If any other business has failed and lost funds the way we have in the last 3 years, there would rightly be questions asked about the competence of the leadership?

Seeing how pathetic we have slumped to in the transfer market, is surely a wake up call. It is embarrassing!

Yet nobody is deemed to be culpable for this failure.

Sorry about this doom and gloom, but I'm so angry!

Best chairman as all the rest sacked him. Fact.

 todd left after gartside took over.

 

 

wrong

 

todd left in september when hargreaves sold frandsen after already selling a few more

 

gartside became chairman in october

 

read the article below, written by a bolton fan who now works on 442 - and then try to defend hargreaves

 

http://www.wsc.co.uk/the-archive/32-Managers/4036-todd-man-out

 

 

Colin Todd left Bolton in farcical circumstances. Gary Parkinson untangles the story behind his decision to leave

The business equivalent of pride before a fall is the construction of a flash new HQ followed by financial disaster and bankruptcy. Building the Prem­iership-standard Reebok Stadium has brought Bolton Wan­derers into such financial peril that there is a grave danger of never getting near that division again.

It all started, of course, with the stock market. BWFC merged with Mosaic Investments in 1997 to create Burnden Leisure plc. Five BWFC directors shared a paper profit of £30 million worth of shares in the new company.

The initial signs were good, with a new stadium ­illustrating the newly promoted club’s am­bition. Man-ager Colin Todd had a transfer kitty and was shrewdly bringing the squad up to Prem­iership level (until he signed Dean Holdsworth for £3.5 million). But the last-day, goal-difference relegation at Chelsea in 1998 was to cause more important losses than the odd tear.

 

Players started to leave the Reebok for sizeable sums which were not reinvested in the team. Alan Thompson was the first to go, for a club record-equalling £4.5 million. Little of it was spent on strengthening the team. Yet strangely the plc found the money for a speculative investment of around £10 million on a hotel in the South Stand at the Reebok.

 

On the field, the team had started the season bright­ly, with Nathan Blake and Arnar Gunnlaugsson scoring goals aplenty. Pity, then, that both were quickly flogged, for nearly £6.5 million in total. At the other end, the suspect defence was plugged by the loan signing of the imperious Jon Newsome, who became available at just £2 million, less than a month after Blake was sold for more than twice that amount. Yet Todd was denied the money to buy him, on the grounds that the club’s fail-ure to sell the old Burnden Park site was costing a packet in repayments on loans secured against the sale.

 

Although Todd remained typically impassive in the media, claiming the sales of the strikers were “foot­balling decisions” rather than financial (chairman Gor­don Hargreaves later revealed this wasn’t true), he was becoming hampered by the tightening purse strings. On deadline day he was reduced to signing a Palace reserve, Jamie Fullarton, on loan and goalkeeper Steve Banks for just £50,000 from Blackpool – though luck­ily he turned out to be brilliant.

 

By then the messages from the boardroom were becoming dark warnings about failure to gain promotion costing the club dear. Shorn of firepower, leaking goals and fearful of the future, the team plummeted from chasing Sunderland for the championship to scraping into a doomed play-off bid.

 

As if the lack of spending on players weren’t enough, it then emerged that the contract to build the superfluous hotel had been “won” by chairman Har­greaves’s construction company. The contract was not offered out to competitive tender, the feeling being that the company’s “knowledge” of the ground entitled it to the job.

 

No money was provided for Todd during the sum­mer, and he was forced to release the out-of-contract Scott Sellars while being denied permission to sign even loan or non-contract players. Still Hargreaves denied Bolton were a selling club, preferring the euph­emism “trading club”.

 

Both Per Frandsen and Mark Fish had clauses in their contracts allowing them to speak to interested Premiership clubs, but at that time there were no takers. While Fish sulked in the reserves, Frandsen buckled down and play­ed diligently, moving his boss to say that losing the Dane, whom he rated at £8 million, would be “one of the greatest disappointments of my managerial car­eer”.

 

However, the straits were now dire, with Hargreaves for­ced to deny whis­pers about an emergency meeting tak­ing place to discuss the possibility of declaring the club bank­rupt: “It’s ab­solute non­sense to talk in those terms,” he said. “It’s just not true.” A day later, the Burnden burden was finally lifted with the sale of the site for £6.75 million. The day after that, Har­greaves and his board sold Frandsen to Jack Walker’s notorious spend­thrifts for just £1.75 million. Todd resigned on the spot, though it later emerged he had known about, and pleaded ag­ainst, the transfer for the best part of a week.

 

Frandsen will not be the last to leave. The club may still be as much as £10 million in debt and few, if any, bids for players will be turned down. By the time you read this, Bolton could have lost any or all of Andy Todd, Eidur Gudjohnsen, Ricardo Gardner and Claus Jensen. Seven first-teamers whose contracts are up in June will not be kept on. Nothing about the future is certain, except that it’s bad.

Gartside did the dirty on Hargreaves to take over the club, he couldn't have any complaints if someone did the same to him. Thing is we fallen so far now under his guidance who is going to want to take it on.

 

We have not fallen that far. We are probably in the same position as we were when he took over. Infact better off because we were almost going bust.

wrong

 

todd left in september when hargreaves sold frandsen after already selling a few more

 

gartside became chairman in october

 

read the article below, written by a bolton fan who now works on 442 - and then try to defend hargreaves

 

http://www.wsc.co.uk/the-archive/32-Managers/4036-todd-man-out

 

 

Everyone who folowed the club in the late 80's and into the 90's knew what a set of corrupt fuckers were running our club.

Hargreaves, Jones and McBain will hopefully rot in hell.

only shysters and fuckwits write for wsc

you're not wrong

hargreaves, now that is a cunt

Wsc is an okay read

Christ we could kill for a per frandsen right now. He'd fucking sort things out and then pop one in from 25 yards just to make sure

Christ we could kill for a per frandsen right now. He'd fucking sort things out and then pop one in from 25 yards just to make sure

been lacking someone like that for years now

 

we need a fuckin nutter

been lacking someone like that for years now

 

we need a fuckin nutter

stig tofting?

Come on now. There's forty odd games left. Leave the bedsheets on the bed where they will do you more good, stop giving Rroverrrs ammo for their Reebok comedy club thread and get behind Dougie. We've had worse starts than this (and don't bother proving me wrong with "in nineteen blah de blah. . . ". You know what I mean.

Come on Bolton.

Come on now. stop giving Rroverrrs ammo for their Reebok comedy club thread and get behind Dougie.

Come on Bolton.

I thought it was a shit thread from its conception. We need to concentrate on our own club and as you say, support the manager.

I thought it was a shit thread from its conception. We need to concentrate on our own club and as you say, support the manager.

 

Sensible as usual.

wrong

 

todd left in september when hargreaves sold frandsen after already selling a few more

 

gartside became chairman in october

 

read the article below, written by a bolton fan who now works on 442 - and then try to defend hargreaves

 

http://www.wsc.co.uk/the-archive/32-Managers/4036-todd-man-out

internet wanker, do some house work....

have you never moved jobs to a bigger company ? rioch said GH was the best chairman he had worked with. todd left after gartside took over.

and he did do the dirty on hargreaves.

 

big ed took over in 2003 not 1999

Thanks Victor I knew as soon as I mentioned Hargreaves , Carlos would come all guns blazing. It's ok to slag him off but not Gartside? Name me a millionaire who hasn't done anything shady (lottery winners excepted before someone says it). I don't care what some bloke on wsc says,(article is just his opinion again)Could just as easily write an article about the financial mess we are in now.I'm entitled to my opinion as well but when people come out with untruths like we were going bust before Gartside took over, that's just not true. He didnt save the club he just saw an opportunity and took it, fair enough but to my mind he is no better than anyone else.Also we all know why Rioch left, if that's just 'fucking off' then aye ok.

The same argument people are having about PG (earning far to much) surely GH was this ten times over?

Thanks Victor I knew as soon as I mentioned Hargreaves , Carlos would come all guns blazing. It's ok to slag him off but not Gartside? Name me a millionaire who hasn't done anything shady (lottery winners excepted before someone says it). I don't care what some bloke on wsc says,(article is just his opinion again)Could just as easily write an article about the financial mess we are in now.I'm entitled to my opinion as well but when people come out with untruths like we were going bust before Gartside took over, that's just not true. He didnt save the club he just saw an opportunity and took it, fair enough but to my mind he is no better than anyone else.Also we all know why Rioch left, if that's just 'fucking off' then aye ok.

Are you a yellow or brown snowball? It's just that your recent posts seem to be full of either piss or shit.

Thanks Victor I knew as soon as I mentioned Hargreaves , Carlos would come all guns blazing. It's ok to slag him off but not Gartside? Name me a millionaire who hasn't done anything shady (lottery winners excepted before someone says it). I don't care what some bloke on wsc says,(article is just his opinion again)Could just as easily write an article about the financial mess we are in now.I'm entitled to my opinion as well but when people come out with untruths like we were going bust before Gartside took over, that's just not true. He didnt save the club he just saw an opportunity and took it, fair enough but to my mind he is no better than anyone else.Also we all know why Rioch left, if that's just 'fucking off' then aye ok.

 

its not just some bloke on wsc

 

and which bits are you unhappy with - you say the article is 'opinion'

 

much of the article isn't opinion, its fcuking indisputable fact and a lot of it doesn't make very good reading

 

for example, the personal profit made by some board members

 

i'll repost the parts of the article that are matters of fact

 

 

It all started, of course, with the stock market. BWFC merged with Mosaic Investments in 1997 to create Burnden Leisure plc. Five BWFC directors shared a paper profit of £30 million worth of shares in the new company.

The initial signs were good, with a new stadium ­illustrating the newly promoted club’s am­bition. Man-ager Colin Todd had a transfer kitty But the last-day, goal-difference relegation at Chelsea in 1998 was to cause more important losses than the odd tear.

 

Players started to leave the Reebok for sizeable sums which were not reinvested in the team. Alan Thompson was the first to go, for a club record-equalling £4.5 million. Little of it was spent on strengthening the team. the plc found the money for a speculative investment of around £10 million on a hotel in the South Stand at the Reebok.

 

On the field, the team had started the season bright­ly, with Nathan Blake and Arnar Gunnlaugsson scoring goals aplenty.  both were quickly flogged, for nearly £6.5 million in total. At the other end, the suspect defence was plugged by the loan signing of the imperious Jon Newsome, who became available at just £2 million, less than a month after Blake was sold for more than twice that amount. Yet Todd was denied the money to buy him

 

Although Todd remained typically impassive in the media, claiming the sales of the strikers were “foot­balling decisions” rather than financial (chairman Gor­don Hargreaves later revealed this wasn’t true), he was becoming hampered by the tightening purse strings. On deadline day he was reduced to signing a Palace reserve, Jamie Fullarton, on loan and goalkeeper Steve Banks for just £50,000 from Blackpool

 

By then the messages from the boardroom were becoming dark warnings about failure to gain promotion costing the club dear. Shorn of firepower, leaking goals and fearful of the future, the team plummeted from chasing Sunderland for the championship to scraping into a doomed play-off bid.

 

As if the lack of spending on players weren’t enough, it then emerged that the contract to build the superfluous hotel had been “won” by chairman Har­greaves’s construction company. The contract was not offered out to competitive tender, the feeling being that the company’s “knowledge” of the ground entitled it to the job.

 

No money was provided for Todd during the sum­mer, while being denied permission to sign even loan or non-contract players. Still Hargreaves denied Bolton were a selling club, preferring the euph­emism “trading club”.

 

Both Per Frandsen and Mark Fish had clauses in their contracts allowing them to speak to interested Premiership clubs, but at that time there were no takers. While Fish sulked in the reserves, Frandsen buckled down and play­ed diligently, moving his boss to say that losing the Dane, would be “one of the greatest disappointments of my managerial car­eer”.

 

However, the straits were now dire, with Hargreaves for­ced to deny whis­pers about an emergency meeting tak­ing place to discuss the possibility of declaring the club bank­rupt: “It’s ab­solute non­sense to talk in those terms,” he said. “It’s just not true.” A day later, the Burnden burden was finally lifted with the sale of the site for £6.75 million. The day after that, Har­greaves and his board sold Frandsen to Jack Walker’s notorious spend­thrifts for just £1.75 million. Todd resigned on the spot, though it later emerged he had known about, and pleaded ag­ainst, the transfer for the best part of a week.

 

Frandsen will not be the last to leave.

 

i've removed a few lines for you

 

opinion my arse

 

we won't discuss the benefit to his company of the stadium build as i don't know if the stories i've heard are true

Edited September 4, 201312 yr by Casino

Hargreaves sold his company for a premium based on its inflated order book after the hotel contract was awarded without going to tender.

 

FACTAFUCKUCKINGMUNDOWOTHGREATBIGGLITTETRYFUCKINGBELLSONANDTHATISNTOPINION oh aye I missed ITK to validate it

Edited September 4, 201312 yr by Gonk

Snowball Hargreaves.

Hargreaves sold his company for a premium based on its inflated order book after the hotel contract was awarded without going to tender.

 

FACTAFUCKUCKINGMUNDOWOTHGREATBIGGLITTETRYFUCKINGBELLSONANDTHATISNTOPINION oh aye I missed ITK to validate it

 

 

Does Hargreaves have a secretary called Helen? I hope not!

Makes horrendous reading.

 

And I wouldn't be surprised to be reading a similar analysis of the last 12 years or so before long. Just a feeling.

Are you a yellow or brown snowball? It's just that your recent posts seem to be full of either piss or shit.

Whatever. Sticks and stones and all that.

Whatever. Sticks and stones and all that.

 

woah, you don't get off that lightly

 

what do you dispute in the article?

 

i'll see if the author fancies answering anything you reckon is 'opinion' and not FACT