Ken Anderson - An apology.

I must be a bit slow because I can't see the bit of how it was always Anderson's plan to shaft Holdsworth.

How so?

The way I've put the story together was that Holdsworth implausibly turned up out of the blue - with NO MONEY - to rescue the club from the 'evil' Eddie Davies.

Now I've had a fondness for places I've worked at over the years but I've never once though, 'you know what, I'll risk bankrupting myself to save the old place from debt, even though it has no chance of remotely even turning a profit for the next year or two because of the loss making contracts it as to honour until then'!

Anyway let us just say in the unlikely event I actually did something so stupid, I still had to find myself a 'money' partner to actually make it happen.

My first choice seemed to have ended up in prison recently, another I was linked to had a very unhealthy reputation and the one I walked into court with bailed out at the last second leaving me ending up with Anderson.

Obviously some sort of deal must have been struck - but who shafted who?

That is of course if ANY shafting was done by any side.

How would it seem fair for me to own half a club, when I couldn't pay any running costs at all - having no money like.

I can't believe Anderson would have no inkling of Holdsworth's financial position and must have negotiated his partnership with him accordingly.

Maybe, just maybe there was a thought that investment into Sports Shield might have been Holdsworth financial input - but seeing the company was only founded like the week before he took over the club this seems unlikely to me.

I honestly can't think why Holdsworth was involved in any way in buying the club other than to be a front piece for some unnamed backer behind him - it simply doesn't make any sense otherwise does it?

Then mix into the story of Birch asking the ST that literally popped up into being overnight just before the takeover (very suspicious that) to become a rival bid to Holdsworth.

So you had someone with no reason or money on the face of it, trying to buy the club from a group who had no money who was put up to being the rival bidder by the agent of the person who already owned the club!?!

Ok, let all that pass - we now have Holdsworth (no money) and Anderson owning the club.

So why did Anderson have to plot to shaft Holdsworth out of it - like a great many seem to believe?

Seems obvious from day one that Holdsworth could never uphold his financial part of an equal partnership to me - unless of course there was someone in the background pulling his strings and financing him.

Also seems reasonable to me for Anderson to say we both pay equally or if you can't you only get to keep whatever percentage of the club you can afford to finance out of your pocket.

That doesn't sound like shafting anyone to me.

It also seems like the two had come to an agreement to do just this - hence the proposed public Q and A - until someone stuck their beak in and caused all this shit at the last minute.

I wonder who are the only people to gain with Anderson getting shafted like this and talk of Administration to appear once again???

I also don't buy into this canonisation (and soon to be martyrdom) of St Dean Holdsworth either - 'I do it not for me but for the fans' bollocks.

Holdsworth has never been in this on his own, someone else as been in the background pulling his strings.  Who, I don't know.

But it's got to be better for the club to have Anderson with a plan to take the club forwards than for people with agendas to get us placed into Administration - surely?

Or am I being a bit stupid and missing something glaringly obvious?

Whoever it was behind Holdsworth (the bloke who fucked off sharpish as soon as he got near the books, can't remember his name) was obviously the money man.

He bailed and Holdsworth had no choice other than to get in bed with Anderson.

Anderson saw an opportunity and took it, safe in the knowledge that SS didn't have a pot to piss in and would be easy pickings, once he'd roped them (him?) into the Blue Marble deal, thus extending DH's liability way beyond his ability to cover it.

He gave him enough rope and Holdsworth hung himself.

And I've no sympathy for him.

Nobody has properly explained away that photo of him and Disley comparing their sets of horse teeth at the match.

A photo which also included that bent twat Michael Collins.

I knew he was in prison in February but couldn't say anything on here because the case was ongoing.

(He got 6 months up front for contempt during the early days of the fraud trial for pretending to be ill.)

So bollocks to Holdsworth and Sports Shield for being bent, stupid and naive.

And meanwhile, while all this is unfolding, who's still got his grubby fingers in the pie and will presumably get another pay out should the club be sold again....?

El Presidente, that's who.

He set Holdsworth up via Birch, created the ST to hedge his bets and create some urgency and sat back and waited.

He might be a twat, but he ain't daft.

Bread2.0 wrote:Whoever it was behind Holdsworth (the bloke who fucked off sharpish as soon as he got near the books, can't remember his name) was obviously the money man.

He bailed and Holdsworth had no choice other than to get in bed with Anderson.

Anderson saw an opportunity and took it, safe in the knowledge that SS didn't have a pot to piss in and would be easy pickings, once he'd roped them (him?) into the Blue Marble deal, thus extending DH's liability way beyond his ability to cover it.

But this isn't true though.

If his money man dumped him at the alter then he would HAD to have walked away from the purchase of the club because he would be committing a crime for which he could be imprisoned, namely purchasing a business knowing he would soon be insolvent.

The deal with Anderson was pre-arranged to avoid that - not just some spur of the moment thing.

Also the Blumarble deal, as I've explained once previously today, was taken out against Burnden Leisure's assets - not Holdsworth's - as part of the actual purchase agreement.

Thus Anderson as an equal director would have exactly the same liability for it as Holdsworth has.

So they both entered into a partnership with their eyes open and without intent to shaft one another.

The fall out between the two in my opinion - as best I can gather from the gossip - arose because Holdsworth almost immediately defaulted on bringing in investment for the club to pay the Blumarble monthly payments - which Anderson had to cover - and which contractually triggered Anderson becoming the senior partner - and Anderson held back his pledge of investment from then on until the financial position with Holdsworth could be clarified.

With Holdsworth (or his backers) not being able to keep their end of the partnership up, Anderson understandably wanted them to exit the club and take the risk/profit himself if he was the one paying to keep the business going.

Seems reasonable to me and must have seen somewhat acceptable to Holdsworth to - hence Andersons planned public Q and A - which was going to plan until someone stirred the shit up at the last possible moment!

My guess - and that is all it is - is that someone wants Holdsworth to remain inside the club in order to keep some influence into what is happening - and Anderson has initially told him/them to get stuffed - hence this current hissy fit and pulling the plug on the deal at the last moment to scupper the Q and A evening and make Anderson appear to look bad.  With Anderson quickly calling their bluff by making things to become known publically through Holdsworth, the ST's and LoV's personal PR hero, Mr Marc Iles himself of all people!

I still therefore can't see how Anderson has tried to shaft Holdsworth from the very start?

I did edit my post after posting to clarify more this point - which you may have missed - and it reads as follows, which negates your point I believe -

Sluffy wrote:
The deal with Anderson was pre-arranged to avoid that - not just some spur of the moment thing.

Also the Blumarble deal, as I've explained once previously today, was taken out against Burnden Leisure's assets - not Holdsworth's - as part of the actual purchase agreement.

Thus Anderson as an equal director would have exactly the same liability for it as Holdsworth has.

So they both entered into a partnership with their eyes open and without intent to shaft one another.

You're missing the point.

Anderson's got the money (his own or somebody else's) to cover 100% of the repayments in the short-term.

Holdsworth patently hasn't.

And Anderson knew this, hence why he set him up and knew that if he bided his time, Holdsworth would have to relinquish his shares or go bankrupt.

It was a cheap way of muscling Holdsworth out and taking 100% ownership of the club.

So when he sells it now, he gets 100% of the proceeds, less whatever he's re-paid to Bluemarble and whatever Fast Eddie's cut is.

Bread2.0 wrote:You're missing the point.

Anderson's got the money (his own or somebody else's) to cover 100% of the repayments in the short-term.

Holdsworth patently hasn't.

And Anderson knew this, hence why he set him up and knew that if he bided his time, Holdsworth would have to relinquish his shares or go bankrupt.

It was a cheap way of muscling Holdsworth out and taking 100% ownership of the club.

So when he sells it now, he gets 100% of the proceeds, less whatever he's re-paid to Bluemarble and whatever Fast Eddie's cut is.

I'm not missing the point at all.

It is you that isn't seeing mine.

I'm Holdsworth, I want to buy the club but I've no money (why the fuck for - makes no sense at all does it?).

I end up in a position I can buy it with by being in partnership with a QuickQuid type company/bloke but have Anderson in the wings just in case.

The QuickQuid company/bloke pulls out and Anderson steps in.

Now how the hell am I ever going to fund my part of the deal with whoever it is I end up in bed with?

I can't sell club assets - Davies has first call on them.  I've no asset's large enough of my own to put into the club - so I must always have been a front man for someone else.

Anderson must have known that and as long as money was put in from the Holdsworth side he had no problem with that.

He therefore did not set out to shaft Holdsworth or anyone else on the deal.

It was only following the Holdsworth side not keeping up their financial side of the deal did he have to act to protect himself - otherwise he'd be putting in ALL the money for only HALF of the ownership of the club.

My point is that if Holdsworth (who has no money) was no more than a front for someone else then Anderson could not possibly have set out with the intent to shaft Holdsworth from the beginning.

Holdsworth had nothing worth shafting for - that is until his camp couldn't meet their financial commitment - in which case Anderson had to move to protect himself and renegotiate the partnership to reflect the financial reality between the two parties.

You old cynic Sluffy, but your reasoning is certainly sound, and now things are coming to pass, in what is seemingly a one-sided power play.

At least the results of this phase of KA's plans should be known by the end of the week

I'm not convinced it was always KAs plan to shaft Deano - more opportunistic now that a further cash injection is needed and DH has already spent his load (metaphorically speaking)

There is however a possibility that efforts to make up the cash shortfall that I alluded to when they first took over (£7.5 million as never going to be enough) were not pursued as enthusiastically as they might have been in order to create this situation once it was realised we have the possibility of a quick return to the Championship - so maybe shafting Deano became the plan?