Charles Bannerman

I would very much echo what DD has just said. The meeting provided as much clarity as it’s possible to get at this stage, and thanks to Scott, Charlie and the ST for providing that opportunity. There’s no easy solution to a massive problem whose origins go back for years, and I do believe that administration - given that “best” simply isn’t a suitable word to use here - is the least bad of the available outcomes. Meanwhile, my thoughts are with the club’s employees, who I hope will be affected by this to the minimum extent possible.

I make it a pretty hard and fast rule not to comment on referees, but I just can’t let go what we saw this afternoon. Mr Stuart’s nightmare can be headlined by the two absolutely clear cut penalties he waved away and there was a lot more that ICT should have had against a pretty physical Annan team. Duncan’s struggle to contain his fury was palpable. I thought that it was a very encouraging performance by these largely young lads who seemed to have just that bit more bite up front - and especially creditable given the circumstances, and that they didn’t know if they were playing their last game for ICT under the cloud of possibly becoming jobless.

Reluctant as I am to create disagreement at a time like this….frankly that’s complete nonsense and there isn’t a shred of evidence linking the mechanics and legacy of the merger with the current situation which has been caused by gross mismanagement compounding the problems of an extremely difficult global, national and local football financial environment.

Orange strips with the sponsor’s name on them in RED CAPITALS.

I agree. It appears to be the club paying off a loan made by RBS in 2016. How the money was found to do this is anyone’s guess, but it seems conceivable that, for some technical reason, this was a loan that it was best not still to be in existence when Administration begins.

I’ve done that, and I can’t make 50% out of any permutation of six current shareholdings. There are 4.902M existing shares, half of which is 2.451M. If you include the Supporters’ Trust’s fixed 10%, then you need 2.723M for a majority. The biggest “holding” I’ve been able to trace, according to the last confirmation statement, is Muirfield Mills whose combined stake among around 9 people is around 820K. The McGilvray family have 487K; the Sutherland family 300K; David Cameron has 175K; Roddy Ross has 170K. We’re still struggling to approach 50% and I’ve been assuming that Savage/Orion, who prefers admin, wouldn’t be part of this, but if you even add in his 467K, then the top six shareholdings (I’ve omitted the ST’s 729K since they aren’t “businessmen”) come to 2.410M which is still short of a majority by either definition. And then is there’s the proposal to convert current debt to equity. If that came about, Ross Morrison becomes the largest shareholder with over a million of what would become a total of more than 6 million. So is he among this group? I’m also struggling to reconcile the categorical statement yesterday (Thursday) that the time had “come and gone” with the stated intention to make a bid by Monday.

That David Anderson bid never looked substantial enough to stand up. I think we are now hovering very close to administration, although I could understand a desire not to announce it until after tomorrow’s game. Presumably the words “under control” mean during or after administration.

They can’t just start selling new shares at a knockdown price. They would need the agreement of shareholders at a general meeting to create the extra shares and also to sell them at a price much lower than what’s been paid hitherto. Apart from the time involved in doing this, it would also require the agreement of existing shareholders, who may see administration as a safer way of avoiding liquidation.

That’s the aspect that I can’t get to grips with. OK… it’s said that the mystery Blue Black and Red Knight would be prepared to follow up “their” £1.2M with more, but £1.2M is chickenfeed compared with the other numbers involved, such is the depth of the club’s financial mire. It’s going to cost £1.6M even to get to the end of the season; debts sit somewhere between £3.4 and £3.8M; and to acquire a controlling interest could cost up to £6.1M… bringing the grand total potentially to over £11M. And then there’s the question of future losses. The £6.1M takeover figure is what would have to be bought in new shares in order to top the combined total of 4.9 million existing shares and the ST’s fixed 10%. On the other hand if “they” were able to persuade some existing shareholders to part with what they have cheaply, that would reduce. I’m struggling to see how this bid, which I believe is the one the board took just two hours to reject before, can be made to stand up unless there’s a very big rabbit waiting to jump out of the hat.

I don’t suppose Eden Court could be approached with suggestions of one or two (non actionable) gags?

If the Immortal One was still with us, I wonder what his professional take on Gardiner would have been?

I think I maybe didn’t do a very good job of saying that I was agreeing with your assessment. It seems that, regarding the period between when his “resignation” was announced and when Savage finally booted his arse out the door - about 9 weeks - he’s been trying to play at Schroedinger’s Cat… simultaneously existing and not existing as he sees fit. I am in no doubt that a lot more than the supporters would put the blame at his feet, which is why I would relish court action where the very best brief that Alan Savage could pay for would very publicly expose the situation in all its awfulness.

As I recollect it, Gardiner’s “resignation” announcement, weighed down by the caveat of “notice”, round about the end of May, wasn’t taken seriously by anyone as having any significance. What really mattered was when he left the building and had no further connection with the club and that didn’t happen until Savage gave him his marching orders several weeks later. During the intervening period, the fans veto on spending money on the club continued because the central issue was whether or not Gardiner carried any practical influence over the club’s activities.

I’m sure I saw 9pm mentioned somewhere, but even if it is 9pm, the sum raised is so far short of £200,000 (however significant that is anyway) that the precise hour might not matter anyway.

Did Panos Thomas’ original announcement of the crowdfunder not say 9pm on the 16th? If so, that would tend to make any announcement on Wednesday appear unlikely anyway. It is also reported that the board will be meeting “towards the end of the week” to discuss such interest as there has been. That suggests Thursday or Friday and if that’s the case, you would them have to add on whatever time it takes to issue a statement - assuming that the board meeting comes to a clear cut decision, whatever that may be.

Since I haven’t fully retired yet, I’m reluctant to say too much, and must say that Stephen McGowan is generally pretty good. I seem to recollect that it said somewhere in the piece it says that “ICT/AS were approached for comment” but in this situation, I’m not sure that standard device is carte blanche to fire on with one side of the story - especially when it’s as controversial as this and it’s being fed to you from a clearly highly polarised viewpoint. I wouldn’t criticise Stephen for not being as intimately familiar with the story as our local press pack, but given that’s clearly the case, I think that makes accepting what Gardiner says without balance a bit risky - especially when you are likely to get bullshit steered past you.

This is in today’s Daily Mail. I really don’t feel inclined to comment… not even to say that the man needs the kind of help that few involved with Caley Thistle would even want to lift a finger to assist him getting.

This isn’t a negative post - just an application of some objectivity. When speaking to the press yesterday, the manager all but ruled out avoiding relegation to League Two if a 15 point administration penalty was to be imposed. I’ve been looking at League One tables back to 2014 and identifying how many points would have to be gained before the 15 point deduction if survival were to be achieved - “survival” being defined as 16 points clear of each season’s bottom placed club (which of course doesn’t avoid the relegation playoffs). Clearly that’s most achievable when there’s a real lame duck in the league and the lowest target of 24 points came from last season when Edinburgh City were awful. The next lowest were 32 in 2023 (Peterhead) and 33 in 2021 (Forfar). On the other hand in 2017 a team receiving a penalty would have needed 55 points to avoid bottom while it would have been 52 in 2019 and 50 in 2016. These higher targets correspond to needing to finish an unpenalised 3rd-5th, although there are a couple of 8ths and 9ths in there. ICT’s current 9 points from 9 games equate pro rata to 36 for the full season which, after the penalty, would have meant relegation in 6 of these 10 seasons So is there a lame duck among ICT’s rivals? Do Dumbarton fit that bill maybe? Or Annan? Or might ICT, after any player cull an administrator might make, become that lame duck anyway?

Although I think it’s obviously helpful that this appeal does well, I also think it’s a relative sideshow that has been overtaken by what now looks like inexorable momentum towards administration. This £200K is chickenfeed in a much bigger game. Also at today’s press conference where the manager expressed slender hopes of staying in League One after a 15 point deduction, Charlie Gilmour spoke very well, saying that if the penalty did happen then it would have the effect of galvanising him and probably others to rise to the challenge. Looking back through the history of this club, I think of a number of episodes of improbable success and rescue such as the club being formed at all, defeating Celtic three times in the Scottish Cup, coming back from 3-0 down against Ayr, cantering home in the First Division in 2010 after looking dead and gone in February, winning the First Division in 2004 with victories over Clyde and St Johnstone, getting into the SPL through a wad of red tape etc etc. One thing that does worry me, though, is whether the same spirit is there these days?

The trouble is that there only 6 of the available 13 days remain and the appeal has only reached 37% of its target - including a £20,000 donation that’s likely to be a one off. I just don’t see anything practicable that could achieve the necessary acceleration in the very short timescale. Two other points. This appeal was floated as having the purpose of avoiding administration which, it emerged four days after its launch, had been the preferred option of AS and the Board anyway. And secondly, I’m not sure that there’s any intrinsic significance of the £200,000 figure since it looks to me that they are just looking to bring in money to make administration happen.

I wouldn’t go as far as the word “aim” in the context of an actively preferred outcome. However I would be surprised if it hasn’t for some time been pretty clear to anyone with a full insight into the figures that administration is inevitable, so dire are the headline numbers that are being made public. As for part time football, again I wouldn’t look on this as an aim but as an inevitable consequence of administration.

Scorrie… I felt that Alan may have slightly ducked my question, but on the other hand there are possibly aspects here to which even he so far has no answer. He may have slightly deflected what by necessity was a complex question by making a bit of a joke about that complexity, but in essence what I was trying to say was:- 1 - since August we have had three or four contradictory versions of whether this £3M of debt is active or has been written off by the lenders. Which is it? And if it hasn’t then 2 - there’s this document lodged with Companies House that seems to allow Ross Morrison to walk away with his pick of the club’s assets in lieu of repayment, so is stadium ownership in danger? 3 - what specifically is the status of the car parks element of these assets here, And 4 - would any of this threat disappear on administration? The answers I seemed to get were 1 - yes, the club is still liable. 2 - I didn’t feel I got clarity on that. 3 - there seems to be some horrendously complicated arrangement involving ICT Properties which an Administrator would establish and 4 - the debt might well disappear on admin on the basis of the claim that these loans were apparently not capital sums but contributions to day to day running costs. This one, for me, is still rolling.

I remain concerned about this document - a charge filed with Companies House in January, suggesting that the large sums loaned by Ross Morrison have security such as the stadium and car parks, which could hence be called in on failure to pay. I asked questions at last night’s meeting which seemed to elicit the answer that, despite various statements that this had/ hadn’t/ had etc been written off, the £3.4M was still very much owed, although administration had the scope to cancel this. The answer from the top table indicated that these loans would be converted to shares, but I’m still not clear as to whether the stadium is in any remaining danger of being “claimed” if this gets messy. Any arrangement with a “Right… if you can’t pay, I’m having the stadium” potential - which this Charge appears to say - has got to be a worry, and I’m not sure if even Alan Savage has a full answer to that yet.

I think £200K seems to be less than the average monthly expenditure. I don’t know what turnover has been because the accounts aren’t required to state it, but £2 million mightn’t be a bad guess. Add the projected £1.2M for the current year to that to get expenditure and you’ve got £3.2M which is a bit over £260K in a month. There therefore has to be some concern if (or rather when) the £200K isn’t reached, then how are they going to manage to pay the October wages?

There seems to be some uncertainty there. The people who currently run the club aren’t aware of any money having changed hands, but it’s been alleged that Carlisle have suggested that it did.