Chris Custodiet

Agreewith you about Coyle but here's Deloitte's summary of 2006/07, the year BSA walked out doubling his £1.5m p.a. salary and putting the boot into the club that had helped make his reputation. BWFC could never spend enough to keep BSA happy but his legacy was one in which scarcely any player would come through the ranks for years afterwards and Premiership survival was dependent upon spending EDs money in ever larger quantities. We finished 2006/07 in seventh place with declining attendances, a negative goal difference one point ahead of Reading, two points in front of Portsmouth and four in front of Blackburn. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/2301797/Deloitte-football-finance-review-Club-by-club-Premier-League-analysis.html

I'm afraid, Sluffy, that in my haste I misread your earlier post. The issue I noticed earlier today was that the appointment of Quantuma as administrators to the hotel was not a subsequent event to the appointment of David Rubin & Partners to administer BL and BWFC but that it too had taken place on 13 May. It shouldn't make any practical difference but it is a different sequence of events to that that seemed to have been portayed in the BN.

You beat me to it, Sluffy. I noticed that this morning. It also looks like the time limit for filing is seven days. Eight weeks sounded way too long.

I blame the Beeno.

PBP were far and away the biggest provider of new finance to ensure survival of the club three years ago. So is it not curious that the ST's Simon Nightingale should have taken the opportunity at the ST's last open meeting to deride Michael James? It surely doesn't augur well for any future relationship between the ST and any new board should any individual with the attitudes of Mr Nightingale remain part of the ST's thinking. I use the word 'thinking'' in its loosest sense.

I think Hoppy was being deliberately obtuse and obfuscatory. Nixon got it more or less right but not completely right. I believe he made the mistake of confusing the loan with the security for the loan. Its an easy mistake to make but they are not the same thing.

The ST and the BN seem to me to have had a lot of attitude without knowing what the facts are whilst ignoring facts that don't suit their agendas that are on the public record. e.g. ICIL's accounts. A flyer is not quite the same thing as a prospectus provided to bona fide parties via a reputable law firm but I think you know that, don't you?.

Peterborough's former owner died a few months ago not long after Eddie had died. Peter Boizot made his fortune out of selling pizzas but I understand he'd not a lot of dough left when he shuffled off the mortal coil. There's a lengthy obituary in the Grauniad about the life of Peter Boizot. Not a mention in the Grauniad about the life and achievements of our Eddie though. I blame that Conn man.

We don't know everything and I expect we never will but there is a lot of information that, one way or another, has been put into the public domain that allows us to figure out much of the likely course of events. At one stage, Howard was a very useful source of information on WW. One of the more interesting bits was that KA/ICIL owed Moonshift nearly £8m. These figures are not on the public record but Howard has assured me that the immediate source of this information was ED's lawyers. The inference was that the figures appeared in the prospectus made available to interested parties prior to the appointment of administrators. One might wonder why both the ST and the Beeno, with their large axes to grind, seem to have avoided making any reference to any of the figures in that prospectus.

Let me put it this way. I would ask myself would Eddie Davies have been so trusting as to hand over £4.4m to Ken Anderson to repay Blumarble without being able to ensure that that's where the money went? And wouldn't any lawyer involved strongly advise against it? As for the other £600K, it remains unclear whether it was handed over. BM took security for £5m but only handed over £4m. There were interest and charges that BM needed securing as well. I can't see why Eddie wouldn't think the same or do the same..

The Moonshift loan is secured against the assets of BL, probably as a second charge behind KA's charge. Moonshift also has a charge on the shares of ICIL which frankly seem to be worth very little. The charge however operated so as to limit the time allowed for repayment. Its a misconception to think that if company A has a charge on the assets or shares of Company B, it must be in respect of loans between A and B. That's not the case. To take one obvious example, Blumarble were granted security over the assets of Burnden Leisure, BWFC, Bolton Whites Hotel and every other member of the group in relation to a loan BM made to SSBWFC. i. e. No members of the group. What route did the money take in September 2018? Probably from Moonshift to Blumarble via the lawyers involved in a three-way transaction.

I'm afraid I don't know what the time limit is for providing notice to Companies House of the appointment of an administrator but 1-0 to Quantuma was just a quip observing that Quantuma were quicker off the mark in this respect than BWFC's administrators. I wouldn't make too much of it but my observation yesterday was not an inference that any time limit had been exceeded but it may have jogged someone's memory and prompted a quick response today. I wouldn't speculate on likely outcomes but I would have thought that Quantuma had been brought in by KA to avoid him being at a disadvantage in the process.

Curious that it should be published by owners of the Beano but not owners of the Beeno.

Sorry Sluffy. I know it might sometimes be difficult to see the wood for the trees but its really quite simple. BM wanted their money back, the club didn't have it and KA had scoured around to get the best deal he could from alternative potential lenders. In the end he ran out of time and options and so called up Eddie. Eddie loved the club to bits and, despite every reservation he must have held, once again agreed. But the terms where that the loan would be to KA who would have the personal responsibility to repay it and would be given another six months to try to sell the club or risk losing his shares. It was not an indefinite loan. BM got their money back plus interest amounting to about 4% and their security was released with KA taking similar security to the one BM had. Nobody has taken £5m. You never know who reads WW. I see that notice of the appointment of BWFC's administrators was filed at Companies House this morning. It was only yesterday that I noted, on these pages, that Quantuma, the hotel administrators, had filed notice of appointment whilst BWFC's administrators hadn't. 1-0 to Quantuma?

Sorry Sluffy but that's not the way I see it. When Blumarble advanced money to SSBWFC in March 2016 it took out charges against all the companies in the Burnden Leisure group as security for repayment. That included Bolton Whites Hotel which also had a charge against it in respect of the £5.5m lent by PBP. I expect that, in the case of the hotel, BM's would be a second charge lying behind the first charge of PBP. When BM got their money back (£4m plus £400K negotiated interest) in September 2018 BM, or lawyers acting on their behalf, filed documents confirming that their charges were satisfied. The money had come from Ken Anderson who, in turn, had borrowed the money from ED. As security for repayment KA took charges against Burnden Leisure, Bolton Wanderers and Bolton Whites Hotel. Once again the hotel charge is probably a second charge lying behind the prior charge of PBP. Its often worth noting the dating of documents but in this case I fear you may be reading too much into the fact that KA's charges are recorded as 27 September 2018 whilst the satisfaction of the BM charges are dated 24 September 2018. I see that Iles of the Beeno cannot resist stirring the pot at each and every opportunity. Only simpletons would have thought that BWFC would have been able to pay its way in 2018/19 without new money from somewhere or the miracle of another Madine-like sale.

I really should have refreshed my memory previously but Sluffy is right that the £5.5m PBP loan was made to and secured on the assets of Bolton Whites Hotel with additional security over the shares of Bolton Wanderers (but not Burnden Leisure shares). The money was used to pay off a NatWest loan and repay borrowings from other group companies (in essence money previously provided by ED). The public record shows that PBP's ownership remains 80% Tom Morris and 20% Michael James. Its unlikely that any of this money would have been provided if MJ had not been a Wanderers supporter but equally unlikely that it was or is entirely up to Michael. The loans Ken Anderson has made to the group are secured by charges against all three companies and remain a personal debt of KA to Moonshift unless he has also used any other personal monies or borrowings to help shore up the business whilst unsuccessfully trying to find a buyer. Howard's figure of £8m (plus accruing interest and charges) seems credible until evidence emerges to the contrary. Sluffy is mistaken about the £12.9m loss referred to in the Chairman's statement. I can see how this misunderstanding arose but this part of the statement referred to the operating loss of the football club, not the hotel. The trade creditors of the hotel at the last balance sheet date were £708K.

Any mutual access would have to be be negotiated if separately owned. Another possibility is for the the hotel to be run as a joint venture, as it was for several years with De Vere Hotels. Quantuma acted for Blumarble in liquidating Holdsworth's Sports Shield BWFC Ltd. Seemed to do a good job.

The appointment of the administrators of Burnden Leisure and BWFC has still not been recorded on the Companies House register. However it seems safe enough to accept that, as reported in the media,, they were appointed by lawyers acting on behalf of the estate of Eddie Davies to recover amounts due to the estate by Ken Anderson. Some months ago, Howard claimed that the amount was nearer to £8m than the £5m reported in the media. Howard made some speculations that didn't seem to me to hold water (particularly relating to Michael James) but he quoted the source of that piece of information as being the lawyers themselves. Unlike Howard, I have had no access to inside info but, in any case, the amount reported as paid to settle up Blumarble was not £5million but £4.4million. So, leaving aside the extra £3m, there's another £600k that might have been used, amongst other things, to help keep the hotel doors open a bit longer. Both Ken Anderson and PBP have charges over the assets of the hotel, as security for money lent to other group companies, but it does not follow that either or both are owed money by the hotel. The more recent appointment of Quantuma by KA was registered at Companies House on 3 June 2019 and might imply that KA is owed money by the hotel that he may need to settle his debt to the Davies estate. Its all a bit inconclusive really but not difficult to understand why all parties involved are trying to look after their own interests.

Apologies for the delay but I agree with Sluffy's comments. I saw nothing in Mr Igoe's comments that we didn't know already but there does seem to be quite a bit of relevant stuff glossed over, though it may well have been inadvertent. For example, the 24% interest was never paid whilst the legal basis of BM's charge over the club's assets was challenged by KA almost before the ink had dried on Holdsworth's signature. Mr Igoe seems to infer that the EFL should have vetoed the Court's approval to the new arrangements even though it meant HMRC and other unsecured creditors were likely to get paid when otherwise they wouldn't. I confess that I read Mr Igoe's article quickly and only once (it didn't seem worth a second reading) but I don't recall him mentioning the further substantial rescue funds from PBP or the player sales that materially helped ensure a going concern for at least another two years after the takeover. He makes much of the consultancy fees even though 90% of the £525K was needed to keep BM at bay, pay off Holdsworth and avoid unaffordable tax charges related to transactions associated with these matters We know, of course, that only £4m of the £5m BM facility materialised but the £2.5m allegedly due from KA remains decidely opaque. Would a man as experienced as KA really put that amount at stake for 50% of the shares when Holdsworth was risking nothing for his 50%? Howard's claim that KA owed Moonshift nearly £8m (not £5m) appears to unintentionally suggest that he might have done but only after Holdsworth had been bought off. Will we ever get objective and informed clarification? I'm not sure we will.

Dave Singleton went to Canon Slade and Eddie Davies lived in Westhoughton? No wonder they are serialising his memoirs in the Beeno.

Sam Allardyce has had 48 years in football and been a manager since 1991, so how much did he learn in all that time about football finance? Apparently he learned that it would be a smart move to borrow £millions from Ray Ranson to spend on players and agents and repay it over 25 years. So just imagine how much BWFC's present players understand about the financial facts of life and how easily they might fall for cloud cuckoo reasoning.

Just been reading up about former Wanderer, Jimmy Hogan, and came across this interesting piece: http://elbombin.stuarthomfray.co.uk/Jimmy-Hogan/. Its over a century ago that Hogan first started coaching the Hungarian team that in 1953 and 1954 showed England how football could be played. Wanderers fans today might be interested in the article's concluding paragraph. '' He continually warned the FA that English football would be overtaken by the ‘Continentals’, but to no avail. In a country where it was believed that keeping a ball away from the players during the week would increase their eagerness to get it on match-day, his love of the short pass, exploitation of space, good technique, and hatred of the mindless long ball would always prove difficult to get across.''

Goal scored by Philliskirk Junior

Just been discussed briefly on Football Focus. Nowt we hadn''t heard before. Lawro made an interesting point re:Norwich. Head of recruitment is second only to the manager in order of importance in any football club, he said. I'd put 'em the other way round if you had a good'un in recruitment.

Done alright has Deano since the collapse of Xpro Management Services Ltd. PFA didn't seem too happy with its predecessor either.