TWO MILLION QUID? In the Conference? During a recession?

[3 Colours Red]

I don't really know how to feel about takeover talks anymore.

If this has any validity to it, I'd certainly welcome that amount of investment in these circumstances but it seems like the same old story. Talk the big talk then string us along forever while we just stagnate.

[Patrick Thistle]

Will they reopen the Kop?

[DCI Harry Batt]

Such an awful, awful, awful idea. Giving away your club. Just...I dunno. It's up to people to decide if they want to give away their futures or not I guess.But bugger me, it's such a terrible idea.

From what the Trust board says, the way they want to deal with it is not only in contravention of previously passed resolutions, but also against the Trust rules. There are reasons for that.

[My Name Is Ian]

The club owns the ground, doesn't it?

[3 Colours Red]

Will they reopen the Kop?

No idea, honestly; would have to wait until at least the SGM to hear what plans - if any - they have for it post-pandemic. Obviously it'd be nice to have a ground with four sides again but I can also see the side that says "there's no rush when we're getting 4,000 in a 10,000 capacity stadium". There have been far too many grandiose plans for redevelopment that have gone up in smoke - nothing's really been done to the place since the Mold Road stand was built (save for a few renovations to the changing rooms and so on) and that was over 20 years ago.

DCI Harry Batt It wouldn't be the first time that the WST have threatened to go back on their word when pound signs have suddenly "appeared" (see Stephen Cleeve, Ashley Ward, Stephanie Booth etc. etc. etc.) and I doubt it'd be the last. It's only last December that Spencer Harris said that a sale was not on the cards. I don't know if COVID has forced the Trust's hand on this but I doubt it's a coincidence that they seem willing to talk right now.

[3 Colours Red]

The club owns the ground, doesn't it?

The WST own the lease until 2115, but Glyndwr still has the freehold I believe.

[My Name Is Ian]

The leasehold is what counts, then.

In a sense, I get it. They've not been doing too well these last few years, and that's frustrating.

But I'd have so many questions at this stage that I don't think I could vote for any form of discussion, the most pressing of which would be, "why so coy?" After all these years of writing about this sort of thing, I've never been given a convincing explanation as to why prospective owners of a football club should remain anonymous for any period of time. I mean, Stephen Vaughan's 12 year bar on acting as a company director ends in November, for one thing.

And supporters who blithely think that Trusts will definitely only sell to the right people only have to look at Notts County to understand that that doesn't always have to be the case.

[DCI Harry Batt]

For me, tbh, while it would be even worse to give away the club to a Stephen Vaughan, it doesn't really matter who the mystery vultures are or what their immediate plans are. In the end they will go bust, get bored, or die, and Wrexham will be in the control of someone else, chosen by someone else, with no reference to Wrexham fans, because they will have given away their right to make that decision.

[3 Colours Red]

I mean, Stephen Vaughan's 12 year bar on acting as a company director ends in November, for one thing.

Yeah, it's the anonymity that has me really worried too. We've been burnt so many times before but we still seem willing to stick our hands in the fire.

[Bizarre Löw Triangle]

The leasehold is what counts, then.

In a sense, I get it. They've not been doing too well these last few years, and that's frustrating.

But I'd have so many questions at this stage that I don't think I could vote for any form of discussion, the most pressing of which would be, "why so coy?" After all these years of writing about this sort of thing, I've never been given a convincing explanation as to why prospective owners of a football club should remain anonymous for any period of time. I mean, Stephen Vaughan's 12 year bar on acting as a company director ends in November, for one thing.

And supporters who blithely think that Trusts will definitely only sell to the right people only have to look at Notts County to understand that that doesn't always have to be the case.

As far as I can tell it's pretty standard practice not to announce stuff until at least the heads of terms have been agreed (my work went through a similar thing this summer and that's what happened). tbh i'd be more concerned if someone was doing a Steve Cleeve/Steph Booth style PR campaign to try to bring pressure onto the Board to proceed with a sale.

In fact the gate approval process for any prospective takeover, ratified in 2018, mandates all negotiations happening under an NDA until at least that point (they give the Board discretion over whether to proceed until HoTs are agreed and the final decision is opened up to the membership for ratification).

I'm more concerned that that process hasn't been followed - and that certain details have been teased "high net worth", "extremely well-known", "?2m investment" while others - what part of the collectively agreed safeguards this deal is pushing past - are not so clear. I would certainly require a solid explanation as to why that process has been sidestepped and why before I voted to proceed to detailed heads of terms.

Though I also wouldn't vote for a decision that doesn't adequately compensate Wrexham fans/Supporters Trust for the value they've created over the last ten years.

[DCI Harry Batt]

It's a shame to have the standard for how our clubs do things set as low as the general world of business.

[My Name Is Ian]

Well yes, I'd agree with this. There's no purpose to them wanting anonymity at this stage (at least, there isn't one that benefits anybody apart from the interlopers), and it doesn't exactly build trust at this sensitive time, should there be an air of secrecy about it all, and especially with the editorialising of the these people's interest seeming to indicate that the Trust itself wants to cede ownership.

The thing about the Cleeve/Booth/etc sorts showing their faces very publicly ten years ago is that they opened themselves up to scrutiny that ultimately made their takeovers untenable. Cleeve wasn't as loud when he bought Kings Lynn, certainly.

I guess that what depresses me about so much of this is that fans' reaction to the enormous imbalances between clubs and divisions isn't to protest for a more equal distribution of money within the game, but to merely want their clubs to join the beneficiaries of that inequality. It's been the same at Newcastle this year.

[Jobi1]

Speaking as a fan of a formerly fan-owned club that sold a significant controlling interest (following a Supporters' Trust vote in which the sale was presented as essential to ensure the very survival of the club) to a (locally) well-known individual who has since completely sidelined the ST, alienated the general fanbase, indebted the club to an eye-watering level to the parent company through vast amounts of loans that are loosely presented as "investment", and sunk the club to its lowest ever level in the pyramid through a litany of appalling, ego-driven decision-making, I would want to know every last detail of what's on offer before voting in favour of it.

[DCI Harry Batt]

Thing is, there's no way that every last detail of what's on offer could ever rule out what's happened at your club, Jobi.

[via vicaria]

Qualifies for the WTF thread, if true:

https://www.leaderlive.co.uk/sport/1...l-wrexham-afc/

Not exactly the names I'd expected to be involved. Still, at least if it is them, it's not Steven Vaughan.

[3 Colours Red]

If Ryan Reynolds had to watch the shower of shite that turned out last season, he'd have ended up looking like Wade Wilson in real life by the end of it.

[Janik]

Wrexham fans should be running a mile from this, unless there is an automatic buy-back clause at a price fixed now (and even then...). It’s hard to see it as any more than a passing fancy for the names involved, giving they appear to have precisely no prior connection to the club.

[Patrick Thistle]

[Patrick Thistle]

That has caused some discussions on the Shrewsbury Facebook page.

A lot of people are posting gifs of Deadpool looking shocked.

[ChrisJ]

Wrexham fans should be running a mile from this, unless there is an automatic buy-back clause at a price fixed now (and even then...). It’s hard to see it as any more than a passing fancy for the names involved, giving they appear to have precisely no prior connection to the club.

It's odd for sure. Both of them appear to have Irish heritage to some degree - are they mixing up their Celts? Reynolds is listed on Wiki as an "actor, producer and entrepreneur." Does that worry anyone? As much as I enjoyed Deadpool, I'd really not know what to think if I were a Wrecsam fan just now.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Entrepreneur means he was just paid the guts of $100 million by diageo for his share in a gin company.

The fact that he's very personable, and extremely rich doesn't change any of the points above.

[Bizarre Löw Triangle]

Wrexham fans should be running a mile from this, unless there is an automatic buy-back clause at a price fixed now (and even then...). It’s hard to see it as any more than a passing fancy for the names involved, giving they appear to have precisely no prior connection to the club.

If we're going to sell our club for some vague promises (and from what i can see a large majority of fans are hellbent on that) I'd probably rather go the full hollywood circus implosion than slowly having the life drained out of us by "proper football people".

[Ray de Galles]

I share everyone's concerns about the supporters giving up control of the club, not matter how sexy the new owners (or their front people) are.

This is just so weird though ;

https://twitter.com/vancityreynolds/status/1308865758710161409?s=21

[Janik]

If we're going to sell our club for some vague promises (and from what i can see a large majority of fans are hellbent on that) I'd probably rather go the full hollywood circus implosion than slowly having the life drained out of us by "proper football people".

I wouldn't expect Reynolds and McElhenney to deliberately destroy the club. Or indeed stick around for too long if it was going wrong. They are too high profile for that, with reputations to lose. It's the latter point that would be the worry - if they don't stick around, then who do they sell it on to? Which has been TonTon's point all along of course. It's not just the motives of the next owner if the fans decide they can't run their own club well, it's also that of the next-but-one and the lack of any say as to who that will be [as I'm sure BLT and others understand].

[Ray de Galles]

I've got a(n admittedly pretty unlikely) theory that Reynolds or McElhenney may have alighted on Wrexham due to reading this Pete Davies book for the US market in the nineties ;

Twenty-Two Foreigners in Funny Shorts:: The Intelligent Fan's Guide to Soccer and World Cup '94