really to do with football at all. That explains why they offered a 5 year contract to a 35 year old centre half. Re the Trust, I think their Trust people were completely dazzled. So the lesson is that we should try if we can to get at least one business heavyweight into our Trust team, who will not be so dazzled. There were reports of a major shareholder ready to join us, and I know Henry has further ideas in this area. I think Notts County shows us what might lie ahead. At least now we can be prepared.

ShootersHillGuru

Nothing to suggest yet that although there may well be other motives behind this takeover at Notts Co that the football side of things will also not be well taken care of. Would be crazy to go for all that ambassador stuff utilising the football profile if in fact the football side of things was floundering. Far to early to suggest that the Notts County issue is either good or bad for them imho. Before it happened they were in reality going nowhere so lets just wait and see. Lots of clubs in a worse financial position than even Charlton might well be singing " Bring on the ole razzle dazzel"

Henry Irving

The Notts Co takeover could turn out fine but there seem to be a lot of unanswered questions and unknown people on the fringes.

I think the point is that the Trust at County had control over their Club. They gave that up (although there was some dissent within the Trust membership) and now they have no control, no influence and are at the whim of some unknown investors with unknown motives who may not even pass the FL's very loose fit and proper persons tests.

stilladdicted

Thought the 'ambassador' stuff was just an 'ingenious' way of paying people extra money to evade the FA payment rules. Trying to follow the money supply thread through the holding and parent companies in different countries looks nigh on impossible. It is indeed a lesson for trusts everywhere, shows the need to ask basic questions such as who are the directors going to be, has anyone ever met them and is their money visible? It will be interesting to see how this particular saga works out.

bingaddick

Link that works.
25th Sept article