But it was a headline that was totally overshadowed when we heard the news that Gary Barlow was threatening to quit X Factor, and Rovers manager Gary Bowyer had been summoned to India to meet the Venkys. What next in the saga? Somewhere there’s a terrific TV soap in there – ‘Meet the Venkys,’ I’d call it.
And then as if all that wasn’t enough, everything was overshadowed by the news that there was real, real intrigue at Burnley Football Club with the statement that came from Co-chairman Mike Garlick.
It was prompted by a Burnley Express feature claiming that talks between the club, John Sullivan and Russian investors were on-going and that both chairmen would be involved. Things had slowed down because Brendan Flood had earlier resigned from the board, this had been a setback, but things would resume again when the ground buy-back had been completed.
Well for a few hours that seemed clear enough: THE RUSSIANS WERE COMING AND THE CLUB AND CHAIRMEN WERE INVOLVED.
But: next up came a quite sensational club statement from Co-chairman Mike Garlick. It rebuffed the claims regarding Russian money; the board were not involved in negotiations. John Sullivan (the man described as international ambassador for the club)) would cease being an Associate Director in May 2013 and Brendan Flood was not permitted to be a director of the club because of Football League regulations to do with being ‘fit and proper.’
And then the whole thing escalated. Official records as to who has taken out an IVA are not top secret and can easily be looked up but the Brendan Flood IVA had not so far been made public. It was revealed that he had taken out the IVA (Individual Voluntary Arrangement) as long ago as February 29th, 2012. Yet he had remained as a director until January 2013 even though Football League regulations prevent holders of an IVA sitting on the board of a football club. An IVA, in short, helps a person in financial difficulty to repay debts without entering bankruptcy.
The airwaves hummed, in fact it was more than just a hum; it was a red hot sizzle with the revelation that came from Flood himself that he currently feels there is a lack of leadership, a lack of belief around the club; that he was not yet finished with the club, could return to the board in the near future, but to return there would need to be changes in the boardroom, and that he had held informal talks with friends about putting money in.
It was further reported that Flood was upset and confused by the decision to involve him in the statement. He was not in regular contact with Sullivan in connection with foreign investment. His IVA in fact runs out soon. Since January we had thought that Flood resigned for personal reasons to do with the sheer exhaustion of sorting out his financial problems, ‘to recharge his batteries’ as it were. In fact, he was ‘outed’ for want of a better word and his ‘unfit and unproperness’ was made public by the club, i.e. Mike Garlick, from whom the statement originated.
If some people thought this was ‘a cheap dig’, ‘an ‘unfair tactic’, ‘vindictive and shoddy’ being amongst the comments, ‘rather naughty of the club’ was another, and questioned the relevance of Flood to the Russian story, then perhaps Garlick felt it was reasonable in view of the Burnley Express report in which Sullivan had referenced Flood, (closely involved in the negotiations’ said the report), and his resignation from the board. But whatever the interpretation it was clear that in the statement, the club/Garlick/and other directors we assume, were distancing themselves from Sullivan, Flood and Russian money.
When, some time ago, the Burnley board was drastically cut from ten to five, it was referred to as the ‘night of the long knives.’ With that in mind, the Mike Garlick statement was perhaps the ‘afternoon of the pen.’ Flood later tweeted ‘actions speak louder than words.’
You wonder where all this will lead. But as Bill Bryson once kept saying – I’m only asking.
It is reasonable to assume that the changes Flood would like to see in the boardroom would involve Clive Holt and Mike Garlick. Of course it was not the IVA itself that was mentioned in the statement, but ‘Football League regulations.’ But from that, ouch, the inference was clear, that Brendan Flood no longer passed the Football League’s Fit and Proper Person test. You didn’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to work out the rest. It was, effectively, as good as a knee in the groin.
Just as there are different opinions of Bob Lord, of Margaret Thatcher, (and probably Gary Barlow), so are there different opinions of Brendan Flood. One group sees him as the man who might have taken the club into administration back in 2009. The other group, and it includes me, sees him as the man whose vision, drive and energy brought Premiership football to Burnley.
So what questions emerge?
Can John Sullivan have made all this up – surely not?
How can there be such a massive gap between what he says and the club says?
Has the Burnley Express got things hugely wrong?
Have Sullivan and Flood been working together on some scheme – or not?
Surely it is too soon for Brendan Flood to attempt a comeback? Who are his friends that might invest?
He would like to come back – but not as chairman – why? If he came back as the power broker, who would he install or support as chairman?
Did Mike Garlick consult with the other board members before releasing the statement, or was it his alone?
And is there a chance I’ll get my potatoes in this week? (I’m only asking). As it turned out, yes, I got some in.
Whatever your opinions are or mine, it’s been a long time since something as eye-opening as this has happened off the field at BFC. The gap between what John Sullivan has been saying about the Russian money and what was in the Garlick statement is so vast it is staggering. And for sure, the reference to Flood was generally seen as sticking the boot in, and as such, a very clear own-goal by Mr Garlick.
It begged the wider question – just how harmonious are things behind the scenes and how are decisions being made? Are they all singing from the same hymn sheet; in fact is there a hymn sheet?
Here is a club where once again we are told the jar on the mantelpiece has very little in it – and yet behind the scenes, appointments seem to be proliferating. At the top is Lee Hoos, presumably earning a bob or two. He has John Mathers as his sort-of number two. Now another appointment has been made and this new appointment is a sort of number-two to John Mathers.
How and why was this latest new guy appointed – shop manager I believe? I thought John Mathers was in charge of retail along with ticketing. The programme says so. I thought there was cost-cutting going on (I’m only asking). People in there had to re-apply for their jobs.
And then on top of all this there is a consultant, Michael Guest, who has been brought in to sort out retail matters. Two of his ‘team’ were in the shop stocktaking one day when I went in, faces new to the club. If memory serves, they told me they too were consultants. When you say the word consultant – the next word that springs to mind is ‘fee’. How much are all these appointments costing? Where is all this money coming from to pay for these people? Who is sanctioning these extra appointments?
The theory is I guess that the club needs a more business-like approach to things. But since when has Burnley Football Club ever been a business? It is not and never will be. In my other life as a little head of a little old village school, and a poor village at that; I spent 14 years milking those poor people of what little money they had for the school. Eventually the penny dropped; they had little left to give and my name was mud. It is the same with the football club. There is precious little money in Burnley and if the ‘new breed’ of business people staffing the club see them as cash cows, rather than the club providing a service to the community, then it will backfire. We had a slogan once ‘the club for its people.’ But which people. (I’m only asking).
Take books in the club shop for example: Of course I‘ve got a vested interest. I don’t write books to see them stacked up in the publisher’s warehouse. But currently you cannot get a copy of either the Fletcher book or the Coyle book, the club shop sold out, and yet they are still selling elsewhere. As things stand at the moment they are not being re-stocked. That’s because, as I understand it, selling books is not seen as a service, but only in cold cash terms as 1% of the retail income. Trouble is if you stop selling everything that only represents 1% of income, then soon it mounts up to 10%. Even if only six people want to buy a book, if it is ‘the club for its people’, then you need to cater for those people.
So what does this club exist for, to provide a service, or to fit a theoretical business model? The latter it never will, so that leaves you to aim at providing the very best of personal services and from that you are repaid with loyalty and repeated custom. This is the model that works in a small town. The worry is that if key posts are now going to people from out of Burnley, then do they know what Burnley itself is all about. Do the people driven by business models know what makes the town tick, that money is limited, that people look to the club as a reference point it’s such a huge part of their lives. I felt terribly sorry at the cancellation of Brian Jensen’s dinner. But the cancellation served to illustrate that people just cannot afford these things. They’ll prioritise. And £80 for top tables at the Players Evening – exactly who can afford that unless they’re corporate funded? The priority for most folk is a match ticket and even that’s only as long as they are affordable.
Ah well: the Blackpool game approached as a big gulp of fresh air – that’s one thing you’re guaranteed there with the wind hammering in off the Irish Sea. The Tim Quelch account of the weather and the FA Cup game in January 76 should be compulsory reading for all Clarets. It was where Jimmy Adamson managed Burnley for the last time. It was where he appeared as a player for the last time.
Anyway: what a week. That was the week that was I suppose.
