Portsmouth,and what went wrong ?

[hitony]

Is the correct answer IMO


Rumour has it only 8K tickets have been sold for their cup game v Coventry

So you really think the reason for them not selling many tickets is an ex managers fault ? thats like blaming Brightons last loss on Archie Macauley ffs

As I have said above, I think you have to look a little further than the ex manager, maybe look at the people who employ him ! and as El pres states above, they have decided to pay the players and not the back room staff, that decision will not have anything to do with the present or indeed any past managers.

All clubs will move on after a manager has left, as much as some members of NSC will disagree with that, ie; MM, DW, RS, etc etc........

 

[webbyson]

So you really think the reason for them not selling many tickets is an ex managers fault ?

Not at all hitony ..............thats not 'arry's fault but i have always thought Portsmouth have been punching above their weight for years and when the old saggy faced con-merchant (allegedly) returned to our much loved nearish neighbours he spent his way to success with money they never had. Not an isolated case some may say but he has always left clubs in a poorer state than when he arrived. Portsmouth seem to have a history of "dodgy" financial irregularities and even now they are blaming the lack of wages payment on a software problem at the bank!! You could not make it up...........they are in leymans terms........in very deep shit. Although i cannot stand the club i feel sorry for the genuine fans, probably the hardcore 8k fans who have got tickets for the cup game..........the rest.....the ones who jumped on the 'arry spendathon F.A cup success can swivel (as can the knuckle draggers who used to give us such a lovely welcome at Fratton)
I think Portsmouth F.C are in decline and are going to find their true level.......just a tad bigger than us

 

[Notters]

My mate (West Ham fan) has given me a ticket for the Portsmouth v West Ham United game on January 26th. It should be a good game but i have never been to Fratton Park and going by the utter hatred of all things Pompey on this site I hope i don't catch anything from them horrid pompey fans. I hope the away end is not near the Pompey fans. Is Portsmouth worth visiting ? any good bars ?

No, it's a hole.

 

[HampshireSeagulls]

My mate (West Ham fan) has given me a ticket for the Portsmouth v West Ham United game on January 26th. It should be a good game but i have never been to Fratton Park and going by the utter hatred of all things Pompey on this site I hope i don't catch anything from them horrid pompey fans. I hope the away end is not near the Pompey fans. Is Portsmouth worth visiting ? any good bars ?

The ground is a shithole. You will be out in the open air (a la Withers, but a lot closer to the action). There are no bars worth using in the immediate vicinity, Pompey "own" all of them. With West Ham visiting it could be quite a charged atmosphere, and you should be prepared to be herded around.

Portsmouth is not worth visiting, I go there under complete sufferance when I have to, and have been known to fake life-threatening illness to avoid it.

 

[beorhthelm]

Bournemouth, West Ham, Portsmouth.

Find the link, and there's your answer

seriously? i dont know the ins an outs of Bournemouths problems or how far back they go, but Redknapp left there in the early 90's. He left WestHam 9 years ago, who've had two new owners in the past 3 years. i think you give Redknapp far too much credit.

portsmouth's problems do share a link with Westham, that of foreign oweners expecting too much, spending too much, and not getting the results. actually, i think this applies to most football clubs in financial trouble, overspending on players salaries or giving too long contracts which cripple if relegated.

 

[HampshireSeagulls]

Harry was a symptom, not the cause. The board suddenly had delusions of grandeur and believed that they could compete with the best, simply by bringing in a loaded buyer, wheeler/dealer manager and some "biggish" names. He came in because he thought the new ground was viable, and it turns out that it wasn't. Harry has quite an impressive financial setup with his advisors, once they had done the digging, he was never going to stay for long. Watch the "tax problem" disappear as well. He came to Portsmouth, invested in property earmarked for demolition, and made a lot out of it. He actually owns quite a large part of Southsea at the moment!

The club has no money whatsoever now. They have had planning permission for a new training ground just outside Gosport, but the caveats included them having to spend some money on infrastructure, etc. They simply cannot afford it, and no-one will give them loans anymore.

Harry came in with a definite aim, he achieved that aim, and realised that once that was achieved, Portsmouth could not go anywhere - no money, no resources, no ground. He knew that the house of cards had to collapse at some point, he came back from Southampton to perform the rescue job to keep them up, but was never going to stay when he had no money to work with. He jumped before the current situation started to unravel, but he knew it was coming.

As for paying ridiculous fees for players/agents/wages - Pompey believed their own hype. The "sleeping lion" that gets trotted out about them on a regular basis was being used by the directors, supporters club, sponsors and other investors who wanted to see the club become a "big" club again. To become a big club needs big money, big names and huge investment. There are changes coming to the European Cups whereby you cannot take part if you have debts on the playing club, which is why Chelsea have made a huge effort to reduce their debts. Other clubs are doing the same, Portsmouth have no hope. Gaydamak can see what is happening, he wants his cash out before HMRC get their slice. HMRC want their slice from the winding up order, and that may prove to be the tipping point for Portsmouth - they cannot afford to pay one set of debts, let alone the other.

Portsmouth should have aimed at mediocrity and allocated funds appropriately. They thought they could play with the big boys, and blew it. They know that administration is now coming their way, they just need to manage it so that the relegation and points deduction, plus the forced selling of players does not send them down through the leagues like a stone. Southampton managed to recover themselves from a similar situation, they are now pissing themselves as Pompey look likely to repeat their mistakes, but without a ground which can be dual-roled. The only thing played at Portsmouth is football, it is not viable to be used as anything else - no income streams from other sports or music. Portsmouth are now banned from buying players and need to clear their debts quickly. It's not going to happen, and they know that.

 

[wigman]

There are no bars worth using in the immediate vicinity, Pompey "own" all of them.
When we last played down there (4-2 defeat) the posse i was with went in the Milton Arms.The pub was half Albion, half Sh**smouth,there was no hassle what so ever.

 

[Barry Izbak]

I feel sorry for the Pompey fans who remember being in the 3rd Division (when we were in the Cup Final) and those who came to Fans United in 1997.

As for all the Johnnie-come-lately dickheads who snubbed their noses at everyone else and celebrated when some unknown arab pledged his allegiance with his money and promised them the earth, I couldn't give a shit.

Here's a club with a long history of out-of-town owners and financial problems, having been in administration before and lurching from one crisis to another over the years.

How many times have they welcomed new owners over the years?
How many more times are they going to fall for the pattter?
What made them think that either of the recent takeovers by someone they had never heard of was going to change them overnight from being a small town club with a shit ground in the shit end of the shittest town on the coast, to being some sort of football superpower?

f*** em.

 

[withdeanwombat]

So you really think the reason for them not selling many tickets is an ex managers fault ? thats like blaming Brightons last loss on Archie Macauley ffs
:

Yeah! Bloody Macauley.Macauley out!

 

[Zebedee]

I feel sorry for the Pompey fans who remember being in the 3rd Division (when we were in the Cup Final) and those who came to Fans United in 1997.

As for all the Johnnie-come-lately dickheads who snubbed their noses at everyone else and celebrated when some unknown arab pledged his allegiance with his money and promised them the earth, I couldn't give a shit.

Here's a club with a long history of out-of-town owners and financial problems, having been in administration before and lurching from one crisis to another over the years.

How many times have they welcomed new owners over the years?
How many more times are they going to fall for the pattter?
What made them think that either of the recent takeovers by someone they had never heard of was going to change them overnight from being a small town club with a shit ground in the shit end of the shittest town on the coast, to being some sort of football superpower?

f*** em.

So you're not a great Pompey lover Barry?

 

[Barry Izbak]

So you're not a great Pompey lover Barry?

take em or leave em

 

[Gordon the Gopher]

I'm going to be quite sad to leave Southsea and head back to Hove as the reports in the news over here get even more worrying for our dear neighbours to the west! here's the latest....





Date: 01 January 2010
By Unknown

POMPEY'S former owner Sacha Gaydamak has claimed he saved the club from going into administration at the beginning of December.
Gaydamak says the club owes him around £32m as part of the deal which saw him give up the club in 2009.

The man who brought in the players who won Pompey the FA cup in 2008 says he was forced to pay £2.5m in debt to Barclays Bank to save the club
ADVERTISEMENTafter Pompey failed to pay back the loan.

He said: 'I was the guarantor of the loan to Barclays. When the club didn't pay, the bank came to me and I paid it to avoid it going into administration.

'If the club goes into administration I lose everything. I'm owed £9m by the club which is due in January 2010 and another £19m in May 2012.'

Gaydamak was speaking to the fans' website True Blue Army.

But when contacted by The News the club denied they were facing administration had the money not been paid to Barclays.

A club spokesman said: 'The club would not have gone into administration.'

Gaydmak has now added his voice to those calling on the current regime to be more open with fans.

The end to 2009 heaped yet more misery on long suffering supporters with the news the club was facing a winding-up petition from the Inland Revenue.

Gaydamak said: 'I join in the frustration of supporters.

'I would like to know who the ultimate beneficiary of the club is, what their plans are and whether I am to get paid.

'In the beginning Sulaiman Al Fahim wanted to buy the club and I was happy to sell it to him, but it became a very lengthy process.

'It was taking so long I got worried and Peter Storrie brought in the Al Faraj group.

'My lawyers were unable to get proof of their funds or who the owners would be. That doesn't necessarily make them bad, but I was uncomfortable with it so I decided to sell to Al Fahim.

'I sold it to him for £1 on the understanding he would refinance the loan to Barclays and take up an option to buy the land surrounding the ground on November 30. He also put £5m into the club at this point.

'When Al Fahim sold on to Al Faraj, they had to get my agreement.

'The land has very little commercial value, but I was holding onto it for security.'

Gaydamak: I saved the club from bankruptcy

 

[Dick Knights Mumm]

As for paying ridiculous fees for players/agents/wages - Pompey believed their own hype. The "sleeping lion" that gets trotted out about them on a regular basis was being used by the directors, supporters club, sponsors and other investors who wanted to see the club become a "big" club again.

I have never yeard that about Portsmouth. It is a line I have heard about Sunderland say - but never Portsmouth. Did they believe that they were some kind of sleeping giant ?

 

[HampshireSeagulls]

I have never yeard that about Portsmouth. It is a line I have heard about Sunderland say - but never Portsmouth. Did they believe that they were some kind of sleeping giant ?

God, continually. They believe they should be in the top 5, they should be in Europe, they seem to think they are almost entitled to be one of the biggest clubs in the UK. They look back to their glory days of winning the FA Cup and they believe that they were just missing the finance/manager/backer/etc. They felt that they were going to storm Europe with fortress Fratton back in the UK to guarantee points and were talking up a real storm about how they were getting back to where they belonged.

Take a look at The Portsmouth News website and see the comments that are flying on there. They never wanted Grant, they felt they deserved a "big name" manager with "big name" signings. They were even applying to host World Cup games for God's sake! This is more disconcerting knowing that Fratton is not up to international matches (not really Premiership either) and the Directors knew that they were not going to be able to build a new ground in a realistic timeframe either.

Sadly, some of the comments seem to be flashbacks to us and the Goldstone, fans not being told anything, concerns about who actually owns the club, where it goes if the debts are called in, the security for the loans, etc, etc. I'd hate to see them fold completely, mainly because the Southampton fans would be intolerable, but taking a division drop would be quite satisfying, although they seem able to do that by themselves at the moment.

 

[Simster]

I have never yeard that about Portsmouth. It is a line I have heard about Sunderland say - but never Portsmouth. Did they believe that they were some kind of sleeping giant ?

Hampshire is right, too many of their fans believe they're absolutely massive when the truth is they're probably a smaller club than Southampton.

 

[Martinf]

It all started to go wrong for them a few years ago after a game at Fratton againts the mighty Albion. There was a bit of a, how shall I say, 'to do' afterwards and some Pompey idiot threw a bottle that almost hit me on the bonce. At that very moment I cursed him, his team and his club. It's just taken a while for the curse to work.

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

"long suffering supporters" - my arse they are long suffering. They are in the Premiership and they have won an FA Cup in recent years. They haven't suffered at all. Speak to Luton fans or Stockport fans ffs

 

[ml.hayman@ntllworld.com]

You might call it narrow-minded,but i think a lot of Pompey,s problems can be laid at the door of a certain Mr Redknapp. One thing is for sure Tottenham will not make the same mistake.

It goes back further than that to the time when a certain Mr.Deacon from Southampton bought the club. His Son is still a board member of Sellar properties who own all the land around Fratton Park