Hoffman (1 Viewer)

IF this deal goes through and thats a big IF, would they still invest the 30m figure? we will ned to fight for promotion or we will become plymouth or worse luton

Tonylinc said:

Is anyone else worried by the amout of time which it appears to be taking to reach a conclusion to these talks? I appreciate that a, "full and detailed", conclusion may take some time, but surely "heads of agreement" should have been reached by now. I am fast loosing any confidence in GH.and Co.

Click to expand...

Not sure I had the confidence in the 1st place...but let us see how this plays out

I have confidence in GH & co
But not any in the morons that own us at present.
My guess is that it's taking so long because Sisu think the club is worth x when GH and everyone else know it's worth shit.
My other guess is that we will be stuck with Sisu until we are put in admin.

Tonylinc said:

Is anyone else worried by the amout of time which it appears to be taking to reach a conclusion to these talks? I appreciate that a, "full and detailed", conclusion may take some time, but surely "heads of agreement" should have been reached by now. I am fast loosing any confidence in GH.and Co.

Click to expand...

Whatever Sisu think the club is worth, it's not!

It isn't worth jack shit.

Not so sure that fact will get through their thick skulls though.

The only thing we can hope for is that SISU sell to Hoff in time for pre-season.

These things take an awful long time. Sadly the writing is on the wall, and everyone knows relegation is looking likely. So Hoffman and co can play hardball now, and wait for cheaper price because as time goes , SISU will have less and less to sell off, and its just going to cost them more and more money until they finally decide their only option is to sell up and cut their losses.
Ideally if the takeover could happen by the end of the season, least we can have a summer sort out, and hopefully build a team at least capable of a challenge for League One promotion next year.

AFCCOVENTRY said:

The only thing we can hope for is that SISU sell to Hoff in time for pre-season.

Click to expand...

But they are not being asked to sell to Hoffman - he is the front man for another group of faceless investors...

So many questions, so much more we need to know.

Portsmouth was passed on to so-called investor after so-called investor like pass the parcel - and there is a sober lesson to be learned.

Hoffman just might turn out to be the answer, but no-one can say for sure yet...and the he can't be any worse than SISU line does not wash because he could be worse than SISU.

Like so many, I remain neutral until I am better informed as to the alternatives to SISU.

True Thorn, but it's the ''Coventry fan'' thing that muddies the waters.

just what if...
Hoffman wants it for nothing?
just what if...
Hoffman did nothing to bring in investment when he was a director?
just what if...
Hoffman sat with SISU and worked out what they had to invest before he jumped ship?
just what if...
Hoffman is happy for the long death of our club?
just what if...

and here are the alternative endings

Hoffman had already lined up his chinese pals to pile in and "save" the club, but needs it to go down

or

Hoffman is full of piss and wind and there is fcuk all to come?

its like a soap opera but less exciting

ccfcway said:

its like a soap opera but less exciting

Click to expand...

yeah like ELDOR FUCKIN ADO

Im getting to the point now where i just want to smash something the whole fuckin aura around coventry city is wank from the shit fuckin players to the wanky bastard of a manager we all know it stems from the pricks at the the top,but im starting to think hoffman is full of the most rottenest of shit (hope im wrong) as well, and as for his get me hopes up hairy bastard of a rogue baboon lacky mr keys you can go and fuck some shit the most......................

The thing that nobody's talking about re. the Hoffman bid is this: the Financial Fair Play rules.

SISU has taken a hammering over their lack of spending, but any new ownership will find themselves officially confined by next season, especially so in L1.

"Championship clubs will be allowed only to spend what they earn from the 2012-13 season while sides in League One and Two will not be permitted to spend more than 55% of their turnover on player wages... League One clubs also agreed to introduce a salary cap from the start of the coming season where teams will be allowed to spend a fixed proportion of their total turnover on player wages. The system, called the Salary Cost Management Protocol (SCMP), currently operates in League Two at a 60% threshold, and this will be reduced to 55% next season."

In other words, Hoffman would be under no pressure to play catch-up with other teams. Ownership should be a much easier, steadier, less costly ride in the years to come.

Would it surprise anyone if SISU were aware of this and didn't want Hoffman to benefit from these future regulations when they have effectively done the hard work and paid the big bills?

Colonel Mustard said:

In other words, Hoffman would be under no pressure to play catch-up with other teams. Ownership should be a much easier, steadier, less costly ride in the years to come.

Would it surprise anyone if SISU were aware of this and didn't want Hoffman to benefit from these future regulations when they have effectively done the hard work and paid the big bills?

Click to expand...

Hoffman has no intention of taking over our club. He is trying to get people that we know nothing of to take us over and invest. Quite a lot of people just don't seem to understand this.

There will be ways around the new rules. Lets say the new owners (if we ever get new owners) own companies of their own. Their companies could sponsor us for say 10m a season. Kit sponsorship and all that sort of thing. It could be happening as we are getting loans and short term signings ready for next season, when any new owners can bring in who they want and need.

This is my guess. No bullsh1t source or the normal rumours.

Takes time, a lot of it and remember it isn't just the football side of things, there's the Ricoh factor too, so there's the council and the Higgs Trust and for a "deal" all parties have to be brought together. Of course there are doubts we all wanted something to happen ages ago to enable us to get in the sort of players to get us out of this mess, perhaps that was pie in the sky. The one thing that gives me encouragement is the silence, especially from the Hoffman camp, Silence is golden they say.

The transfer window is now closed so any takeover would have limited affect apart from the funds to bring in a Warnock type of manager. My guess is that any consortium will sit tight until our fete is sealed and then make a move when the value is less than SISU's current one.

EleanorRigby said:

Takes time, a lot of it and remember it isn't just the football side of things, there's the Ricoh factor too, so there's the council and the Higgs Trust and for a "deal" all parties have to be brought together. Of course there are doubts we all wanted something to happen ages ago to enable us to get in the sort of players to get us out of this mess, perhaps that was pie in the sky. The one thing that gives me encouragement is the silence, especially from the Hoffman camp, Silence is golden they say.

Click to expand...

"Silence is golden when you can't think of a good answer."
Muhammad Ali

EleanorRigby said:

Takes time, a lot of it and remember it isn't just the football side of things, there's the Ricoh factor too, so there's the council and the Higgs Trust and for a "deal" all parties have to be brought together. Of course there are doubts we all wanted something to happen ages ago to enable us to get in the sort of players to get us out of this mess, perhaps that was pie in the sky. The one thing that gives me encouragement is the silence, especially from the Hoffman camp, Silence is golden they say.

Click to expand...

especially when that chap from ACL said 2 weeks ago they havent had a meeting nor is one planned with anyone about the ownership of the arena

isn't the hoffman crap.just another sisu in the making...i have my doubts.

I have written before in my short time on these boards, but I repeat. I am very dubious about the Hoff situation. As said above, we will just be swapping one set of faceless moron "businessmen" for another. Of course they will wait until we are League 1 or in admin to get the cheapest price. Then it will be a long, long road to recovery. But we will rise again. Nurse!

PUSB

After yesterday's defeat I need a glimmer of hope from somewhere. I left the ground in tears as I realised that after 50 years following Cov I am right back where I started in Div 3. Is anything happening? Are talks still taking place? Urgently need a ray of hope

According to Stuart Linnell on CWR yesterday, yes. Hope that makes you feel a bit better.

Thanks. It does

CCFC are similar to buying a pub. How come?
OK there are a lot of distressed leasehold pubs for sale. They are worth little if anything. However if you apply to buy one you will find that while no premium is due they will want advance rental, proof of working capital, buy stock at valuation, buy fixtures and fittings, agree to take on existing staff, pay for what goodwill exist, transfer licenses, talk with council over your ideas and future plans to improve requiring their permission, talk to potential co-investors like a brewery who may or may not give you some funding for a return on investment...and the list goes on.

Point is any business guys is not cut and dry simply because you see 'nil premium' and you think it's worth jack shit as you say.

CCFC does have value period. imagine starting a new football club? What would that entail and cost? how many years would you have to wait to get into the football league? CCFC franchise (if I can call it that) has value. It's debts are loans for the most part to current owners. CCFC are in effect debt free. It's a question of how much would SISU write off from their loans? It works in so many complicated ways and olderskyblue has explained some of these many times but there will come a point that SISU will accept a figure if right. I doubt they will readily do so as in the longer term they will eventually get their money back by following the track they have now started (cutting cost, building slowly and gaining successive promotions) and have the share of the Ricoh.

Hoffman and his investors will not get it for a pittance. I also suspect the 'faceless' investors he represents may be content initially to invest with SISU for the medium term and share the responsibility for the next few seasons with an agreement to pay a second amount later and eventually SISU hand over the club in full. To do that they would also need a plan that had investment for the clubs immediate needs (players and ACL share purchase) It's the ACL share purchase that it is beleived the council will not release to SISU. While that could easily be legally challenged it will be more prudent that the few seasons plan as co-investors would suitably persude the council to allow the ACL purchase to go ahead.

That's just some of the issues i suspect Hoffman and his team are negotiating over.

my only hope is that SISU realise that next season in Division 3 the season tickets sales will be disastrous, and all this penny pinching they have done will cause the reverse of what they thought would happen.

Next season , being optomistic the home crowds will drop to 8000 in my opinion, so they will have to sell more players to survive, which will weaken the team even further, so we drop to relegation candadates instead of play-off hopefuls, which will decrease the crowds further and further, to the point where we will be in the bottom division, and the cycle goes on and on.

They must have some common sense, i think, so how can they make this work by staying with the club. There only hope is getting the Ricoh but that will never ever happen as the council have said a catorgorical NO, to selling it to them.

There simply is'nt any hope for them, and come one day soon they will realise it, or they fall over and hit there head which makes them see sense and admit there needs to be some investment in the team to push for promotion next season and try and sell then, but i know that this will never ever happen.

The Rev

Aren't people forgetting that Hoffman is a City supporter?

I can't see how Hoffman and co could possibly be any worse than Sisu!.

The Reverend Skyblue said:

my only hope is that SISU realise that next season in Division 3 the season tickets sales will be disastrous, and all this penny pinching they have done will cause the reverse of what they thought would happen.

Next season , being optomistic the home crowds will drop to 8000 in my opinion, so they will have to sell more players to survive, which will weaken the team even further, so we drop to relegation candadates instead of play-off hopefuls, which will decrease the crowds further and further, to the point where we will be in the bottom division, and the cycle goes on and on.

They must have some common sense, i think, so how can they make this work by staying with the club. There only hope is getting the Ricoh but that will never ever happen as the council have said a catorgorical NO, to selling it to them.

There simply is'nt any hope for them, and come one day soon they will realise it, or they fall over and hit there head which makes them see sense and admit there needs to be some investment in the team to push for promotion next season and try and sell then, but i know that this will never ever happen.

The Rev

Click to expand...

You might be surprised rev. IF we have new owners and they as i am certain they will appoint a new manager and allow him some decent dosh to bring in new players fans will initially respond. The problem is there will be little room for failure. I think Sheffield Wednesday's gates are atleast the same as last season, although that might not be the best example as they do have a pretty loyal fan base

EleanorRigby said:

You might be surprised rev. IF we have new owners and they as i am certain they will appoint a new manager and allow him some decent dosh to bring in new players fans will initially respond. The problem is there will be little room for failure. I think Sheffield Wednesday's gates are atleast the same as last season, although that might not be the best example as they do have a pretty loyal fan base

Click to expand...

One hope's Eleanor, that this will one day end. When we start again next season i'm sure a few early wins will attract the fans back, and i know however i try to convince myself, i know deep down i'll come back aand watch again.

I'm getting so angry match days when yet again we cock it up, and i hate i get so angry, infact i'm worse now that i've ever been, and i don't like that this mess has changed me. Yet again last night i spent in with my best friend Jonnie Walker, and up until this season i would never had let this happen, drinking to try to soften the pain is not a good way forward. Thankfully though i love my whisky, i only drink at week-ends but why have i let it affect me like this , i'm so angry about the situation at Cov.

The Rev

The Reverend Skyblue said:

One hope's Eleanor, that this will one day end. When we start again next season i'm sure a few early wins will attract the fans back, and i know however i try to convince myself, i know deep down i'll come back aand watch again.

I'm getting so angry match days when yet again we cock it up, and i hate i get so angry, infact i'm worse now that i've ever been, and i don't like that this mess has changed me. Yet again last night i spent in with my best friend Jonnie Walker, and up until this season i would never had let this happen, drinking to try to soften the pain is not a good way forward. Thankfully though i love my whisky, i only drink at week-ends but why have i let it affect me like this , i'm so angry about the situation at Cov.

The Rev

Click to expand...

I was on my way back from a hockey match yesterday afternoon, and we were 2-1 up around that point. By the time I'd done a bit of shopping and got back into my house, my phone's saying '2-3, Chopra 95' and I end up wanting to smash the nearest thing in sight. England winning the rugger helped, and I'll be there at the Madejski next weekend for another 90 mins of bloodboiling football-masochist? Think we all are.