Darlo Uncovered

At Hartlepool United, did they really not learn anything from all the shite he put us through 6 years ago...

Deluded as fuck.

Some of our fans last year hadn't learnt from what he put us through either

Just took a look on the bunker and this stood out:

"The future will depend on Raj's integrity, appetite for the fight and the business plan working. "

Well that's them fucked then. No integrity, no appetite for a fight, and I'm not sure he even had a business plan during his time with us.

Sounds like (I've not read any detail) he's asked the fans to stump up money as part of the deal. I'd be interested to know - is the fans money going to be a 'loan' which is repayable to them, like his money was when he was here?

There seems to be lots of "better than nobody" type comments. I'd suggest quite the opposite. He'll load more debt on them and walk away in a couple of years leaving them in an even worse position.

Why not just do what we were forced to do now and get on with rebuilding the club properly? They have a ground and a bigger active fanbase than we had in 2012 so they'd be in a better position than we were and could get back to their current level probably in 5-6 years.

Two more years struggling under Radjed and they'll lose another chunk of supporters by the time they see sense and reform themselves.

I was about to finish with "it's their club though, so let them do what they think is best", before realising the irony of that statement - it's not their club at all, and they're missing the opportunity to make it their club.

I understand their desperation and I understand they think if it's good enough for Stelling it's good enough for them.

But even ignoring most of Singh's many bad points which were highlighted throughout his time with us (and his attempt to get back involved again), they'll be stumping up a lot of cash for next to no say in the running of a football club who's main direction will be determined by a man who's proven he can't run a loss making, recently relegated FL club in non-league.

I'll be shocked if this works out OK for them

Just shows what you're prepared to do when you're desperate

Raj is doing what he wanted to do in both in 2011-2012 and also last summer - own the club whilst getting fans to pay for much of it.

The Trust are so far out of their depth that I feel sorry for them, they don't have the experience or knowledge to do anything other than pray that someone takes the problem away from them and Uncle Raj has stepped up to do just that.

If they can raise £600k for Raj's business plan with nothing but a token seat on the board then good luck to them.

Crazy.

Absolutely insane getting into bed with him. Stumping up a significant amount of cash, for a minority share to fund a bloke who only protects his own interests. You can imagine if they have a poor run of form and crowds drop, Singh will inevitably start issuing statements about how he can't sustain his level of investment. He will also no doubt, grow tired of the council after five minutes when they wont sell the ground to him.

By no means a done deal. Sage effectively need to agree to write of the debt. Supporters to raise £600k capital.... Lets not forget the FA "FIT AND PROPER" person test ...or has it been swept aside.?

tezza wrote:Lets not forget the FA "FIT AND PROPER" person test ...or has it been swept aside.?

I asked this previously and apparently he would pass as this was checked out by our SG when he was sniffing around last year

How can this man even be allowed back near a football club after what he did to our football club, seems Hartlepool fans are of the opinion that anything is better than nothing, how wrong they can be! There is a reason there was a big backlash last summer from the fans when S***h appeared, I wouldn't wish that man on anyone, even Hartlepool!

I'm no fan of Singh. But strangely enough we won the trophy under him.

D_F_C wrote:I'm no fan of Singh. But strangely enough we won the trophy under him.

Despite him some would say.

Lets not forget his failure to push on with that under our belt, his stewardship led to the demise

As was said he is great when all going well, however when it gets tough ...that said HUFC is fairly close to becoming a care home

Raj Singh was involved in two Insolvency Event's with DFC.
#1 March 2009
#2 January 2012

However luckily enough for himself & Hartlepool he escapes the cutoff date by one year & 5 months.

FA Owners & Directors test

Since 1 August 2010 I have not been an Officer of:
(b) one Football Club or Parent Undertaking of a Football Club that has entered into
two separate Insolvency Events and in respect of which a sporting sanction was
applied either:
- whilst I have been an Officer of that Football Club or Parent Undertaking
of a Football Club; or
- in the 30 days immediately following me having resigned as an Officer of
that Football Club or Parent Undertaking of a Football Club.

SINGH , SAY NO POOLIES BEFORE HE TAKES YOUR EYES OUT, HES A LIER, SAYS ANYTHING TO HIDE WHAT HE'S AFTER.TAKE HIM ON AT YOUR PERIL.
JUST SAY NO ,START AFRESH WITHIN YOUR MEANS KEEP YOUR CLUB ALBEIT AT A LOWER LEVEL OF FOOTBALL STILL YOUR CLUB. BETTER THAN NO CLUB, WITH HIM AS OWNER FOR A SHORT TIME LEAVING YOU WITH DEBT YOU CANNOT SERVICE.

I'm not surprised their fans are giving RG a go. The alternate option is a taking a massive bite of a s*** sandwich, rolling sleeves up and doing what we've done. The only time fans do this is when it's the only option left.

Reality is, it'll probably end up with them going down our route, but at least with RS they have a stay of execution and the miniscule chance of their team drawing Man Utd in a cup game and balancing the books.

tezza wrote:By no means a done deal. Sage effectively need to agree to write of the debt. Supporters to raise £600k capital.... Lets not forget the FA "FIT AND PROPER" person test ...or has it been swept aside.?

Trouble is that the FA are hardly 'fit and proper' to run the game. Do the Pools Supporters really want to 'get into bed' with Singh, knowing his track record with DFC? Not so much a case of 'buyer beware', more like selling your birthright

Desperate people do desperate things.

They need so much more detail, Raj wants 250k up front plus 5k a month for at least 3 years from them. So that's 430k for at the most 20% stake in their club. Basically they are being blackmailed with a give us your money or the clubs done.

Sage are up to get some payments if the players they have sold have come through with any sell on clauses, if they get back to the FL any of that money.

Next season the FL money is halved to 250k and the season after that they get zero from the football league and the Academy money also disappears (see York situation now).

So if they stabilise either in National League or National League North but because they are financially held back now and keep getting beat by part time clubs etc. will the fans stop going and stop putting in money, then will Raj blame them and give up himself again.

As a fan I couldn't put my money in to that deal of no club shares or no CBS shares basically you get your club to continue, owned by someone you can't influence again.

Just made me realise what a good position we are in currently, roll on the rest of the season.

Don't let Singh get his grubby paws on the 'Golden Share'

super_les_mcjannet wrote: Just made me realise what a good position we are in currently, roll on the rest of the season.

Yep - our situation isn't perfect, but at least we're not hoping that a man who has been involved in two administrations in football already is our knight in shining armour.

Don't get why, in their position you wouldn't take potentially £1.8m over 3 years with a consortium that includes your club president and lifelong fan, even if it includes Raj Singh!

Probable alternative is admin or liquidation and a possible Northern League team. Surely if it all go,s pear shaped in 3 years they will be in no worse a position than they are now. Ie huge debts and facing liquidation.

The council own the ground so no risk with Singh their, and so what if part of the deal is for the consortium to build flats or a nursing home on land nearby. If I was putting large chunks of money into the club with no chance of seeing it again through football, I would want to see something from it as an incentive to invest.

Personally, I,m dissapointed if it go,S ahead because would have liked to have seen them in the N League, but in my view nothing to lose given their current position.

Don't get all this " don't touch him with a barge pole" given what I have said above. Let's be honest he seems to be the only North East businessman with any desire to get involved in football at this level, which is a shame for us.

Quakerlad wrote:Don't get why, in their position you wouldn't take potentially £1.8m over 3 years with a consortium that includes your club president and lifelong fan, even if it includes Raj Singh!

Probable alternative is admin or liquidation and a possible Northern League team. Surely if it all go,s pear shaped in 3 years they will be in no worse a position than they are now. Ie huge debts and facing liquidation.

The council own the ground so no risk with Singh their, and so what if part of the deal is for the consortium to build flats or a nursing home on land nearby. If I was putting large chunks of money into the club with no chance of seeing it again through football, I would want to see something from it as an incentive to invest.

Personally, I,m dissapointed if it go,S ahead because would have liked to have seen them in the N League, but in my view nothing to lose given their current position.

Don't get all this " don't touch him with a barge pole" given what I have said above. Let's be honest he seems to be the only North East businessman with any desire to get involved in football at this level, which is a shame for us.

Raj.

The probable alternative you refer to sounds beneficial to me - they get to own their club and have a few seasons of glorious steam-roller action before getting back to the level they are at now but on a more solid footing.

You say they'll be no worse off in 3 years if they take Singh's offer, but who is to say they won't have lost 2,000 paying fans by that point? They've already put up with multiple relegations in the last few years. The longer the struggle, the more fans they'll lose.

Singh thinks that most football fans are thick and deluded - this is obvious by the fact that he thought he could muscle his way back in with us after we had worked so hard to clear up the mess that he had left us in. I'm so glad we sent him packing, as we have a good feeling around our club now.

Hartlepool beware, be very aware!

I see some Pools fan claims to of spoken to Raj, claims he made mistakes buy wanted out when we didn't meet our side of a deal?!?!, would this be the time he claimed he would only continue to fund the football club if we sold 2000 Adult season tickets, a season in which we were only averaging 1600 due to the season in league 2 under Steve Staunton! There does however seem to be a few polls fans with their heads switched on suggesting they should listen to the Darlo fans

Just let the bloke get on with it, I'm sure he will do his very best for the Chimps as he only has there best interests at heart... Goodluck Raj and Artlypool

Most definitely an 'I told you so' moment coming up if they go ahead with it, still wouldn't wish Raj on them mind, a relegation yes but not Raj

If Singh was going to genuinely be putting in the type of his own money he’s trying to suggest then he should be comfortably able to start the ball rolling with enough to get them to the end of he season. Couple of hundred thousand or so. Would allow the Trust to sort themselves out and try a community share offer or something “proper” instead of just asking for people’s donations.

Bet he doesn’t though.

m62exile wrote:If Singh was going to genuinely be putting in the type of his own money he’s trying to suggest then he should be comfortably able to start the ball rolling with enough to get them to the end of he season. Couple of hundred thousand or so. Would allow the Trust to sort themselves out and try a community share offer or something “proper” instead of just asking for people’s donations.

Bet he doesn’t though.

There are a few litigation issues that need sorting before anyone puts any money in. Unless they are sorted then even Raj isn't going to put anything in.

I can kind of understand the fans clinging to the existing club, but they are having to raise a very significant sum over a short period of time for only 20%. What is Jeff Stelling’s financial involvement and will he be on the board? If this consortium fails in 18-24 months would there still be the appetite / finances from fans to start again? I think it would be asking a lot of some fans


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We were in the same boat in 2012, Clinging on to any hope of holding on to the club at the same level in the footballing pyramid, what we've got behind us now is the experience of both clinging on and starting from the bottom. We as Darlo fans know what the best option is for them which is staying clear of Raj and going the route of fan ownership even if that means starting afew levels down, they have the support and infrastructure in place to be better prepared than we we're, with the right man in charge they would soon be back.

TinShedDarloFan wrote:We were in the same boat in 2012, Clinging on to any hope of holding on to the club at the same level in the footballing pyramid, what we've got behind us now is the experience of both clinging on and starting from the bottom. We as Darlo fans know what the best option is for them which is staying clear of Raj and going the route of fan ownership even if that means starting afew levels down, they have the support and infrastructure in place to be better prepared than we we're, with the right man in charge they would soon be back.

To be fair, we only had the one option as eventually there were no prospective investors remaining. It was either that or oblivion. They, at least, have choices though neither is particularly palatable


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Robbie Painter wrote:Raj Singh was involved in two Insolvency Event's with DFC.
#1 March 2009
#2 January 2012

However luckily enough for himself & Hartlepool he escapes the cutoff date by one year & 5 months.

FA Owners & Directors test

Since 1 August 2010 I have not been an Officer of:
(b) one Football Club or Parent Undertaking of a Football Club that has entered into
two separate Insolvency Events and in respect of which a sporting sanction was
applied either:
- whilst I have been an Officer of that Football Club or Parent Undertaking
of a Football Club; or
- in the 30 days immediately following me having resigned as an Officer of
that Football Club or Parent Undertaking of a Football Club.

Really good post Robbie. And what a mockery it makes of the FA Fit & Proper test