Having been in self-imposed exile for the past three months, finding ourselves bottom of the table after 12 games has prompted me to take a fresh look at where we are now, particularly off-the-field. What has happened in the (almost) eight months reign of Sumrith Thanakarnjanasuth?
There was a lot of talk coming into the close season about the signings we were going to make, and the quality which was going to be added to the squad. Even allowing for management failings, bottom after 12 games doesn’t lie; we have a lower mid-table squad at best. There is, of course, debate to be had about whether a good budget has been spent badly, or whether it wasn’t a particularly good budget in the first place. Certainly, the often-contradictory statements of the current manager don’t help in working this out. My feeling, however, is that it’s more the latter than the former. Regardless, I don’t think the position is helped by what’s going on behind the scenes.
We currently have an absentee owner, and regardless of modern technology allowing 24/7 communication, nothing can replace having someone actually at the club on a regular basis with appropriate decision-making authority. You can glean a hell of a lot more simply being on site rather than relying on emails and phone calls. This is exacerbated by having a part-time managing director and, again, regardless of his competence (and I know there are those questioning this), you simply can’t run a professional football club with an absentee owner and a part-time MD.
What the club was crying out for was a director who could be at the club on a regular basis to fill the void. So, when two new directors were announced last month I was looking forward to finding out what they were bringing to the club and/or what investment were they making. And the answer to that is “no idea”. All we really know is that we have a German who is Hong Kong/Vietnam based, with no apparent previous involvement in football, and a London-based Jordanian, whose investment company provided a $25m loan to Reading when they were owned by the Thai consortium. As mentioned in my previous posts, this resulted in significant sums being paid out by Reading to arrange and service this loan.
So, what are they actually bringing to the party? There doesn’t appear to have been any financial investment, at least not in equity terms anyway. There is, of course, the fabled “contacts” and “expertise”, and the basic fact that they appear to be wealthy individuals. But this simply raises the question of why they would want to get involved with a third-tier English football club, with no ground, no real assets, and an ongoing dispute with the club’s landlord? Getting some insight into their reasons would be really useful. Similarly, if there is substance behind the much-rumoured bid from Erick Thohir, there needs to be scrutiny of what his interest actually is.
And, on the dispute with the landlord, what the hell is going on? How on earth have things been allowed to deteriorate to this level? Yes, we all know that Kassam is a supposedly-difficult character to deal with, but when the club’s MD is effectively trying to threaten Kassam to the negotiating table by saying that there are five potential sites the club could move to, that’s the sort of bullshit which needs calling out.
Whose job is it to call out this bullshit? Well, surely that’s down to our supporters’ trust? Unfortunately, OxVox have all but disappeared, certainly in terms of anything substantial. We’ve had two directors appointed; not even acknowledged by OxVox, let alone any queries as to what they are bringing to the club. We have the MD claiming there are five sites the club can move to; no comment from OxVox despite them previously nailing their colours firmly to the KasStad mast. In fact, no feedback at all from OxVox of the recent fans’ forum on any topic! What’s the current debt situation at the club? Has Darryl Eales received his £4-and-a-bit million pay off from the club? So many significant issues, so few questions apparently being asked. Even allowing for the rumoured in-fighting on the committee, this level of radio silence is unconscionable for a supporters’ trust.
I note the chair of the trust said on Thursday “just because someone is not saying anything all of the time it doesn't mean they aren't doing anything.” That is of course true, but saying precisely nothing of substance for many months certainly gives the impression of doing nothing.
There was a lot of talk coming into the close season about the signings we were going to make, and the quality which was going to be added to the squad. Even allowing for management failings, bottom after 12 games doesn’t lie; we have a lower mid-table squad at best. There is, of course, debate to be had about whether a good budget has been spent badly, or whether it wasn’t a particularly good budget in the first place. Certainly, the often-contradictory statements of the current manager don’t help in working this out. My feeling, however, is that it’s more the latter than the former. Regardless, I don’t think the position is helped by what’s going on behind the scenes.
We currently have an absentee owner, and regardless of modern technology allowing 24/7 communication, nothing can replace having someone actually at the club on a regular basis with appropriate decision-making authority. You can glean a hell of a lot more simply being on site rather than relying on emails and phone calls. This is exacerbated by having a part-time managing director and, again, regardless of his competence (and I know there are those questioning this), you simply can’t run a professional football club with an absentee owner and a part-time MD.
What the club was crying out for was a director who could be at the club on a regular basis to fill the void. So, when two new directors were announced last month I was looking forward to finding out what they were bringing to the club and/or what investment were they making. And the answer to that is “no idea”. All we really know is that we have a German who is Hong Kong/Vietnam based, with no apparent previous involvement in football, and a London-based Jordanian, whose investment company provided a $25m loan to Reading when they were owned by the Thai consortium. As mentioned in my previous posts, this resulted in significant sums being paid out by Reading to arrange and service this loan.
So, what are they actually bringing to the party? There doesn’t appear to have been any financial investment, at least not in equity terms anyway. There is, of course, the fabled “contacts” and “expertise”, and the basic fact that they appear to be wealthy individuals. But this simply raises the question of why they would want to get involved with a third-tier English football club, with no ground, no real assets, and an ongoing dispute with the club’s landlord? Getting some insight into their reasons would be really useful. Similarly, if there is substance behind the much-rumoured bid from Erick Thohir, there needs to be scrutiny of what his interest actually is.
And, on the dispute with the landlord, what the hell is going on? How on earth have things been allowed to deteriorate to this level? Yes, we all know that Kassam is a supposedly-difficult character to deal with, but when the club’s MD is effectively trying to threaten Kassam to the negotiating table by saying that there are five potential sites the club could move to, that’s the sort of bullshit which needs calling out.
Whose job is it to call out this bullshit? Well, surely that’s down to our supporters’ trust? Unfortunately, OxVox have all but disappeared, certainly in terms of anything substantial. We’ve had two directors appointed; not even acknowledged by OxVox, let alone any queries as to what they are bringing to the club. We have the MD claiming there are five sites the club can move to; no comment from OxVox despite them previously nailing their colours firmly to the KasStad mast. In fact, no feedback at all from OxVox of the recent fans’ forum on any topic! What’s the current debt situation at the club? Has Darryl Eales received his £4-and-a-bit million pay off from the club? So many significant issues, so few questions apparently being asked. Even allowing for the rumoured in-fighting on the committee, this level of radio silence is unconscionable for a supporters’ trust.
I note the chair of the trust said on Thursday “just because someone is not saying anything all of the time it doesn't mean they aren't doing anything.” That is of course true, but saying precisely nothing of substance for many months certainly gives the impression of doing nothing.
