Darlo Facing Cash Questions

Five years after reforming, Darlington have admitted they are facing a cash crisis and are seeking talks with potential investors.

The club has been told it will not be able to compete in the National North play-offs after failing to meet ground grading requirements. They are one of three clubs barred by the League due to not having 500 seats under cover - a League requirement rather than a FA one - with all three appealing the decision.

However two Darlington Directors have resigned over the issue, and a third is considering his position, citing 'vitriol' from supporters in the wake of the news. The club says that they could not afford the six-figure cost of installing the seating anyway, with losses mounting following their move back to Darlington after an enforced exile in Bishop Auckland, and would struggle to raise the £500,000 needed to achieve the full 'A' grading needed to remain at National Premier level, let alone the financial needs on the pitch.

The supporter owned club has reported debts of £80,000 and has required a £50,000 loan from Directors and outside supporters to stay afloat this season. Operating costs of £35,000 over budget this season were compounded by income underperforming by £30,000 under the projected figures, with £15,000 of debt still on the books from last season.

Manager Martin Gray has been told to cut his budget by £85,000 for the coming season to balance the books, with the triple promotion winner warning supporters that he will leave if that is the case. Gray says he needs a £400,000 budget to compete at National North level - £10,000 a week on part time deals - with the club finances showing that 70% of income was directed to the playing budget.

Gray says the ownership model has to change to compete at their level and above, telling a supporter forum 'as a fan owned club we have gone as far as we can go. We need a different direction for this football club to go forward. We are an embarrassment, a laughing stock in the football world.'

Gray says he is in talks with investors who are capable of pushing the club forward, but that the supporters will have to accept a minority stake for it to happen.

Money No Object, Object To No Money

Portsmouth's takeover discussions should lead to a Supporters Trust representative remaining on the Board, according to a survey by the Trust.

The view appears to be at odds to early statements from Michael Eisner, who sees the supporters being part of a 'heritage' board to protect the finer details of the Portsmouth 'brand' rather than the operational running of the club.

More than 2000 supporters largely backed talks with the former Disney chief, and generally thought the club would be able to achieve a higher league placing with a Billionaire behind them than the current ownership setup, although they wanted to retain a supporter voice on the club Board.

However when it came to funding a new stadium and increased investment in the playing budget, supporters voted for new shareholders or owners to be the ones to cover the financial needs, with less than 10% of respondents expecting the current shareholders, including the supporters, to cover the bills.

Nearly half of respondents had 'no reservations' on Eisner buying the club, with an almost equal number not wanting a single person owning the club again.

Meanwhile the single owner model remains badly broken at Leyton Orient. Off-field staff have issued a statement saying they have started a grievance process with the club over unpaid wages, but that the complaint has not been responded to.

Staff still have not received their March wages, with little more than a week until April's sums are due, and have received no communication as to whether they will receive the money either.

Over at National League Barrow, their single owner model has just recorded a £1million debt to their owner over the past trading year. Owner Paul Casson loaned the club £990,754 in the past 12 months to the end of May 2016, with the US based businessman telling the press he had no intention of calling in the debt.

That £1million investment saw the Bluebirds end the 2015/16 season in 9th place, ten points outside the play-offs. This season they are in 7th place, outside the play-offs by four points with just two games remaining.

With a similar debt likely to have been accumulated this season the Bluebirds are likely to be nearly £3million in debt by the time the current financial year is complete, on fairly static average attendances of 1300.

You Can't Say We Didn't Tell You

A small uproar has erupted in the IT community over Microsoft's decision that it will no longer support new hardware on anything other than Windows 10.

In a rare occurrence, I'm actually going to back Microsoft on this one. They've had that stance for 15 months. It was January 2016 that they posted that they wouldn't continue software fixes for Windows 7 and 8.1 (having already ditched 8 as the bad job that it was) to the newest generation of processors.

The new processors are literally new. AMD's Ryzen was announced 5 months ago, Intel's 7th Generation of Core processors came out in January. Only the hardcore "must have" people will be running these right now.

Microsoft have a habit of ditching old tech - if not old operating systems - to drive PC sales and, subsequently, their licence sales. Their switch to "Windows as a Service" with an app store in the Apple mould is the recognition that - as Apple found - the basic software that drives the machine should essentially be free, with everything else a paid-for add-on.

The main issue Microsoft will find now is that their eco-system is overgrown with other products. Don't want to pay for Word? Here's Open Office. The Windows system has, for the last 25 years, nurtured a stream of bedroom programmers to bring a deluge of software to the platform that Apple can't even come close to matching.

It's all a bit Frankenstein's Monster, but the drive for new tech has gone from the desktop to the mobile screen. Something Microsoft doesn't have dominance of.

Microsoft accidentally built the beast they are now hopeful of containing. It's not likely, at least in the short term, but they are hopeful. Revenues at the Gates-inspired conglomo-fest are struggling, with the switch of Office to a subscription model probably the only thing keeping the Microsoft executives from not being in a full-on panic.

Windows is now such a throwaway item, anyone is able to get it for free in exchange for a single 'white lie' click on a particular Microsoft website. It's the unpublished loophole in the licencing agreements that Microsoft sign with equipment manufacturers in a bid to keep Windows as the dominant player in the increasingly irrelevant desktop game.

Google's Android operating system is now so big, thanks to mobiles and tablets, that Microsoft is genuinely under threat as the supplier to the world. Google are to make major plays into the Business sector, from the traditional home market they are now dominating, and there are plenty of companies now reliant on Google services to find an Android or Chrome infrastructure an acceptable one.

We are all going to be assimilated. Microsoft still hope it will be with them.

The Misery Drags On

A week after Ilkeston's players went on strike, the club has assured the Northern Premier League that they will fulfill their fixtures. The players, some unpaid since before Christmas, have agreed to see out the season without wages.

It is reported that the power supply to their ground has been cut off due to non-payment of electricity bills, and some office staff have gone unpaid for up to six months as the club, which started the season under suspension for non-payment of football debts, seeks a buyer.

Meanwhile over at National South side Gosport Borough, HMRC have submitted a winding up petition for the fourth time in 12 months. The club says the quarterly VAT bill was due early last month and an offer to settle it by last week was rejected. Chairman Mark Hook went to the press to lay some of the blame at former Vice Chairman Jim Fallon's door, saying he changed his mind on a £40,000 sponsorship deal at the last minute.

Fallon himself had only just completed a three and a half year ban from football during a previous stint at Gosport with the FA finding him guilty of transfer irregularities, something which he still denies. The events left Fallon threatening to sue the club over loans he had made totalling £84,000.

Gosport are currently four points the wrong side of the relegation line with just four matches remaining and, like Ilkeston, are looking for new owners.

Over at Leyton Orient, their youth side put in a valiant effort but ultimately lost 3-0 at Cambridge United in League Two. The majority of the club's First Team had become injured with wages still unpaid leaving a youthful side, whose starting XI squad numbers included 4 and 7 and then nothing under 22, to toil towards an almost inevitable relegation from the Football League.

The club are now ten points adrift of safety with five games remaining, and could be relegated on Friday after their match at Luton. That may be a blessing in disguise, with one of their two Doctors walking out last week due to non-payment.

In Football League matches, two Doctors are required - one for the players, and a second for the crowd - meaning Monday's crunch game with 22nd place Hartlepool may not be allowed to go ahead.

An All Cash Business

For nearly two years Carlisle United have been in discussions with a Billionaire investor.

Under the secrecy of non-disclosure agreements details of the individual were scant. Huge claims were made, offers considered and rejected. The 'billionaire'? A Syrian former pizza shop owner living in Canada.

Yahya Kirdi had previously tried to buy Liverpool in 2010, claiming to represent a group of Middle East investors. Fans dubbed it "the joke bid" with plans to rebuild the Anfield stadium with a solarium(!) whilst he also claimed to have placed a £162million order for passenger aircraft that the manufacturer named confirmed did not exist.

Claims Kirdi was a former international footballer were dismissed, and his spokesman expressed surprise when official documents were sent to him detailing Kirdi as the former owner of a small - failed - pizza takeaway in Canada.

The bid for Liverpool was withdrawn a few months after it became public. Five years later Kirdi started negotiations with Carlisle. He also appears to have tried to buy other clubs around Europe without success.

Carlisle have now turned to the owner of Edinburgh Woolen Mill for temporary funding after declaring Kirdi's plans as unrealistic on both squad budgeting and the development of Brunton Park.

Meanwhile over at National South side Chelmsford City, a long standing takeover has suddenly collapsed. Jade Global Group (JGG) were announced more than 12 months ago as ready to take over the club, passing a club shareholder vote last July.

JGG owner Kevin Allen resigned at the end of January, being replaced by a Michael Mescal, aged 62 according to documents filed at Companies House.

A Michael Mescal was convicted in an Italian court in July 2000 for drug smuggling, aged 46. Whether it is the same person is open to debate, but the press reports at the time hint the pair to be of a similar age. A separate entry on Companies House for a Michael Mescal, also born in May 1954, set up a construction company in January.

For Chelmsford themselves, their Chairman and Legal Counsel have resigned from their Board positions and the club now faces an EGM in the next few weeks to agree a way forward with 'short term financial pressure' on the club.

Invest To Improve

Telford have put their remaining shares back on sale and have expressed a hope to sell most of the remaining £344,000 worth.

A club statement says that 137 supporters bought shares in the last round, having had just 123 vote in the original decision to scrap supporter ownership of the reborn club. The statement came a few days after a statement on the club's Early Bird Season Tickets, noting that just 111 had been sold compared to 425 in the same period last year.

There seems to be a very committed ten percent of supporters still at the club but the majority seem to have lost a certain level of interest. They still come to games, over 1,100 last week for their win over Worcester, but the successive seasons of dismal results that has seen them fall out of the National Premier and have two seasons at the wrong end of National North have worn the bulk of supporters down in their levels of support.

A 3-0 loss to fellow strugglers Boston yesterday further cemented their bottom six place and, although they are highly unlikely to go down, a third season of struggle will not be tolerated for a club once considered to be a rising star.

Elsewhere, Darlington have had their name change ratified by the FA. The club recently moved back to the town and will now drop the 1883 suffix to their name that they were forced to adopt to differentiate themselves from the failed club when they reformed five years ago.

With echoes of activities closer to home, the club are currently under investigation by the FA for crowd disorder at a recent game where smoke bombs and alcohol were thrown onto a pitch. The club has already banned a number of people from attending further matches.

Paying The Dues

Three clubs have failed to pay their players and staff in the past week leading to further doubt about their futures.

At Northern Premier League side Ilkeston FC, 14 points inside the relegation zone, club captain Matt Baker took to a fans forum to state that many of the players refused to play in yesterday's game at Workington after being unpaid for several months, causing the match to be postponed.

The club were only formed in 2010 after the demise of Ilkeston Town, then of National North, who went bust in September 2010 due to a £47,000 tax bill. They restarted at Step 4, winning promotion in front of over 1,600 supporters in the first season but gates have tumbled over the last 12 months as the club intensified its focus on an Academy structure, with much of their first team teenagers on full time deals.

An average of 300 through the doors this season is just two thirds of last season's number, which had remained largely static since their promotion. The league will now seek assurances that the club will fulfill the remaining fixtures with a long hoped-for takeover still seemingly no closer.

Meanwhile Morecambe's players and staff have found their wages delayed for a third time this season. The club's owner, or at least the one currently having the strongest claim to ownership, says an 'international money transfer' was delayed leading to the failure to pay. The club's players responded on Saturday with a 3-1 loss at Cheltenham as they sunk to within 10 points of the relegation zone, albeit with only six games remaining.

Elsewhere, Leyton Orient's failure to pay saw another manager out of the door. Danny Webb, who started as the youth team manager but found himself in charge of the first team after a succession of walk outs, has made way for his assistant, Omer Riza.

Since beating fellow relegation favourite Newport 4-0, the club have lost five successive games with just one goal scored and now face the prospect of relegation by Easter Monday.