Chris Roberts

If Badcott were here, he'd be saying your next trick would be to thank Bateson, Jon.

You know it makes sense. ;D

When I read some of the views on this thread about firstly the Robert backers (is that really the correct term for them) and then the one I loved the best about Roberts just wanting to be the owner of a football club and was going to make millions from a land and property deal on Torquay seafront, just so he could them pour it into a football club, I just can’t understand why he is still not here.

Mind you if some had taken the time to read the Roberts plan where all those involved (the ones Heather White had to find) formed a new company to build the stadium, Hotel, shopping complex and then that company was going to be disbanded and a new one with Roberts at the head, they might have worked out than, once it was all built he had no plans to have any part in TUFC.

No all he ever said was the football club could use it for a £1 a week, if you were going to build what he planned would you not have made sure your club got to enjoy extra revenue streams from the stadium, to help it in its daily survival.

Someone posted that they believed what they knew and I only believed what I thought I knew, very interesting but I have never changed coarse from the first day Roberts rolled into town about what I believed and I’m not about to.

What you are about to read I will not claim as fact, nor will I state it is not, for now I will just say what if.


Roberts a former train guard who loved reading rag to riches story books and his first real business attempt failed, mind you it might not have if he not forgotten to report that burglary that had happened six months before his company went bust. I do not know the selection path Roberts took for his next get rich plan, but I can see why he choose Torbay to try and carry it out.

I should point out at this time I fully believe Roberts thought it all out, it was his plans his ideas that he managed to sell to others, or at least made them believe he could deliver the Rec site.

Torbay’s newly elected mayor an estate agent was sending out very loud messages across the country; he wanted to be the person to turn Torbay around, only he is just as big a dreamer as Roberts. The message was there was land for free in the Bay to those who could build the sort of things he had in his vision for the new Torbay.

Roberts had done is homework, he came and looked around the Bay a long time before we ever got to hear his name and yes he saw what a great site the Rec site was and set to outline what he would bring to Torbay in return for that site.

He knew the town had a football cub that had been run down and it had a owner that wanted out, he also knew that the very best chance he had of getting the Rec site was to do it all in the name of the biggest sports club in the town.

By owning the club he would not need to negotiate with the owner, he would only need to get the rugby and cricket club on board by offering them a brand new home, but then he had to get them off the site anyway.

He also got behind him a few people who wanted a slice of the cake, not the club just the development on the Rec site, people happy to lend their name but without providing any backing at this stage. It gave Roberts much more credibility and in return he promised he would deliver the Rec site.

I will give my views on Sadler and Bateson in another post sometime, but in this one all I need to say is Sadler was sold something that convinced him he was on to a winner, unless he was a fool or just loved a gamble.

It was important that people believed Roberts owned the club and even when it came out he only owned 34% he still carried on claiming that he owned all Batesons shares, why? Because he sure did not want any alarm bells to start ringing.

Bateson must have told him that the club could afford to have the five grand taken out each month for the instalment plan and that he would need to increase the revenue streams, ones that where there only Batson never bothered with. You will remember when ever he stopped talking about his stadium, he went on about how he was working to get more money into the club.

The real problem was there was no money in the TUFC bank account when he took over the club; the season before Bateson left he had a £400.000 loan in the club, during that season he took £100.000 back. Just before Roberts took over he then took the remaining £300.000 back as well, all the money that was in the bank.

Still Roberts believed it would not be a problem, he just needed to get more cash into the club and he then announced all his plans, there was even talk about other sport facility’s, but they soon got forgotten. There was no talk at this time about a hotel and shopping complex, just a new shinny stadium for TUFC.

Things started off Ok for him at the very start, his plan while simple in idea was also very clever and complicated and it needed everything to come together overtime for it all too work, the only problem there was no plan ” B” but Roberts clearly thought he did not need one. A time scale was set at three years, that is the time from taking over TUFC until the complex was built and one thing he knew was he had to keep the club running for that long, as without the club his plans were over.

He soon ran into problems, the rugby and cricket club were not that convinced by him and someone then found his account on facebook. Full of stories he later claimed had been put up by his friend, but ones that clearly showed the man was no more than a romancer.

As a direct result of the facebook find others were soon digging to try and find out more about him and all sorts of very damming things were soon out in public. Thing’s that clearly would harm his chance of getting the Rec site. The HE ran front page stories on him and he then banned them from the ground, claiming it to all be lies and even said he would take legal action against the HE.

He was working up a the club often until 10pm at night, working on his plans and trying to find ways to get more revenue into the club, he was aware more was going out than coming in. Unable to increase income he was forced to make cutbacks, I’m convinced Akins was only got rid of to save money, far better to have his friend do the job and save him and the club some money, as he had to keep those payments to Batson going, or else dear Mike would be claiming the club back.

His plan to bring in low paid players from abroad was just another cost cutting measures; he did believe the ones he hoped he would get would be good enough to hold their own in an English league.

The pressure was growing on Roberts and then he learned that the Nick Bye had backed away from him big time, telling Roberts he needed to sort out the problems now at TUFC before he was ever prepared to discuss the Rec site with him again.

Roberts was finding he had nowhere to turn and then someone threw a real big spanner in the works and one that was going to put him in ever greater financial difficulty. I will not go into that and trust no one else will, but there are many on here who know what I’m talking about.

Then for the sake of piece and harmony with my fellow TUFC fans came what I shall call the final nail in Roberts coffin, his backers were already at the point where they believed mainly due to what Bye had said, that Roberts stood none if any chance of getting the Rec site, but a fans vote of no confidence sure made up the minds of any who did not feel that way.

Roberts knew that it really was bad news and he was aware of how Bye would view it all, but still he clung and believed that we would get past it all and get his plans back on track. He had one other major problem and that was there was no money left to make the next payment to Bateson.

That is why I said that no matter what the fans had voted, Roberts was finished and had nowhere to go, it was over only he still would not accept it, to do so would mean it really was the end and I was told even when Bateson took the club back, Roberts still could not except it was over.

I’m sure some will tell me that I’m so wrong in what I believe happened, I have no problems with that, there are so many different takes on what happened held by many different people, I just believe what I like to think I know.

Jon I really don't think I hi-jacked this thread to rekindle an old fight with Merse I have reread my posts I have made on this thread.

I did make my views clear on how I feel merse so often likes to stick labels on me and that I do get a bit fed up with the constant lets slag the locals off that merse seems to enjoy.

No post I have made on this thread has been rude to anyone and has been told in an honest and CALM way, no anger or trying to belittle anyone, just telling it how it is and how I remember it

Actually, Dave, it was Friends Reunited.

Without access to the .net archive I'm struggling to recall which tittle-tattle merchant found that one...

This whole Facebook/Friends Reunited fad annoys me. Someone showed me that I had a Facebook account......................well it was news to me as I had never opened one nor would I ever.

I'd no more believe one of these profiles than I would anything I read in the Daily Star or The Sun!

Best out of it, Merse!

Just be careful you don't start tweeting:

Pauper buys club with funny money. Chaos reigns, sanity restored but the doldrums follow. Sillsy gets the second and we’re happy again.