shefcanary

😲 I was joking, kind of, but rats hey!

Your assertion almost makes it sound like that Delia was in direct talks with Attanasio (totally in private without other Board members other than Wynnie knowing, Delia knocked Attanasio back but the Pink'Un ran their story, Foulger read it and offered Attanasio his shares undermining Delia. Is that what you are saying? Insurrection in the ranks ...!

The Pink'Un are now quoting: The report claims that early discussions between all parties have been positive and that joint majority shareholders Delia Smith and Michael Wynn Jones wish to retain their 53 per cent holding in Norwich. It is unclear at this stage whether Attanasio, 64, would look to take on a larger share of the club in the future. Attanasio is a multi-millionaire businessman, who purchased the Brewers in 2004 for a reported $223 million, and is also the part-owner of Milwaukee Admirals. The Pink Un exclusively broke how Attanasio’s delegation at the Spurs game included his two sons, Mike, who was sporting a Norwich scarf, and Dan, David Stearns, president of baseball operations for the Milwaukee Brewers, Dan Fumai, chief financial officer at the Milwaukee Brewers and Rick Schlesinger, president of business operations for the Brewers. Also among the delegation was Richard Ressler, a minority stakeholder at the Brewers and on the advisory board. He is a close friend of Attanasio and goes back to Brown University with the multi-millionaire. City have declined to comment when approached whilst a spokesman for Attanasio has also contacted for comment. I'm going out on a limb here and saying I don't buy this. Attanasio has gone to an awful lot of trouble just to buy out Foulger's shares, without a promise of greater control; from a hard headed business person's point of view it makes no sense. It is a senseless gamble (much like my own on the horses, where I never look at form, keep my fingers crossed). I say again, all this public show of welcome with all his operational staff in tow shows a much deeper investment planned than just buying out one shareholder. Is this a line fed to the Athletic to throw us all off the scent again (or maybe to throw prospective selling clubs off trying to negotiate larger fees)? 🤔 This development is even more unlikely than Attanasio's interest in the club in the first place.

One thing I really hate is someone filming the action instead of living the moment. Are they all like this over here, worse than at home?

Catching up having been doing other things. I always thought that Attanasio's offer would be based on a fixed budgeted figure initially, flushing out how much of a share of the club it could buy him. It may well be true that now Foulger is looking for an exit (rumours on here that his farms are now in administration so he needs some cash). However if it was just Foulger selling to Attanasio, then there would be little need for all the welcome etc. that has been taking place; it would be purely a person to person sale, as it only gets them a seventh of the club. So I am minded that the negotiations are currently still around what the fixed sum Attanasio has in mind is going to get him, in terms of shares and Board level control, whilst setting out a pathway for eventual full takeover. This is in accord with Smith & Jones earlier public discourse where they intimated they would be more welcome for someone to come on board in a smaller way, that both parties got to know each other better and that if things were still working Smith & jones would be happy to sell up. So Foulger's shares plus a little of the new shares; I estimated before c.20,000 being issued would still leave Smith & jones with just over 50% and controlling shares, with maybe a convertible loan on top and a couple of seats on the Board to complete the package. Purely conjecture on my part, but a total investment from Attanasio's point of view of $20-30million? Not quite the complete change of picture we first thought, I won't hide my disappointment at that but I still think Attanasio's presence on the Board will see a step change in how the club attacks the next season.

I'm absolutely certain that would be the case. And the club are probably rightly angry that it has broke and weakened their negotiation position. But they only have themselves to blame. With a Chairperson and a CEO they would not be in the position they find themselves and would have been in charge of the narrative. Very costly once again ....

There was talk as Pukki got older and his initial burst pace slowed that he could be played in a more central attacking midfielder role given his work rate on the ball. This could potentially extend his career a couple more years if he was up for it, maybe more if you look at someone like Wes. Is that a change that Deano & Shakey may look at? 🤔

Tell me about it! And currently they are laying a new gas main in Mottram which adds another 45 minutes to that. Sheffield to Manchester in 2hrs 15 minutes recently, that's only half an hour less than the time it takes me to get from Sheffield to Norwich (without speeding - I think I could possibly do it in same time without scaring my passengers - 80-85mph ish)!

I can get from Sheffield to Norwich in 2hrs 45 minutes without breaking the speed limit now, when back in the 80's it was easily 3 and half. I always go down A1 to the A14, its half an hour quicker. It ain't so bad now they have sorted the A14.

Well, preparations at least.

It's not for you though Ricardo it's to keep the kids off the streets, they can't figure out jumpers for goal posts any more! 😉

One for Attanasio longer term when looking at redevelopment around the Carra. As discussed elsewhere a 4-5,000 arena close to the current ground would make a fine base for a Norwich basketball team. Might win over a few politicians as well. Very Delia-like 😉

They have thankfully. You would hope they would treat it as a test this time rather than a cup final, especially as we want them to beat the Binners twice next season.

I would imagine so. After thousands of Killers fans and Elton John fans jumping up and down on it, plus being under tarpaulins for a couple of weeks, it will need all that time to fully recover.

Sorry Nora, most players agree with that point of view once they are out of earshot of him. Whilst working for him they know which side their bread is buttered! They agree the ride is worth hanging on for and there are quite a few laughs, but don't cross him! I agree that teams don't hold that view. Most chairmen probably still wake up in the night with cold sweats when they think about his methods though.

The city centre & dockside have been re-developed with a lot of sympathy and it is a great place to visit as long as you don't stray too far (shocking that they had their world heritage site taken away for the Everton ground development - not sure what the politics of that was). I would encourage a visit and as not many Scousers hang out in those areas as it is very much a tourist trap, you have no need of trepidation on your visit. 😉

He sure is, I'd add self-serving to that as well! 😂

You mean about some people not being happy? 🙂 I've led medium sized organisations in the past, the aim was always to have a harmonious working environment with everyone on message, but such is human nature a very rare beast to attain. But you tries your best (to be the best you can be, natch). I now restrict myself to leading small charities where such harmony is usually easier to maintain. 😉

And this comes back to my current main criticism of the club at the moment - just who is in control? The fact some within the club are unhappy with the way the story comes out shows a clear lack of governance and accountability within the club. An injection of energy and proper leadership is required, Attanasio on paper seems to be the person that can oversee its restoration.

Not sure why. Barnsley have been around longer and although in the dim distant past they have won probably as many major trophies. Barnsley is only slightly smaller in terms of population than Norwich, the main difference is its proximity to Sheffield, Rotherham and Doncaster. The key reason to make a comparison, is that they are currently owned by American investees, a major surprise when it happened. They have pursued a "Head Coach" policy over the past few years, which interestingly has not provided a consistency of playing style on the pitch as the owners try to force success rather than build for the future. Their current performance suggests a low bar comparability, but there for the grace of god go we. However the current choice of potential investment partner does seem a very good fit. Until I saw Purple's comment I also tend to agree with this - it suggests all parties were comfortable that a deal was close. As noted above, Purple's comment seems to imply an inside line on this. Is it just that the club wanted to be in charge of the narrative, or is there a real risk of failure of negotiations? I come back to the ITV "quote" from a club official, which confuses the hell out of me, suggesting it may be the latter? I hope the official just got it wrong.

Situations like this is why there should have been stronger messaging to ticketless Liverpool fans before the final not to travel to the stadium on Saturday. With the way things are in France at the moment, there really should have been more work done to advise on what to expect from the French police if there was the slightest whiff of trouble. It is a country that is split right down the middle in terms of politics, with tensions often being displayed in public arenas. Another warning to all in the first world.

I agree that the Liverpool fans were targeted. The way fans were corralled (kettled if you want) into organised queues was heavy handed, but I can see why it was done, due to the well known use of storming of turnstiles employed by ticketless Liverpool fans in the past. The lack of effective pre-screening of tickets away from the turnstiles was a failure of all parties, especially the French. You would have expected the Liverpool club could have worked with the local authorities to organise this better. Reputations flew before the "genuine" Liverpool fans unfortunately. The lack of a any kind of statements from either the club, FA, City Council or fan groups before the match asking only genuine fans with authorised tickets to travel to the stadium flies in the face of the "100% blame attributable to the French police". Unfortunately Ken, the majority of people in this country have heard it, seen it and experienced it all before from Liverpool. Until there is a change of attitude from the city, club and fans they are unlikely to derive much sympathy from the wider public.

Yeah, as Ricardo said that was 71/72 season, the match against Millwall. This was a top of the table clash and showed Ron had got a team that could fight hard to challenge for promotion. Great match, good memories.

It would be good to hear some acceptance from the campaigning Liverpool fans (there was a particualrly aggressive podcast bloke on BBC 2 news this morning) that there was a genuine issue over fake tickets, calling out their fellow "fans" for expecting to get away with it at the expense of the genuine fans. My Twitter feed was full of people "celebrating" their fake tickets. Fan groups, and the club, should have begged people with such tickets not to travel on the basis that the trouble witnessed would happen. Some degree of humility from the leaders of their campaign, with acceptance that some Liverpool "fans" raised issues that other clubs don't seem to attract, would help their case. Until then, response generally seems to be "well its always Liverpool! They get what they deserve!" They have to look hard at themselves.

Famewo seems to not have impressed Charlton's new manager, hadn't been playing regularly, which was strange to put it mildly given he had been putting in man of the match performances under the previous manager. Is there a fitness issue?