Jump to content

Livingston - all the threads merged


Recommended Posts

http://sport.scotsman.com/sport/Deadline-s...sale.5496639.jp

"There is no possibility of the club continuing to trade under the interim manager or any subsequent administration process.

"Any shareholding in the club is thus of no value. Despite the foregoing, on behalf of the creditors I have today offered to buy the shares which represent the controlling interest in Livingston Football Club from Angelo Massone for £25,000, subject to certain conditions.

"Deadline for transfer of these shares is noon, Wednesday July 29.

"Should this deadline pass without the share transfer I regret it will be necessary to commence the liquidation of the assets of Livingston Football Club Ltd, including all its contracts, especially player contracts."

Do do do do do, wa wa wa....

Edited by Scary Bear
Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://sport.scotsman.com/sport/Deadline-s...sale.5496639.jp

tick tock tick tock......

£25K for Massolini - will he won't he?

So, if Massone hasnt actually put any money into the club and has had all his expenses met by the club, he could walk away with a £24,999 profit? Maybe he isnt as stupid as we thought? :o

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Too late guys. :P

McGruther must be pretty confident of a rescue if he is willing to offer Massone £25000 to GTF. Where is that money coming from?

As has been said many times, this has all been a stitch-up between Nixon/the trust/McDougall/West Lothian Council all along.

I wouldn't be suprised if there has also been agreement with the SFL and Airdrie and Cowden are on notice to go up a division while Livi get demoted to the third. (Ballantyne in on the SFL Management Committee after all :ph34r: )

Edited by KingfaetheSooth
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The SFL League Cup and Challenge Cups are simply split 60/40 on the net proceeds. I've no idea if that's what they used to do when League gates were split or not. At a guess I'd have said not and since the same number of games were played and costs would even out it would be logical just to split the gate down the middle but like I say I have no idea. How recently did they actually do this? Must be back to before the creation of the Premier Division anyway surely?

The Scottish Cup is very similar to be honest. Before they reorganised recently the situation was:

Rounds 1-2: Exactly as the SFL, 60/40 split

Rounds 3-5: Net proceeds split: 5% to the SFA as a Levy, 57% Home club, 38% Away Club (in other words, 60/40 after the levy is taken off).

Semi Finals and Finals are run by the SFA and clubs effectively get 40% of the net takings each. (that's presumably what happens with SFL League Cup semi finals and finals also as well as the Challenge Cup Final).

I'm not sure since the changeover what round the levy comes in at now. I think it's the 3rd round still but as we haven't had a home third round tie since the changeover I'm not certain and it may now be the 4th.

Interesting to note the comparison with the SJFA who get a 10% cut of all Scottish Cup ties and 33 1/3 share of semi-final and final ... although of course there are additional expenses for SJFA ...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh puleeeze! I can just about put up with the rest of the criticism of everything Livi in this thread but dont, dont, dont write anything that would elicit even a smidgeon of sympathy for that man. He is a proven liar who cares about nothing other than himself. And now in spite of all his pitiful utterings at every opportunity that he just wants to "save thee club" he has been heard by employees in one of his regular temper tantrums threatening to bring it down rather than sell his shares to the interested party. The man is a first class arse!

Yes the man was struggling under a sea of inherited debt and told lies to try to keep things moving along (not saying it was right) but do you honestly think putting out a video of an interview with a creditor and a statement from a quasi director about how he feared for the future of the club helped?

Aye Massone has turned into a bad un but dont dont dont try to elicit sympathy for those who drove him there, for once they get control you will surely be on your way to hell in a hand cart!!

I heard a rumour that the trust were tapping up corporate clients months ago. The behaviour of the trust and the council in all of this is shocking, I read on Livilions that the trust were having meetings with individual councillors weeks ago to garner support. I'd say they were on par with the spivs and speculators who brought down the Bank of Scotland!!

Some of the support allied with the council have engineered the current situation and now that they nearly have what they wanted are unsure of what to do next, £10,000 in the kitty, raffles for teddy bears, FFS!! get a grip.

I was once a a farm roup when standing next to me an old fella bid £500 for a heap of scrap described as a plough, I asked him why he had paid so much for something that was only fit for scrap, he replied "he (the farmer who was having his goods sold off) is one of us, I'm only doing what I can in his hour of need as he would do for me." Livi have never been "one of us"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You are normally spot on but your perspective on this is a little wrong (and I suspect your past experiences may colour your view on this - which I can quite understand)

There is no question of "devaluing Massone's debt". Massone's debt (if it exists ) will still be there regardless of what happens to the club re administration. Whether he gets any of the money is dependent on what happens of course but that applies to everyone.

The Council have a very strong hand here as they own the freehold. While it is encumbered with a lease it is not worth as much to them as unencumbered. Whether the basis of the lease is changed or whether a different amount of land is leased is something that no one can see yet so how the Council will come of this is completely unable to be guessed at.

Also to suggest that simply becvause interested parties have had meetings to see what might happen to the club if it goes into administration is in some what underhand is also wrong/. It would perhaps be negligent not to have such mettings. It is difficult for to see what you would have accepted? Massone carrying on and running up vast amounts more of debt? The Council coming down harder earlier when there might have been a chance that Massone could have salavaged something and paid the creditors? The council coming down on him now is apparently not yor preferred solution.

You have hard words for everyone but no suggestion as to what you think would have been the right thing to do. I know that the idea positon is that Massone had been a white knight and would ahve paid everyone. But the reality is he is a lying so and so who took a while to be found out. so having got there what do you think could realistically be done, or do you consider the club should just have been closed down as being beyond redemption?

Good post. Duncan has been spot on through the thread but I've ceased to agree with him a bit in the past couple of days and I don't have a problem with what the council are doing here.

First up, it's not clear to me there, is that £25K to Massone intended as a final pay-off in lieu of all debt or is he still going to want is pennies in the pound from any subsequent deal over and above that? I suspect the former, McGruther is in a pretty strong bargaining position there if the alternative is liquidation and getting nothing. That would bring the debt somewhere under a million.

If the council have been talking to interested parties and are indeed willing to cut a better deal with one of them in whom they have most confidence then that's perfectly legitimate - in fact given Livingston's history of failing to screen owners up to now you'd think WLC would be applauded for taking that step. They can't agree a stitch-up by themselves because it needs agreement from other creditors, but they can make it easier for one group to put in an offer if they're willing to forego there own debt, and so long as it's transparent that's fine. There's a significant difference there with Leeds United where much the same thing happened, because the major creditor who was willing to take a lower deal from Bates's bid was an offshore trust with identities unknown - since there was no obvious reason why such a trust would be anything other than neutral in the matter of ownership, and since offshore trusts have followed Ken Bates' business career like a bad smell and been involved in previous stitch-ups, there was a strong suspicion that Bates himself was involved with or had links to it. That would have made it illegal, but it doesn't apply here. (Other interested parties thus had to make an offer to the offshore trust as well, and thus while they were putting in bids of higher total value than Bates's, they were worth less to the other creditors - again that's a bit different from the Livi scenario where it's a matter of trying to save the club rather than a question of which group of businessmen would get their hands on a Leeds which was still going to be a very viable asset.)

Whether the WLC tax payers think that's all fine and above board is a separate matter and a matter for them, but we are where we are and WLC realise they've lost probably their money in any scenario; if they're preferred option is to nonetheless do what they can to retain a senior football club in the town and direct their efforts to that then from a business point of view that's perfectly legitimate and I don't see a problem with it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, let me get this straight. If the Ferranti-Christ* doesn't sell up by Wednesday afternoon, will I have a free Saturday this weekend, or is it not that simple?

(* - from one of the 'When Saturday Comes' annuals of the early 90s)

:lol: I'd quite forgotten about that.

Wonder what Mr Blobby thinks of all this.... he probably doesn't give a flying one right enough....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pompous p***ks! She's only trying to help! Damned if you do on this forum and damned if you don't.

I'd reckon that at least 90% of the condescending know alls who laugh at the Livi fans on here have never gone any more out of their way to something for their clubs other than the normal buying of a season ticket, a strip and a 50/50 draw. The only difference between us and you is that you decided sometime in the past to follow a team that was run by folk who may have known what they were doing. The reasons we support a team are wide and varied. Certainly 13 years ago I didn't sit down and calculate whether or not it would end up with the eejits who got in. But I'm in now and I care about what happens to it and I make no apologies for that! :angry:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pompous p***ks! She's only trying to help! Damned if you do on this forum and damned if you don't.

I'd reckon that at least 90% of the condescending know alls who laugh at the Livi fans on here have never gone any more out of their way to something for their clubs other than the normal buying of a season ticket, a strip and a 50/50 draw. The only difference between us and you is that you decided sometime in the past to follow a team that was run by folk who may have known what they were doing. The reasons we support a team are wide and varied. Certainly 13 years ago I didn't sit down and calculate whether or not it would end up with the eejits who got in. But I'm in now and I care about what happens to it and I make no apologies for that! :angry:

Good man.

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...
  • Recently Browsing   1 member

×
×
  • Create New...