Figure owed to Stewarts is more likely half that. One or two other creditors joined the petition though. I never got confirmation as to who, but I think you could guess one of them. So total petition debt may be closer to £400k.
Too expensive, too long. Would leave them financially supporting the club at this level without making much movement towards making it self-sustaining.
What we're seeing at the moment, culminating in Roots Hall being formally sold to COSU/POSU if/when Fossetts planning permission is granted, is the club being separated from Ron's property dealings. It just requires time and patience due to the extent to which he's tangled it all up.
I understand your sentiment. I'd be one of the first people protesting if I thought it would do any good at the moment. There is absolutely a compelling argument that it took our fanbase far too long to come together and to start making our voices heard/Ron Martin's life difficult. No point dwelling on the past though, it is what it is and hopefully lessons have been learned for the future.
I genuinely don't think there is anything to be gained from protesting at this precise time though, apart from perhaps making people feel better. Which is fine. Generally though, there are independent processes happening which have to be allowed to run their course.
FWIW, the story that drew Justin Rees' attention was the one on the BBC Sport website reporting on RM selling SUFC for £1. Nothing to do with the protests as that story would have been on the BBC Sport website regardless of what the supporters were doing. He did find out about the protests pretty quickly afterwards though!
We're in contact with Justin Rees, the council and Anna Firth. We are considering putting something out, but I'm conscious that we don't know much beyond what was in the Echo story yesterday. Don't want to waste time putting out a nothing statement, so would want to word carefully.
There is an agreement in place for him to repay half of what the Consortium pay out if the deal falls through. I don't anticipate its a particularly strong agreement, and it's all well and good him trying to make himself look good by referring to it, but at the end of the day he doesn't have the money to honour it at the moment, and I don't know how legally enforceable it is.
The £3.5m paid by COSU is "committed spending". So what they've laid out on wages and any bills paid so far, in addition to the debts they've committed to repay once the deal completes.
COSU will not sanction the sale of season tickets unless they can ensure that the revenue generated from the sales will be used for the football club. I don't know how much more diplomatically I can word it! I understand Ronald keeps asking when they will go on sale, though. I wonder why?
Nope. They won't have control of the club's bank accounts and credit cards until they own it. It's different with wages as they know the amount needed to pay the entirety of the monthly wage bill, so can deposit that money into the club's account on the day of, or the night before, and Tom can then quickly pay it back out again for the payroll run.
Because he availed himself of any day-to-day responsibility for running the football club, and people have been able to keep him away.
Ah, the million dollar question!
www.rochdaleafc.co.uk
