It would be entirely reasonable that anybody taking in a lodger should be paid for so doing. The terms of payment have nothing to do with anybody else but the parties involved. But that does not make the person providing the lodgings an employee any more than it makes the kit supplier an employee.

Irrespective of that, what gives anybody on this forum the right to question the integrity of the FR chair?

The fans, I'm afraid, are between a rock and a hard place. It would seem that any funds provided to the existing set up may just be sending good money after bad, particularly if it is used to pay money to an ex player who, under any normal contract conditions, would be in breach of contract!

This pretty much sums up my own thoughts regarding making a donation at this time, buying into a newco would be a different kettle of fish though.

The issue on Patten and Anderson is that they are legally owed that money and if it isn't paid then that could well be the end of SCR. So regardless of what anyone thinks if their ability and effort in a Reds shirt there is little option but to pay them.

Barton - I`m not sure here re Patten. His contract was for 3 years and he has walked out after just 2. So there may well be an angle for an adjournment.

As for Anderson surely we could be looking to do a deal maybe - another 12 month contract on a play as you play basis with the previous contract being rolled in.

Just feel that jaw jaw is better than war war.

I just dont know the arrangement with HMRC or whether they are definitely on the Petition.

Well you can extend that to people who, totally out of character, shout and scream at players and referees at matches. And I think most of us have done that at some point to be fair. What I would add is the web isn't the wild west environment of old. Today, when you make named, personal insults on here, it leaves yourself and this forum open to litigation.



The vibe I got from Thursday's meeting was to try and clear the petition and take it from there. (The fans won't be able to raise much more than that anyway, if we're being honest.) It would mean the club can trade while the RFL liases with its interested parties to buy the club in January. Very sketchy on the details but the RFL's COO Ralph Rimmer said as much to Paul Highton and the lads. The rest of the money appears to be liabilities that can be spread over a period of time or working capital - I can't recall with any certainty but that's the impression I got.

The most encouraging revelation was in regards to the 'robust' business plan, which could show a profit on modest crowds (based on the paying numbers from last season?). 'Robust' meaning cutting our cloth accordingly. And why John didn't disclose this fully on the 17th, I don't know. It would have saved a week's worth of despair.

Not that achieving last year's figures will be a cakewalk but the 8,000 nonsense was pie in the sky and it would have been futile continuing on that premise.





And that is the issue. If this isn't paid or contested, I believe the club would go into receivership - that's straight to liquidation, don't pass administration or CVA. That would mean starting the club from scratch. And it's clear from the last couple of meetings that opinion is mixed on this. I wouldn't bail on being handed that scenario but it would undoubtably be a very different world.



This was mentioned on Thursday.









Essentially, I got the impression the FR board have decided that keeping the company alive is preferable to the more seismic options. Therefore, dealing with the winding up petition is paramount. This does mean supporters are being asked to deal with at least some of the debts of Wilky's administration, as in 2003. But this is (I assume) probably the end of John and Howard's involvement.

If you don't mind doing this and want the club to secure its Super League place next year, donate as much as you can to the [url=http://viewtopic.php?p=17216287&tsmp=1356797928#p17216287Salford City Reds Foundation Appeal[/url. If you're still unsure, try and make some of the fundraising nights and the Swinton game - at least you'll have a night out while contributing . If you're still against this particular campaign, join Forever Reds as a member and donate through the Trust. Here, your money won't go to paying off another company's liabilities and you can have your say against the board's direction through the appropriate channels. If you do none of those, then why are you here?

The garbled point I tried to get across at Thursday meeting is there needs to be a clear, saleable message that supporters can spread, in laymen's terms, to their family, friends and acquaintances. Although crowd figures are a poor measure - they can be manipulated, inflated by freebies or heavily weighted towards concessionary discounts - a quantifiable if arbitrary number is nevertheless an easy sell. So if you could say to people with confidence that once the petition is cleared, and the remaining debt is restructured, the club could sustain itself on 4,500 paying punters - that's saleable. There was just something missing on Thursday to be able to come away with something like that. But it was more encouraging fare.

The whole thing is summed up very nicely by one phrase above...'very sketchy in the details'. Are people overlooking the 2nd petition brought by Mr Patten. No one seems to know what's for what who or when. Use the monly raised as a carrot for the mystery investor. While its tough on the players concerned, their beef is with the club/board. You need 600k just to get to the start of the season, that is not too long after the 7th Jan. When is someone going to be realistic. Based on the last 6 months of info out of the club how can you be sure that the figures given to you are the real figures.

I can understand the people who are reluctant to fund the existing Administration, if they have no confidence in them. However, whatever happens we will have a new Administration in place. If the potential new investors take over then a new Board of Directors will be appointed. If the club enters Administration then the Administrator takes over the management of the club. Either way the current Board goes, so any pledges, donations will not go to the current Administration.

No. That's [url=http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/60356/pages/24098what we're talking about[/url. And it is the most immediate issue.

Are we not a bit ahead of ourselves here? Who is running the club up to the Hearing? Who will be running the club post the Hearing? How do we know whether John/Howard/Ian have a plan B or not? Remember the Company is still insolvent so any new Director being appointed should take the appropriate advice.

As I said: sketchy.

So is it known when the taxman wants his slice of the pie?

What I can't understand,apart from Chinese writing,is how using the fund to pay off the 2 players' winding up order is different to how the fans' cash was wasted at Bradford.
I understand the basic argument that the Club may go bust unless the cash is paid across but not how the club will survive beyond that. This is not based on anything other than JW saying they needed ten times that.
If we had a definitive statement,rather than informed opinion, that £60k would mean the Club could continue then I'd be all for it.
The genuine supporters want to help,as did Bradford's,but this seems a plan based on hope which is fair enough,but delaying what may be inevitable rather than funding a coherent future.
Sorry,but someone had to say it.
Finally,if it really is that critical, why are Peel not doing it?
The amount is not as significant to them as it is to the fund raising supporters and,as I've said before,whatever their reason for pledging £750,000 to the original plan,that reason must still exist. It won't be their love of Rugby or connection with Salford.
I don't buy the fact that investors are looking for some sign of commitment from fans: they'll be looking at a cold hard business case.
If JW comes out and says that paying off the winding up order is a good use for spending supporters hard earned cash,I'll concede the point.

That's exactly what I don't get. As far as I understand it, the argument is: get the 60k and we *might* survive, don't and we definitely won't. So far, so simple. However, if it's a matter of survival, 60k is surely not an insurmountable sum to Wilkinson and Clague, and little more than a rounding error to Peel. What are we missing here?

A leap of faith, probably.

The reference to a leap of faith feels like emotional blackmail,a tug at the heart strings .
Common sense dictates that we need some sort of steer that settling the winding up order would do more than get us to the end of January.
I really do understand the feeling that we must do something but surely there needs to be some guidance.
Everybody is well meaning but there has to be some indication that there's a chance of this working,not just its implicit that ,if we don't,1914 Ltd will fail.

Ideally.

Bonito red.
You talk a lot of sense and I think I, like many other fans, understand the sad situation in which scr find themselves.

I see a big problem though after the Bradford fiasco.
If only one lesson should have been learned from that, it would be to keep your fans and supporters FULLY informed if you expect them to put their hand in their pockets. It would seem however that open, candid and detailed statements are still very difficult to come by. ( maybe for good reason, but nevertheless )

I sent a serious ( for me ) donation to Bradford bulls but as it all turned out, wished I had not.

Added to that, Peel holdings treated me very poorly when I came as an away fan, and I am afraid it leaves me, and many others reticent to help out when we are not sure exactly what the money is earmarked for.

I wish Salford the very best in their fight for survival, but for once I don't think that the fans will have a big effect on the result of what will happen.

Bradford raised 500k and still went into administation. It may have bought time but that money dissapeared into a black hole and once pledged the money has gone for good, it can't be raised again. So will 60k save the club? Or does it delay the ineviable? Does it just get the current owners off the hook via bank guarantees as it did with the bulls or does it solve the problem? Does the club still need K540 in the following 3 weeks or else its game over? What is peels role in all this if nosey parker is to be believed and they have paid half of the last months wages? How much tv money have the rfl advanced and how will this impact? Just what is the playing budget under the 'robust' plan? People need to know the real outcome of their goodwill.

An awful lot of questions and 'ifs' in this thread that really need answers before people part with their hard earned. The money can only be raised once, it has to be put to maximum use and not wasted. As a wakefield fan it sounds like ted richardsons desperate plea for backing at the end of his tenure. We refused and thankfully got our white knight and didn't look back, if he had of stayed the hole would have just got deeper. The rhetoric that came from wakey back then mirrors now, i.e. lots of open ended questions that never got an answer. I genuinely wish salford the very best, you are a club i've always had a soft spot for. But please get the answers needed to ensure that precious money isn't wasted.

Great post Theboyem very sensible and realism at last.

In the interests of fairness you should also remember that the Bradford situation was somewhat different to that of Wakefield. The shareholding of the club was split and went something like a quarter to Caisley, just under a quarter to Hood, another quarter split between half dozen individuals and the rest was made up of hundreds of small fan shareholders many of whom might not even have still be alive.

Once the 500K was raised, Hood was adamant that he had further investment ready to come in. However an EGM was called by Caisley to oust Hood and he had the backing of enough shareholders to do that. So any investment he may have had was never going to succeed once Caisley called the EGM. Where we would have been it Hood had of been of successful I'm not sure. Coulby then became acting Chairman and took the club into administration.

I'm not sad to see the back of Hood or Caisley and the club does seem to be making good progress under new management. The true test will be in the next few years though.

I wish Salford the very best of luck though and fully understand the desperation and pain you're all feeling right now. You will get know it alls telling you what you should be doing but there are no guarantees that it will work out the same. We had many telling us that the supporters trust should have raised the money and bought the club. It's hard enough to get supporters to join the board to organise events for fund raising, never mind taking on the running of a SL club.

Just my personal thoughts though and I sincerely hope you find a solution and I hope to visit your ground in happier times in May.

My heart really goes out to you guys having been through the same last year. I've pledged to your fund and will be paying as soon as the PayPal account becomes available for much the same reasons that I did with the Bulls: I can't be certain that my money won't go into a black hole nor that it won't go straight into a director's pocket, but what I can be sure of is if my club had folded and I hadn't put my hand in my pocket I'd have been left with a "what if I'd done more" feeling for years to come.

Good luck guys!

Surely us at FR want new owners,don't we.I mean can we really ask people to donate,if not.

Giving anything without regime change is a waste of time and money. The supporters should demand a place on the board.

Lance wake up will you

This is typical of FR, you have members who don't even know what's going on. Transparent my booty.

I'm a member & I know what's goin on, think anyone with common sense realise there is going to be new owners whatever happens.
It's going to be a takeover or administration so which ever, the end of the present owners & board is inevitable.
I don't want to see the end of the club, but the club as we know it won't exist & think that's why forever reds are doing the fundraising to make sure there is a club to still support when whoever takes over.
Think they have learnt from the Bradford fiasco & won't part with any money until they are sure it is going in the right place.
At least some of the fans are getting of backsides & doing something, the saying springs to mind Them that moan & do nowt shouldn't moan at all.