Can anyone in the know tell what was the vote in numbers as in for and against?
70% in favour. That means that 7 in 10 members in the trust are total idiots.Originally Posted by gael353
This is our Trump/Brexit moment.
I think I'm done with this unfortunately. It's blatantly obvious that this will all end in tears.
Last edited by Pablo Escobar; 29/10/2020 at 7:07 AM.
[/B][I]P.Esc.
That's unbelievable. I know we've sold a stake in our club to Denis Desmond but it's an investment and we still have a huge say in our club's future. I don't get how Cork could have gone from such a strong position to the members washing their hands of the running of the club so quickly.
Call option. Does that mean Hemmings could wait sometime before exercising his right and leave Cork in total limbo next season?
A sad day for Cork and the league in general.
The plan to secure the freehold interest in the stadium jumps out to me. What happens when the MFA refuse to sell? I don't see any talk of committing to building a new stadium. How much would FORAS actually need to raise to secure a First Division licence?
Not seeing much in the way of details but maybe it was provided to the members and they felt it wasn't achievable on their own. It'll be very difficult to pick up the pieces again should things go wrong with Grovemoor.
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Upwards to the vanguard where the pressure is too high.
The man himself is a billionaire so he doesn’t need cork to make a quick buck. The issues will be in the years ahead as the man is advancing in years and do his family share his interest in football.
Since when have billionaires turned down an opportunity to make a quick buck?
Since when has anyone made a quick buck out of the LoI?
Interesting also to note that only earlier this month a couple of Cork fans here were saying the bid would "in all probability rejected", that it wasn't a serious takeover offer, and that there was almost no chance the offer would be accepted. Just wondering what's changed? I presume there's no major stakeholder in FORAS who controls, say, 20-30% of things - so a 70% vote effectively means 70% of fans voted for it?
Yet with FORAS strongly recommending it, it seems hardly surprising the deal has gone through. This does seem to suggest that the deeper financial issues within the club (as in, above and beyond what other clubs are facing at the moment) are probably quite real as well.
I wonder did the restrictions on Fans and the reduced income as a result seal the deal ? or has this been coming no matter what.
It became apparent over the last 2 weeks - that the club would have serious issues in obtaining a license to compete in 2021 without a substantial cash injection. Our debts are not too dissimilar to what we had when we obtained a license last season, however there was a real risk that due to the changing nature of that debt we would not have been issued a license. This has swayed many members and I think we have collectively held our noses and moved it on to save the club itself. Very dramatic, all very quick but I suppose another typical chapter in the history of Cork soccer.
I feel that Hemmings has picked us off in a moment of weakness but to be fair to him, he did stump up the cash when we needed it last season and I think he and his company are more pragmatic than the usual football investors. They have taken Preston from a valuation of when they took over of 165k to a current valuation of anything between 40-75m depending on what you believe. I don't think he has a chance in hell of turning us into something valuable but we are going to find out now anyway.
There was also the 'nothing to see here' angle on financial issues said, debt preventing a 1st Division licence I think might just have turned heads and the lesser of two unwanted choices kicked in.
I voted to sell. I did not enjoy doing so. My approach was always what is best for the long term future of the club. I am not convinced that in the long term selling to an individual is better than keeping the club fan owned. I think we are likely to have more success in the short term under Grovemoor than FORAS but in 15, 30 or more years? That remains unknown.
I think if the vote happened a week ago then the vote would have been closer but some things emerged that swayed a significant number of no voters like me. For me it came down to licensing. We have a relatively small amount of debt that the board have indicated is manageable over the next number of years but there is the possibility that the licensing committee disagrees that this debt is manageable while we are a first division outfit with no gate receipts, limited ability to fund-raise and in an environment that makes businesses slow to support us. There is the possibility that licensing is loosened as multiple teams could find it difficult to be granted a license otherwise but we can't gamble on that possibility, and we have seen how much more strict licensing was under this new FAI in 2020, and the FAI have given no indication that this will change in 2021.
So in the end I voted to secure our immediate future but I did so feeling very unhappy about it. I hope I made the right choice, but we won't know for several years.
Theoretically yes, and that was a concern raised time and time again. We were told the reason for the bid to be structured this way has to do with the structure of FORAS as a Cop-Op/Friendly Society. I don't fully understand why. The board also indicated that they believe he will initiate proceedings immediately but in the meantime we still own the club and are continuing with our license application for the 2021 season. The reality is that Grovemoor need to move quickly if they plan to receive a license for 2021 so we should know shortly if they are serious or not, though theoretically they could choose to do nothing and wait, and then in several years after we have turned things around again take us over in a healthier position owning all of our assets. It makes me very uncomfortable but hopefully its all dealt with quickly.
We as a membership hadn't received any information from Grovemoor in the ~8 months since they first indicated their interest in taking over the club. Obviously they had been in communication with the board but in order to win the vote they needed to win over the fans and had taken no steps in doing so. A week ago, with the information we had I think the vote would not have passed. Probably 60% plus against at that point. The licensing issue coming to light really changed things for a lot of people, myself and many people I have spoken to about the issue included. A lot of very anti-sale people ended up voting yes because the immediate risk was too great. Now we wait.
I think this raises more questions than it answers though.
If the Revenue debt was cleared in full this time last year (special request of the Revenue, it seems), but now debt is "not too dissimilar", then that is indicative of big issues. This can't built up all that quickly - certainly it can't have built up over the past two weeks.
Again, obviously covid is affecting all clubs and it was probably inevitable that someone would suffer in this. But I think the situation in Cork is above and beyond.
There is zero chance of turning an LoI club into something valuable. Dundalk aren't valuable with two recent EL group stage qualifications behind them. Rovers aren't valuable with a solid academy under their belt.
I think calling the debt not too dissimilar is not accurate. Our net liabilities in February were in excess of 650, with significant debt to Revenue. I don't want to get into detail but our current net liabilities are much lower than that in October and would probably have been lower again in a year without covid and games without fans. In addition none of the current debt is to revenue other than normal debt accrued in trading that will be paid back as it falls due. The debt position has not changed over two weeks, the way we look at the debt, particularly in relation to licensing has changed.
The Revenue debt was cleared pre-license clearance last year. So that's finished.
That left us with say 'X' amount of debt remaining at the time we received a license. One year down the road we have a similar amount of debt but with the conditions we now face as a result of COVID, and the way that debt has been re-structured greatly impacts our ability to trade as a going concern and as a result impacts our ability to get a license for 2021.
I don't understand why the finances are so complicated.
CCFC is a new club and has had big crowds, lucrative transfer fees, and decent European runs in its ten-year existence.
So why is there this strange debt agreement in place whereby debt is being reclassified or restructured (they're two different things; El-Pietro's post suggests the former but you use the latter term) such that it puts the licence at risk doesn't seem to make any sense.
You'll forgive my "boy who cried wolf" approach to this given the previous posts. I might nip off and have a goo at the CRO actually.
Surely licensing regulations can't be as stringent next year regarding debt? Obviously you can't take the **** but the licensing committee has to take current covid environment when evaluating clubs?
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