As I mentioned in an article yesterday morning things had gone reasonably quiet of late - with no updates on the 10000Hours Community Interest Company bid, led by current Saints director Richard Atkinson, or the consortium involving another director Ken McGeoch and business partner Paul Davies.
That changed yesterday with the news the McGeoch group had been using a lawyer - Garey Withey - who was also involved in Craig Whyte's disastrous/comical (delete as appropriate) takeover of Rangers. The man in question was actually the company secretary at Ibrox but McGeoch said the firm of lawyers had been told where to go last month and that they were optimistic of still completing a deal.
That optimism probably vanished yesterday afternoon when chairman Stewart Gilmour spoke about the matter on Radio Scotland before giving similar comments to various journalists. Gilmour and a number of other directors are trying to sell a 52 per cent controlling stake in the club and have been attempting to offload it since September 2009. They were concerned about the involvement of anyone connected in the Rangers farce, which is totally understandable, and were worried about a few other things - although they weren't concerned there was some attempt to turn is into Rangers (more on that later).
As far as the selling consortium were concerned, the McGeoch/Davies deal was dead but on Friday a letter arrived from a different group of lawyers claiming to represent them. The consortium decided enough was enough and decided they will no longer be considering selling to McGeoch and Davies.
As I said, it is completely understandable that the board don't want anything to do with anyone connected to Whyte or Rangers. However, the whole scenario has been jumped upon by a number of people believing McGeoch was leading a scheme to turn is into a "Newco Rangers".
This is a laughable suggestion. McGeoch is a lifelong St Mirren fan and has been on the board for years, although isn't part of the selling consortium. Why on earth would he try to turn us into Rangers? There may well be people in his consortium who'd like to do that but we've no idea because information about this bid is painfully thin on the ground. We don't know who they are or why they want to by the club. However, I refuse to believe a St Mirren fan would be trying that - but the reaction of some people would have you thinking the offer was submitted on Rangers headed notepaper!
The question of why they were using the same group of lawyers as Whyte does need answering - especially as they deal mainly with English rather than Scottish law. However, it may be there are few firms who deal with football club takeovers. 10 or 15 years ago you used Barr to build your stadium then when you realised couldn't afford it you called in KPMG as you went into administration. Is Withey the takeover equivalent?
Regardless, the McGeoch bid using him is a rather foolish move due to the Rangers connection. The consortium's motives only became public in September but you can assume they'd been working on things for a while before that, while the problems at Ibrox have only surfaced in the last few months. However, using anyone connected to Rangers - or Celtic - was a daft move.
McGeoch is still hopeful of completing a deal but Gilmour's comments suggest he's wasting his time. That brings us back to 1000Hours, which has been quiet for the last few months. Gilmour claimed he is hopeful if this being resolved by the end of the month, saying talks had moved up a gear in the last week or so. The 10000Hours Twitter account has come to life in the past few days, although quite rightly decided against making more information available due to the sad news about Bolton's Fabrice Muamba.
So, we're left with one deal seemingly dead because it won't be accepted and the other one looking more and more likely to go through. The cynic in me says the news about the McGeoch bid hitting the rocks going public has come at a rather convenient time for the CIC because it has turned people against one director and suddenly made them all favour of a fans ownership scheme just as one was about to be finalised. Coincidence or something more sinister? There's as much proof of the latter as there is that McGeoch and Davies were about to move us to Ibrox.
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