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Good god. They really are thick as **** Midsomer Murderer Club Legend 44 minutes ago Quote No point in worrying what that lot are doing. We need to concentrate on us - the sh** will soon be the poor relation in this infrastructure redevelopment. The Bears are doing well, basketball is on the up too. All the rest is hotels, houses and a multi use indoor arena - wouldn’t be surprised If SL sold the sh**, after all, they are costing him a fortune and holding him back

I am not in denial. FFP is a real concern to me. Our spend in the 2016-17 season was ...well reckless ? But I would have to see evidence of wrongdoing before any action was taken against us. And so far, I dont see any. I would accept if we were charged and convicted and say the club would deserve any penalty. I see only resentment that we brought good/high priced players. You have highlighted the the more high profile arrivals at Aston Villa, but not mentioned where we sold international standard players and had others taken off the wage bill. Transfers were a two-way activity. You pointed out Snodgrass however we were only paying one third of his wages. Bolasie earns a kings ransom at Everton but i'm yet to see proof that we were paying all of his retainer. I'm not convinced. I know many opposing fans wanted to see us lose Grealish and as I said before it nearly did happen, but in the Championship we should not be a selling club. Its a club that's going to aim to get back where it was. And we did blood Green, Hepburn-Murphy & Davis our youth graduates but we cannot fill the team with them. We were promoted relying our 3rd choice Goalkeeper. I respect Bristol, hope you get promoted soon, but I'm here to stick up for my club. If I was satisfied that we had done something wrong I'd be the first one to condemn.

It wasn't much and I think it's been paid off by now. The vast bulk of the debt is to Dwane Sports, registered in Jersey for tax and secrecy reasons, but we don't know Dwane Sports' financial position. The likeliest source of DS's money IMO is corporate loans from AQ controlled companies so that if they do need to write anything off then they will get a tax credit for it. That wouldn't happen if it was personally-owned shareholdings or loans. The charge on the ground is in favour of Dwane Sports so its lending money to BRFC counts as secured lending which comes at a lower rate then unsecured. Per my previous post I think they have sufficient equity for one more season and then the lending becomes unsecured and they start losing money on top of the original purchase price ?£6m. It is not a good position in which to be. Potential buyers can read the finances as well as I can and any such will do the sensible thing and wait for either adminsitration or a sale at rock bottom price which are going to be a matter of time unless they suddenly change tack and start pumping lots of money in for a new stadium and a promotion push to try to sell the club for a premium as a successful Chamionship team. That would be a very high risk strategy as they don't have the bottomless pockets of the Lansdown family who can budget for an annual £25m loss agaisnt the AQs' £3m.

Found an alternative ground guide earlier and had to share this Barnsley fans review of the swamp. 'Gary Bennett, 4th May 2019 - Bristol Rovers v Barnsley Travel: Having been to Bristol City a few times the route was routine till we got to Bristol. But we followed the satnav and found off street parking easily enough. Refreshments: We found a local pub on Gloucester Road and kept ourselves to ourselves as the pub was a bit lively with Rovers supporters. Impressions: I have to be honest and say the ground is barely Football League standard and light years away from Ashton Gate. The away facilities are terrible. What's with all the tents? Atmosphere: We went one up then went down to ten men and they got a late winner but it didn't really matter as we were back in the Championship anyway. Exit: We hung around in the same pub and kept quiet! Then an easy drive home. Enjoy: Bristol is a great city especially around the centre and we wish we could have stayed the weekend as we have done before. But the Rovers ground is abysmal and the area around it doesn't have too much to offer. Luckily we won't be back next season (or any time soon hopefully).' https://www.tothe92.co.uk/groundguide/bristolrovers.html

I’m no Rugby expert but I’d be surprised if the financial rewards for Bristol Bears reaching the top flight are as high as City reaching the Premier League. As difficult as it is to believe sometimes we really aren’t that far from achieving that judging by the last 3 seasons. We already have the stadium. Importantly, Steve Lansdown has never struck me as someone who just gives up and walks away from challenges. Its great to see that there are STILL sagheads out there who think that SL is going to pull the plug. You’d think after 10 years of coming out with the same wishful shit they’d have taken the hint by now. Obviously not.

They've got a fantastic fan base ? Where the **** are they all then ? Waiting for another Wembley appearance ? Oh, hang on, they only had 25k for their last one so it can't be that. They are 11th in the third division for average attendance - fantastic fan base my arse.

Still waiting for the Bristol Rovers obitiary. Joined the Football League in 2015, achieved sweet FA and died in 2021. RIP Bristol Rovers.

Patriarch isn't a word you hear very often these days. Either way, RIP.

Why add more strain to our pitch for the women? No offence but not enough people really cares about women's football. I may be wrong but when the new training ground is made aren't the women's home games being played there?

Some shithead texted TalkSport earlier They were debating what Pep would experience if Man City fell down the leagues and he stuck with them , as he’s promised They Promptly read out the text ’Pep would be heard mumbling. ‘Is this a circus’ what are all these tents , when he visited Bristol Roves Minimal Ground’ Childish ?

Quelle surprise. A Villa fan in denial. Truth is pal, you were very very close to breaching the regs. It was widely acknowledged by the whole football world. You may have just gotten away with it. Just. Suck it up, be grateful that you might’ve just sneaked under, but don’t come here acting high and ******* mighty and that you weren’t pushing the line. Cuz you were. Very close.

Again if you read, I gave the rationale. Why so defensive? Why so worried? And in contrast....why so confident that you are fully compliant? Do you go on a charm offensive with all these too? Thats all we are asking. When you come up with bollocks like you should be entitled to replace players like for like (and how unfair it would be to have to play “youngsters”) you sound like one of your fellow “entitled” fans.

The problem is, if you have breached for the three year period, the horse has bolted. Until you publish your accounts we don’t know. You don’t seem to get that we are speculating and therefore discussing on a forum stuff that has been put out in the media. If this thread is nonsense, why not scroll past it? We’ve had some good debate on this thread with fans of other clubs, and we’ve had some who seem to be worried by it. It’s a forum, it’s not a court.

So dumb its unreal.

Dirty rotten bastards - Green Day

xegas Gas Posts: 6,344 Posting Level about an hour ago via mobile stuartcampbell likes this Quote Post by axegas on about an hour ago The “faithful and true” chant just isn’t true is it? We’ve got a fantastic fan base but attendances will always drop off the back of a few bad performances and season ticket sales reduce after a poor season just like any other club in the Football League. They have a "Faithful and True" chant, i thought it was just a few morons on Slagchat that came out with the faithful and true line but no they have an actual chant. unbelievable.

Maybe? I am sure they have many other things on their minds right now. Hell of a family resemblance there by the way. Condolences to the family.

AFAIK it has been actively marketed for sale for the last couple of years and that's why they are spending £250k on a London office each year. These private company sales generally are not advertised in the press because that smacks of desperation; instead high net worth individuals are identified and targetted for a "marvellous investment opportunity" which is what Higgs did in finding the AQs.

@bert tann keeps dropping hints that there is something brewing, but his posts are so cryptic and obscure I have become convinced he is a question setter on "Only Connect", and that he can introduce me to the rather fruity Victoria Coren-Mitchell .

Of course I'm aware of this. However, at this moment in time we are under. Hence no action from the EFL/PL. I'm confident that we'll remain under and with a projected overspend of around £25m (your figures), it would have to be a hefty hike on the ground sale to take us over. You are hoping that we'll be dragged into it. I see this as little more than straw clutching. You've speculated all the way through this and being wrong every step of the way. Out of interest, do you know what figure your lease is for AG?

... is it normal for lawyers from same ultimate organisation or two different ones to be involved with both sides For barristers, yes, common. They have a different operational set up to other lawyers.

Homes Under the Hamer didn’t go well either.

Genuine point. I wonder how Mr Vince would feel about a world where a footba club's home fans are travelling 20/30 miles to home matches. Doesn't really fit with his view of sustainably and renewables. Genuine point. I wonder how Mr Vince would feel about a world where a footba club's home fans are travelling 20/30 miles to home matches. Doesn't really fit with his view of sustainably and renewables.

I agree - why on earth would officials demonstrate a bias towards Bristol Rovers?! It’s not a big enough club and refs and linos certainly wouldn’t be influenced by the ‘cauldron’ like atmosphere at the Mem ? - pens given in favour of the gas is not really a debate worthy to stand aside the ‘away team pens at Old Trafford and Anfield’ debates ...?

They thought they’d found a solution, by listing the club for sale on eBay. The one bid they did receive has now been withdrawn, after one disgruntled punter said “I needed a fancy dress costume for my kids party. I offered £12.50 for a Mickey Mouse outfit, and nearly ended up as the owner of Bristol Rovers”..!

Yep, because: he was 18 at the time, having made 2 senior sub appearances he didn’t cost us a several £million loan fee he didn’t cost us £50k plus in wages per week We would love to have brought him back here last season (more so to piss you off probably), but guess what? We accepted he was beyond our budget. We would’ve liked him back when he was going to Swansea, but we accepted we couldn’tt afford it. You obviously could..... ......or took the gamble you’d be promoted before the EFL would act if (if!!!) you did go over.

You miss the debate.....again!!! Your argument was that if you had to sell a player because of FFP you shouldn’t have resort to playing youngsters, you should be able to bring in someone equally as good. If you can do that for free, then great. We don’t have FFP to worry about, because we accept that when we sell a player for £7m (Flint) we can’t then go and spend another £7m on his replacement. We go and buy Webster for £3.5m. When we sell him for £20m (so glad it was Brighton rather than you!!), we can spend £7m on Kalas. When we sell Reid for £9m, we buy Andi Weimann for £2m and Mo Eisa for £800k. You see that when your costs outweighs your income, you have to make that money up somewhere. And then we also rely on bringing Kelly (An 18 year old in) through because we sell a Joe Bryan....and sell him for £15m ahead of the end of our accounting period, and we report a profit. You see, we are forced into bringing youngsters in. Some will come through our academy like Reid, Bryan and Kelly. Others like Flint we bought for 300k as a 22 year old late developer, Brownhill for youth development compensation. We then develop them. We accept that. You see bitter that Grealish might have had to be sold. But you’re a huge club, so that’s ok. When we see your 18/19 accounts and they’ve been analysed by more (much more) experts than me in Kieran and Swiss, we’ll see what’s really happened. Might all be fine, in which case you can sit their smugly. But it does make you wonder why so many people have questioned your FFP position..

Fair to whom though? Surely it has to be primarily fair to all the other championship clubs who, knowing the new ffp rules ( as did every other club ahead of the 3 year assessment period), took whatever steps were necessary to bring their finances in line, even if it meant selling their best players at the cost of competitive advantage.

That happened to me at Eastville. I gave it the “big un” then had to run away and hide when my secretary’s husband showed up.

In the last 5 maybe 10 years most teams don’t come back down they stay up for a number of seasons

This is just complete nonsense