The Debt.

[Harry Genshaw]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

Here's 4 more - The buck stops here

[midlands exile]

Yeah but is following BWFC websites a bit like watching Father Ted without the humour?

'Didn't Father Jack once have a trial for Liverpool'? said Dougal.
'No, he was once on trial in Liverpool', replied Father Ted

In a way that's true enough. There was quite a bit of wit and some wisdom in the Wanderers fanzines and some of it carried over to this website. Its not been totally extinguished but it gave ground firstly to arrogance (we are a cut above teams like Ipswich, PNE or Nottingham Forest for example) followed by a malevolence that maliciously blamed the board and its financial backer for failing to keep us in the manner to which we had become accustomed. The price to be paid is now that our very existence is under serious threat.

But the point is that the board have authorised the financial self destruction of the club, whilst spinning the supporters a yarn that there was nothing to worry about. So the accusations towards them aren't malicious but accurate - the board are either incompetent or have ulterior motives.

[midlands exile]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

Here's 4 more - The buck stops here

^this^

[thebish]

No doubt it's a succession of decisions made in an increasingly difficlt situation, each compounded by the previous. As has been said before, no one was complaining when the same team's decisions were taking us to Europe.

It's a car crash, just too simplistic to pour on the vitriol.

Thank heavens! A sensible voice at last.

I'll wager that is the very first time anyone has ever said that to Enoch!!

[LeverEnd]

Yeah but is following BWFC websites a bit like watching Father Ted without the humour?

'Didn't Father Jack once have a trial for Liverpool'? said Dougal.
'No, he was once on trial in Liverpool', replied Father Ted

In a way that's true enough. There was quite a bit of wit and some wisdom in the Wanderers fanzines and some of it carried over to this website. Its not been totally extinguished but it gave ground firstly to arrogance (we are a cut above teams like Ipswich, PNE or Nottingham Forest for example) followed by a malevolence that maliciously blamed the board and its financial backer for failing to keep us in the manner to which we had become accustomed. The price to be paid is now that our very existence is under serious threat.

And now we have you turning up with your hindsight genius telling us all how lucky we were, Spare us your apologist agenda.

[Worthy4England]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

[LeverEnd]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

[Enoch]

clearly they needed to cut much deeper and much faster.

In hindsight they most certainly did.

Though whatever the train of events that led us here, I seriously doubt there was ever a plan to grind the club to dust and wash it down the pan. It's gone tits up, but surely not by design.

Probably the point I realised the game was up is here.

I know it's pi$$ easy with hindsight. Reality is Garty is paid big bucks to successfully resolve those gambles and didn't. My supposition is that he genuinely thought we'd go straight back up. I don't believe either bloke planned us to get to this juncture, but you have to ask what the cunning plan was in the eventuality that we didn't go straight back up, coz it's looking like there wasn't one.

Indeed. It does look as though 'Plan A' failed, albeit we ended up having a good go and there wasn't a 'Plan B'. At that point the die was cast and it's been a downward spiral since.

I imagine rather than throwing their hands up and admitting defeat, they battled on in the vain hope it would be reet.

[Abdoulaye's Twin]

I was/am thankful to ED for the financial support over the years that contributed some very good years. I remain thankful, but that doesn't absolve ED and PG from what looks with every passing day some pretty gross incompetence. I can understand taking a gamble to getting us promoted first time round. I understand that it takes time to move on players and reduce expenditure on salaries. I even understand that they put their trust in Coyle and backed him with big contracts for the likes of Andrews (though Zat's renewal deserves no understanding).

The things that irk me and leaves me scratching my head are (in no particular order):

- Having been a perma-crock, they decided to give Wheater a pay rise during the announced cost cutting period.
- Renewing Zat Knight's contract and paying him so much despite little interest in him from elsewhere.
- PG stating plans in place for relegation, including salary reduction clauses etc. Clearly there wasn't.
- PG stating all the debt was owed to ED, apart from £5m overdraft. Not true.
- PG declaring that ED had to give 10 years notice to call in debt. Maybe this is true, as he hasn't called it in. But he didn't say that ED could cut the funding, leaving a massive gap between incoming and outgoing...with no plan to manage that gap.

Now, my particular favourite irk...

- Signing Amos on £16k a week only a short time ago. Now, we all wanted him signed, we're all happy he signed, but we couldn't fcuking afford it. We couldn't afford half of it. Seriously, how many clubs outside of the Premiership can genuinely afford 16k a week for a goalkeeper? Certainly not one trying to cut it's way to a sustainable Championship level budget.

The entire board, and ED as owner are responsible for where we find ourselves. ED could have chucked 300 billion quid at the club, but that doesn't give him the right to put us in this situation. I don't for a second believe any of this is shady, I think he's genuinely fcuked up. I don't know how hands on he's been, but regardless of that, he has employed and backed PG to manage the club. The buck stops with ED.

Right now the players need the backs against a wall, the whole world is against us so lets prove them wrong attitude. I thought Lennon was that sort of player, but he's clearly not that sort of manager. I know Jimmy doesn't want the gig, but I think him, with some of the other coaches that have been with us a long time might do a better job, at least until the end of the season.

[Gudnib]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

I thought you had understood this, Worthy. Gartside was absolutely right in saying that the club had near zero debt whilst Eddie was lending the club money that in cash flow terms was more akin to equity finance than loan finance. The financial problems we now face are, as you really ought to know, the additional liabilities that have built up since Eddie stopped pumping money in.

The directors and auditors are presently unable to sign off the 2015 accounts on a going concern basis and cannot sign them off on any other basis without damaging the club's interest. So what's your considered advice given the negotiations that Trevor Birch is conducting?

Now lets consider Plan A and Plan B.

Plan A involves trying to keep the club as a going concern that might be of interest to a prospective purchaser i.e. a former Premiership club with a highly developed infrastructure that is only one promotion away from a return to the Premiership.

Plan A is hanging by a thread but should it have been abandoned before talking to supposedly interested parties from Thailand, Ireland, Greece, Essex or anywhere else?

Plan B is that you abandon Plan A and make such cuts to the clubs playing and other staff that further relegation was all but certain requiring still more cuts.

Just for the record the club did cut the wage bill by £25million in the two years following relegation and is believed to have cut it still further but would you liked to have seen the club to have cut more deeply and if so when and to what extent? Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

[Abdoulaye's Twin]

Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

If the gamble carries a reasonable chance of the club going under then no. I don't believe those 2 loans in themselves would mean us going under, but when you add together a lot of expenditure it amounts to a gamble that is putting the future of our club at great risk. I doubt you'd find many folk that would accept Zat Knight, Gary Madine, Emile Heskey et al a particularly astute (even sane) gamble. Certainly the bookies would be queuing up to take your bet.

You can point to statements in accounts all you like, but the fact remains that between 2007 and now a significant number of terrible decisions/gambles/call them what you want have been made by and under the stewardship of ED and PG.

[midlands exile]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

I thought you had understood this, Worthy. Gartside was absolutely right in saying that the club had near zero debt whilst Eddie was lending the club money that in cash flow terms was more akin to equity finance than loan finance. The financial problems we now face are, as you really ought to know, the additional liabilities that have built up since Eddie stopped pumping money in.

The directors and auditors are presently unable to sign off the 2015 accounts on a going concern basis and cannot sign them off on any other basis without damaging the club's interest. So what's your considered advice given the negotiations that Trevor Birch is conducting?

Now lets consider Plan A and Plan B.

Plan A involves trying to keep the club as a going concern that might be of interest to a prospective purchaser i.e. a former Premiership club with a highly developed infrastructure that is only one promotion away from a return to the Premiership.

Plan A is hanging by a thread but should it have been abandoned before talking to supposedly interested parties from Thailand, Ireland, Greece, Essex or anywhere else?

Plan B is that you abandon Plan A and make such cuts to the clubs playing and other staff that further relegation was all but certain requiring still more cuts.

Just for the record the club did cut the wage bill by £25million in the two years following relegation and is believed to have cut it still further but would you liked to have seen the club to have cut more deeply and if so when and to what extent? Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

Come on then Gudnib... Long-term lurker who suddenly springs into life when things go proper tits-up, trying to defend the indefensible, and fond of a smug condescending tone. You aren't on the board of directors are you?

[Gudnib]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

I thought you had understood this, Worthy. Gartside was absolutely right in saying that the club had near zero debt whilst Eddie was lending the club money that in cash flow terms was more akin to equity finance than loan finance. The financial problems we now face are, as you really ought to know, the additional liabilities that have built up since Eddie stopped pumping money in.

The directors and auditors are presently unable to sign off the 2015 accounts on a going concern basis and cannot sign them off on any other basis without damaging the club's interest. So what's your considered advice given the negotiations that Trevor Birch is conducting?

Now lets consider Plan A and Plan B.

Plan A involves trying to keep the club as a going concern that might be of interest to a prospective purchaser i.e. a former Premiership club with a highly developed infrastructure that is only one promotion away from a return to the Premiership.

Plan A is hanging by a thread but should it have been abandoned before talking to supposedly interested parties from Thailand, Ireland, Greece, Essex or anywhere else?

Plan B is that you abandon Plan A and make such cuts to the clubs playing and other staff that further relegation was all but certain requiring still more cuts.

Just for the record the club did cut the wage bill by £25million in the two years following relegation and is believed to have cut it still further but would you liked to have seen the club to have cut more deeply and if so when and to what extent? Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

Come on then Gudnib... Long-term lurker who suddenly springs into life when things go proper tits-up, trying to defend the indefensible, and fond of a smug condescending tone. You aren't on the board of directors are you?

No, I have just been following it all for a very long time worrying how it was all going to end and getting annoyed with the blame mongers whilst Eddie Davies and Phil Gartside were living a nightmare with little chance of any satisfactory resolution.

[Abdoulaye's Twin]

I certainly believe it has been a nightmare for them. PG's health is testament to that and I hope he recovers. The nightmare whilst not entirely, is in large part of their own making. I know society likes to pass the buck and not accept responsibility for mush these days, but it really does rest with those responsible for decision making. In the instance ED and PG are the decision makers, or are we to accept Doris the tea lady is really at fault here?

[Prufrock]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

I thought you had understood this, Worthy. Gartside was absolutely right in saying that the club had near zero debt whilst Eddie was lending the club money that in cash flow terms was more akin to equity finance than loan finance. The financial problems we now face are, as you really ought to know, the additional liabilities that have built up since Eddie stopped pumping money in.

The directors and auditors are presently unable to sign off the 2015 accounts on a going concern basis and cannot sign them off on any other basis without damaging the club's interest. So what's your considered advice given the negotiations that Trevor Birch is conducting?

Now lets consider Plan A and Plan B.

Plan A involves trying to keep the club as a going concern that might be of interest to a prospective purchaser i.e. a former Premiership club with a highly developed infrastructure that is only one promotion away from a return to the Premiership.

Plan A is hanging by a thread but should it have been abandoned before talking to supposedly interested parties from Thailand, Ireland, Greece, Essex or anywhere else?

Plan B is that you abandon Plan A and make such cuts to the clubs playing and other staff that further relegation was all but certain requiring still more cuts.

Just for the record the club did cut the wage bill by £25million in the two years following relegation and is believed to have cut it still further but would you liked to have seen the club to have cut more deeply and if so when and to what extent? Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

That the funding cuts required to get us, with an average attendance somewhere in the middle of the league, commercial links from premier league days and parachute payments, to a financially viable place would have guaranteed relegation is bollocks.

But, on the rest of your assumptions, you have no right to gamble on option A if, should it go tits up, you aren't prepared to cover the finding gap until we can cut costs to get to option B. If ED want prepared to cover that, he should have instructed PG to budget within our means as a championship club from the day we went down. That means no mega deals for Knight and Andrews, Baptiste the year after or even Amos *this* summer.

[Peter Thompson]

I certainly believe it has been a nightmare for them. PG's health is testament to that and I hope he recovers. The nightmare whilst not entirely, is in large part of their own making. I know society likes to pass the buck and not accept responsibility for mush these days, but it really does rest with those responsible for decision making. In the instance ED and PG are the decision makers, or are we to accept Doris the tea lady is really at fault here?

+1

[Nicko58]

It would be possible to use a lot more but you have managed to hit on the the one word that really says it all- simplistic.

You are also making some very simplistic statements, although often dressing them up in 1000 words to support your position. People who have a more succinct view are generally lobbed simplistically into the not sensible, knuckle dragging waste bin, if that view differs from yours.

However, if they happen to be in agreement, it gets one simplistic sentence saying how wonderfully perceptive they are.

As someone who's been supportive of Davies and Gartside, I was generally happy to take at face value Gartside's statements around being a Club with near zero debt and that ED had the principle amount covered. That we can't file the Accounts raises some serious questions, fck all to do with the size of Premier players Contracts.

You forgot (or were too kind) to mention condascending arrogance.

I thought you had understood this, Worthy. Gartside was absolutely right in saying that the club had near zero debt whilst Eddie was lending the club money that in cash flow terms was more akin to equity finance than loan finance. The financial problems we now face are, as you really ought to know, the additional liabilities that have built up since Eddie stopped pumping money in.

The directors and auditors are presently unable to sign off the 2015 accounts on a going concern basis and cannot sign them off on any other basis without damaging the club's interest. So what's your considered advice given the negotiations that Trevor Birch is conducting?

Now lets consider Plan A and Plan B.

Plan A involves trying to keep the club as a going concern that might be of interest to a prospective purchaser i.e. a former Premiership club with a highly developed infrastructure that is only one promotion away from a return to the Premiership.

Plan A is hanging by a thread but should it have been abandoned before talking to supposedly interested parties from Thailand, Ireland, Greece, Essex or anywhere else?

Plan B is that you abandon Plan A and make such cuts to the clubs playing and other staff that further relegation was all but certain requiring still more cuts.

Just for the record the club did cut the wage bill by £25million in the two years following relegation and is believed to have cut it still further but would you liked to have seen the club to have cut more deeply and if so when and to what extent? Would you, for example, have preferred that we had not taken Jutkiewic and Dawson on loan and just given up on attempts to regain Premiership status?

Come on then Gudnib... Long-term lurker who suddenly springs into life when things go proper tits-up, trying to defend the indefensible, and fond of a smug condescending tone. You aren't on the board of directors are you?

That thought had crossed my mind. If not someone on the board of directors, then at least someone who has a personal relationship with Eddie Davies. The eagerness to defend him at all costs is bizarre if not.

[Gudnib]

I certainly believe it has been a nightmare for them. PG's health is testament to that and I hope he recovers. The nightmare whilst not entirely, is in large part of their own making. I know society likes to pass the buck and not accept responsibility for mush these days, but it really does rest with those responsible for decision making. In the instance ED and PG are the decision makers, or are we to accept Doris the tea lady is really at fault here?

I have never met Eddie Davies btw but have spent several years campaigning for the accountability of senior public employees who have not acted in good faith. But I make a huge distinction between those who act mistakenly but in good faith and those whose actions are not in good faith.
Eddie Davies would not have made his fortune in the way he did without considerable business acumen but the world of football is very different and outcomes far less predictable. He would have been wise not to have got involved at all but once he was he was ensnared in events many of which he could not control and he was never going to escape abuse whenever he decided that enough was enough.
I was shocked by the news of Phil Gartside's illness not least because, on the few occasions I have met him, I have never been left in any doubt that Bolton Wanderers was just as important to him as most other supporters. I hope too that he fully recovers and that Trevor Birch can find some way through this maelstrom.

[bobo the clown]

^^ You DO "go on" a bit don't you !?

[plymouth wanderer]

I certainly believe it has been a nightmare for them. PG's health is testament to that and I hope he recovers. The nightmare whilst not entirely, is in large part of their own making. I know society likes to pass the buck and not accept responsibility for mush these days, but it really does rest with those responsible for decision making. In the instance ED and PG are the decision makers, or are we to accept Doris the tea lady is really at fault here?

I have never met Eddie Davies btw but have spent several years campaigning for the accountability of senior public employees who have not acted in good faith. But I make a huge distinction between those who act mistakenly but in good faith and those whose actions are not in good faith.
Eddie Davies would not have made his fortune in the way he did without considerable business acumen but the world of football is very different and outcomes far less predictable. He would have been wise not to have got involved at all but once he was he was ensnared in events many of which he could not control and he was never going to escape abuse whenever he decided that enough was enough.
I was shocked by the news of Phil Gartside's illness not least because, on the few occasions I have met him, I have never been left in any doubt that Bolton Wanderers was just as important to him as most other supporters. I hope too that he fully recovers and that Trevor Birch can find some way through this maelstrom.

I bet Christmas was a ball in your house!