If the proposal is voted down and Rob sells the club, is there a risk that the new owner could move away from AP and leave the trust with a stadium and no football team? Who would then be responsible for the stadium and payments?
Personally I think there is actually minimal risk in the short to medium term. Firstly the Football Club has a twenty year lease on Adams Park. Normally when a business is sold with a commercial lease attached then the lease carries forward - maybe new owners could sell up the lease but that's at least £300k.
The new owners would then have to build a new stadium somewhere within the Wycombe area to comply with EFL location rules (whatever they are). That's further £?M.
Then any new football club would have to attract a crowd. Assuming many current fan base stayed loyal to a phoenix club playing at Adams Park in non-league they'd have a fans base of about 3000(?). We've not been sustainable (I know, maybe RC hasn't tried, but the Trust did before him) with the current fan base.
In summary, I can't see it being logical for any new owners to immediately want to vacate Adams Park in the short to medium term at least.
If the proposal is voted down I find it very unlikely that anyone with even the remotest interest in seeing a fairly insignificant division 3 side thrive let alone survive will suddenly appear. Let's face it we have been the same financial position before against a background of better economic conditions and no one was pounding our door down.
Rob would simply put it up for sale, no buyer would come along in a timeframe he found acceptable, the squad would be dismantled at the next transfer window and we would fizzle out come come summer. A gloomy outlook some might say but I can't see much beyond that.
And wouldn't it be a sick irony if those homeless rugby pests came back looking for a ground with a ready made fan base
Then there would have been justifiable complaints that they were only reflecting one side of the story. I’m not saying the BFP is beyond reproach, but for better or for worse it’s the only newspaper that gives comprehensive coverage of WWFC on a weekly basis.
They we’re quick off the mark with an article about Arthur Fowler dying this week. Which, as far as I could tell, had absolutely nothing to do with Bucks.
This bit is not crystal clear. I assumed the trust board represented the trust so if the views of the trust were against they would be compelled to say no. However as they have already said yes and moved to heads of agreement it would appear the trust board can do as they please.
At 25% we dont need to sell our stake - Drag-along clauses wont work - so, they NEED the Trust to agree to selling our stake. DON'T sell anything that takes us below 25%. They MUST put this to an EGM, lodge the paperwork with 21 days notice and then give all trust members a vote. Their ARE alternatives. Hayes/Beeks played the same game -"there is no alternative apart from what we are proposing". rubbish.
If Coughigs try to call for more capital, the Trust can see them in court on a number of reasons - including reckless endangerment of the football club by negligent and imprudent spending - with the minority shareholding of the Trust unable to prevent it. [even though I think the Trust could and should have stopped it].
The latter. .... or he has misunderstood English company law. [which is easy for anyone to do!!]
Memorandum and AoA of the company (WWFC) require 75.1% to change a whole host of things in the company. #bullying [again]
This is a family that KNEW what they were getting into - they should be spending their OWN money, not the club's money. This is EXACTLY what Steve Hayes did. At least he had the good grace, eventually, [and I got to know/dislike him very well] to do the right things as he left the club. He didnt need to, but he did. I communicated with Trevor S et al. at the time of the purchase by Coughigs - and i reminded them that the acid test was at the point of departure - would the Coughigs leave us in a better place? Only if they could answer YES, then it was ok to proceed.
Tervor ....... you remember, and you can still say "yes" ?
Tbf, and this is not me defending the Couhig's generally, Pete did stick around in the UK for the best part of 3 years. Away from his family, and completely locked down during Covid. Whatever the reasons he's gone back and kept quiet, and whatever decisions he made whilst here, you can't say he came over occasionally when he lived on Marlow Hill during the the last terrible few years.
Couhig gave a rather telling answer to his future at the club in the recent interview. He didn’t confirm or deny he was staying only to say that “nothing lasts forever”. I’m paraphrasing his comments as can’t recall exactly.
One question not being asked…Is the club already up for sale?
This would make sense- there is a relatively small window of opportunity (ie this season) for Couhig to sell out
a. without racking up serious club debt and
b. likely for a small personal profit.
Thus, if he can get out without a furore, he will. At the same time, he also knows that if the club somehow DO get promoted this season, he’s hit jackpot.
However, he isn’t going to advertise to fans he is keeping his options open.
It was a hell of an undertaking and you always wondered how it worked for him.
But the "Occasionally" bit is clearly meant about the future, not the past. His interest seems to have dropped, with a "visa" reason given on one hand, but then in the same interview a big suggestion he'd packed it in because we didn't give more stuff over to them.
Plus slightly worrying talk about he was the "exit" route, and now isn't!
It's a pickle. I'm looking forward to an actual game of football tomorrow I have to say.
@HitAndHope Of course the club is up for sale. As are all the players on the pitch + the manager. If the right offer comes along everything / everyone has a price. It’s the way of the (football) world.
Has the ‘promotion or bust’ (worryingly almost literally) vibe contributed to some of the pretty awful football we’re playing at the moment?
Has GA retreated back to what appears to have been his preferred way of setting up and had proved so successful, rather than develop a more riskier playing style? (This could partly explain his reluctance to play Horgan who for all his positives is occasionally prone to costly errors).
Has the need to win resulted in a nervousness amongst the team that has resulted in an inability to defend set pieces?
Probably not (and I can‘t find any logic in any theory for the unwillingness to use subs in a positive way) but GA must feel under more pressure than he ever has before, which can’t be that healthy a position for him or the club.
Sorry if I’m late to the party - but that video of RC on the club website isn’t reflecting a man who wants to be here for the long term.
Saying he’d already listen to offers, that he wasn’t looking forward to the flight home, that anyone in the club is dispensable.
If his heart really isn’t in it already, then these heavy infrastructure projects aren’t going to help. I think there’s a genuine discussion that needs to happen about whether it’s wise to take on any debt with an owner who seemingly is already looking for a way out. I imagine the forecast £3mil loss this season is mostly championship savings, so if they put a pause on the very ambitious (and unlikely to change anything) infrastructure projects, we’d still have a club in a relatively healthy financial footing, with a great manager and playing squad (with young talents who will bring in some £££ in the near future).
Shame about Pete - whilst I can understand his points about the 25% trust agreement, ultimately that was a deal that they developed and signed themselves, it wasn’t something they inherited. So to seemingly lose his cool and sack it all in seems a little childish.
Because they cannot have the "Crown Jewels" ie: the ground which was never on the cards from day one they have reacted accordingly and whatever plans they had in mind are now up in smoke.
I respect your opinion but I’m not sure the stadium can be described as the ‘Crown Jewels’ as there is there is zero possibility of using the land for anything other than a stadium in the foreseeable future, assuming that is what you are hinting at.
The money squirrelled away during the Championship was burned through last season. This season's £3m deficit will be funded through equity bought by cash injections by the Couhigs.
The ambitious programme of redevelopment is more likely to be a template for a prospective buyer. The practicalities are somewhat fuzzy, but if they have planning permission in place it could help a sale go through.
Re: Pete Couhig - for someone who takes such an interest in English football, the critical importance of a club's ground being secure from hostile outsiders should be impressed on him. Demanding that Adams Park is put under their control as part of WWFC while they're trying to find a buyer for WWFC has quite rightly been rejected out of hand by the Trust's representatives on the WWFC board.
I suppose it depends whether the Couhigs want to be remembered in the same vein as Frank Adams, someone who looked to improve WWFC without looking to get their money back, or someone who put money in then took their pound of flesh.
By all accounts (and quoted in the Wanderers TV with Nigel Kingston today) Pete still sits on the club board so cannot have disappeared entirely. This seems like a pretty important point to be clarified - has PC packed it in because he's been told he can't buy the stadium / the club outright or are the visa reasons genuine? If he has thrown his toys out of the pram then that seems a risky and potentially destructive conflict of interest for a significant board member to hold.
Industrial, stadiums etc. But we all know handshakes are made, lovely dinners are put on for councils and suddenly things are possible.
In your time in football you'll have seen numerous clubs utterly screwed when they lost control of their stadium. We almost lost it to Wasps just a decade ago. We've seen Bury and the like get in a mess, Coventry etc.
Keeping the stadium is so utterly important that crown jewels as a description, if anything is light.
Re Pete Couhig, do not discount the possibility that Rob is not being entirely truthful.
The visa issue is credible - our immigration system is completely dysfunctional as the Tories pander to the tabloids - but throwing his toys out of the park over stadium ownership feels less so.
Perhaps more likely he either 1) became frustrated at Trust not buying in to and challenging the Couhiggean master plan or 2) he didn’t buy into his uncle (?)’s Couhiggean master plan.
Comments
@Commoner
If the proposal is voted down and Rob sells the club, is there a risk that the new owner could move away from AP and leave the trust with a stadium and no football team? Who would then be responsible for the stadium and payments?
Personally I think there is actually minimal risk in the short to medium term. Firstly the Football Club has a twenty year lease on Adams Park. Normally when a business is sold with a commercial lease attached then the lease carries forward - maybe new owners could sell up the lease but that's at least £300k.
The new owners would then have to build a new stadium somewhere within the Wycombe area to comply with EFL location rules (whatever they are). That's further £?M.
Then any new football club would have to attract a crowd. Assuming many current fan base stayed loyal to a phoenix club playing at Adams Park in non-league they'd have a fans base of about 3000(?). We've not been sustainable (I know, maybe RC hasn't tried, but the Trust did before him) with the current fan base.
In summary, I can't see it being logical for any new owners to immediately want to vacate Adams Park in the short to medium term at least.
If the proposal is voted down I find it very unlikely that anyone with even the remotest interest in seeing a fairly insignificant division 3 side thrive let alone survive will suddenly appear. Let's face it we have been the same financial position before against a background of better economic conditions and no one was pounding our door down.
Rob would simply put it up for sale, no buyer would come along in a timeframe he found acceptable, the squad would be dismantled at the next transfer window and we would fizzle out come come summer. A gloomy outlook some might say but I can't see much beyond that.
And wouldn't it be a sick irony if those homeless rugby pests came back looking for a ground with a ready made fan base
Then there would have been justifiable complaints that they were only reflecting one side of the story. I’m not saying the BFP is beyond reproach, but for better or for worse it’s the only newspaper that gives comprehensive coverage of WWFC on a weekly basis.
Hey, come on now, be fair.
They we’re quick off the mark with an article about Arthur Fowler dying this week. Which, as far as I could tell, had absolutely nothing to do with Bucks.
https://www.bucksfreepress.co.uk/news/23110794.bbc-eastenders-actor-bill-treacher-passed-away-aged-96/
This is assuming the vote matters, doesn't it?
It is irrelevant, but that's not the BFP doing. That's an SEO article syndicated across Newsquest's papers - which should be made clearer.
This bit is not crystal clear. I assumed the trust board represented the trust so if the views of the trust were against they would be compelled to say no. However as they have already said yes and moved to heads of agreement it would appear the trust board can do as they please.
This thread has nearly 40 thousand views and almost 900 comments. You’d think the BFP could knock up a headline even if just for the clickbait.
A few of many things leaving me scratching my head...
-Rob giving the impression in the video that he's effectively voting for all 3 directors of the football club.
-Flashback to the Etihad and Steve Hayes' 'random' appearance.
-Pete advising on the football side of things
At 25% we dont need to sell our stake - Drag-along clauses wont work - so, they NEED the Trust to agree to selling our stake. DON'T sell anything that takes us below 25%. They MUST put this to an EGM, lodge the paperwork with 21 days notice and then give all trust members a vote. Their ARE alternatives. Hayes/Beeks played the same game -"there is no alternative apart from what we are proposing". rubbish.
If Coughigs try to call for more capital, the Trust can see them in court on a number of reasons - including reckless endangerment of the football club by negligent and imprudent spending - with the minority shareholding of the Trust unable to prevent it. [even though I think the Trust could and should have stopped it].
Battle not over - #standuptobullies (again)
I haven't seen the share holding agreement, but this question was specifically asked of RC and his answer was that yes the Trust would have to sell.
For you to be correct either he didn't know the answer and guessed or he has seen the share holder agreement and lied.
Since this is a crucial question it should be asked at the Trust AGM. Sadly I'm unable to attend either in person or via Zoom.
If we bring Wasps in we're just a plastic pitch and finding a spot for the manager's son in law away from exact de ja vu.
The latter. .... or he has misunderstood English company law. [which is easy for anyone to do!!]
Memorandum and AoA of the company (WWFC) require 75.1% to change a whole host of things in the company. #bullying [again]
This is a family that KNEW what they were getting into - they should be spending their OWN money, not the club's money. This is EXACTLY what Steve Hayes did. At least he had the good grace, eventually, [and I got to know/dislike him very well] to do the right things as he left the club. He didnt need to, but he did. I communicated with Trevor S et al. at the time of the purchase by Coughigs - and i reminded them that the acid test was at the point of departure - would the Coughigs leave us in a better place? Only if they could answer YES, then it was ok to proceed.
Tervor ....... you remember, and you can still say "yes" ?
The latter from 1000s of miles away. Although he'll come over occasionally.
Tbf, and this is not me defending the Couhig's generally, Pete did stick around in the UK for the best part of 3 years. Away from his family, and completely locked down during Covid. Whatever the reasons he's gone back and kept quiet, and whatever decisions he made whilst here, you can't say he came over occasionally when he lived on Marlow Hill during the the last terrible few years.
Couhig gave a rather telling answer to his future at the club in the recent interview. He didn’t confirm or deny he was staying only to say that “nothing lasts forever”. I’m paraphrasing his comments as can’t recall exactly.
One question not being asked…Is the club already up for sale?
This would make sense- there is a relatively small window of opportunity (ie this season) for Couhig to sell out
a. without racking up serious club debt and
b. likely for a small personal profit.
Thus, if he can get out without a furore, he will. At the same time, he also knows that if the club somehow DO get promoted this season, he’s hit jackpot.
However, he isn’t going to advertise to fans he is keeping his options open.
It was a hell of an undertaking and you always wondered how it worked for him.
But the "Occasionally" bit is clearly meant about the future, not the past. His interest seems to have dropped, with a "visa" reason given on one hand, but then in the same interview a big suggestion he'd packed it in because we didn't give more stuff over to them.
Plus slightly worrying talk about he was the "exit" route, and now isn't!
It's a pickle. I'm looking forward to an actual game of football tomorrow I have to say.
@HitAndHope Of course the club is up for sale. As are all the players on the pitch + the manager. If the right offer comes along everything / everyone has a price. It’s the way of the (football) world.
A passing thought.
Has the ‘promotion or bust’ (worryingly almost literally) vibe contributed to some of the pretty awful football we’re playing at the moment?
Has GA retreated back to what appears to have been his preferred way of setting up and had proved so successful, rather than develop a more riskier playing style? (This could partly explain his reluctance to play Horgan who for all his positives is occasionally prone to costly errors).
Has the need to win resulted in a nervousness amongst the team that has resulted in an inability to defend set pieces?
Probably not (and I can‘t find any logic in any theory for the unwillingness to use subs in a positive way) but GA must feel under more pressure than he ever has before, which can’t be that healthy a position for him or the club.
This just makes me wish that a WWFC fan could win a big EuroMillions jackpot and buy / invest in the club! Problem solved!
I'd agree, except RC has publicly said he won't sack him as long as he owns the club.
Sorry if I’m late to the party - but that video of RC on the club website isn’t reflecting a man who wants to be here for the long term.
Saying he’d already listen to offers, that he wasn’t looking forward to the flight home, that anyone in the club is dispensable.
If his heart really isn’t in it already, then these heavy infrastructure projects aren’t going to help. I think there’s a genuine discussion that needs to happen about whether it’s wise to take on any debt with an owner who seemingly is already looking for a way out. I imagine the forecast £3mil loss this season is mostly championship savings, so if they put a pause on the very ambitious (and unlikely to change anything) infrastructure projects, we’d still have a club in a relatively healthy financial footing, with a great manager and playing squad (with young talents who will bring in some £££ in the near future).
Shame about Pete - whilst I can understand his points about the 25% trust agreement, ultimately that was a deal that they developed and signed themselves, it wasn’t something they inherited. So to seemingly lose his cool and sack it all in seems a little childish.
Because they cannot have the "Crown Jewels" ie: the ground which was never on the cards from day one they have reacted accordingly and whatever plans they had in mind are now up in smoke.
I respect your opinion but I’m not sure the stadium can be described as the ‘Crown Jewels’ as there is there is zero possibility of using the land for anything other than a stadium in the foreseeable future, assuming that is what you are hinting at.
You’re right Adams Park was never on the table and I’m sorry Pete had problems with visas but that’s not our fault either.
The money squirrelled away during the Championship was burned through last season. This season's £3m deficit will be funded through equity bought by cash injections by the Couhigs.
The ambitious programme of redevelopment is more likely to be a template for a prospective buyer. The practicalities are somewhat fuzzy, but if they have planning permission in place it could help a sale go through.
Re: Pete Couhig - for someone who takes such an interest in English football, the critical importance of a club's ground being secure from hostile outsiders should be impressed on him. Demanding that Adams Park is put under their control as part of WWFC while they're trying to find a buyer for WWFC has quite rightly been rejected out of hand by the Trust's representatives on the WWFC board.
I suppose it depends whether the Couhigs want to be remembered in the same vein as Frank Adams, someone who looked to improve WWFC without looking to get their money back, or someone who put money in then took their pound of flesh.
By all accounts (and quoted in the Wanderers TV with Nigel Kingston today) Pete still sits on the club board so cannot have disappeared entirely. This seems like a pretty important point to be clarified - has PC packed it in because he's been told he can't buy the stadium / the club outright or are the visa reasons genuine? If he has thrown his toys out of the pram then that seems a risky and potentially destructive conflict of interest for a significant board member to hold.
Although RC said in the interview he effectively votes for Pete and Missy so how much influence those two actually have is questionable.
Industrial, stadiums etc. But we all know handshakes are made, lovely dinners are put on for councils and suddenly things are possible.
In your time in football you'll have seen numerous clubs utterly screwed when they lost control of their stadium. We almost lost it to Wasps just a decade ago. We've seen Bury and the like get in a mess, Coventry etc.
Keeping the stadium is so utterly important that crown jewels as a description, if anything is light.
Re Pete Couhig, do not discount the possibility that Rob is not being entirely truthful.
The visa issue is credible - our immigration system is completely dysfunctional as the Tories pander to the tabloids - but throwing his toys out of the park over stadium ownership feels less so.
Perhaps more likely he either 1) became frustrated at Trust not buying in to and challenging the Couhiggean master plan or 2) he didn’t buy into his uncle (?)’s Couhiggean master plan.