We Had Joy........... (warning long rant!)

[Sheepskin Stu]

Ok chaps. I'll point out one more EXTREMELY important fact that seems to have passed by you all.

If you ignore the tiny percentages of the shares owned by the VSC and a few others, JR owns 33.3% of the total number of shares. Bramhall and Watson own another 33.3% each. Now, surely that should be enough food for some very considerable thought?

And if you want another thought to ponder: don't forget JR is a FAN. That has IMMENSE implications for the running of this club.

I'm gobsmacked tbh by the level of debate on here.

BobG

PS I'll put it another way: a triumvirate, as is extremely well known, is the most unstable form of government known to man.

I think there's a good point in that somewhere Bob but my limited thought can't work it out.

So what happens then if two of the three major shareholders decide not to be directors anymore? Would they want to sell and how much would that be? Can JR buy them?

[BobG]

I might be persuaded to discuss things more openly offline Stu, but I'm certainly not going to do join up the dots publicly. I've given everyone more than enough clues over the last few weeks. There are a few guys on here who have worked it out for themselves - without any need for help from me either. It can be done. So I'll be damned if I'm going to hold the hands of them that pretend their emotions constitute the act of thinking. You certainly don't fall into that category Stu so let's touch base sometime?

BobG

[Bristol Red Rover]

Bob you really are on a negative roll

The worst directors are ones who are not fans - plenty of examples about. JR being a fan is what got us to the Championship. Maybe that was a step too far? But boy, its been a good few years. I don't see the writing on the wall that we are about to slip into terminal decline. If you have that insight Bob, please share it because so far you are mainly just hinting at things.

Shares - they're worth what someone will buy them for. Could be that if there was some property interest in the club, they would be worth something to the worng type of person. As thats not the case, currently anyway, I don't see a problem there unless you are a shareholder in which case the value of your shares at the minute are likely to plummet.

[BobG]

No Bristol. Shares are power. Wheover owns the majority of them owns the thing they represent. Whoever owns the majority of them can make his view, opinions and decisions stick. John does not own a majority.

Fan directors are ok - until they over reach themselves. if they don't have the financial, moral or management resources at whatever level they aspire to, disaster is only ever a step away. And tonight, disaster is upon us. And I don't mean the result.

Like I said though, I'm not going to join up the dots publicly. I have indicated pretty well all the key areas over the last few weeks. That's as far as I'm going.

BobG

[pubteam]

I might be persuaded to discuss things more openly offline Stu, but I'm certainly not going to do join up the dots publicly. I've given everyone more than enough clues over the last few weeks. There are a few guys on here who have worked it out for themselves - without any need for help from me either. It can be done. So I'll be damned if I'm going to hold the hands of them that pretend their emotions constitute the act of thinking. You certainly don't fall into that category Stu so let's touch base sometime?

BobG

Bob, you speak a lot of sense and your contributions add a lot to the forum, but what's with the constant \"everyone else on this forum is a pleb\" attitude?

[wilts rover]

and your solution is what Bob? Stage a coup? Are you going to drive the tank or fire the gun? Or just stir up more trouble by pouring petrol on troubled waters. Come on, you are better than the s**tstirring children on here and imho your posts are doing far more harm than good.

[BobG]

Sorry PT. I don't mean everyone. I get a bit cheesed off being told I'm a numpty by some on here who it's patently obvious are unable to string two logical and rational thoughts together. Tell me, just what proportion of those who contribute to this site can form a connection between events that happened 3 months apart? Not many. But it's that recognition of patterns, of events pointing in a direction, that give the clues to where to look, where, and what to ask, where to focus.

I really don't have any problem being a lot more open with anyone on here who has shown he or she can recognise that alternative views can have credibility, that something, somewhere has gone horribly wrong, that there's more to any football club than simply players and manager. But I simply will not pander to the febrile desires of anyone who can't be bothered to accept that their view is not the only view. Like I keep on saying, emotions are not a good basis for rational thinking.

Cheers

BobG

[Bristol Red Rover]

What can they do with this power thats a problem?

JR has been a successful businessman, he's not just a fan. Yes he overstepped with his enthusiasm about how he'd get support from the Donny public. In fact he has had as much as was reasonably going to happen in so short a time. Beyond that I think he's done well.

[BobG]

No Wilts. I won't stop. My purpose, my objective, my goal in life generally, is to encourage people to think for themselves. To not accept, blindly, what they are told - wheover tells it. And that, of course, includes me. I do maintain though that all is not well with the good ship DRFC. And the problems are manifold, serious and not just on the playing side. And, as you for one should certainly know, there is no solution. Certainly not one that any of us are going to enjoy. The only possible 'acceptable' way out was quashed by John a couple of weeks ago.

BobG

[wilts rover]

But thats just it Bob, there has to be a solution. Even if you, me, madmick, or anyone else likes it or not, JR needs to find a way of funding a football club for the 2012-2013 season. I trust him to know what he is doing - because frankly I dont have any better ideas - nor as I have yet to see does anyone else.

[BobG]

Oh there is a solution mate. It's just not pleasant at all.

BobG

[Dickie Dido]

What's the solution then, Glasshopper?

[BobG]

What's a Glasshopper?

BobG

[Chris]

I said to a friend (none-DRFC) roughly two or three months ago that I firmly believe that Doncaster Rovers will spend at least one of the five seasons following this season in League Two.

Who fears the same?

[Dickie Dido]

It's Chinese for Grasshopper Oh great one. I thought all Lovers Rovers knew that.

[pubteam]

I said to a friend (none-DRFC) roughly two or three months ago that I firmly believe that Doncaster Rovers will spend at least one of the five seasons following this season in League Two.

Who fears the same?

Great endorsement for the crystal ball if this turns out to be correct.

[albie]

Bramall and the Watson family have control of Patienceform, by holding majority shares. They have also put loans into the club.

If they want the loans repaid, that might be a problem. If they want to sell their shares, they can do so to whoever they wish, unless there is a buyback clause which JR can activate. Ken Richardson anyone?

Seriously, either of these actions, coming when income next season shows a real fall on the current season, is likely to put the cat among the pigeons.

Nobody is saying this will happen, but it could, so people need to see the big picture, not just what happens in the next few games.

[Wokingviking]

Oh there is a solution mate. It's just not pleasant at all.

BobG

It's just not realistic either.  Replacing the benefactor model with a supporter-owned club is the \"solution\" being touted here I am guessing.

Firstly, this presupposes that the two departed directors will hand over or sell their majority shareholding to the supporters (this is where I think BobG is going with this).  For that to happen, JR would have to be in agreement (due to \"pre-emption rights\" in the Articles of Association... I suspect there may be further hurdles written into a Shareholders Agreement that may possibly exist but is a private document). If JR was to agree to a supporters takeover, then you would also need to ask him to continue bank-rolling the club for several years given the existing contractual commitments, otherwise you're looking at the club going into liquidation, never mind administration, so the club would fold altogether.  In addition, the two departed directors and JR would face potential disqualification as directors - the Insolvency Practitioner that would be appointed in this scenario would identify that the directors had withdrawn previously pledged financial support and effectively caused the insolvency.  Given that JR is running a successful business and the other two presumably prize their reputations, then I don't think they would want to risk a disqualification order.  So the idea that control of the club can be passed to supporters without adverse effect, either now or in the near future, only works if someone provides an endowment of several million pounds to meet unavoidable future losses... hmm, anybody?

However, assuming the unlikely scorched earth approach where JR and the other two simply walk away and the club does fold and you \"phoenix\" as a new club bearing the name Doncaster Rovers, then what happens?  Assuming you've got a ground to play in that meets requirements, then you apply to get in as high a league as will accept you (Northern Counties East? Unibond if you're lucky?) but then what has Doncaster Rovers become?  DRFC is then an irrelevance really, at that level, it is no longer a flagship of the town. Think Doncaster United playing on the airport, bearing the town's name but so what?  And don't try and draw parallels with AFC Wimbledon here - they had a real \"cause\" they could rally 3,000 fans behind.  An undignified \"coup\"* by Rovers supporters, sidelining JR, would switch most supporters off (me certainly), but as I originally stated, and for the reasons above, this is simply not realistic.  

(* Any \"coup\" effectively has to be sanctioned (or allowed by their walking away) by JR and the other two, so it wouldn't really be a coup anyhow.)

So what about the (somewhat unlikely) option that John cedes control but continues funding the club.  Apart from the money, JR is the only fan we have who knows how to run a football club; he's been doing it, pretty successfully, for 14 years.  Which other fan/s do we have with those credentials?  The concept of a community-owned club is laudable, but to automatically assume that it would then be run better is highly questionable to say the least.

Unless and until the economics change, and football below first tier goes part-time as in much of Europe, then a self-financing community-owned club is unlikely to survive at Football League level.  So what's the point?

I've tried to be unemotive in my analysis above, and focused on the question of the benefactor model versus the self-financing community-owned model.  Sure, the fans may have to have this debate at some future point, but that should only be in preparation (and with JR) once John chooses his departure date - a long, long time off I hope.  So please can we close this debate down for now?  It's just divisive and damaging.  What makes this worse is that it's all unrealistic.

[BobG]

Ha! Actually Woking, I hadn't even considered the option of the supporters owning the club! No. I was hinting at major, major, MAJOR cost cutting. And everything that that implies.

It's an idea I should think about though for sure. So many thanks indeed for your thoughts. I will have a ponder.

Cheers

BobG

[BobG]

What can they do with this power thats a problem?

Sorry Bristol. Missed your question. Do you believe JR did a 48 hour U turn last October all by himself? You're right. He didn't. That's an example of the use of power that has a direct impact on what happens at DRFC. John is no longer in control. It's made him look a total bloody idiot. In public. And why might anyone want to do that to John you might care to ask yourself too.

BobG

[Wokingviking]

Ha! Actually Woking, I hadn't even considered the option of the supporters owning the club! No. I was hinting at major, major, MAJOR cost cutting. And everything that that implies.

It's an idea I should think about though for sure. So many thanks indeed for your thoughts. I will have a ponder.

Cheers

BobG

You disappoint me Bob, how benign!  I'd assumed from other comments on here, and your responses, that it ran deeper than that.

However, the cost-cutting approach stlll eventually takes you into obscurity when every other club has a sugar-daddy (or creditors!) bank-rolling it.  But assuming you do go for a slash 'n' burn approach, the trouble is that other clubs don't want to take on our players on the terms they currently enjoy, basically.  We're stuck with those commitments.

[BobG]

Yes. Quite possible Woks. That's one of the reasons why this is so damn scary. But I still wouldn't be at all surprised to see some of our better players leaving for somewhat surprising clubs - and us letting them go. We cos we can;t afford them any more, and them, because they simply want to get away.

As for supporter ownership - it's not very likely is it? Nice as it might sound, we could only raise a paltry few thousand when we wanted to buy a striker. We're not going to raise millions are we? And there's no revenue stream that would support borrowing it. So pretty unlikely I suggest.

BobG