Question for Pools fans...

[NolansOrient]

It is only through a few fairly recent posts on here that I became aware of just how dire the situation is at your club.

Firstly, not that it does any good, you have my sincere sympathies. We at Orient have gone through the worst 4 year period in our history, and very nearly went into administration / liquidation in 2017, so I feel your pain to some extent.

Secondly, my main question, what has actually happened at Hartlepool which led to your current situation? I would be really interested to learn about what caused your current plight, has anyone written a summary which could be shared here?

Finally, all the best for these coming dark months. Things looked incredibly bleak for us not that long ago, but we were lucky enough to find new owners and investment, despite not owning our ground, having (at the very, very least) c.£4m debt, most likely around £10m or £15m, and no senior pros at the end of last season. So things can change for the best very quickly given a bit of luck.

Good luck for your future both on and off the pitch.

 

[Tranmerewhite]

Karma for taking the piss out of Tranmere going down. Or for somehow beating us in 2005.

In all seriousness there must be some serious mismanagement going on there. The parachute payment alone should cover their wage bill.

 

[Chief Rocka]

The following is as I understand it to be true, the other lads may have different opinions or are more knowledgeable of the facts than I, but here goes.

Back in 1997 Pools are bought by Berge Larsen a rich Norwegian in the oil industry, one of his companies a Scottish based oil firm IOR takeover the club, with Ken Hodcroft as chairman, they propped us up to the tune of £1m a season (unverified but they loved to tell us of this fact) and they ran us like a business, refused to pay agents fees and it was incredibly rare for them to spend money on players, why a random Norwegian was at all interested in a football club was anyone's guess, they said owning a football club was a great talking point for meetings and gatherings with clients in the middle east, I also imagine there was some sort of tax write off but that's not my speciality. This was when we were at our most prosperous.

It was all rosy until Mr Larsen stopped putting his money in, they wanted out, it later transpired he'd been investigated for an alleged multi-million kroner tax evasion, which he was acquitted for but his interest in Pools was over. They were looking to sell and in 2014 they had their first bite, first up was a ragtag group of misfits Stephen Murrall and Peter Harris who called their consortium TMH (The Monkey Hangers, yeah right) but IOR pulled the plug at the eleventh hour over concerns about how they were planning to run the club, turns out this was a masterstroke, http://www.cotswoldjournal.co.uk/ne...raudsters_jailed_after_Hartlepool_United_bid/

Despite this setback IOR were becoming even more desperate to sell, the second chancer to roll up to our doorstep was a bogus company JPNG an Essex based 'businessman' (read snake oil salesman) Gary Coxall and his silent and ultimately deadly partner Peter Goldberg (the money man, again, yeah right) IOR handed over the keys to the club DEBT FREE, having wiped a £14m pound 'debt' to themselves, jolly good we thought, fresh start. Turns out the guy hasn't a pot to piss in, he was an affable person, conmen generally are, easily accessible on twitter, promised the world and delivered nothing but debt, he remarked about our winding up order from the HMRC that it was 'only a bit of paper' nothing to be worried about, we had three winding up petitions under his leadership in under two years, the guy took out basically a payday loan from some ropey character because he said getting money from elsewhere took too long, it took the investigative skills of members of The Poolie Bunker (main forum) to find out who they really were and by that time the money man Goldberg had vanished into the night, what he took with him we don't know and soon after on the eve of our relegation to non league Mr Coxall also went AWOL, a few months ago he declared himself bankrupt, his unmarried partner no doubt holding the cash he took from us.

Now onto our current owners, this is where it gets muddy, Sage Investments, property developers, John Blackledge the owner and financier and Pam Duxbury, accountant and chairwomen, this pair were roped in by Coxall over what is known as and mocked by all, the Millhouse Masterplan, a regeneration scheme that involved the ground and surrounding areas, you know the drill, sports complex, hotel, shopping, it all looked lovely, but nobody wanted to pay for it, I'm lead to believe Sage loaned Coxall some amount of money and since he's done a merry dance and fucked off it's been lumbered at our door (again I could be wrong here) and as prospective buyers have come out and said the finances are in such a state that they don't know how much money it's going to take to get us back to zero.

It's come out (unofficially) in recent days that Sage haven't been funding us since September, so they've trousered player sales which include Nathan Thomas £250k and Connor Simpson £60k, season ticket money (2,700 ST) parachute payments (£500k?) even football fans have raised us £75k several televised Sky games from last year, where in the merry hell has the money gone?

The Trust launched their fundraising campaign yesterday and are probably our only hope, administration is a certainty, liquidation is looking even more possible.

I probably missed out some pertinent bits and was generally rambly but that's the jist of it.

TLDR We were ran like a business for 17 years, then got sold down the river by a series of thieving bastards

 

[Tranmerewhite]

£14m debt.. we nearly got into the premier league on a third of that. So decades of mess then.

 

[Chief Rocka]

£14m debt.. we nearly got into the premier league on a third of that. So decades of mess then.

The debt of £14m was only a debt to themselves, when they sold the club they wiped it, fresh start for the new owners, no debts.

 

[PoolieTom]

Summed up well CR. At a guess, Coxall trousered a lot of money, realised he could trouser some more, Sage borrowed money to Coxall, who shockingly trousered it. Sage then came into the club with the intentions of getting that money back ASAP. Through season ticket sales, transfers (etc), they got that money back quickly, which left us with no money to run for the rest of the season.

So things can change for the best very quickly given a bit of luck.

We all have our fingers crossed, but as is the norm, it's the hope that kills you.

 

[Tranmerewhite]

Just hope you don’t end up fan owned. Not something that will work at Hartlepool. Hopefully for you someone willing to take a short term hit will come in. Hard to say how anyone would get that back though, so it’ll need to either be a fan or following an administration with pence in the pound deals.

 

[Minstermen central]

No matter how shit your club is,always look on bright side this could be your new badge

 

[Tranmerewhite]

No matter how shit your club is,always look on bright side this could be your new badge

Or worse yet they could get Gary Mills as manager.

 

[Minstermen central]

Or worse yet they could get Gary Mills as manager.

Mills is like Pep compared to McNamara.

Hopefully Pools will get sorted proper club.

 

[Master D]

Reading all that the first guy to blame would be the Norwegian for handing over the reigns to the conmen in the first place instead of doing his background checks (which he seemingly did when the first group of chancers were on the scene), there has to be a duty of care when transferring a club. It's basically selling the club down the river so the fans should also have been properly investigating what was happening when that transaction was taking place and what the new owners were bringing i.e. sod all. If the fans don't do it then nobody will.

 

[PuB]

Sounds like a sorry state of affairs indeed, hope it all gets sorted for the best.

 

[E10rifle]

Reading all that the first guy to blame would be the Norwegian for handing over the reigns to the conmen in the first place instead of doing his background checks (which he seemingly did when the first group of chancers were on the scene), there has to be a duty of care when transferring a club. It's basically selling the club down the river so the fans should also have been properly investigating what was happening when that transaction was taking place and what the new owners were bringing i.e. sod all. If the fans don't do it then nobody will.

See also: Hearn turning down a series of bidders because they were chancers, then selling us to Becchetti.

 

[Farleigh]

Every lower and non league club is just one bad owner away from oblivion.

And football seems to attract such people with depressing regularity.

 

[John Still]

Thanks to a small group of our fans we managed to get rid of Glenn Tamplin, the rest of the fans saw no problems with this one trick pony. Good luck Pools.

 

[Soup Ladle]

All summed up well by the two lads on here.

There’s a small chance that the Ostersunds owner might buy us but not getting excited yet.

We have a 50k tax bill due any day now. That is what might plunge us into admin. We’ve had 3 recent winding up orders so don’t think HMRC will do us any favours.

Karma for taking the piss out of Tranmere going down. Or for somehow beating us in 2005.
.

I felt for you when you went down. It’s never nice to see proper clubs get relegated to this cesspit.

As for 2005, you battered us good and proper that night but big Dimi had the game of his life. 8 mins away from the Championship in the final, dodgy pen man sent off. We’ve never recovered from that really. Our ex chairman said he got a letter from someone before the game warning him about things not going in our favour.

 

[Chief Rocka]

As for 2005, you battered us good and proper that night but big Dimi had the game of his life. 8 mins away from the Championship in the final, dodgy pen man sent off. We’ve never recovered from that really. Our ex chairman said he got a letter from someone before the game warning him about things not going in our favour.

That night at Prenton Park will stay with me forever, remember getting crushed down at the front when Humphreys scored the winning penalty, 8 mins from the Championship, what might of been.

 

[Pablosammy]

That night at Prenton Park will stay with me forever, remember getting crushed down at the front when Humphreys scored the winning penalty, 8 mins from the Championship, what might of been.

I was crushed too. Emotionally.

 

[Chief Rocka]

I was crushed too. Emotionally.

Been there many a time we had loads of playoff defeats, Darlo, Blackpool, Cheltenham, Bristol City, beating your lot was our first semi final win.

 

[PoolieTom]

Reading all that the first guy to blame would be the Norwegian for handing over the reigns to the conmen in the first place instead of doing his background checks (which he seemingly did when the first group of chancers were on the scene), there has to be a duty of care when transferring a club. It's basically selling the club down the river so the fans should also have been properly investigating what was happening when that transaction was taking place and what the new owners were bringing i.e. sod all. If the fans don't do it then nobody will.

The Norwegian got locked up and left Ken Hodcroft in charge, with no money. We had been on a downward spiral since the League One Play-Off Final, progressively getting worse on the field, hence finding ourselves down here. Fans were sick, there were a few IOR out murmurs heard at games and eventually Ken sold the club, issuing a statement of 'be careful what you wish for' to the fans.

As for background checks, the club did absolutely none. The first bunch of chances were outed as conmen by fans approximately 7 minutes after being announced as our new owners. It still took a few weeks for Ken to bin them off. The second c*** Coxall took a little longer to be outed. Probably 7 and a half minutes. 'Be careful what you wish for' Ken said. Prick. Anyway, Coxall came in waving his willy about, declaring his love for the area, having cosy meetings with fans promising sexy football and a return to the good old days.

Our esteemed local journo took it upon himself to call us fans, who had taken 7 minutes of internet searches to know this c*** was up to no good, 'Amateur detectives', implying we knew nothing, and Coxall was the bees knees. Oh, did I mention Coxall treat our journo to 18 holes around the golf course every other week? No?.

This caused a massive divide amongst our fans, which is still rumbling on. Ultimately it was a majority who had been won over by Coxall, so the minority fell on deaf ears.

 

[Soup Ladle]

The Norwegian got locked up and left Ken Hodcroft in charge, with no money. We had been on a downward spiral since the League One Play-Off Final, progressively getting worse on the field, hence finding ourselves down here. Fans were sick, there were a few IOR out murmurs heard at games and eventually Ken sold the club, issuing a statement of 'be careful what you wish for' to the fans.

As for background checks, the club did absolutely none. The first bunch of chances were outed as conmen by fans approximately 7 minutes after being announced as our new owners. It still took a few weeks for Ken to bin them off. The second c*** Coxall took a little longer to be outed. Probably 7 and a half minutes. 'Be careful what you wish for' Ken said. Prick. Anyway, Coxall came in waving his willy about, declaring his love for the area, having cosy meetings with fans promising sexy football and a return to the good old days.

Our esteemed local journo took it upon himself to call us fans, who had taken 7 minutes of internet searches to know this c*** was up to no good, 'Amateur detectives', implying we knew nothing, and Coxall was the bees knees. Oh, did I mention Coxall treat our journo to 18 holes around the golf course every other week? No?.

This caused a massive divide amongst our fans, which is still rumbling on. Ultimately it was a majority who had been won over by Coxall, so the minority fell on deaf ears.

I was never in on the Loughlin hatefest but that's enough to change my mind if true.

EDIT - changed my mind. Golf is shite. What a prick.

 

[Tranmerewhite]

I felt for you when you went down. It’s never nice to see proper clubs get relegated to this cesspit.

As for 2005, you battered us good and proper that night but big Dimi had the game of his life. 8 mins away from the Championship in the final, dodgy pen man sent off. We’ve never recovered from that really. Our ex chairman said he got a letter from someone before the game warning him about things not going in our favour.

Did that keeper go onto a higher level? Must have made 10 world class saves that night

 

[Soup Ladle]

Plays for Middlesbrough, a few times for Greece I think and played in the Premiership.

He is/was quality and a top fella. Still takes an interest in how we're doing on social media and stuff.

 

[EnglishRed]

Plays for Middlesbrough, a few times for Greece I think and played in the Premiership.

He is/was quality and a top fella. Still takes an interest in how we're doing on social media and stuff.

Didn't stop Juan Ugarte putting 5 past him

 

[The_Boss]

Juan Ugarte could put 5 past David De Gea

 

[Chief Rocka]

Plays for Middlesbrough, a few times for Greece I think and played in the Premiership.

He is/was quality and a top fella. Still takes an interest in how we're doing on social media and stuff.

His restaurant in the Boro is also top notch, we really only went to catch a glint of the Dimster and he wasn't there, the git

 

[NolansOrient]

The following is as I understand it to be true, the other lads may have different opinions or are more knowledgeable of the facts than I, but here goes.

Back in 1997 Pools are bought by Berge Larsen a rich Norwegian in the oil industry, one of his companies a Scottish based oil firm IOR takeover the club, with Ken Hodcroft as chairman, they propped us up to the tune of £1m a season (unverified but they loved to tell us of this fact) and they ran us like a business, refused to pay agents fees and it was incredibly rare for them to spend money on players, why a random Norwegian was at all interested in a football club was anyone's guess, they said owning a football club was a great talking point for meetings and gatherings with clients in the middle east, I also imagine there was some sort of tax write off but that's not my speciality. This was when we were at our most prosperous.

It was all rosy until Mr Larsen stopped putting his money in, they wanted out, it later transpired he'd been investigated for an alleged multi-million kroner tax evasion, which he was acquitted for but his interest in Pools was over. They were looking to sell and in 2014 they had their first bite, first up was a ragtag group of misfits Stephen Murrall and Peter Harris who called their consortium TMH (The Monkey Hangers, yeah right) but IOR pulled the plug at the eleventh hour over concerns about how they were planning to run the club, turns out this was a masterstroke, http://www.cotswoldjournal.co.uk/ne...raudsters_jailed_after_Hartlepool_United_bid/

Despite this setback IOR were becoming even more desperate to sell, the second chancer to roll up to our doorstep was a bogus company JPNG an Essex based 'businessman' (read snake oil salesman) Gary Coxall and his silent and ultimately deadly partner Peter Goldberg (the money man, again, yeah right) IOR handed over the keys to the club DEBT FREE, having wiped a £14m pound 'debt' to themselves, jolly good we thought, fresh start. Turns out the guy hasn't a pot to piss in, he was an affable person, conmen generally are, easily accessible on twitter, promised the world and delivered nothing but debt, he remarked about our winding up order from the HMRC that it was 'only a bit of paper' nothing to be worried about, we had three winding up petitions under his leadership in under two years, the guy took out basically a payday loan from some ropey character because he said getting money from elsewhere took too long, it took the investigative skills of members of The Poolie Bunker (main forum) to find out who they really were and by that time the money man Goldberg had vanished into the night, what he took with him we don't know and soon after on the eve of our relegation to non league Mr Coxall also went AWOL, a few months ago he declared himself bankrupt, his unmarried partner no doubt holding the cash he took from us.

Now onto our current owners, this is where it gets muddy, Sage Investments, property developers, John Blackledge the owner and financier and Pam Duxbury, accountant and chairwomen, this pair were roped in by Coxall over what is known as and mocked by all, the Millhouse Masterplan, a regeneration scheme that involved the ground and surrounding areas, you know the drill, sports complex, hotel, shopping, it all looked lovely, but nobody wanted to pay for it, I'm lead to believe Sage loaned Coxall some amount of money and since he's done a merry dance and fucked off it's been lumbered at our door (again I could be wrong here) and as prospective buyers have come out and said the finances are in such a state that they don't know how much money it's going to take to get us back to zero.

It's come out (unofficially) in recent days that Sage haven't been funding us since September, so they've trousered player sales which include Nathan Thomas £250k and Connor Simpson £60k, season ticket money (2,700 ST) parachute payments (£500k?) even football fans have raised us £75k several televised Sky games from last year, where in the merry hell has the money gone?

The Trust launched their fundraising campaign yesterday and are probably our only hope, administration is a certainty, liquidation is looking even more possible.

I probably missed out some pertinent bits and was generally rambly but that's the jist of it.

TLDR We were ran like a business for 17 years, then got sold down the river by a series of thieving bastards

Thanks for the reply, it's ridiculous that the club should have to suffer instead of the owners - whats happened to this Coxall now?

And who's in charge of Sage?

Crazy stuff - not gonna lie, from that read it looks bleak. Best of luck, I would never make the trip up to Victoria Park, but I think I will now.

 

[Chief Rocka]

Thanks for the reply, it's ridiculous that the club should have to suffer instead of the owners - whats happened to this Coxall now?

And who's in charge of Sage?

Crazy stuff - not gonna lie, from that read it looks bleak. Best of luck, I would never make the trip up to Victoria Park, but I think I will now.

Your welcome, John Blackledge is in charge of Sage, another shadowy figure who could walk past me in the street and I wouldn’t know it was him, I don’t think anyone knows what he looks like.

Coxall, now declared bankrupt for the second time in his life was last seen setting up another (bogus?) company Punjab Records, to what gain who knows?

I wouldn’t book any accommodation or train tickets for our game just yet mate, there’s a bloody good chance we won’t get our next home game v Woking on

 

[Darlo On Tour]

His restaurant in the Boro is also top notch, we really only went to catch a glint of the Dimster and he wasn't there, the git

Superb food, and a nice place to eat and relax, me and the missus called in a few weeks ago (she's from the Boro plus we use to live their years ago). Couldn't see Dimi like. Going back through to the Boro on Monday, so we might call in

 

[Soup Ladle]

Club's twitter feed posted this in an attempt to not give much away about where we're heading

https://twitter.com/Official_HUFC/status/957548728847564802