Official news re: bids

[Neko Bazu]

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/luton_town/7177839.stm

Television presenter and lifelong Luton fan Nick Owen is fronting a bid to buy the troubled League One club.

His consortium is funded by local and overseas businessmen and they expect to get a decision from the administrator by lunchtime on Wednesday.

"I cannot wait for us to get the go-ahead - I'm very hopeful," Owen told BBC Three Counties Radio.

Luton entered administration on 22 November and the deadline for bids to save them was 1700 GMT on Monday.

It has been reported that a number of potential purchasers submitted formal offers and the administrator Brendan Guilfoyle is due to announce which of them will be granted an exclusivity period as the preferred bidder.

Owen confirmed that his consortium's bid is backed by the three principal supporters' groups, including the supporters' trust which helped oust former chairman John Gurney from power in 2003.

"It is a great lift to know they are right behind us," said the 60-year-old presenter of the BBC's Midlands Today.

"The people in the consortium are all lifelong Luton fans. The main players will be familiar to a lot of Luton fans - Gary Sweet, Anthony Brown and Stephen Brown.

"These guys have worked so hard over a few weeks now to put together a very impressive application - 64 pages of it. They are big Luton fans and have pulled together some very successful businessmen who are Luton fans.

"It blew my mind away when I read the application"

Some of the investment is being provided by former Luton youth player Mick Pattinson who is now president and chief executive of US housebuilder Barratt American.

He is joined by other long standing season-ticket holders and two unnamed former players who now have successful business interests.

"They're coming in because they want to see this club survive," said Owen, who added that former Watford and England manager Graham Taylor was acting as a football advisor to one other group which, he claims, has not made a bid.

There is at least one other offer on the table, though, thought to come from a developer.

"I'm very positive that we could well be the only credible bid," said Owen.

"I'll be surprised if we don't know before Wednesday lunchtime but it could be sooner."

Absolutely fantastic news, if this application gets accepted This is probably the closest we're ever gonna get, short of a Trust share-buyout, to our club being run 'by fans, for fans' - Gary Sweet in particular has proven his worth, as he led the Trust when it ousted Gurney, and by the sound of things the other investors are doing very well for themselves on a business level. I can't see Sweet or Owen working with anyone looking to make a quick buck... so there's hope!

Rumour is that the other bidder is Cliff Bassett - a former member of Jayten. C'mon now, surely that bid can't be taken credibly after all Jayten did to us over the last few years?!

[Golden_Boy™]

All jokes aside - I seriously hope you don't go under. To be fair your club has been run shockingly for ages, and this was always on the cards, but I still wan't L*ton to survive. We need your club around for the rivalry it creates between our clubs.

*avoids blatant joke about getting 6 easy points*

[Neko Bazu]

localboy said:

All jokes aside - I seriously hope you don't go under. To be fair your club has been run shockingly for ages, and this was always on the cards, but I still wan't L*ton to survive. We need your club around for the rivalry it creates between our clubs.

*avoids blatant joke about getting 6 easy points*

There's quite a few Watford fans have remarked on that, actually - the whole business of 'no true fan wants to see a club go under' aside, I wouldn't want you guys to disappear either! I mean, who would we have for our main rivals then?! QPR or Franchise FC? Frankly, that'd be a crap rivalry in comparison to what 4-4-2 magazine named as football's fiercest! ;D

[Golden_Boy™]

Indeed. Can't help but wonder exactly what role GT has though. . .

[Neko Bazu]

As I understand it, he was in a football advisory role to a third bid, but they pulled out at the last minute. That's certainly the word going round, and a lot of the rumours I'm hearing are from someone who certainly appears to have some sort of connection to the 2020 bid - while he's not an investor or advisor, he knows a lot of behind the scenes stuff, and has had 100% accuracy so far! Possibly a friend of one of them or something? I dunno.

[Golden_Boy™]

I was warming to the idea that he was there to do an `inside job` ;D Ah well!

[Neko Bazu]

Official Statement from the Loyal Luton Supporters Club:

Update re player sales and bid timetable
Thursday, 10 January 2008

Many of you will have undoubtedly been disappointed by the news today of the player sales of Ahmet Brkovic (free transfer to Millwall), Chris Coyne (to Colchester for ~£350k) and David Edwards (to Wolves for ~£675k less sell-on to Shrewsbury) together with the loaning out of Lewis Emanuel (to Lincoln, although there may well be the possibility of this being made permanent) and Ed Asafu-Adjaye (to Salisbury).

I have this afternoon spoken to representatives of the LTFC 2020 bid and the Administrator, Brendan Guilfoyle, to establish the facts behind the current situation.

The simple position is that with David Pinkney’s initial funding commitment expiring on 31-Dec-2007 all the money has now dried up and the Administrator needs to realise cash to run the business. Guilfoyle has told me that he needs to raise more than £1m to ensure the Club has sufficient funding in place to complete the fixtures this season. His primary objective here is to ensure that LTFC survive and retain their Football League status, He certainly doesn’t want to be associated with the demise of a Football League Club as much as we don’t want to see the Club fold, however, what we have to realise is that whether survival is in League 1 or League 2 there is a far more and important longer-term issue here.

Quite simply the easiest way to raise this money is via player sales and whilst the timing is far from ideal the Administrator cannot run the risk of losing out on this much needed cash should he for example hold out for a further week and that player then suffers a major injury putting the sale at jeopardy and ultimately the Club’s survival.

Many of you will also ask about the income being generated from the Cup games and yes whilst that helps the situation this is partly covering other genuine ongoing costs. We also believe that the money sought by the Administrator is also net of the monies we will collect from the sale of Matty Taylor. Unfortunately we would warn you that we should also expect another couple of sales.

This obviously causes great concern across all fans as well as the management particularly given the recent run of good results. However, we can assure you that the investors behind LTFC 2020 are equally frustrated but we all have to face the reality of the situation that Kevin Blackwell was running too large a squad (29 players) and the wage bill was significantly out of kilter in relation to our revenues. Drastic measure need to be taken to: (1) ensure we generate cash to survive through the administration process; and (2) our total wage bill is gradually reduced to more manageable levels albeit this will clearly take longer to achieve.

I would make it clear that LTFC 2020 has NOT been consulted on any of these sales.

The Administrator has confirmed that there has been more than one bid lodged and that he is hopeful of going exclusive with one party next week, however, he did tell me that he was confident that a sale would be completed in line with his primary objectives outlined above. We should view this positively.

Following a period of exclusivity being awarded the process involving the CVA is an extremely complicated one. There is quite a rigid timetable for each element although in total it will take around a further two months before the CVA is completed and then a further 3-4 weeks before the Football Authorities grant the golden share to the new owners to assume responsibility and allow the Club to maintain its league status. Given the legal complexities involved the timetable can’t be accelerated and will no doubt cause more frustration for the fans but we are sure that everyone behind the successful bidder will be doing their best to come out of this situation and assume full control as quickly as feasibly possible.

Upon gaining exclusivity, it should be remembered that the people behind this bid will still NOT be the new owners of the Club and whilst having some influence will not have control over the Club. In simple turns it will be like turning an offer on a house exclusive – you still don’t live there and committing significant funds for investment prior to completion will be of a high risk nature as the deal may fall through for no fault of your own and there will be limited options to reclaim any cash invested.

The guys working behind LTFC 2020 are working extremely hard round the clock at the present time and I don’t think sleeping is something that fits into their current agendas. They have asked me to assure you that there is NO problem with their funding and the issues they are working through are all highly technical and requiring significant professional advice alongside the expertise from within the bid team and investor base.

The main message they want to send out to all fans is that there is no problem with the 2020 Mission and they remain very confident they can get through the current situation to hopefully claim preferential bid status – monies required by the Administrator to guarantee such status have been lodged at solicitors and will be released as and when the situation demands.

Clearly the situation is far from ideal but let’s all stand back and take in a sense of realism. LTFC is currently in an extremely dire financial situation and this was inherited by the Administrator when he took over and something we have been banging on about at LLSC for some time. The Administrator needs to take measures to ensure our ongoing survival and is doing his best to achieve this. It is only natural to look for people to blame in this situation and on information before LLSC no blame whatsoever should be attached to either the Administrator or the groups bidding for this Club. People coming out blaming these parties in public are very naïve and should check their facts before making such wild accusations.

The only people to blame for the current situation are the previous owners of the Club, i.e. Jayten – Bill Tomlins, John Mitchell, Derek Peter, Richard Bagehot and David Pinkney. They have driven the Club into a position of financial suicide through serious mis-management resulting in the current Administration and now flurry of player sales. You can be assured that when this process is over we will be making representations to the highest authorities that none of these people are allowed to get involved in football club ownership/ management ever again.

In the meantime we need to realise that at the end of the day players, management and coaches are nothing more than commodity items and will come and go. Us the fans are the only permanent feature of the football club and as stakeholders the true fabric of it. Now is the time more than ever to show solidarity, to carry on the magnificent support seen last Sunday and get fully behind LTFC. If possible all get down to the ground on Saturday and carry on buying programmes/ merchandise etc. and show any prospective new owner how great the fans are for this Club.

It is never easy when players are being sold, however, if that’s what’s needed to ensure we still have a Club at the end of this then we just have to get on with it and start re-building again. We’ve done it before and with the right owners and right management we’ll do it again. We need to get fully behind the team and show them the same passion as they have shown us on the pitch these last few weeks.

I would also urge all fans to show their support on Saturday for the LTFC 2020 bid. Let the Administrator know who we trust and who we want to run this Club.

Don’t forget if you want to find out more or ask questions then we will be holding a meeting this Saturday from 1pm in the upstairs function room (Harveys) in The Four Horseshoes, Park Street, Luton. Liam Day, Chairman of Trust in Luton will also be available together with other prominent members of the Trust and hopefully if they are not caught up elsewhere we are also hoping for representatives from the LTFC 2020 bid to be present.

Finally, in these testing times try and keep the calm, remain patient and carry on your awesome support for this still great Club.

One step back to take three steps forward, I guess - short-term pain for long-term gain and all that. Can't say as I like the player sales, but it's encouraging that 2020 say they have the funds needed for initial investment ready and waiting, at least - if the administrator can keep to his announcement deadline this time, that money will hopefully be in the club next week, and we won't need to sell anyone else. Surely we can hang on to Bell, Spring etc a little longer, what with the money generated by the sale of Coyne and Edwards?

Onwards and upwards, Hatters! (Well, eventually...)

[derekhappyhatter]

Calvin Andrew off to Plymouth, apparantly

[Neko Bazu]

derekhappyhatter said:

Calvin Andrew off to Plymouth, apparantly

Word on the grapevine is that Andrew's going for 250k and Brill's going for 200k.

How anyone can rate Brill below Andrew is beyond me That's nothing against Andrew, but Brill's worth an arse-load more than that!

On the upside, the rumour is that we'll get Brill loaned back to us as part of the deal, so all may not be lost on that front...

[derekhappyhatter]

It does seem to confirm that this agent is just selling players at the first opportunity, rather than trying hard to get a better price

And Ding-dong Bell to WBA apparantly for £750,000.

Just how much does this administrator want/need to keep us going to the end of the season??

[Neko Bazu]

derekhappyhatter said:

It does seem to confirm that this agent is just selling players at the first opportunity, rather than trying hard to get a better price

And Ding-dong Bell to WBA apparantly for £750,000.

Just how much does this administrator want/need to keep us going to the end of the season??

As I understood it, we needed "over a million" to see us to the end of the season, if there wasn't a preferred bidder (given that said preferred bidder would inject cash immediately). As best I'm aware, we've got that now. So I don't know what he's playing at

Someone's obviously forgotten about the point of keeping the club running as a going interest - I know that if I weren't a fan, I'd have seriously considered pulling my bid out by now.

[derekhappyhatter]

Yes, Neko, I heard it's £1.4million 'till the end of the season.

So, we got 675k from Wolves, 350k from Colchester (assuming they paid up in full in one go) which = £1.025m.

Now take off the agent's fee (10%, 25%, who knows?), oh yes and the administrator's cost (I've read it's £285 per HOUR) and we are probably still in deep doo-doo.

Bell, 750k + Andrews, 250k + Brill, 200k, might get us somewhere near

[Neko Bazu]

TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FIVE POUNDS PER BLOODY FUCKING HOUR?!

No wonder he's taking so long sorting out the preferred bidder

Jesus... c'mon, I know accountants that're Luton fans; let's get them in to balance the books instead! Tenner an hour very tops!