The Birmingham Mail are saying that Milan Mandaric has had a bid for the club turned down, even though it met Xia’s financial demands and I’m again wondering why?
And then it turns out that Wyness isn’t suing for “wrongful dismissal”, but is accusing Xia of “tortious interference” instead;
https://villaleaks.com/avfc-tortious-interference/
No, I didn’t know what it was either, but put simply, it’s where an owner prevents an officer from complying with his legal obligations.
The article states that “the implication would be that he was prevented from seeking insolvency advice and / or investment for AVFC by Xia, despite his fiduciary responsibilities to do so.”
Which is pretty much what we thought.
The interesting or probably worrying part though, is the following;
“The further implication of this is twofold; that Xia cannot let the club go into administration nor can he sell the club.”
Now, I don’t quite understand this, as it seems to me that if Xia sells, there would probably be some sort of agreement to sort out the debts.
But it’s always possible that I’m missing something, in which case perhaps you can enlighten me?
Is it the fact that Xia is being sued that makes it impossible for him to sell?
I don’t know, but whoever is leaking this stuff seems to know what they’re talking about and it certainly fits with Xia’s statement that the club isn’t up for sale.
I’m not sure if I fancy Mandaric coming in. From memory it seems fans loathed him, but there’s no doubt he leaves clubs on a much better footing and if that’s what’s required, maybe he might be good for the club, if not us supporters.
Whatever, if this story is true, it’s all very worrying, as we might very well be stuck in total limbo.
France got lucky with first two goals which gave Croatia an uphill task. Overall though I think they were good value for being world champions. England on the other hand have made big strides since the euros 2 years ago, and hopefully they will improve more to become serious contenders for next euros and World Cup.
Agreed, Holte, they were worthy winners.
Without wanting to put a dampener on England’s performance, we did ok.
But had a fairly easy route, with all the big guns being knocked out, yet blew it as soon as we met a decent side.
But yes, we made big strides, compared to 2 years back, where it couldn’t have got any worse, imo.
Wasn’t it Houllier, who ran the French FA footballing setup, a few years back?
If so, maybe this WC win is down to him?
Zia’s statement is wrong on one point. The football authorities administering FFP cannot prevent the company, i.e. the ultimate owners of AVFC Ltd, from issuing new shares and re-capitalizing the company.
What they can do is impose sanctions concerning the Company’s membership of the Football League, if it goes ahead with the above. For example relegation or points deduction. However on that point there are already legal challenges to UEFA on the continent and in process. Bosman, restraint of trade, allowance for cost inflation are all on the table. It seems that some clubs have already got away with new share sales without sanctions. Mandaric is one of the people who did take a governing body to court and won, so maybe that is why his advice is being sought.
OLL – I could not understand how FFP rules could be allowed to essentially interfere with fiduciary duties of Company’s Officers and be lawful – eg recapitalising the Company to ensure it remains solvent.
Your post explains that point clearly – the EFL appear to be on thin ice.
This is what I don’t understand lads, it seems Round who was sacked by Villa was bringing people to the table to sell shares,
I don’t know if you’ve read this but please explain who’s right and who’s wrong.
James Nursey went into further detail on his Twitter account where he made mention that Round had brought potential buyers of AVFC to the table.
The implication made by Nursey is that like Keith Wyness, Round has been sacked for daring to suggest that Xia has to sell and making moves in that direction.
The Mirror article written by Nursey and Neil Moxley makes mention that Wyness is suing the club for constructive dismissal.
However, this website has learned that is not technically true, and the actual reason Wyness is suing AVFC is much more indicative of the problems to the club.
It’s understood by this website that Wyness is suing for “tortious interference”.
Tortious interference is where an employer intentionally stops an employee from carrying out legally required duties.
An example would be an employer preventing a health and safety officer from carrying out certain legal duties despite that officer being personally liable for any claims that may arise.
While the exact details of the claim isn’t known to this website, the implications as to why Wyness is suing for tortious interference are obvious.
As a director of AVFC, Wyness would have had certain fidicuiary responsibilities to undertake if he believed that AVFC were trading insolvently.
If a creditor has served an official notice requesting payment of a debt that totals more than £750 and you fail to make payment within 21 days the creditor can take you to court and have your company wound up legally insolvent. At that point you could be subject to administration (if the creditor holds a legal charge on your debenture), liquidation, or your company could be in danger of being wound up. However, if you take action to show that you are making an attempt to satisfy creditors (i.e. – by pursuing a voluntary arrangement or pre-pack administration) you can postpone or completely avoid the demise of your company and facilitate a better outcome. If, however, you cannot show that you are acting in the best interest of the creditors you could face penalties that require you to pay company debts.
(taken from https://www.realbusinessrescue.co.uk/business-insolvency/trading-insolvent-director-responsibilities)
It’s well known that AVFC were threatened with a winding up order by HMRC in May over unpaid taxes. HMRC do not make those kind of threats for a first offence, so therefore it would be reasonable to assume that Wyness knew there was trouble and that he had to take action to try and resolve this, as per his responsibilities.
As Wyness is suing for tortious interference, the implication would be that he was prevented from seeking insolvency advice and / or investment for AVFC by Xia, despite his fiduciary responsibilities to do so.
The further implication of this is twofold; that Xia cannot let the club go into administration nor can he sell the club.
Xia has somewhat confirmed this in his recent open letter to AVFC fans, as posted on the club website on Friday July 6.
This is not good news at all for AVFC fans.
While administration would be painful, it would also take control of the club away from Xia and put it into the hands of someone whose aims would be much clearer; ie to get rid of debt and to make the company solvent again.
The alternative is a situation whereby Xia does what he can to maintain control of the club. This would mean drastically reducing outgoings, trying to get as much money through the door as possible to reduce ongoing debt and trying to survive through it.
AVFC fans only need to look at the operation of Birmingham City during the period Carson Yeung was on trial to see how this would work.
All players with any value sold; all avenues of forward financing explored, and a strict cap on outgoings such as new player wages to ensure that the club can continue to trade going forwards.
It doesn’t paint a pretty picture , so what’s Xia up to.?
Yes, I’ve read the article – there was a link posted to it. It suggests (as Badger pointed out) that Xia by sacking Wyness has backed himself into a corner and can’t sell or go into administration as that might be interpreted as an admission that Wyness acted correctly and should not have been removed.
On Round there appears to be two stories, the other being that we quite simply are cost cutting and his role is unnecessary as Bruce can take on his responsibilities.
The real problem is that we are hypothesising from limited and quite often unsubstantiated stories that are subsequently shown to be unreliable.
Indeed Bill – what is Xia up to?
Exactly 3 weeks to the start of the new season and no-one seems to have an idea of what the f*** is going on. We don’t even know what team we’ll have or even if we’ll have a team.
It’s depressing and demoralising me so God knows what it’s doing to the players and staff. Success this season will be not getting relegated.
I’m resigned to a long stay in the Championship, if we manage to stay there that is.
Pat 57, Hitch,
Don’t that show how unbelievable business Xia doing and harm to our club, the man has gambled our football club and lost. To be fair, trading standards need to intervene, Aston Villa is a British business and has been used and robbed fans of competing against other clubs fairly and sold tickets to fans knowing it cannot compete. It’s disgraceful trading to me if that happen in his China he’d be locked up. Bloody robbery.
“sold tickets to fans knowing it cannot compete.”
Now that’s a very good point Bill.
That could indeed be seen as a misrepresention of the facts and indeed would be, if this was a public company.
Unfortunately, it’s not public and Xia has done nothing wrong, legally.
Morally, it’s totally wrong.
Many people would not have bought STs if they’d known the state of the club.
But that would probably have left us in a worse situation.
I still don’t know what to think.
Aston Villa are on telly twice in their first eight days of the season.
Villa’s Championship campaign starts later than their rivals as their opening match away at Hull City at the KC Stadium on Monday, August 6 is live on Sky Sports (kick off 7.45pm).
And their Carabao Cup first round tie against Yeovil Town at Huish Park on Tuesday, August 14 has also been chosen for coverage on Sky Sports (kick off 7.45pm).
Villa’s home match against Brentford has been moved for Sky. It was due to tkae place on Tuesday, August 21.
It has been switched to Wednesday, August 22 with a 7.45pm kick off.
Thanks for that Bill.
The question is will we want to watch it though? For the first time I’m seriously thinking of not renewing my Now TV pass for the new season.
Pat57, is your tv a smart tv,? I have the smart and just order what I want on the day.
Bill, I get the monthly pass which is a bit cheaper
I’m trying to stay positive, but it is hard to see this week at Villa Park being anything more than depressing. It is good to have the CEO hands on for a while, but I can only assume Xia is over to finalize player outgoings. The question now is how many are needed to go before Bruce can start recruiting free agents.
What’s really hard to take is the uncertainty and all the press speculation – mostly negative – doesn’t help.
We need Bruce – sorry to have to say this – but if anyone can keep us in the Championship next year he can. It’s about survival – forget challenging for promotion and we’re going to need all of Bruce’s experience and contacts to survive.
Once again we are going backward as a club – will it ever end?
Chin up, lads.
We don’t know anything, until we know for certain.
If Villa were a company where you could buy shares, I’d take a small punt, believe it or not.
The best time to buy is when it looks like a company is on it’s arse.
You just never know.
But being more realistic, you’re probably right, Pat/Marvin.
Yep, agreed Hitch.
We need Bruce more than ever at the moment.
It’s nowt to do with the style of footy, but this is certainly no time for inexperienced, up and coming managers.
We’ll have plenty of time for that if it goes tits up under Bruce 🙁
Think contacts.
Bruce has them and can call favours in.
It now seems we can’t even afford to get loan players in.
I’m not surprised, tbh.
But what’s annoying me is that it seems the Birmingham Mail are leading these stories.
Call yourself a Birmingham paper?
Stick to reporting the FACTS!
Bloody blue nose, click-baiting rag, imo.
I watched the long videos on the official site and Youtube of the Kidderminster and Telford games. The outfield players looked OK, Kodja in fact looked sharp. Unfortunately neither of the keepers is worthy of the shirt so another loanee is an essential if we are to stay in the top half of the table.
Express & Star saying that either Xia will sell or agree to sell a significant minority stake as early as this week and has a number of offers to select from. We’ll see!
Fingers Crossed he sells 100% – The only thing his stewardship has shown, is you can be worse at running a football club than Randy Lerner.
Villa and Walsall live on u tube..
It starts a 19 45 tonight.
Thanks Bill
i dont want to be making excuses. but this season will be well and truly fooked by the time the dr sells or sells some shares. saying we need to reduce wages promptly and rake in 40 million we havent sold a bean. this is because nobody will take us seriously, why when they can stand well back and wait for us to get more desperate.
most other clubs will have signed some of their targets and sold some of their crap. they will have a idea of players they will have in this season squads. we won’t have a clue, who will be here until the window shuts, so how we gonna prepare for season. its a nightmare
for example kodjia might be central to bruce plans and then hes sold last minute of window. bruces plans will be in tatters.
its a very strong looking side tonight. we could be getting the wrong players match fit most of this team could be sold come the championship kickoff
Goal Hourhane after 3 minutes
Hourihane could be key for us this season. We just cannot lose both Grealish and Hourihane
Goal Hourhane again 20 yard shot.
A very strong side indeed.
Nath, don’t be so downbeat mate.
Bruce is doing exactly what he should, in training the players he currently has available.
If we are going to sell them, he has a duty to ensure they’re in tip-top shape, so we ensure the best fee.
Call me stupid, but I suspect he’s going with most of the players he’s expecting to have come the start of the season.
I don’t think this current “doom and gloom” story is over by a long chalk.
I genuinely don’t believe that Xia is so stubborn/stupid that he will let us fail, by turning down offers that complied with his requirements.
I still need to retain hope.
we won 🙂 i wont be happy until this mess is cleared up.
of the game, we passed the ball well had some good moves scored goals and created chances , playing new system they settled good with ball, but without the ball and when walsall were breaking past our midfielders, our back three backed off, one of the back three, needs to go to the man close him down and hold him up, it only happened two maybe three times, but its something they need to work on,
i been hearing spuds will clinch grealish this week 🙁 maybe this is why drx is in london