Wrexham Football Club Takeover – What is the problem?

Over the last eleven months there has been ongoing discussions between a group of supporters (The Wrexham Supporters Trust – WST) and the current owners and directors of Wrexham Football Club , Mr Geoff Moss and Mr Ian Roberts. At times the takeover deal has seemed closer than others, but never closer than two weeks ago when all that was required was the proverbial ‘rubber stamp’ from the footballing authorities.

Over the last few days there have been statements issued by the WST and the Club to explain the current round of ‘deadlock’ in talks. It seems all elements of the deal have been agreed, however there is an unresolved issue with dealing with unknown possible liabilities.

The WST have created a new company (Wrexham AFC Ltd), which will move the ‘assets’ of the old company (Wrexham Football Club 2006 Ltd) to it. The assets itself really are the membership of the league, the players and the name as the Racecourse and Colliers Park training facility have been sold to Glyndwr University.

The footballing authorities wish to ensure that any debts or claims issued against the old WFC 2006 Ltd will be honoured by the new Wrexham AFC Ltd. The logic being to prevent a method of writing off debts being created, and also maintaining the footballing authorities firm stance on ensuring ‘footballing debts’ are paid.

It is believed the current owners have agreed to cover any liabilities that arise that they are currently aware of, and the WST appear to be happy with that arrangement. The sticking point comes regarding liabilities that neither the current owners or the WST are aware of. The WST have requested that the current owners agree to unlimited liability, whereas the offer is believed to be a ‘cap’ of around £100,000 .

The WST claimed that an ‘arrangement’ was in place to satisfy the footballing authorities, but the current owners had expressed a ‘different view on this arrangement’.

In a statement yesterday the current club directors stated they were unable to to ‘give an open cheque’, alongside with a veiled deadline of 24 hours to respond to the offer on the table.

It is believed that the WST have so far injected £100,000 into to the running of the club, and had agreed to run it under a licence agreement. Yesterday it seems that agreement came to an end, with the directors stating the WST ‘no longer help run the club’. The directors have an ongoing stance of ‘not putting anymore money into the club’, and thus the loss making club is in stalemate with the situation getting worse every day.

Currently non-playing staff have yet to receive their wages for last month, and there appears to be no change to that situation. If this persists and extends to playing staff then there is a footballing rule that if a player is not paid for three (and sometimes two) months it can be seen as ‘just cause’ to terminate contracts and sign elsewhere.

Wrexham FC are currently top of the league, and are due to embark on the start of (hopefully) a decent cup run tomorrow night live on S4C.

What are your thoughts on the delay? Leave a comment below…