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Pompey on the verge of liquidation


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Portsmouth administrator Trevor Birch has told ESPN that the club could be liquidated within a fortnight, with Nwankwo Kanu having formally lodged a claim for £3 million in back pay.

Portsmouth, the 2008 FA Cup winners, were last season relegated from the Championship after incurring a ten-point penalty when they returned to administration. They are due to begin the new League One season with a further ten-point penalty, but there is currently some doubt as to whether the club will still be in existence by the time of their first fixture, against Bournemouth, on August 18.

Pompey's first-team squad currently numbers 12 players, only eight of whom are senior, and for now manager Michael Appleton is unable to make signings. There is currently a takeover offer on the table from former owner Balram Chainrai, but that is conditional on the eight senior players leaving or accepting substantial pay-cuts.

To prolong the club's existence for as long as possible until a takeover can be secured, Birch has imposed a £5,000-a-week salary cap, which would be a substantial pay-cut for players like Tal Ben Haim, who is on £36,000 a week. The excess would be paid at a later date, but only if the club avoids liquidation, and the chances of doing so are being hindered by the players' refusal to compromise.

"The club is heading for liquidation in just a few weeks, perhaps two weeks if these players don't leave or compromise on their wages," Birch told ESPN on Sunday. "We still have players like Ben Haim, Dave Kitson and Kanu on our books."

To complicate matters, Kanu, the former Arsenal and Nigeria striker, has formally lodged a claim for the arrears on his wages.

"Kanu has served the club notice that he wants to leave but before doing so he wants the money he says is owed to him by the club," Birch said. "These players hold the survival of the club in their hands.

"I must stress it is not their fault as the players didn't get the club into this trouble, but they do now have the ability to get the club out of this mess.

"The problem with everybody is that this club has cried wolf so often that no one believes it will happen, no one believes they will go out of business, but they will in two or three weeks. It is that serious now. The trouble is 'Portsmouth fatigue', but the truth is that the club is now fighting for its life."

Read more at http://www.espn.co.uk/football/sport/story/161659.html?CMP=OTC-RSS#x3r1JR9s3IXG0lYS.99

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Their fans have been through as much shite as us.

Can only feel sorry for this and if becoming a Newco gives them a fresh start then so be it. Wavering in and out of Administration is no use.

Good luck to them either way, hopefully the fans can buy over the assets.

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Saw this the other day. It's quite an eye-opener about what has gone on down there

PFC have called on creditors from the 1st CVA (the ones who will only get back 0.4p in the pound) to help them appeal against their 10 point deduction for failing to honour the 1st CVA. This is one of the replies (I bet they don't send this to the Football League):

A letter from a Pompey Fan:

Dear Pompey (whatever comany you are this 1/4er)

Your urgent request poped up on my RSS feed calling for CVA 2010 creditors to get in touch, so I felt obliged to contact you, although im not sure why really after the way PFC treats its local community, business partners and sponsors.

( http://www.portsmouthfc.co.uk/Latest...tors-3538.aspx )

So, you want me to confirm I am satisfied that the club I used to love ruined my life? How about a little background...

I would like to point out that I was a victim in the previous Portsmouth 2010 administration, and as such I no longer run my freelance photography business as a result of the clubs collapse. A few thousand pounds may not mean much in the world of football but to a one man band like myself it is enough to ruin you. I now work in a shop, but at least I managed to keep my mortgage repayments up.

Now, as you are aware us creditors were pushed (I wont go as far as blackmailed) into accepting a CVA which payed a dividend of 20% of the original debt. The payment schedule was over a period of five years, however our first installment was pushed back to 2012. This was never going to solve the problems this administration had placed on my business, as a sole trader I knew it would finish me off either way and as such I simply voted with little care for myself.

Whilst I found it incredibly disturbing and deeply insulting to see the club continuing to sanction player purchases and associated salaries, I understand football and the nature of the beast of remaining competitive so it was something I had to accept, even though I was unable to continue my freelance work with the club.

To see the club go back into administration again this season was simply staggering, and discovering they had racked up more dozens of millions of debt, whilst never getting round to paying mine or any other poor souls from the creditors meetings a penny of our dividend, left me in a state of almost shock.

I am currently receiving correspondence from PKF regarding the 2012 administration (despite having to wind my business up), and I am told the original 2010 CVA debt will now be diluted into a 2012 CVA, and as such the 20% dividend will now be 2% of 20%.

What a generous offer from Mr Chainrai!

As a result my original debt in full will have gone from approximately £3000 to £12, and more importantly without my consent this time round. Not that I really had a say last time round, as Andronikou kept finding more debts to the point he magically produced the 75% he needed to stop HMRC liquidating the club.

That is absolutely scandalous and I cant help but think that if I tried to behave like that, I would be in prison by now!

As I have mentioned, I had to wind my business (and dreams) up so the debts owed to me are irrelevant what ever percentage they finally decide this time round.

So thats my background. Now I will consider your question again, am I in favour of CVA MKI being diluted into CVA MKII without my consent?

Let me highlight the financial consideration again: £3000 * 20% * 2% = £12 (with no consent)

How about you go and choke. You can shove your CVA and stick your proposals on an expensive trip to Gibraltar. My life is in ruins because of your behaviour, I want to see PFC struck right down to the lowest level of the game, only then will I continue to support the club I formerly loved that destroyed everything I had built up.

I sincerely hope you can understand quite how much distress this has cause myself and my family.

Regards

P*** ******

PFC fan 1965 - 2010"

I don't want to see any club go to the wall but sometimes these things go to far.

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Ourselves and Pompey are prime examples of how the governing bodies in this sport have failed misrably. Theyve allowed compeltel and utter crooks to come in and rape the clubs. 30 years ago football was protected from this, but then they started floating on the stock markets and they didnt become clubs anymore. they were nothing more than commerical investments who stole the soulds of clubs from fans.

The last guy who owned pompey was some foriegn cunt who was arrested aboard by lithunian (i think) police and they even stated that he could have his asstes frozen, whih included Pompey. All the while some of the bets fans in England hve to sit back and watch backroom staff cryign there eyes out on SkySportsNews because theyve been made redundant.

the whole thing is a fucking outrage.

The adminstrators should sell the business & assets to a NewCo created by the fans & council, and the fucking FA should give them the money to buy those assets since there incredible lack of protection for the club caused this mess. Fucking foriegner owners looking for a quick buck or the odd scam. It's disgusting.

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Kanu, with his £3m claim and Tal Ben Haim and his agent are killing the club with their non-interest in backing down on his £36,000 a week contract.

Just shows how greedy some cunts really are. Feel sorry for the Club and most of all the fans.

Hope they can pull through.

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Off the point but reading that letter, "...kept finding more debts to the point he magically produced the 75% he needed to stop HMRC liquidating the club", why couldn't we have found a debt, or taken out a new debt before we went into administration so that HMRC weren't as big a creditor?

Obviously a shame for Pompey, there fans have had just as bad a time as us.

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Off the point but reading that letter, "...kept finding more debts to the point he magically produced the 75% he needed to stop HMRC liquidating the club", why couldn't we have found a debt, or taken out a new debt before we went into administration so that HMRC weren't as big a creditor?

Obviously a shame for Pompey, there fans have had just as bad a time as us.

Considering our debt to HMRC was mooted at around 100 million...

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