Capel Saint

It's not looking very rosy unless one of these supposed 'interested parties' gets a move on and signs on the dotted line. Even so, whoever buys the club will now have a bigger rebuilding job to do with the ever increasing exodus of coaching staff and now players deciding they've waited long enough. If Pinnacle don't complete today then I think their bluff has been called and I can't see them being considered any longer. Evidentally Fry has given this Swiss consortium up to tomorrow Iif we believe the Echo) to make an offer and buy the club. Oh the joy!

Exactly! The only winners of this current set up are the players and their agents who absolutely coin it in.

Especially as time is ticking with regards to pre-season, getting the squad sorted out, appointing a manager, signing any new players and on the club side, selling season tickets.

Not until the deal is signed and sealed will I firmly believe that a new era is starting at Southampton Football Club. Until then, everything else is pure speculation.

Well just as long as things are moving forward. With pre-season already around the corner they need to push things to a completion soon. Especially the sanity of all us Saints fans who have been waiting with baited breath these last couple of months!

Hope it isn't us. He's done nothing at the last three clubs he's managed.

Sorry, don;t agree with you there. I think there is a high probability of a deal being struck soon rather than the club being wound up. Administrators would only wind up a business if there were no serious bidders. With talks ongoing and albeit slowly going forward, I firmly believe the club will be in new hands soon and all this current worry will disappear. I'm going to stay posivive!

As fans that is what we would wish, however in the world of business and finance, this process takes quite some time. At least when the new owners are installed then hopefully they will have already agreed a plan of action to put immediately into effect.

Personally I view Fry's comments a bit more positively. Yes, it is a short term worry that the club cannot pay the salaries of the SFC staff but considering that there are 4 interested parties with one entering exclusivity, then at least it shows things are moving forward. Also with Fry setting up a meeting with the staff I assume that they will be told the exact situation with timescales of a takeover etc and will be given the option to hang in there or look for another job. Administration is never nice and it is the poor employees that get hit the hardest. That is a fact in any company that goes into administration. However with buyers on the horizon then there is real hope they will be able to keep their jobs and will be paid all salaries owed byt he new owners. I don't agree with a number of posters on here who keep spouting that the club is doomed.....it is not! We as fans just need to be patient and not jump to conclusions which are probably no where near the truth of what is actually going on behind the scenes. Give it a couple of weeks and I reckon the club will have a new owner who can stop the slide and turn the club around and take it forward.

Unless he has received an indication from this mystery overseas interested party that they are prepared to pay £14m and so Fry is going back to the other bidders to see if they want to improve their existing offers. Just a thought!

Any link to go with this story from the Echo?

Quite!

I think this is all a moot point as even if Lowe, Wilde and Crouch could have agreed on a deal for Crouch to come back into the club, how long do you think it would have been before they fell out over club/financial issues? I would have given it less than three months before they would have been slagging each off in the papers again. In the end the club was left with three individuals who I don't think would have ever been able to turn the club around and if we hadn't entered administration this season, it would probably have happended next season.

I don't think us porr fans will ever know the real truth that went on but a mental picture of three kids arguing over playing with the trainset comes to mind. They have all collectively sniped at each other in public and behind closed doors and it is the club and fans that have suffered because they became entrenched in their own views rather than look at things for the good of the club! I reckon all the past Directors realised a few years ago when we finally were relegated from the Prem that forming a plc to run a football club is, in general, a huge mistake as it has now proved. I just hope that these prospective groups that have made/or are making an actual bid for the club have nothing to do with any of the ex-directors. As people have said before, a clean sweep at Board level is required and it is such a shame it has taken the club to be relegated to League 1 and administration for this to be achieved. I'm also keeping my fingers crossed that they have enough money to turn the club around and invest in a good manager (Curbishley) and quality players to get the club moving forwards, rather than backwards.

Football is an entertainment business and therefore with the quality of the football reducing, especially last season, people aren't going to spend their hard earned money watching ****e football and the team continually under performing. IF the team had been playing good football and winning more games, more people would attend. Simple as that!

I think we will, as the club won't be run by a disastrous plc set up.

It does take a while for these things to be sorted out and is never a quick process. To be fair, if it takes only 3-4 weeks for the plc to go into administration and a firm offer made with firm financial backing to service the debt and take the club forward, that is fairly speedy. As someone said earlier in this post, it is better for Mr Fry to take a few days longer to get the right person and the best offwer, rather than to just accept the first offer on the table, just so a deal can get done. Another plus point is that at least Mr Fry is keeping the fans regularly up to date with what is going on. It makes a refreshing change from the last 2-3 years of crap that has come out from the various 'Boards'!!

Forever a Saint, red and white all the way through!

Well worded post and it sums it up nicely for me. I'm sure the administrators will try to cause as little disruption to the current season as possible and will be working behind the scenes to stabalise the club and sell it as a going concern. It is going to be interesting to see if there are any genuine investors to step in to save the club or whether the likes of the Fulthorpe consortium/ Paul Allen etc were just a bunch of tyre-kickers.

I don't think it is a farce if Saints escaped the 10 point deduction. The club has to look after itself and if a couple of other chairman scream 'foul' then that is up to them. In a point of law, I wouldn;t have thought the FA can suddenly change the law to punish a club just because it has expolited a loophole. Sure the FA can close it afterwards but I can't see them being able to legally defend their decision if they tried to deduct Saints points now. It's fooked the club under this current structure so it would be good to have one small positive for Saints to have been run by a plc.

Unfortunately we as fans won't ever to get to see the real goings on behind the club which is rather a shame as it could settle a lot of arguments/differing of opinion that are raised on this messageboard.

Yes, but I would also counter that maybe a lot of fans did not have much faith in the appointment of two unknown Dutch managers/coaches who were given the task of playing a mostly reserve/youth side because the Board had sold/loaned out a number of the remaining quality of the squad. I accept that they had to reduce costs but it was incredibly nieve of them to think we would score loads of goals without the services of Rasiak, John and Saganowski leaving just McGoldrick and Wright-Phillips who had not particularly shone in the goal scoring stakes of previous seasons.

Hmmm.....and the poor football and the constant drawing and losing at home had no impact on the attendances? I think you need to remember that football is a results driven business. Winning brings success which bings bums on seats. Don't think a few stay=aways because of Lowe would have massively affected the gates.

Yes, please FF. l Let us poor 'in the dark' fans have some of the info. Go on.....you know you want to.....please?