Chairman Grant Ferguson Interview

[Scotchegg]

Oxford United Chairman: Well… er… I mean… obviously it’s very expensive building a stadium… er… there’ll be some debt that needs paying off… and… er… yeah… important the club gets full use… errrrrrr… can keep profits above and beyond servicing the unspecified debt… aaaahhhhhhh… might be that there’s no profit but still it sounds good… uunmmmm… certainly not under communicating in my opinion… uuuuuhhhhhhhghgfguyffyhgdg…

Oxford United Fans: I think that went well! Refreshing! He seems like a genuine guy!

We don't always agree, but on this I am 100% with you.

 

[greatunclekip]

Having read this thread, I've just had a listen.

All I can say is that some of you are easily pleased if you think that was a good interview. He shifted some s**t onto Des and some more onto Tim Williams. He skirted around the major issue of who owns, and who funds, the stadium with no specifics whatsoever.

Let's see how he copes with some less friendly questioning on Thursday.

Agreed. We are so, so far away from the days of Ashton and Eales.

I’ve asked before (and will ideally at the forum) - what are Tim and Adam’s KPI’s, which I assume are set by Grant? A relegation battle almost lost, spending an absolute fortune on players soon shipped out (Findlay), blowing a comfortable playoff challenge for midtable, just what are they being assessed against?

 

[Thecurraghofkildare]

I believe that Ferguson has come out, a few days before meeting the fans, and looked to defuse the tension from what would have otherwise could have been a pretty volatile fans forum.

I don't think that anything would have hugely changed behind the scenes and I suspect that he will soon jet off and leave Tim Williams to continue as before.

Exactly this Scotchers - this felt absolutely like an exercise in trying to reshape the growingly hostile landscape, re-set some of the narrative and soften mindsets ahead of the fans forum. Understandably so perhaps, but while the interview was welcome and Grant spesks well, lots of questions remain unanswered.

Some of the more concerning points.

Grant gave no clarity at all in terms of project cost, funding or future stadium ownership. We have no certainty that the club will own its new home or be in a position to re-pay the likely huge level of debt. The owners can’t be about to embark on a £100-180 million (who knows?) project without having a very clear understanding of, and business case for, what does sustainable mean? And we can’t just blindly trust that our future (unknown) ownership structure, carrying this massive mountain of debt, will be hugely more benign landlords than Kassam.

Grant did not really accept and certainly didn’t apologise for the shockingly poor communications under TW/AB - in fact the club hasn’t under communicated in his opinion - really?

Grant acknowledged that he worries about a reported disconnect with fans but he is not sure how many people feel that way - well 95% (141 out of 148 people) who have so far voted on this forum have no confidence in the chief executive which should give a clue that this is not a small problem. The last two sets of OxVox updates, whilst trying to remain diplomatic, are likewise screaming of their frustration and disappointment with the club hierarchy. It is utterly amazing that not one single person on this forum has said (from all that I’ve read anyway) a single positive thing about Adam Benson while many have expressed hugely negative opinions of him. Yet we are still bizarrely entrusting our commercial future - in effect the club’s viability - to someone who has alienated his customers and yet whose performance Tim writes glowingly about.

Grant revealed that he asked for a fan engagement strategy from the management team before the start of the season and here we are more than 8 months (and counting) later and we might be about to see something (coincidentally on the eve of the forum) after no engagement with fans during the intervening period. How can such under performance and delay be tolerable? Repeating the TW/AB line about acting like a higher league club and the potential benefits of a Fan Advisory Board just sets alarm bells ringing.

Grant tried to address the ridiculously high turnover of staff as reflecting positive change conveniently ignoring the well known (and referenced on here) reasons for many of the (non playing side) departures. Wool being pulled over his eyes by senior management because he is not around enough or deliberate revisionism?

So the real question is, will Grant be the solution as chairman and do what needs to be done in relation to the off-field management of the club, or will he become part of the problem by backing them for too long as he did with Karl Robinson?

The jury is very much out.

 

[Front Post]

Wow Grant Ferguson is alive.

Whilst I enjoyed listening to the interview, and questions Jerome asked. I find it extraordinary hard to believe how a manager can be happy with the current staff he has. It’s plainly obvious that more staff is needed!

He’s hopeful of a response in the summer for the new stadium. I think that’s a tad optimistic, as it may be around September. If earlier great!

Anyway I prefer listening to Grant Ferguson over Tim Williams.

He currently has the same number of coaching and medical/fitness staff as Manning and Robinson had. I posted on another thread with the comparisons.

The real point is whether they're all experienced enough/up to the roles for where the club wants to be going.

 

[Leysboy]

He currently has the same number of coaching and medical/fitness staff as Manning and Robinson had. I posted on another thread with the comparisons.

The real point is whether they're all experienced enough/up to the roles for where the club wants to be going.

Definitely experience required imo. I wouldn’t be against a DOF figure to help the manager out. At the moment it’s seems the inexperience is showing in terms of results on the pitch.

Manning had staff that were a bit more experienced, and the was reflected with results on the pitch. Although some of the games he managed were pretty dire too.

 

[m]

Wow.

Just wow at some of the responses.

 

[DannyW]

I believe that Ferguson has come out, a few days before meeting the fans, and looked to defuse the tension from what otherwise could have been a pretty volatile fans forum.

I don't think that anything would have hugely changed behind the scenes and I suspect that he will soon jet off and leave Tim Williams to continue as before.

Yep

 

[JayOx88]

I was a bit taken aback by Grant feeling the need to say the club will always have the right to play at the stadium and call it home - call me crazy, but I had kind of expected that as a minimum...

It essentially felt like he was saying 'well you'll have that, so why does it matter who owns the stadium?'

Now we know their intention is to fund it through 'the markets' a very plausible scenario here is a stadium with a lot of debt that will be a big liability against the club, and at this point we have no idea who is providing the capital and what say they'll have over the stadium. One of the reassuring outcomes of the club not owning the stadium was that we would only ever pay a peppercorn rent to be there, but can anyone say with any certainty that will still be the case when we have no idea what the refinancing terms will be and what investors expect from putting millions of their own money into this?

I'm no expert at all on any of this so will be absolutely delighted to be told my musings are absolute nonsense, but from my perspective it's important we remain on high alert around all of this and ensure we're not just happy to go along for the ride whatever the outcome.

 

[OUFCwaffle]

I was a bit taken aback by Grant feeling the need to say the club will always have the right to play at the stadium and call it home - call me crazy, but I had kind of expected that as a minimum...

It essentially felt like he was saying 'well you'll have that, so why does it matter who owns the stadium?'

Now we know their intention is to fund it through 'the markets' a very plausible scenario here is a stadium with a lot of debt that will be a big liability against the club, and at this point we have no idea who is providing the capital and what say they'll have over the stadium. One of the reassuring outcomes of the club not owning the stadium was that we would only ever pay a peppercorn rent to be there, but can anyone say with any certainty that will still be the case when we have no idea what the refinancing terms will be and what investors expect from putting millions of their own money into this?

I'm no expert at all on any of this so will be absolutely delighted to be told my musings are absolute nonsense, but from my perspective it's important we remain on high alert around all of this and ensure we're not just happy to go along for the ride whatever the outcome.

Thankfully a large portion of our fanbase are all too aware of how badly these situations can go wrong. It's critical that we keep pressuring the club to ensure that we're not in another Kassam Stadium 2.0, or worse, bankrupt when they eventually decide to move on.

 

[Yellowmania]

From that interview apparently Firoz is an Oxford fan, who’d have guessed it eh?

 

[Colin B]

From that interview apparently Firoz is an Oxford fan, who’d have guessed it eh?

Of all the things GF said, that was the one that marked him out as gullible and out of touch most.

 

[Scotchegg]

I was a bit taken aback by Grant feeling the need to say the club will always have the right to play at the stadium and call it home - call me crazy, but I had kind of expected that as a minimum...

It essentially felt like he was saying 'well you'll have that, so why does it matter who owns the stadium?'

There's nothing hugely wrong with this position, but it's about protecting the club and the financial arrangements beyond anything we have had before, and this being 100% watertight from a legal perspective.

 

[Symp59]

Definitely experience required imo. I wouldn’t be against a DOF figure to help the manager out. At the moment it’s seems the inexperience is showing in terms of results on the pitch.

Manning had staff that were a bit more experienced, and the was reflected with results on the pitch. Although some of the games he managed were pretty dire too.

They have one at Port valefc and the fans hate him and blame him fir there demise so far this season and Stoke city have just sacked there's. A good manager should be fine with the recruitment team in tandem.

 

[JayOx88]

There's nothing hugely wrong with this position, but it's about protecting the club and the financial arrangements beyond anything we have had before, and this being 100% watertight from a legal perspective.

Well absolutely, I guess my point wasn't put well and I should have said 'finances' instead of 'owns' - it just came across to me that he though he could reassure us by saying 'you'll get a new home to play at and that's all that really matters'.

You're right, it doesn't necessarily matter who owns it as long as the club's interests are legally protected, but it does matter how it's funded and by whom. Our long term future may well be covered in that we have a long-term lease and are protected from outside parties trying to do take control and oust us from the site, but to my mind this doesn't protect the club from a scenario where it pays significant rent to service debt and is required to do so for a number of years if there are more creditors involved than first thought. While we may have much more potential to generate revenue, the latest murmurings hint at this not being quite as cushty a deal for the club compared to the scenario that was mooted a couple of years ago.

Obviously, it is still vital that this stadium goes ahead and is the only option to secure our long-term future right now, but it's important for us as fans to be aware that there may be way more liability against the club than first thought and that we need to have our eyes fully open to whom we might be relying on.

 

[RyanioBirdio]

Now we know their intention is to fund it through 'the markets' a very plausible scenario here is a stadium with a lot of debt that will be a big liability against the club, and at this point we have no idea who is providing the capital and what say they'll have over the stadium. One of the reassuring outcomes of the club not owning the stadium was that we would only ever pay a peppercorn rent to be there, but can anyone say with any certainty that will still be the case when we have no idea what the refinancing terms will be and what investors expect from putting millions of their own money into this?

What will likely happen is that the ‘rent’ will appear very affordable but the ‘cost’ will not be the same number.

Eg. The amount applied as ‘rent’ for the stadium is £500,000 per year but the total ‘cost’ of servicing the debts and the shareholder yields are £4million per year. This could potentially mean that the money from the bar and restaurant, all usual match day revenues, and maybe even the club shop turnover may have to go towards servicing this, but technically it wouldn’t be ‘rent’. The devil is in the detail.

This is why when Ferguson says he understands that the club could be able to keep all the profit above and beyond servicing the debt, it’s a really delicate issue. There is no guarantee that there will be any profit, and if the stadium is owned by the markets then the shareholders reserve the right to increase the fees and charges over time. Even if the ‘rent’ is locked in at a fixed rate, what about the interest on the debt or the other miscellaneous charges applied to the site?

If anything, as far as I’m concerned that interview with Ferguson has left me more worried than ever that this is going to be an absolute stitch up.

 

[Orkney Islands Yellow]

Is there anything Ferguson and Williams can say that'll get people onside? Seems bridges have been burnt in some fans eyes.

 

[Foley]

It sounds as if the structure of the funding won't be detailed yet.
The key things are that the club have full use of the stadium , they can generate significant additional funds from the stadium and they have a watertight agreement that the ground can't be sold to a 3rd party at any time.
I am assuming that the plan is still to make the club sustainable ( the reference to other clubs generating £5m ).
There needs to be clarity and confirmation of the 3 issues.

 

[Orkney Islands Yellow]

The company that owns the stadium must be inextricably linked to OUFC Ltd by common directors and guarantees so if one company starts to feel pain the other one does too. That way its in the bests interest of everyone for both companies to trade sustainably.

 

[Foley]

What will likely happen is that the ‘rent’ will appear very affordable but the ‘cost’ will not be the same number.

Eg. The amount applied as ‘rent’ for the stadium is £500,000 per year but the total ‘cost’ of servicing the debts and the shareholder yields are £4million per year. This could potentially mean that the money from the bar and restaurant, all usual match day revenues, and maybe even the club shop turnover may have to go towards servicing this, but technically it wouldn’t be ‘rent’. The devil is in the detail.

This is why when Ferguson says he understands that the club could be able to keep all the profit above and beyond servicing the debt, it’s a really delicate issue. There is no guarantee that there will be any profit, and if the stadium is owned by the markets then the shareholders reserve the right to increase the fees and charges over time. Even if the ‘rent’ is locked in at a fixed rate, what about the interest on the debt or the other miscellaneous charges applied to the site?

If anything, as far as I’m concerned that interview with Ferguson has left me more worried than ever that this is going to be an absolute stitch up.

Spot on- the devil is in the detail.
There was dis discussion of equity and affordable debt.
So this is the key thing. How much will the debt repayments be and how much is the projected additional income that the club will make?
We need to have that detail, but from the interview it didn't sound as if that will be forthcoming soon

 

[RyanioBirdio]

How much will the debt repayments be and how much is the projected additional income that the club will make?

And what happens if the club is unable to meet those obligations for whatever reason? Who is liable?

They clearly have this all worked out, but what they don’t want to do is tell anybody. Even though the fans are the people who have campaigned the hardest to get it to this point and will be the ones ultimately stumping up to keep paying for it for decades to come.