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This mess is entirely of Swann’s making. He chose to appoint an inexperienced family member as chief scout, he chose to create the transfer committee, he chose to spend cash the club didn’t have chasing his vanity project of Championship football. What have all those decisions achieved? Relegation, poor squads, revolving door policy for managers, huge debt, assets being stripped, and a football club that is in crisis.
It’s all very well spouting how the club’s debt was wiped clean by transferring the ownership of the ground and surrounding area to Coolsilk, but that debt was only there in the first place because of the way he (Swann) chose to run the club. He created the debt for the club, and the debt was owed to him!
Swann has told us time and time again that we should trust him, but when you look at his track record, he has all the credibility of a snake oil salesman.
This club is in a very perilous state right now. Following the rescue loan, we are now indebted to EFL so are no longer debt free. The club is operating under the restrictive policies of the EFL transfer embargo following the loan and is making a loss week on week. The chairman is refusing to stake anymore of his personal fortune into the club, and having no assets, the club has no way of securing additional funding other than relying on gate receipts, season ticket sales, merchandise, sale of assets (players), and sponsorship.
There was a time when Swann said that the ground redevelopment would bring in the income to secure the clubs future. Now that Swann’s company owns the ground, even if the ground development was to occur (and I highly doubt that) the only one who would benefit financially from this is Swann and Coolsilk.
Today we sit 6 points adrift of safety (this is effectively 7 if you look at the goal difference), are back in debt, operating at a loss, and have a chairman who appears to be looking for a way out. The club is in a very perilous position, and I fear that there is a very bleak future for the club.
In short, Swann has been a total disaster!
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Swann in April: “It was revealed that the club’s Glanford Park ground and other assets have been transferred to Swann’s Coolsilk Property and Investment company, with £11m owed to Coolsilk being written off in the process. Speaking to the BBC, Swann defended the deal, and insisted it will protect the club for a period of “999 years”.
Swann in October: “I am working on a project on our site which would ease that pressure on us, without risking the football club and has meant a temporary move of the ground and assets to its parent company whilst we work on this and I can assure everyone that once all this has been completed, the ground and training facilities will be back in Scunthorpe United Ownership.”
Swann’s word is his bond…In April he said that he had taken the assets as repayment for his loans. In October he said that the assets were transferred as a ‘temporary measure to aid future investment’. Those two statements are in direct conflict.
I am starting to think that he ‘misspeaks’ more than Boris Johnson!
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Swann sat thinking “No incoming signings, the fans are getting restless and starting to blame me. What can I do to distract them?”…”Oh I know”…Please vote on a next seasons kits.
Message for Swann – How about you stop with the misdirection and pull your finger out of your ass and start helping the club survive the drop!
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We’re gonna be left with the dregs that nobody wants and won’t actually strengthen the team. If you haven’t already, I would pop to the bookmaker and get a tidy sum on our relegation. We might as well make as profit from this mess.
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Even if we survive this season do you realistically expect things to change for the better next season? I don’t…As Turkish said “The rabbit gets f*cked” – Scunthorpe United is the rabbit, and Swann is the reaching for the lube.
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@Ironawe – sadly I think you’re correct.
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Lets look at his track record with us; gambled the financial security on the club chasing Championship football, fell out with developers, fell out with council, and fell out with the fans.
He promised 3 things; a new ground – didn’t happen, Championship football – didn’t happen, entertaining football – didn’t happen. Instead we got unsustainable debt, mock-up images of ground redevelopment, relegation battles, a squad that would struggle to be competitive in the National League North, and all club assets transferred to Swann’s company.
Lot’s of promises, none fulfilled, so it’s an emphatic NO from me!
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Looking at the next few fixtures I fully expect us to be 5 points adrift from safety come the end of January. The simple truth is thus; the squad are just not up to the job in hand. It doesn’t really matter who the manager is at this stage, unless we get some better players we are going down.
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After all the recent bad blood between the supporters and the board it would be a nice gesture if Swann and co. bought up the empty seats to ensure that the supporters bus could run.
Can’t see it happening though, why would he want to start building bridges with the supporters when he blames us for our current plight?
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No matter which way you cut it the club has a very bleak future, and as many on here have already said, this is all down to the way Swann has chosen to run the club.
Even if we do the unlikely and survive the drop this season does anyone really think next season will be any better? Swann has made it abundantly clear that he is no longer going to invest into the club, and so far, this is the ONLY promise he has delivered on.
Having said several time in interviews that if anyone wants to buy the club they should contact him, so it’s clear to me that Swann is looking for a way out. Him shifting the ground / land ownership to Coolsilk was a master stroke for a businessman. If the club does end up going into administration the creditors cannot take the real assets (the ground and surrounding land) as they aren’t owned by Scunthorpe United. Scunthorpe United FC Ltd could then dissolved, no more football club, and Swann is left holding the assets. He could knock the ground down, selling the scrap, put in planning permission for more homes / flats / whatever, and walk away with a tidy profit.
I am not saying that this was Swann’s idea from the start, indeed I actually think he did have intentions of getting us into a new ground and the Championship when he arrived. But his failed gamble has resulted in our current plight, and the chips have fallen in such a way that Coolsilk stand to benefit from the failure of Scunthorpe United as a business.
DISCLAIMER: All the above is pure conjecture and is not intended to slander, misrepresent, cause harm or distress to Peter Swann, his family, his business interests, business partners, or anyone else associated with the club, Coolsilk, and / or Peter Swann.
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I think we can all agree that things appear to be heading in the right direction since KH took the reins however, one thing we need to happen quickly is wins!
Whilst improved performances indicate that he’s slowly turning things around we must remember that we need to finish 22nd to avoid being relegated. When we look back at the last few seasons, we can see on average a team needs 47 points to avoid relegation, with both Bristol Rovers and Barnet being relegated with 50 & 51 points respectively. The big question is “How many points do we need this season for safety?”.
Looking at the League 2 table we can see the teams in the relegation battle zone (20th or lower) are all averaging 1 point per game or less. Based on the form from the start of the season we have Carlisle, Oldham and of course us all projected to get less than 40 points for the season. Whilst we could potentially survive the drop on 40 points, I feel that we should be targeting a minimum of 48 points as this would give us a greater chance of avoiding relegation. The issue then becomes how do we get 34 points from the remaining 27 matches? We need KH to start turning this team of dustbins into a cohesive unit quickly so we can start to scrape a few wins and get those points on the board. We were thankful for Orients wasted opportunities last week, and the Bradford match could have gone either way.
December is a very important month for us, and the next two matches could really make or break our season. We need to win the Stevenage match to pull them right into the mix. If we can follow that with an away win at a out of form Hartlepool United (they’ve lost 5 on the bounce) we’ll be able to take some confidence into the Bristol home match, and the very important away match at Oldham on Boxing Day. A few good results this month could see us pull out of the drop zone, and more importantly, drag more teams into the battle. Failing to beat Stevenage and Oldham won’t relegate us, but it will make our job of survival so much harder. I feel that come the end of December we’ll have a much clearer understanding just where we’ll finish come the end of the season!
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“The idea that it’s gonna be impossible to sign decent players in January is wrong.”
Based on what? We have struggled to sign quality players for the last few seasons, and now we are operating under the restrictive T&C’s of the EFL loan that Swann signed us up for.
Try as I might I cannot see any decent player wanting to come to Scunthorpe in the transfer window unless Swann returns to the heady days of signing players on unsustainable wages. To do that, Swann would need to pay-off the EFL loan, and find a way to inject finances into the club without falling foul of the FFP rules.
I hope I am wrong, but I just cannot see how we can sign quality. The best we can hope for is that we manage to offload a few of the dustbins we have in the squad, and replace them with loan signings that are hand picked by Keith Hill.
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Whilst this is indeed good news we have to remember that Swann is a beguiling club owner, and one has to wonder about the timing.
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Lets be honest, this squad is terrible, I mean REALLY terrible. I doubt there’s a manager in the world who could polish the turd that Swann has dumped on us! If we don’t strengthen significantly in the transfer window we will, without a doubt be relegated.
Our only hope is finding 2 teams that are worse than us. That worked for us last season (but only just). I cannot see us being so fortunate this season.
With each and every match that we play I start to dislike Swann more and more.
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@Alcazar – yep, right now he is in a strong financial position. His company (Coolsilk) owns the land, and SUFC are tenants of Coolsilk. Should the worst happen, Swann could just walk away with the land, and would likely make a very tidy profit developing on the land.
I guess it all depends on what sort of legacy he wants to leave behind. Whilst the above seems a real possibility, you have to remember that Swann does have a bit of an ego. Being remembered as the person who single handedly destroyed Scunthorpe United is not something he would willingly want on his CV.
I really do believe that Swann is drinking in the last chance saloon. This is his last opportunity to get it right. I feel that if he sorts out the EFL loan situation, backs KH in the transfer window, starts on the ground development, and produces a realistic timetable for the transfer of the football ground and surrounding ground back into SUFC ownership, he will start the healing process with the fans, and they will return. The issue is however, he doesn’t have a great track record delivering on any promises to date. Fans will NEED to see ACTION and NOT WORDS.
Alcazar – totally agree. I have always adopt the following philosophy; when words and actions are in conflict go with the actions as these are likely the persons true intent.
I see regular word salads being given out by Swann, but I see no actions to back it up. Swann is drinking in the last chance saloon. If he doesn’t follow through on his words, he will forever be remembered as the Chairman who never followed through on his promises, drove a large core of the supporters away, and ruined the club!
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The frustrating thing for me was seeing how often we gave the ball away with sloppy passing. Hill definitely has his work cut out over the coming weeks ahead.
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Swann doesn’t have a good track record with his recruitment decisions thus far and this is the biggest decision that he will make during his time at Scunthorpe United. If he gets this appointment wrong then we are doomed to relegation and who knows what follows that!
The next issue is, once he has appointed a new manager, he needs to ensure that the manager can bring in players for the right calibre. Despite what Swann thinks, from what I’ve seen this season the current squad don’t have enough in them to ensure we are safe from the drop. We are short on ability and confidence. I think two or three quality singings would quickly take us from nailed on relegation certainties, to mid-table safety.
Whatever happens, this next week will likely define how history will remember Swann.
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Agree – I think this is the last throw of the dice from a desperate man who has backed himself into a corner.
This will go one of two ways; Swann will appoint from within, and not provide any new cash to strengthen the squad or, Swann will appoint an experienced manager, sort out the EFL loan, and then provide some £££’s to strengthen the squad in Jan.
If Swann opts for the first choice then we are nailed on certainties for relegation this season, likely followed by administration shortly after. If he opts for the second choice then it is likely that we will retain our league status, some of the missing fans will start to return, and we will start to amass debt again.
This is a right f*cking mess!!
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On the pitch – a few green shoots are starting to appear.
Lets not get carried away…whilst the result was good from Saturday’s match, we were heavily indebted to Rory for a couple of top drawer saves in the first half, as was the same in the previous match. Sure it is a welcome relief to get 4 points out of the last two matches, but the margins have been so close it easily could of been 0 points!
With Colchester, Salford, Mansfield, Orient and Bradford all coming up before the end of November, the next month will confirm where we are likely to find ourselves in the league.
As for attendances: Who can blame the fans for not turning up. The board have spent the last few years alienating the core of the fanbase, which has driven many away from the club. All football fans care passionately about their respective clubs, and Scunthorpe United fans are no exception. If fans who have been fallowing the Iron for decades are no longer turning up, you know it’s not just down to the results on the pitch. I suspect that the only way we will see a return to 3,000 plus gates is if the club actually start performing well on the field, or the board start to deliver on their promises; neither of which look likely right now!
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Appointing Cox was yet another blunder in a long series of blunders in the boardroom at Scunthorpe United.
Given that fact that at the time of Cox’s appointment, the club was in the midst of a major cost cutting exercise, it was essential that the club appointed an experienced manager who had delivered good results whilst working on a shoestring budget. Instead, the board decided it was better to go with a manager who had no experience of the top job in the football league.
This mess is all on Swann, he needs to make a change before we find ourselves further adrift at the bottom of the table.
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