Clubs demand Sheffield Wednesday points deduction

[teddybeararmy]

15 minutes ago, Minton said:

 

It's worse than that. It's like Camelot checked your ticket, paid out the money, sent you a letter saying it was fine, let you spend the money and then decided that it wasn't fine and went you to give the money back.

 

Sellers remorse basically.

Your suggestion is that the efl agreed the ground sale and then went back on that agreement. 

Now, none of us are privileged to what documents were presented to the efl and so its pointless speculating on who is in the wrong. 

Can you give an opinion on if the ground sale was signed and sealed by the end of the 17-18 accounts, why did DC say we were in serious trouble with ffp/p&s in late 2018 at the fan's forum. 

[Blue and white]

2 minutes ago, S36 OWL said:

Would Gibson be moaning if Boro were top of the league? I very much doubt it. 

Who gives a monkey's, if it wasn't him it would be someone else, there is only one person to blame.

Edited February 25, 2020 by Blue and white

[Guest]

Not too sure what the future of the EFL will be if they lose these cases to be honest,  I think they have to make it stick 

 

Suspect it will turn into appeal after appeal though, they need to prove they had no knowledge of the transaction been done in the way it was or gave agreement of any form as alleged by the club , likewise for the chairman if it’s the other way round 

 

Will go on and on and on this 

[ChinaOwl]

14 minutes ago, S36 OWL said:

Would Gibson be moaning if Boro were top of the league? I very much doubt it. 

 

Total irrelevance.

 

We have either done something wrong or we haven't. That will come out in due course. But if it turns out that we actually are guilty of wrongdoing, Gibson had a legitimate grievance. Don't blame him for that. Blame those guilty (if that is indeed the case). If Gibson's accusations had no basis, you can be pretty fekkin' sure it will come back to bite him in due course.

[Mr Farrell]

1 minute ago, ChinaOwl said:

 

Total irrelevance.

 

We have either done something wrong or we haven't. That will come out in due course. But if it turns out that we actually are guilty of wrongdoing, Gibson had a legitimate grievance. Don't blame him for that. Blame those guilty (if that is indeed the case). If Gibson's accusations had no basis, you can be pretty fekkin' sure it will come back to bite him in due 

 

It was always the classless blunts who blamed anyone but themselves.

 

To hear people blaming Middlesbrough for our grubby fiddles is embarrassing.

[teddybeararmy]

46 minutes ago, Royal_D said:

Not too sure what the future of the EFL will be if they lose these cases to be honest,  I think they have to make it stick 

 

Suspect it will turn into appeal after appeal though, they need to prove they had no knowledge of the transaction been done in the way it was or gave agreement of any form as alleged by the club , likewise for the chairman if it’s the other way round 

 

Will go on and on and on this 

Think I read that as part of the arbitration process both parties agree that the findings are final and not appealable. 

As for the efl hearing if it gets that far, does anyone know if that can be challenged 

[striker]

8 minutes ago, teddybeararmy said:

Think I read that as part of the arbitration process both parties agree that the findings are final and not appealable. 

As for the efl hearing if it gets that far, does anyone know if that can be challenged 

I'd think it would be. If it gets to a hearing, supposed to be an independent panel?

 

EFL have a history of appealing their own independent panel's adjuducations, so presume we could have a go too. 

[Minton]

2 hours ago, teddybeararmy said:

Your suggestion is that the efl agreed the ground sale and then went back on that agreement. 

Now, none of us are privileged to what documents were presented to the efl and so its pointless speculating on who is in the wrong. 

Can you give an opinion on if the ground sale was signed and sealed by the end of the 17-18 accounts, why did DC say we were in serious trouble with ffp/p&s in late 2018 at the fan's forum. 

 

Back dating sales is common practice in business. 

 

The club has said that we submitted our accounts to the EFL and they accepted them.

 

The EFL stated that they charged us after new documents came to light. 

 

Derby have said the same as us, that the EFL have effectively moved the goalposts after the fact.

[teddybeararmy]

3 minutes ago, Minton said:

 

Back dating sales is common practice in business. 

 

The club has said that we submitted our accounts to the EFL and they accepted them.

 

The EFL stated that they charged us after new documents came to light. 

 

Derby have said the same as us, that the EFL have effectively moved the goalposts after the fact.

Granted it may be common practice in accountancy and tax affairs, doesn't mean its allowable in the efl rules which all clubs agree on and should abide by. 

By early 2018 DC and his team already knew we had smashed the upper limit of ffp, DC then confirms we are in serious trouble at the fans forum, the account period 17-18 is then extended at the last possible moment, then the accounts are released late, even you must see we are firefighting. 

Hopefully we do win at arbitration, but it won't be because of our forward thinking chairman, it will be a technicality exposed by an expensive lawyer against a weak governing body. 

[Minton]

1 minute ago, teddybeararmy said:

Granted it may be common practice in accountancy and tax affairs, doesn't mean its allowable in the efl rules which all clubs agree on and should abide by. 

By early 2018 DC and his team already knew we had smashed the upper limit of ffp, DC then confirms we are in serious trouble at the fans forum, the account period 17-18 is then extended at the last possible moment, then the accounts are released late, even you must see we are firefighting. 

Hopefully we do win at arbitration, but it won't be because of our forward thinking chairman, it will be a technicality exposed by an expensive lawyer against a weak governing body. 

 

We set our stall out well before the lawyer came in, he had no say in how our accountants did our finances

[Dick_Turpin]

24 minutes ago, Minton said:

 

Back dating sales is common practice in business. 

 

The club has said that we submitted our accounts to the EFL and they accepted them.

 

The EFL stated that they charged us after new documents came to light. 

 

Derby have said the same as us, that the EFL have effectively moved the goalposts after the fact.

Back dating is only allowed if there is a substantive legal basis.  Anything we come up with is speculation.  We don't know what evidence the EFL have and what arguments Wednesday have to refute their allegations.  Fingers crossed. I just want the bleeding thing sorted - although I'd rather we hadn't needed to embrace accounting shenanigans in the first place. 

 

[mogbad]

14 minutes ago, teddybeararmy said:

Granted it may be common practice in accountancy and tax affairs, doesn't mean its allowable in the efl rules which all clubs agree on and should abide by. 

By early 2018 DC and his team already knew we had smashed the upper limit of ffp, DC then confirms we are in serious trouble at the fans forum, the account period 17-18 is then extended at the last possible moment, then the accounts are released late, even you must see we are firefighting. 

Hopefully we do win at arbitration, but it won't be because of our forward thinking chairman, it will be a technicality exposed by an expensive lawyer against a weak governing body. 

Back dating the stadium sale is allowable under EFL rules. It wasn't under the old FFP regulations but is allowable under the P&S rules that now exist. 

 

However to back date the stadium sale to the July 2018 accounts documents needed to be in place to show an intention to sell the ground. Those documents needed to be in place by 31st July 2018. 

 

Presumably in our discussions with the EFL last summer we've provided information indicating that the documents were in place & the stadium sale was allowed. The EFL are now saying further information has been obtained that brings the stadium sale process into doubt.

[teddybeararmy]

20 minutes ago, Minton said:

 

We set our stall out well before the lawyer came in, he had no say in how our accountants did our finances

We may have set our stall out, but all the goods on it were out of date according to the efl. Hence the need for a lawyer 

[HarrowbyOwl]

2 hours ago, teddybeararmy said:

Think I read that as part of the arbitration process both parties agree that the findings are final and not appealable. 

As for the efl hearing if it gets that far, does anyone know if that can be challenged 

You are right. There are 2 types of arbitration under EFL rules - Board Disputes and Disciplinary Appeals. At the moment we are in the former. Decision of a League Arbitration Panel can't be appealed. But parties can launch an arbitration appeal against decisions of an EFL Disciplinary Commission.

[Minton]

1 minute ago, teddybeararmy said:

We may have set our stall out, but all the goods on it were out of date according to the efl. Hence the need for a lawyer 

 

Except when we sold the goods to the EFL, we asked them to check our goods were in date and they accepted that they were and signed a document to that effect. Only to later come back and claim that they have changed their mind. Which from a legal standpoint is wrong.

[teddybeararmy]

2 minutes ago, mogbad said:

Back dating the stadium sale is allowable under EFL rules. It wasn't under the old FFP regulations but is allowable under the P&S rules that now exist. 

 

However to back date the stadium sale to the July 2018 accounts documents needed to be in place to show an intention to sell the ground. Those documents needed to be in place by 31st July 2018. 

 

Presumably in our discussions with the EFL last summer we've provided information indicating that the documents were in place & the stadium sale was allowed. The EFL are now saying further information has been obtained that brings the stadium sale process into doubt.

Think this was discussed by our resident accountants and highly possible but if that document was in place at the time why tell the fans later in the year that we were in trouble. 

[teddybeararmy]

2 minutes ago, Minton said:

 

Except when we sold the goods to the EFL, we asked them to check our goods were in date and they accepted that they were and signed a document to that effect. Only to later come back and claim that they have changed their mind. Which from a legal standpoint is wrong.

But what if we tippexed the date out and wrote a new date in with a sharpie. 

[Minton]

Just now, teddybeararmy said:

But what if we tippexed the date out and wrote a new date in with a sharpie. 

 

That would be misleading. 

 

However it is more the case that our sell by date stated August 2018. As far as we are concerned, that covers it up until the 31st. The EFL are saying that it only covers it until the 1st August. 

[mogbad]

1 minute ago, teddybeararmy said:

Think this was discussed by our resident accountants and highly possible but if that document was in place at the time why tell the fans later in the year that we were in trouble. 

 

If the documents were in place the club/DC didn't necessarily have to undertake the sale process & they may have been put in place as a last resort should we need to get out of a FFP/P&S hole. However the fact that it all seemed to be done as a last minute exercise is concerning & doesn't indicate to me that it was a pre-planned process. I'm personally not feeling confident on the arbitration outcome.

[teddybeararmy]

5 minutes ago, mogbad said:

 

If the documents were in place the club/DC didn't necessarily have to undertake the sale process & they may have been put in place as a last resort should we need to get out of a FFP/P&S hole. However the fact that it all seemed to be done as a last minute exercise is concerning & doesn't indicate to me that it was a pre-planned process. I'm personally not feeling confident on the arbitration outcome.

We were in the hole by the time of the fans forum, the only way out was promotion (highly unlikely at that point) or the stadium sale. Why wasn't it mentioned to ease fans worries at the time.