[Archived] Dialogue With The Owners

[47er]

No doubt. But perhaps they see it as someone who wants a punt at the 100 million Premiership jackpot while they have to write off their 100 million. What counts is their perception of what's in their best interests, not your nameless friend's.

The fact is, they hold all the cards - all of them. They could stay here forever or close us down tomorrow or anything inbetween, all on a whim. It's clearly going to take a bit more than "Answer the effing email" to start to influence how they choose to play their hand.

And you have no more idea how to go about influencing Venkys than Pune Rover or any one else.

You got something right though. Rovers is their club and they can do anything they want to, including closing it down, " all on a whim".

It isn't "our club" anymore and dosn't feel like it is.

[A cup of beans]

And you have no more idea how to go about influencing Venkys than Pune Rover or any one else.

You got something right though. Rovers is their club and they can do anything they want to, including closing it down, " all on a whim".

It isn't "our club" anymore and dosn't feel like it is.

I think that's part of the apathy.

We need to feel it's our club again.

We need to feel anger and upset, and to demonstrate it.

[Iceman]

FFS, these clowns will never engage with the fans.. Derek Shaw still feeding sections of the fans with rubbish, and we continue to play this game with them in the hope that they will sit down and talk things over. Its never going to happen. When they leave, whatever happens, positive or negative, fact is they need to get lost. This club and its foundations that Uncle Jack built up when he took over, and turned this club into a respectable institution has been destroyed. And yet we still want some form of dialogue with these people?

[Exiled in Toronto]

Do you have a problem reading, where did I say effing anything ?

My friend does have a name, you just don't know what it is.

I was paraphrasing your obvious sense of frustration that the emails go unacknowledged.

I suspect the point is that the Rao's don't know who he is from Adam, and don't particularly care to be told how to conduct their business.

Anyway, I wish him luck getting through to them.

[Exiled in Toronto]

And you have no more idea how to go about influencing Venkys than Pune Rover or any one else.

You got something right though. Rovers is their club and they can do anything they want to, including closing it down, " all on a whim".

It isn't "our club" anymore and dosn't feel like it is.

Sadly, the seeds of it not being our club were sown when 100 million new shares were issued and Jack bought all of them. The fact he was one of us masked that the club had moved from being communally owned by a collection of locally-based directors that shifted over time. Pretty much anyone who had a few bob was tapped up to join the board, the dad of a classmate of myself, CLB and Arbitro being one of them. We also had quite a wide share ownership by normal fans who had chipped in to the cash-raising efforts in the late '60s and early '70s, "Rally Round the Rovers" being one share ownership drive I remember.

Jack's whims were those of a true fan, so all was well. Where the Trust badly let us down IMO was not realising that Jack did more than put cash in, he was a fan, as had been all the directors before him (mostly). They sold to someone who, as we have learned the hard way, have whims that have nothing to do with being a fan. Jack's legacy would have been best protected by some sort of long-term transition back to local, fan-based involvement in the running of the club.

[Leonard Venkhater]

FFS, these clowns will never engage with the fans.. Derek Shaw still feeding sections of the fans with rubbish, and we continue to play this game with them in the hope that they will sit down and talk things over. Its never going to happen. When they leave, whatever happens, positive or negative, fact is they need to get lost. This club and its foundations that Uncle Jack built up when he took over, and turned this club into a respectable institution has been destroyed. And yet we still want some form of dialogue with these people?

As the song goes...

" Let's all drink to the death of a clown"

[47er]

Sadly, the seeds of it not being our club were sown when 100 million new shares were issued and Jack bought all of them. The fact he was one of us masked that the club had moved from being communally owned by a collection of locally-based directors that shifted over time. Pretty much anyone who had a few bob was tapped up to join the board, the dad of a classmate of myself, CLB and Arbitro being one of them. We also had quite a wide share ownership by normal fans who had chipped in to the cash-raising efforts in the late '60s and early '70s, "Rally Round the Rovers" being one share ownership drive I remember.

Jack's whims were those of a true fan, so all was well. Where the Trust badly let us down IMO was not realising that Jack did more than put cash in, he was a fan, as had been all the directors before him (mostly). They sold to someone who, as we have learned the hard way, have whims that have nothing to do with being a fan. Jack's legacy would have been best protected by some sort of long-term transition back to local, fan-based involvement in the running of the club.

Lets be clear, I never used to think t was our club in the sense that we owned it. It was our club in the sense that I identified with it, saw it as representative of our community, and felt that those running it did so with the best interests of the club at heart and felt that the opinion of fans were taken into account.

Contrary to your email, those feelings did not dissipate when Jack took over and bought 99.9999% of Rovers shares. Rather they were enhanced.

Not anymore!

[47er]

Jack's whims were those of a true fan, so all was well. Where the Trust badly let us down IMO was not realising that Jack did more than put cash in, he was a fan, as had been all the directors before him (mostly).

Just reread this EIT and am completely gobsmacked.

You seem to be claiming that the Trust didn't realise that Jack was first and foremost a Rovers fan!!!!That's how it reads.

How could anyone with any sort of relationship with Jack fail to spot that he was driven by his love of the Club?

What are you on about?

[Exiled in Toronto]

Just reread this EIT and am completely gobsmacked.

You seem to be claiming that the Trust didn't realise that Jack was first and foremost a Rovers fan!!!!That's how it reads.

How could anyone with any sort of relationship with Jack fail to spot that he was driven by his love of the Club?

What are you on about?

How else do you explain them choosing to sell to people from a farway country with no connection to football, let alone Rovers, leaving us for the first time in our history with ownership that had no local connections whatsoever? They obviously didn't think having that bond was important.

[Exiled in Toronto]

Lets be clear, I never used to think t was our club in the sense that we owned it. It was our club in the sense that I identified with it, saw it as representative of our community, and felt that those running it did so with the best interests of the club at heart and felt that the opinion of fans were taken into account.

Contrary to your email, those feelings did not dissipate when Jack took over and bought 99.9999% of Rovers shares. Rather they were enhanced.

Not anymore!

You seem determined to start an argument in a phone box. I think "Jack's whims were those of a true fan, so all was well." makes it pretty clear those feelings did not dissipate at that point, don't you?

But the seeds had been sown at that point as we were at the behest of the whims of a rich man who lived a long way away; the fact he was a fan was masking the danger of what might follow. We lost the "fan" component of our ownership and direction but kept the "rich people living a long way away" element - I think this was a crucial oversight by the cash-hungry Trust. But if you are happy with it...

[yoda]

I was paraphrasing your obvious sense of frustration that the emails go unacknowledged.

I suspect the point is that the Rao's don't know who he is from Adam, and don't particularly care to be told how to conduct their business.

Anyway, I wish him luck getting through to them.

At no point have I ever said the objective was to tell the Rao's how to run the club, why do you constantly try to change the tack ?

[Exiled in Toronto]

At no point have I ever said the objective was to tell the Rao's how to run the club, why do you constantly try to change the tack ?

They may well perceive it that way. There has to be some reason they aren't engaging.

[Amo]

They may well perceive it that way. There has to be some reason they aren't engaging.

They're clinical morons?

[broadsword]

Clinically-diagnosed, or just very neat with their idiocy?

[yoda]

They may well perceive it that way. There has to be some reason they aren't engaging.

They may well also perceive it as we are minions, there could be hundreds of reasons why, so it's best not get hung up on that and try and do something positive, instead of criticizing those that do actually try.

[Amo]

I have to laugh at EiT's suggestion that Venky's won't listen to fangroups, local businessmen etc. because they only have the club's best interests at heart and not the owners. I would've thought the two were intertwined, no?

Look where they've got from listening to cockney wideboys, Malaysian soccer pundits, and shelf salesmen. You'd think that eventually something might click in their brains that maybe, just maybe, they've gone wrong somewhere and they should actually try engaging with people who care about the club. Unfortunately, that might mean a few home truths for the Rao kids, and we all know their egos couldn't handle that.

Yes, they are morons of the first order.

[Exiled in Toronto]

I have to laugh at EiT's suggestion that Venky's won't listen to fangroups, local businessmen etc. because they only have the club's best interests at heart and not the owners. I would've thought the two were intertwined, no?

Look where they've got from listening to cockney wideboys, Malaysian soccer pundits, and shelf salesmen. You'd think that eventually something might click in their brains that maybe, just maybe, they've gone wrong somewhere and they should actually try engaging with people who care about the club. Unfortunately, that might mean a few home truths for the Rao kids, and we all know their egos couldn't handle that.

Yes, they are morons of the first order.

Doesn't matter what you or I think, what counts is what they think. Mistake to assume anything with this lot.

They may well also perceive it as we are minions, there could be hundreds of reasons why, so it's best not get hung up on that and try and do something positive, instead of criticizing those that do actually try.

I was trying to give suggestions. In my view, trying to figure out those reasons is the single most positive thing that could be done, otherwise the alternative is giving up.

[Jock]

They treat us as like something they've stood in.

But I'm proud to be a Rovers Minion.

The idea of a football club is we all club together.

Let's drive these shysters out of OUR club.

[TBTF]

I have to laugh at EiT's suggestion that Venky's won't listen to fangroups, local businessmen etc. because they only have the club's best interests at heart and not the owners. I would've thought the two were intertwined, no?

Look where they've got from listening to cockney wideboys, Malaysian soccer pundits, and shelf salesmen. You'd think that eventually something might click in their brains that maybe, just maybe, they've gone wrong somewhere and they should actually try engaging with people who care about the club. Unfortunately, that might mean a few home truths for the Rao kids, and we all know their egos couldn't handle that.

Yes, they are morons of the first order.

Spot on Amarillo and I strongly suspect that's why they found the 2 Ian's a bit hot to handle.

[47er]

How else do you explain them choosing to sell to people from a farway country with no connection to football, let alone Rovers, leaving us for the first time in our history with ownership that had no local connections whatsoever? They obviously didn't think having that bond was important.

Quite simple really. They trashed Jack's legacy because they didn't care about the Club like Jack did.

They wanted the money and as much of it as possible. This was best resolved from their point of view by selling the Club while it was still a going Premier League concern. Ehtics were not going to get in their way.

It certainly wasn't because they didn't realise the extent of Jack's love for the Club!! A ludicrous claim you've made there!

[Mike E]

How can the trust possibly be to blame for not knowing Venkys would force the removal of Williams, Finn, Sam etc?

At the time of sale, Venkys insisted they'd keep the current management structure and spend £5m every transfer window.

Pretty much what we had been demanding from the Trust ever since they didn't let Hughes buy Lassana Diarra.

It was a gamble, but at the time it seemed a very reasonable one. Who at the time could have possibly foreseen what has happened to us since?

[DE.]

The Trust took the money and ran. If they cared at all about the club one of them would have commented in public by now.

Rovers was an albatross around their neck that they were glad to be free of. As soon as a bidder passed the PL Fit and Proper Test (hah) they were gone and gone for good.

[47er]

Well they hired Jerome Anderson to find them a buyer and Venkys hired him to find them a club. So he got paid from both parties apparently. How dumb is that? Due diligence?

But we are talking about the past. I started the thread to discuss the future as a result of E.I.T. claiming there was no dialogue between the Rovers end of things(fans, local politicians, would-be buyers etc) and Venkys because of shortcomings on "our" part. We were not going the right way about it apparently.

I think this is nonsense. There is no dialogue because Venkys refuse to engage. You can't make the unfathomable Venkys talk to you if they don't want to. The extract from the Trust's recent email which I quoted in the very first post put it very well.

Through all this thread I have heard nothing from to justify EIT's claim and I'll repeat that I'm sick of people making excuses for Venkys arrogance and stupidity. They will literally be the death of us.

[Iceman]

if the Trust cared, they would have come back and tried and get the club back. The messed up by selling to these imposters, and we havent heard a word from them since(at least i dont think they have said anything)...

Fact remains, things will not change, unless the fans drive them out and away from the club. New people in charge might not be super rich like them, and we might fall into league 1 or 2, but we will be rid of these people who continue to be stupid, and make stupid decisions, while listening to stupid people giving them stupid advice.

[Rover_Shaun]

Smoke and mirrors. Only three people are directly to blame for the the absolute black hole the club is mired in