petef
Match Room Manager
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Post by petef on Dec 17, 2016 12:08:28 GMT
With talk on another site of a last minute eleventh hour offer that was rejected it comes to mind that Dave Phillips probably fell out of love with the fans and this burdern of a football club some time a go and more than likely was so peed off with the whole situation did the deal with GI out of spite. Not suprised as the old boy, who probably wants a peacful last few years, has been a target for the abusers who will no doubt want to hunt him down and hang him from a tree. You reep what you sew I guess.
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Dec 17, 2016 12:19:58 GMT
Can't wait for the Fans' Forum introducing these guys... I don't think I could believe most/all of what they say. Anyone remember on Boxing day a few seasons ago just as Roberts was about to be strung up he uttered those words "I've got a Northern Ireland International signing for us on Wednesday". Suddenly the lynching stopped as folk were taken in... GI will know how they need to play this in the short term. They have plenty of experience and can do a pretty good job with local media when they decide to. Whatever will come of us, I don't see us becoming a quick death.
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Jon
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Post by Jon on Dec 17, 2016 12:31:35 GMT
Tell me Jon what would have happened if Phillips had not stepped in when he did and where would the club be right now. Where would the club be now? Not up to its neck in debt and about to be handed over to property developers. The wheels were in motion for a community share issue before PETER MASTERS stepped in and stopped that by putting in a bid that included a lengthy exclusivity period. He then pulled out of the deal causing (yes MASTERS caused it) an issue with the Conference AGM looming. Had MASTERS not interfered, we would have seen the community raising sufficient share capital to buffer against future losses after taking on a debt-free club for £1. Why did MASTERS buggar us up like that? Hmmmm.... looks like it has played to his advantage. Before anyone knew that Masters had withdrawn, DEAN EDWARDS grasped the opportunity for an ego trip. He had always resented people who ran the club and saw the chance to trick gullible people into a scheme that would see him in a position of power at Plainmoor. A meeting was held with TUST at which it was said that a consortium of ten successful businessmen would stump up £300k of share capital and provide a CEO with Football League experience working for free. This proved to be untrue on all counts. DEAN EDWARDS did pretty well out of it - outwitting the board and helping himself to a decent wedge. Yes, they were outwitted by DEAN EDWARDS!!! What would have happened if EDWARDS had not interfered? I have been reliably told that the Conference AGM could have been sorted. "The chains on the gates" was bollocks. Who was going to chain the gates on a debt-free club? Emotional blackmail used by Edwards and swallowed hook line and sinker. Mervyn Balson admitted many weeks later that their "investment" remained untouched. There would still have been time for a community share issue. What would have happened if Phillips, Balson and co had woken up to the fact they had been duped and called for help? A community share issue would have saved the club. What would have happened if Phillips had called for a community share issue instead of borrowing money from GI? The club would be safe. I am NOT claiming that a community share issue would be a panacea and see us top of the league and rolling in money. I am saying it would have been a far better option than the course that Masters and Edwards set us on. The current board has done nothing but keep full speed ahead straight at the iceberg. I am furious with them. I am not the type to get furious easily. You will not find me having slagged off board members in the past. I am not an angry person normally, but I am angry now. No personal abuse, the facts speak for themselves.
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rjdgull
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Post by rjdgull on Dec 17, 2016 12:56:00 GMT
It is really hard to understand why long term fans of the club have gone down this route. I suspect that they have been out of their depth and in thrall to Pete Masters. Like Jon and many other fans, I am angry.
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Post by loyaltygull on Dec 17, 2016 13:51:00 GMT
A few more days and wealthy chinese investors were hoping too buy the club instead phillips and co chose the pig in a poke for there own personal reasons and not best for tufc and they were supposed to be our guardians
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petef
Match Room Manager
Posts: 4,626
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Post by petef on Dec 17, 2016 14:28:32 GMT
Tell me Jon what would have happened if Phillips had not stepped in when he did and where would the club be right now. Where would the club be now? Not up to its neck in debt and about to be handed over to property developers. The wheels were in motion for a community share issue before PETER MASTERS stepped in and stopped that by putting in a bid that included a lengthy exclusivity period. He then pulled out of the deal causing (yes MASTERS caused it) an issue with the Conference AGM looming. Had MASTERS not interfered, we would have seen the community raising sufficient share capital to buffer against future losses after taking on a debt-free club for £1.Why did MASTERS buggar us up like that? Hmmmm.... looks like it has played to his advantage. Before anyone knew that Masters had withdrawn, DEAN EDWARDS grasped the opportunity for an ego trip. He had always resented people who ran the club and saw the chance to trick gullible people into a scheme that would see him in a position of power at Plainmoor. A meeting was held with TUST at which it was said that a consortium of ten successful businessmen would stump up £300k of share capital and provide a CEO with Football League experience working for free. This proved to be untrue on all counts. DEAN EDWARDS did pretty well out of it - outwitting the board and helping himself to a decent wedge. Yes, they were outwitted by DEAN EDWARDS!!! What would have happened if EDWARDS had not interfered? I have been reliably told that the Conference AGM could have been sorted. "The chains on the gates" was bollocks. Who was going to chain the gates on a debt-free club? Emotional blackmail used by Edwards and swallowed hook lone and sinker. Mervyn Balson admitted many weeks later that their "investment" remained untouched. There would still have been time for a community share issue. What would have happened if Phillips, Balson and co had woken up to the fact they had been duped and called for help? A community share issue would have saved the club. What would have happened if Phillips had called for a community share issue instead of borrowing money from GI? The club would be safe. I am NOT claiming that a community share issue would be a panacea and see us top of the league and rolling in money. I am saying it would have been a far better option than the course that Masters and Edwards set us on. The current board has done nothing but keep full speed ahead straight at the iceberg. I am furious with them. I am not the type to get furious easily. You will not find me having slagged off board members in the past. I am not an angry person normally, but I am angry now. No personal abuse, the facts speak for themselves. Are you 100% certain of that Jon. Do you honestly believe that the club would still be in existence if it been handed over to the TUST at that time? If you had said " The wheels were in motion with 100% sustainable guaranteed funding " then I would believe that you have would have a convvincing a case. Everyone is getting angry and pissed wiithout knowing ALL of the facts that led up to this point - its mostly guesswork and its feeding the fire. I believe its only fair that Phillips, GI et al should at least be given the oportunity to state their case. Yes on the face of it undeniably looks like a cop out and a bad deal for the football club but before we hang anyone give them the chance to speak FFS! I still find it hard to grasp why GI continued their interest after they pulled the plug prviously over the Councils refusal to sell them the ground. Surely this was/ is key to their plans if they do in fact need the land to develope the ground for other puposed. A greyhound track has been suggested but I fail to see the legs in that one. Do they believe thay can convince the coucil to change their minds or have they been given secret assurances? I'm just getting some felt tips, wood and cardboard togethr to write some protest banners. Anyone want to join me?
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Post by loyaltygull on Dec 17, 2016 14:43:07 GMT
And when it goes tits up because its only a matter of time when it does,paul bristow will turn in his grave as bristows bench gets bulldozed
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 17, 2016 15:13:47 GMT
Hector The requirement for an exclusivity period stretching right up until 31st January next year, was a demand to be declared the winner (and only participant) in the race, before you'd even agree to take part. How you 'prove yourself' by asking for the rules to be rigged so that no one can beat you, I really don't know ? TUST were just as entitled to bid as everyone else. Their demand that all others be disqualified (and that exclusivity period wouldn't have let in those multi millionaire Chinese who were knocking on the door at 2.15pm yesterday ) from the race, wasn't deemed acceptable. If TUST had a strong and compelling case, then that might have been different. 2016 has been a bad year for negative campaigners. 'A plague of locusts will descend upon Britain and you'll all starve before Christmas' was the message from all the major Party Leaders and the main national television stations to anyone contemplating voting for Brexit. Hillary, likewise, assuming that solely attacking her opponent rather than giving people anything positive to look forward to under her Presidency, also found herself losing out. TUST, despite it's monthly meetings with the club, despite it's page in the programme for so long, despite (I'd guess) having all three Forums under TUST member ownership and influence...couldn't produce the positive message to convince the Board, or to convince a reasonable amount of fellow supporters so that a formidable membership could be built. There was no lack of quantity in their negative campaigning, but the positive campaign was either lacking quality or absent altogether. Hector will get over this, and soon buy into the ambitious future that G.I will lay out for us. A little disappointment now is only natural, but once that Boxing Day atmosphere is sampled, and Clarke Osborne's programme notes are read, TUST's scare stories won't seem so believable and a much brighter 2017 will beckon for the club. Let's finish with a few words from Hughie Green OPPORTUNITY DOESN'T KNOCK FOR TUST 'Yes indeed folks, and I mean this most sincerely. Taking a look at the scoreboard and we see that it's the band from Bristol, those boys who call themselves 'Gaming International' who are our winners. A few words of commiseration for 'TUST', whose van ran out of fuel on the way to the studios, meaning they missed out on the OPPORTUNITY to perform for us tonight. Despite a whip round, or 'Community Petrol Scheme', as those TUST boys preferred to term it, not enough cash was raised to purchase sufficient fuel for the tank'.
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Post by loyaltygull on Dec 17, 2016 15:58:48 GMT
You couldnt make it up bristol rovers get themselves billionaire jordanian bankers and we get gi
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simonb
TFF member
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Post by simonb on Dec 17, 2016 16:17:22 GMT
Blimey we've got an apologist for Clarke Osbourne now as well! Don't panic everybody it's all going to be sunshine and roses after all!
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Dec 17, 2016 16:27:03 GMT
That's two posts from GI Joe since the property developers took over across the forums talking pretty much solely about TUST and praising GI for good measure. In the words of Floridagull and Disney - 'Let it go'.
No longer the poster forever known as Chris Roberts' biggest fan. Not even the poster who mentions TUST in every post he makes or gets Brexit mentioned however irrelevant. He's moved on. Clarke is his Superman now. Sod it. Give us a cartoon, Joe. Your voice needs hearing.
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hector
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Post by hector on Dec 17, 2016 19:39:24 GMT
Had they been open to fan ownership from the start, instead of doing what Peter Masters told them to; if the press had been onside - in that 18 months with everyone pulling in the right direction, then a purchase price ( what even is that, by the way?) could likely have been raised. The problem is, supporters were never given the opportunity and of course they weren't - that wouldn't have been on Peter Masters agenda. TUST were never physically stopped from doing anything, other than being denied a preferential bid, when there was only a few months to go before the GI loan needed repaying. And it is obvious why that was so. TUST already knew then that there was animosity towards it from the club but had done nothing concrete to rebut that and prove it was worthy of consideration. In the early days of TUST there was a lot of interest and positive feelings about it. It got press coverage - didn't the HE do an interview with Michael Goldbourne at the time? - and membership surged to 400 very quickly. Instead of building on that goodwill TUST almost became complacent. There was no-one standing in the way of TUST trying to raise money well in advance of the day that was inevitably coming when they could make a bid for ownership. There was nothing stopping TUST starting a pre-share issue 18 months ago. I suggested something along those lines at the time. TUST had ample time to find out if community ownership was really viable. DP, Masters, GI; none of them could have stopped TUST putting their toe in the water with supporters to gauge interest. They had no control over TUST whatsoever. If TUST had been proactive they could have counteracted any negativity coming from the club, along the lines maybe of 'Well we already have 1000 fans signed up at £100 each in readiness' and they could have possibly been saying that 12 months or more ago. Instead they sat back, almost as though they were expecting at some stage for the club just to be handed over to them. Your ire is aimed at the wrong people when it comes to what TUST didn't do. No it isn't at all. Had the club presented fans with the possibility of 'fellow fans, here is a chance to own your club and we will facilitate this' rather than talk TUST down and mess them about, then it would have had a decent chance of working. The alleged supporters, running the club, have MADE THE CHOICE to seek the club to property developers rather than give fans the chance to attempt to buy the club. This wasn't a collection of businessmen looking to sell the club - it was a group pretending to be fans of the club. No supporter in their right mind would choose to sell the club to property developers over TUST. But a board of directors, swayed by the parasite that is Peter Masters, have betrayed TUFC. There is no way that this move is in the interests of what TUFC represents. We are now a plaything for GI, open to emotional blackmail whilst they trample all over our heritage. Jon is a decent barometer of sensible thinking. If someone like him is as angry as his posts suggest, then we ought to take notice. The club is dead now. The bloodsuckers of GI have its corpse and they will do with it what they will. All we have is the ground. The council need to ensure that they do not sell. If it means the closure of the shell that GI have then so be it - the club is our memories, our ground and our context. GI can have the name if they like but they cannot take the rest away.
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hector
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Post by hector on Dec 18, 2016 0:47:41 GMT
No supporter in their right mind would choose to sell the club to property developers over TUST. But a board of directors, swayed by the parasite that is Peter Masters, have betrayed TUFC. There is no way that this move is in the interests of what TUFC represents. We are now a plaything for GI, open to emotional blackmail whilst they trample all over our heritage. All this outrage isn't going to change anything. I deal in realism and where there is no other option, play with the cards that were dealt. I also think DP did the same. I don't get why you can't grasp that TUST was not a viable option. If DP had allowed TUST to proceed and TUST had failed to succeed, what would you be saying now? That DP was chopper for ever thinking a group with little experience in running a football club and with no financial backing was the stupidest idea ever? It was too big a risk so he took the only other option. All we have is the ground. The council need to ensure that they do not sell. If it means the closure of the shell that GI have then so be it - the club is our memories, our ground and our context. GI can have the name if they like but they cannot take the rest away. No, the club is the team that turns out every week and the people in the background that enable that to happen. I don't want the club to die. If you want to consider the club dead to you, then go ahead and become a bitter and twisted man with just your memories. Me, I want to be looking every matchday to see how we got on. I don't particularly care whether we stay at Plainmoor. And if you think that is heresy, just Google 'clubs that have moved grounds'. It's pretty eye-opening; QPR, for example, have moved 14 times since their formation and they're off again in 2018. It's not the big deal you're making out. As long as we have a ground that meets our requirements with a long-term lease, that will do for me. And if you think that the future of the current ground will be decided by anything other than the amount of money the council is offered, you're just gullible. Everything has its price; it's just a process of negotiation to establish the mutually agreeable figure. No doubt it will all become clear soon enough. I don't get why you don't get that TUST was never given an opportunity to be a viable option. It's clear for all to see if you're willing to look. The club was never interested in going down that way. Masters has been pulling the strings all along in his special status of advisor. His attitude to supporters is pretty well documented. And it just may be that TUFC means NHS to different people. TUFC will always be more Jim McNichol and Alex Russell to me, than it is Sean McGinty or GG. My grandfather and father before me, took that stroll to Plainmoor and the history of many families are tied up in that football club. My son may not get the chance - the club is in the hands of malevolent owners, owners who you seem to overlook, do not follow through on what they promise. How dare they come in and trash and trample over something sacred to so many, simply because they want to make cash for themselves. That's why I'd prefer the club went to the wall and a Phoenix club carried on at Plainmoor. Read what is happening with Coventry City - that sort of scenario is probably the best we can hope for.
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hector
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Post by hector on Dec 18, 2016 10:11:40 GMT
I suspect sadly, that GI do not care if there are people who care and want to keep a professional club in Torbay and I resent the insinuation that we should be having to prove ourselves, as supporters, to a malevolent force, should we fear they close our football club down, if we do not acquiesce or fall in line.
The club requires more forensic examination than ever now it's been handed over.
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petef
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Post by petef on Dec 18, 2016 14:28:31 GMT
I have a theory in my mind. I keep asking myself WHY would GI still be interested in the purchase of the football club and have come to some obvious but wholly unsubstansiated conclusions. I am not in the know this is pure assumption. Undoubtedly they have been and still are looking at the big picture. A picture that involves the freehold of Plainmoor so that can be re-developed for housing - in the long term and would guess they are prepared to sit on the football club keeping the football side of things ticking over but no more than that. Just enought to apease the few remaining locals supporters until they can negotiate a deal with the council. If that falters they will do the same keep the club ticking over on minimum funding and reach a point where they put the club up for sale or hand it over to the TUST. By which time we could be a few divisios lowerr ofcourse. For them to have maintained an interest and subsequently purchased the club I'm feel certain that would have recieved assurances that its highly likely that the council would agree to after meeting certain conditions. I also am guessing that the stadium idea at the Willows is still in the equation and would possibly be used as the lever to obtain the freehold of Plainmoor. The new stadium would include a greyhound track (Dave Philips is a bookmaker and so wuld surely be in favour which may well have influenced his decision to allow GI to purchase the club) along with the football pitch and a new home for the football club - whatever standard that may be, it simply wouldnt matter to them. I see no other scenario why savy business men would be interested in owning the club unless they could make , what amounts to a paltry investment into an acceptable profit for their owners or share holders. So I basically predict in their retoric that "The club is safe in our hands".(we will comtinue to let it run along on a shoostring not relly bothered where it ends up as its not important in the long run. Then, if they get no joy from the council will then hold the council to ransom over the Freehold and development land at the Willows.( This will distract the attention away fronm GI and we will all be blaming the council for our woes!) If the Coucil refuse on all counts they will abondon the club and just try and recoup there money so in fact it still may and up in the hands of teh TUST! Its a VERY small business gamble for a bigger prize and the only one I can think of that makes any sense, unless of course anyone else has a theory!
Its going to be very interesting to hear what they have to say . I bet they still use Dave Phillips as their mouthpiece as Clark Osbourn looks like he keeps his head pretty low and out of the firing line- cant find a single public image of him . Does anyone even know what he even looks like?
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