Portsmouth FC faces the prospect of closing its doors for a final time on August 10th unless all the senior players agree to transfers or wage cuts.
Will they survive?
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The club has been in administration since February and only has seven senior players on its roster despite being due to start their League One campaign on August 18th. Unless a move is made by those seven players to either leave or lose wages, the club will have no choice but to close.
It’s been a bad few years for Pompey. When they won one of the game’s greatest football trophies, the FA Cup in 2008, and sat comfortably mid-table in the Premier League, things looked rosy for them with the promise of more football medals on the horizon.
It was to be all downhill from there though as they were relegated a season later after being deducted 9 points for going into administration with £135 million of debt. This meant they had to sell off many players which could have kept them in the league, namely Peter Crouch, Sylvain Distin, Glen Johnson and Niko Kranjčar – all of whom have gone on to play elsewhere to great effect.
No amount of prowess or football goals would be enough to save them in the Championship either, with a dodgy Lithuanian business deal being the undoing of their destiny this time. In their first Championship season their chairman Vladimir Antonov was arrested and bailed for his dealings with his majority-owned bank Bankas SNORAS. This led to Antonov’s resignation and the issue of a winding-up order by HMRC to the tune of £1.6 million in unpaid taxes.
Portsmouth were then relegated from their second season in the Championship for being placed back into administration – the second time in three seasons – after being docked 10 points. The Football League imposed severe financial restrictions on the club that included paying all creditors in full and restrictions on borrowing for the next five seasons.
This coming season in League One, if they make it to the beginning of the season, will be the first time the club has kicked footballs around at this level in 30 years. It really doesn’t look like any amount of sales or campaigns will be able to save the club.
It’s not all bad news for Pompey fans though and they shouldn’t throw away their football kits just yet.
The Pompey Supporters’ Trust (PST) and Portpin are both interested in buying the club. Portpin, which has already invested £17 million to the club in 2012 to try and keep them afloat, will now be looking for a bigger investment. Both the interested parties have said that they will only take on the club on the condition that the wage bill is reduced through sales and compromise and it has been made very clear to joint administrator Trevor Birch that they will not take action until there is movement from the players.
So the players will decide the fate of the club. This is the way football should be, although it’s a shame this instance is under such dire circumstances.
Image Rights: Ben Sutherland
