Ken Anderson - Old Owner (Definitely. For Ever ..... )

[boltonboris]

Club had a little 'visit' from HMRC at 9 o'clock on Saturday morning

I know you'd expect more audits than normal after our issues, but Civil servant bean counters on a weekend?

Told that there is further outstanding PAYE tax - Which isn't related to previous winding up orders

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Ken's latest, lifted from tomorrow's programme.

https://www.bwfc.co.uk/news/2017/octobe ... chairman6/

[Bijou Bob]

The play offs are clearly an unrealistic aim, but Ken will push the possibility for the sake of potential suitors.

The season we went down, 49 points were needed for safety. Last season, Blackburn went down with 51. Realistically, avoiding relegation is a hope, not an expectation.

I reckon we need 55 points to stay well clear of the bottom 3 or 4. 16 wins from the remaining 34 games and a couple of draws. Given the fact that we've already played at home against rivals in the bottom half of the table, that means winning around 5 or 6 of those away from home. I don't know about anyone else, but I'm not sure we're going to be good enough to do that. I hope I'm wrong.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

The season we went down, 49 points were needed for safety.

Not strictly true, Bob. Charlton were the third team to drop, with 40 points and -40 goal difference, so although fourth-bottom Rotherham got 49 they didn't need that much – they could have survived with 40 and their vastly superior GD.

Points hauls of highest relegated team, going backwards from last season:
51
40
41
44
54
40
42
47
46
52

That's an average of 45.7pts to beat, which is kinda Ken's point. Over the last seven seasons the average has been 44.5pts, and even that average has been dragged up by two significant outliers – Blackburn last year and poor old Posh in 2013, who only finished 14pts off the play-offs but still went down.

We've had 12 games and, er, amassed 5 points. There are 11 games before Christmas, which makes a handy halfway point of 23 games. To hit 23 points by then, and therefore be on course to survive, we could win six of them: I nominate QPR (H), Fulham (A), Sunderland (A), Reading (H), Barnsley (H) and Burton (H), none of which are outlandish wishes upon a star. I'm not saying it's likely to happen, I'm just saying it's feasible – and let's not forget, that would be making up for our awful start in just a quarter of the season, rather than the three-quarters we have left.

Owt could happen. Buckle up, buddy.

[TANGODANCER]

There's always the fact that other teams are less than perfect all the time. Keep winning and anything's possible.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Ken's thrown a proper wobbly.

https://www.bwfc.co.uk/news/2017/octobe ... statement/

"However, to bring closure to this extremely unhelpful situation the Chairman has today confirmed that any ongoing discussions with investors will be terminated with immediate effect and that no further expressions of interest will be entertained for the foreseeable future."

Apparently because, and I'm paraphrasing but only slightly, "people have tweeted".

[Peter Thompson]

Very strange....it sounds like he's lost the plot

It was Anderson himself who only a week or so ago seemed happy enough to inform everyone that he was in talks with a couple of creditable investors - either that or its a smokescreen and he's got investment from someone who doesn't want to be named ?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Very strange....it sounds like he's lost the plot

It was Anderson himself who only a week or so ago seemed happy enough to inform everyone that he was in talks with a couple of creditable investors - either that or its a smokescreen and he's got investment from someone who doesn't want to be named ?

I genuinely hope that's the case, PT, because it seems to me the other options aren't pleasant at all.

As you say - and, to be fair, as he says - he has been happy to be very "transparent" about it. But now it seems that by getting people talking, he has got himself upset and thus made the decision to withdraw from all negotiations. That seems very very odd indeed – as you suggest, it sounds like he's lost the plot, because that's not a sensible thought process:

"My constant proclamations that the club is for sale have made people talk about the club being for sale, including potential buyers.
I don't like that, so what can I do?
I know, I'll stop talking to potential buyers."

[TANGODANCER]

Very strange....it sounds like he's lost the plot

It was Anderson himself who only a week or so ago seemed happy enough to inform everyone that he was in talks with a couple of creditable investors - either that or its a smokescreen and he's got investment from someone who doesn't want to be named ?

We have to assume that there are some circumstances/reasons we don't/can't know about to bring this reply. People like Ken Anderson haven't got where they are by "losing the plot". Better to wait and see what's happening than start making silly accusations....

[BWFC_Insane]

Crazy stuff. Absolutely bonkers. Not least because since Ken did an interview with the BN to confirm interest from investors in the club and that talks were taking place I've seen no further speculation on it. Not newspapers or online media at least.

[Prufrock]

Sounds to me like he's thrown a wobbler at some sort of perceived "leak"...?

[officer_dibble]

He’s off his fcking tits with this one??!

[Harry Genshaw]

If there was a serious bidder willing to pay half a million to look at the books and pay enough for Ken to trouser a phenomenal profit, would he really be saying

"Nah, forget it. Someone's had a pop at me on Twitter" & walking away?

[bristol_Wanderer3]

It is going to be interesting how Ken manages to keep the club funded through this season. Either:

1.) The club is funding itself and isn't making a loss this season, or
2.) The club is making a loss, and Ken is funding the loss himself, or someone else connected with the club is, or
3.) The club is making a loss, and no one is funding the loss, and we are relying on income from elsewhere, such as player sales to fund the loss.

All of that assumes short term debtors Blumarble, PBP, Brett Warburton, Eddie Davies, or the bank we have a considerable overdraft facility with allow the club to continue trading as is. And it seems it is best not to think about next season if we are relegated.

[boltonboris]

When all said and done - He wants to sell the stadium, pocket the money, lease it back at someone else's expense, but because he can't - He's thrown a hissy fit and said it's all our fault

[BWFC_Insane]

When all said and done - He wants to sell the stadium, pocket the money, lease it back at someone else's expense, but because he can't - He's thrown a hissy fit and said it's all our fault

Nah. If he wanted to throw a hissy fit over that the article would have referenced the ST.

I think he's probably either finding it hard to attract anyone serious to invest or is just playing games trying to drive up a deal.

Probably the former. And the website piece was deflection of blame.

[Martin_Cruise]

I can't believe that the owner of a second tier football club would openly admit to changing his plans to sell the club because he received some criticism on social media and in the press
It is the sort of behavior one would expect from someone running a cub scout troop or under 15s team."Im not buying you all a new strip because you said I was a fatty on twitter!"

Blimey, one needs a thicker skin than Ken apparantly has to take on such a large football club as Bolton.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

He's had his say in the usual fashion: Ken's Kolumn.

Due to the amount of time it was taking for Paul Aldridge and our Finance Department to deal with - and the unsettling effect it was having on our staff - I decided that now was not the time to have these discussions and our focus must be firmly fixed on the team and the results.

For the record, only one of the several interested parties was able to show proof of funds and, whilst I have terminated discussions until the end of the season, this is an opportunity which may be resurrected in May. I won’t be continuing dialogue with any of the other parties.

So we might talk again in May, which will be in no way unsettling for staff of a probably freshly-relegated team. How deeply curious.

He also has a little nip back at the Scunny chairman, with a wholly unexpected reference to the classics.

[BWFC_Insane]

From Ken's piece...

I took this decision because several of the interested parties did not have the necessary funds required to take the club to the next level. Despite numerous requests for them to provide evidence of their funding capabilities, each of them failed to provide acceptable evidence after a number of weeks.

However, they continued to request financial and other sensitive information from the club and our associated businesses.

This to me reads like he thinks someone was pretending to be interested in the club to extract information. Was someone from the ST up to fun and games?

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

Ken's Kolumn O'Klock. No bully-pulpit action this time. Most interesting thing is a (re)stated intention to recruit more players in January.

https://www.bwfc.co.uk/news/2017/novemb ... hairman-2/