Coventry City FC (The Bantams, Sky Blues)

I think that Mark Robins has the potential to be the best City manager since George Curtis and John Sillett. The only problem is that the current financial crisis is likely to stop him having the opportunity. Even if the rent farce is sorted out, the chances are that Sisu won't give him any money to keep McGoldrick - other than a loan extension, or to buy new players either during the January window, or at the end of the season. Will he be happy just bringing in loan players? If he won't be given finances to buy new players, he might well leave, just like he did from Barnsley. It would be a tragedy, I believe, if he does go.

Thinking of 'Nuddy' Ndlovu. One of the best players to wear Sky Blue IMO.

I agree that BR and his ilk were the main protagonists of all these problems, and the deal to sell the ground should have been investigated as that did not seem right at all. In fact the only person who seemed to benefit at the club was BR. And while they also negotiated the rent deal SISU from a legal perspective agreed to it unconditionally as if they'd signed the original agreement themselves when they bought the club. Not factoring in a worst-case scenario of relegation was their own fault, and a situation largely bought about by their own shortcomings in how they dealt with the squad last year. The mortgage thing isn't totally analogous, but the arena does have another potential use - for concerts. The arena makes c. £0.5m extra profit per concert (sometimes more) so three concerts a year and their better off. No football club cuts overheads as the upkeep of the pitch with groundsmen, undersoil heating etc. is no longer required, and enables them to market the arena for an extra 6 months of the year (CCFC effectively have a retainer on the facilities from August-May so as not to damage the pitch) The SISU thing about rent for other grounds isn't analagous either because their comparisons are based on old stadia who only need to cover running costs, whereas the Ricoh has a mortgage to be settled (and the only reason ACL have that mortgage is because CCFC asked the council for help when it ran out of money) In terms of cashflow the arena is run pretty much on breakeven so the high rent is pretty much a necessity. Finally, the idea of moving is a non-starter. I think Hinckley is probably about as far as many Coventry based fans would be willing to travel for home games, and no stadium is big enough in that vicinity. After accommodating ST holders and the required amount for away fans there'd be absolutely no other tickets to sell - no income at all. And some of the ST holders would be demanding a refund as well. Besides which the contract for the Ricoh would still be valid and therefore the rent payable. It's not a bargaining tool, it's a suicide mission.

I remember Kenny Satchwell being badly injured by the Bournemouth keeper Tommy Godwin, an Irish international in an incident well outside the penalty area at Dean Court. Lots of City fans lived in Bournemouth, having moved down to De Havillands to build the DH110. I think his leg was very badly broken.

From 1915 Midland Daily Telegraph - Saturday 13th November 1915 COVENTRY FOOTBALL ITEMS The Coventry (Association) team are playing Northampton, at Northampton, today week. The visitors will be represented as follows: Blake (Coventry City), goal; Cartwright (Tottenham Hotspur) and Ireland (Southampton), backs; Bibby (Norwich), Feebury (Crystal Palace), and Craig (Coventry City), half-backs; Richards (Wolverhampton Wanderers), Dobson (Coventry City), Allen (Coventry City), Lowes (Coventry City) and Middlemiss (Tottenham Hotspur), forwards. The return match will be played at Coventry in the second week of December for the benefit of the Prisoners of War Fund. For the match between an England XI, and a Coventry XI, fixed to take place on November 27th at the Butts ground, in aid of the Prisoners of War Fund. Mr. T. Paybody has kindly promised to present a new ball.

No. They are taking out a loan which they are then effectively 'passing onto' ACL to pay off the mortgage. Increased debt on the balance sheet for the loan. Increased assets from that debt being owed back to them by ACL. Net effective is zero. If they hadn't done that, and ACL had been put into admin by the bank, there was a very real risk the stadium could have been sold for less than market value. As the council are a 50% shareholder in ACL this would have led to them suffering a massive loss in asset value in the short term in the public accounts and the loss of earnings the stadium gives long term. These would have the potential to reduce public spending pretty significantly.

And if the Council hadn't got involved in the stadium in the first place none of this would be necessary and Coventry City would still be playing at Highfield Road

No, they wouldn't. By the time the council got involved BR had long since sold the stadium land to a housing group and was renting it back (apparently at the same price the club are paying in rent for the Ricoh). The pittance he got for the land went on decontamination so without the council involvement we'd still be renting a stadium, just one much older and smaller, for the same price, so the same, if not worse, money problems would still be apparent. Rent negotiations with the housing group would have been a non-starter - they've have been more than happy to kick the club out so they could build homes. And I can't see SISU having got involved without the stadium being involved and therefore CCFC would have gone under instead.

Former shareholders in the club who were conned out of their investment by SISU might disagree with you about that!

I'm not saying I'm a fan of SISU - I'm not. I think they've used bully boy tactics time and again to try and get what they want and then cry 'unfair' when someone does it to them. I've got a lot of sympathy for the smaller shareholders (most of those were single token shares and therefore the loss wasn't really financial it was an 'emotional' loss, the larger shareholders pretty much all had some kind of say in the boardroom and therefore the loss they made is their own fault for not shouting louder at the time) But despite this it is beyond doubt that SISU were the only people capable of stopping us from going into admin 30 mins before the deadline. No-one else was in a position to come in at the 11th hour and make a deal - it was SISU or admin. And the thing that attracted SISU was the stadium. So without it admin would have been the result.

Interesting to read in today's paper an article recalling the 1956 England 4 Brazil 2 match at Wembley, ahead of tomorrow's friendly, and to see the name first on the team list : R Matthews, Hall, Byrne, Clayton, Wright, Edwards, S Matthews, Atyeo, Taylor, Haynes, Grainger Well done, Reg! Sad to think that, before long, Byrne, Edwards and Taylor had died in the Munich tragedy, and Hall succumbed to polio I guess Colin Grainger is the only survivor from that team in 2013

Reg Mattthews was a brilliant goalkeeper and one of my boyhood heroes. He was the first Coventry City player to play for England and gained five full caps. I can remember watching his last game at Highfield Road before he went to Chelsea.

Can anyone really blame the manager from leaving in the state CCFC finds itself under the present ownership?