Jackie@home

The Echo is now as trustworthy as the Sun - they've done nothing but try to scare us for the last few months. One tabloid headline after another in a desperate bid to sell more newspapers. There was a time when they really did get the news first, but I will need to see it reported somewhere more reliable before I get too stressed out.

Typical Echo. It is noticable that Radio solent have not mentioned any problems with other consortia, neither have any other BBC outlets. They seem to be sticking to the facts - if it's on their media, we can start worrying. The Echo was so much better in the days of Graham Hiley and John May, when they were really ITK.

Just going to have a glass of wine out of my amazing Liebherr wine fridge - absolutely excellent, holds approx. 500 bottles graduating in temperature up each shelf to give you the perfect temperature for each style of wine. Suddenly, we start seeing a name that has probably been around us for years, without us noticing. I wonder if they will be backing further development of Southampton docks? It's got to be one of the best ways to get the local council onside; financing the local football club. How many cranes will they need then? Probably make loads of other stuff that is used in the docks aswell.

I'd heard a few months ago ( before Shearer's caretaker spell at Newcastle), that he had been approached by an overseas consortium (don't know which one) to take over as manager. This was when we first went into administration and was confirm a week or so ago by someone else involved in the Pinnacle bid. I think that they are getting their wires crossed - Shearer was definitely approached, but not by Pinnacle.

NickG, you are right from what I've been told -a consortium were hours away from exclusivity themselves and didn't think that Pinnacle had the finances in place to make a bid (correct!), which is why they were caught on the hop. Apparently been looking at us for 2 years. Whether they are the consortium that Fry is now closing in on a deal with is the same, I don't know - person who gave me the original info a couple of months ago has stayed sober during recent contact and frustratingly revealed nothing.

The productivity level of Saints fans must have plummeted over the last couple of months. Even those who don't spend hours on here seem to be spending hour after hour catching up with the latest rumour. Our server has been down at work all week so I have had to spend my evenings looking on here rather than lunch time - the ironing is piling up and I have to cook for 12 people tomorrow and 10 Sunday. For God's sake get on with it - some of us have other things to do apart from sitting in front of a keyboard!

I have definitely got to the stage now where I'll believe it if I see it. MLT has expected the deal to be signed tomorrow, whenever tomorrow is, on at least 3 different occasions. I think he is relying a lot on what TL has told him rather than his own concrete knowledge of those involved. From my own personal experience of dealing in business with the Spurs supporting North London Jewish community, getting them to part with any money is like drawing blood from a stone. They regard it as some kind of badge of honour to hang on to their money until the last possible moment with no regard for how other people in business view them or their reputation. Perhaps we have been unlucky, but I groaned when I heard where the Pinnacle consortium or individual backer, whoever he or they are, comes from. I just hope I'm wrong, because I am sure that MLT has the best intentions. I just don't know how good his instincts are at 'smelling a rat'. Some of us have a natural instinct for realising who is a bull****ter, some others get suckered in time and time again.

Apparently they did not think that Pinnacle were in a position to make the bid - it took them by suprise. They were literally hours away from their own offer. I don't think that they were totally shocked that it has come to this and were waiting in the background should anything happen.

TL might be talking but he's not actually saying much - we haven't a clue regarding the details of what the FL want them to sign. Mark Fry seemed to be indicating that it was still about the -10 points, but we don't know. I just can't believe now that Pinnacle will complete; even Matt didn't sound confident this morning. In hindsight, it's a shame the Swiss missed the original deadline - I have only heard positive things about their bid.

This, scarily, reminds me of the episode in the early '90's with that kid Spencer something or other was going to save Aldershot. I remember him being on Meridian and South Today getting his few moments of glory before the club went bust. Weymouth had a similar situation a few months ago where this bloke was supposed to have suffered a heart attack on the way to the press conference - turns out he lived in a council house. Football certainly attracts some absolute nutters.

I'd also heard that the Swiss group had been pipped to the post by a few hours, and they were quite shocked when Pinnacle gained exclusivity. I just hope that they are still interested with the threat of an extra points deduction, because they sound like the real deal. Apparently they had been looking at us for some time, but the bid also involves property development, which is always complicated. However, money would be no worry and they already had a manager set up ready to go - one who wouldn't be interested unless there was serious money to spend.

I think the idea is that Matt will fulfill the Niall Quinn type role - there will be others with business expertise on the board. He will be the link between the manager and coaching team and the administration and financial people. Matt has made some scathing remarks in the past about the very high percentage of footballers who are only motivated by money; hopefully, with him on board we will be more capable of weeding out those with the wrong character than we have done since the Strachan days.

Exactly, mattyd - there is another bid waiting in the wings if this one doesn't go through.

Miserableoldgit, I know MLT wasn't saying it was a shoo-in, and I did listen to the clip. I was responding to Nineteen Canteen's remarks that, if Matt was going to be chairman he would know by now and not be so vague; trying to make out that Matt is some kind of idiot. (post 19) I was backing up Matt's approach to the question - just saying that he was right to not put all his cards on the table at present until all has been signed and sealed. I also heard the same as Wild-Saint yesterday; everything is going to plan for the purchase so far.

Leicester lost a few players, but when it's not your own team you don't take too much notice of it at the time - it depends who replaces them. All players had meetings with Wotte and were asked whether they wanted to stay - I think it's highly unlikely that McGoldrick and Surman said yes. In which case, there is no point paying their wages over the summer - I'm sure the players will have learnt of interest from other clubs some time ago. It's always the same when clubs get relegated - most of the Newcastle players have promised to stay and get them promoted. In reality, they will get left with the duffers on huge wages that nobody wants; the best players will leave, whoever ends up owning the club.

It's highly likely. Matt is a mate of his, and Dowie can have no certainty about what is going on at Newcastle. Apparently, they said at Coventry that his family were still living up north and this proved a problem, rather than his management ability. He will have to move them back south - this is a huge job that needs undidvided attention -travelling backwards and forwards to Lancashire won't be an option. Personally, I would prefer Paul Tisdale as Dowie's record is rather mixed.

The point is, surely bringing in the white witch worked? We did well after she worked her magic. We're getting so desperate now, it has to be worth another try.

Mmmmmmm...... very interesting. A colleague of Mark Fry was certainly looking very pleased with themselves this evening, but still giving absolutely nothing away.

Getting back on topic, the other week I met one of Mark Fry's colleagues - obviously far too professional to give anything away ( frustrating as hell though this was, only to be expected.) This person, however, had been working on the Bournemouth situation for a very long time. They said that one of the reasons it takes so long is that all the people involved in football like to do "deals", often many of them are not even in writing but committed to verbally with players' agents. Once you get into the details of buying a club you find an amazing amount of deals come out of the woodwork - they all have to be studied, you have to find out what you are actually committing to. Also, if property development is included in the bid, perhaps there have been talks going on with the council re: planning permission, etc. If this is the case, it WILL take ages, and what you bid will be dependent on what you are allowed to do development wise.

Actually, my husband and I took paycuts this year to help the company we own through the worst of the recession, and we haven't asked our staff to do the same. However, the staff discussed things amongst themselves and agreed that they would all work a 4 day week rather than some of them be laid off. Luckily, it hasn't come to that. We also know of rival companies where the owners have paid themselves big fat salaries and gone into administration several times leaving their suppliers with huge unpaid bills. It's just wrong - like Lowe, they have no conscience. I know that players at Bournemouth were only being paid a percentage of their salary for several months, but they gave it their all, which is why they survived. The fact that they had people like Fletcher and Howe who had been associated with the club for many years is not coincidence - it's what Saints have lacked the last few years.

Anybody wanting to develop the area around the ground (which is what I've heard from someone who does know but is far too professional to tell me - frustrating or what) will have to raise money from the banks - this is never done in cash. This is the major problem. 18 months ago the banks would have lent money to your golden retriever - now they don't want to lend to anyone, except with the most punitive of terms, otherwise I think that a deal would be nearly in the bag by now. By the way, some people have been pretty patronising about MLT. He doesn't deserve it - he's an intelligent guy who has more brains than to ally himself with any old tyre-kicker that comes along.

Perhaps they partly owned it, as I know it was supposed to be part of a large development. He definitely gave the impression that a large proportion of their debts were written off, basically because they were the only offer in town and they were offering cash.

I read an interview with Ray Ranson talking about what they were doing at Coventry. (This was in the Independent on Saturday a 2 or 3 weeks ago). Apparently, they were able to pay off the stadium debt for £9m by playing "hardball" with the creditors, as he described it. I am also pretty sure that their debt was considerably higher than ours. Makes you wonder even more why our lot didn't accept their offer, if you didn't already realise how incredibly incapable they were at running a business.

They are showing it again at 10.55pm if you missed it this time around - well worth it, as long as it doesn't make you too morose about how we've ended up.

I certainly would not let Redknapp off the hook. We had a team that finished safely in mid-table the season before, even with Sturrock managing it and ending up with 13 players crocked - remember the 3-3 v Newcastle? A brilliant game. Redknapp went around telling the media that it would be a miracle if he kept us up. None of his journo mates questioned why, when the team had finished so comfortably the year before; they are so besotted with him. At Pompey, Spurs and West Ham he spent a stack of money on already established players - Can Defoe score goals? Christ, it doesn't take a football genius to work that out, just somebody else's deep pockets to pay for it. Suprisingly enough, when you spend tens of millions on players, your team's results improve. I think Bournemouth's financial problems started when he was manager there. My husband always said that he was a plant, and he was only half-joking, because there were so many obviously bad decisions made by him, just too many to list - bloody Callum Davenport, Bernard, playing his son for 90 mins each week when he could only last 45, playing Ormerod over Phillips, marginalising Doddsy and Oakley who had helped us fight our way out of trouble for so many seasons: I could go on and on.