Cogs/clappers/gino Backers Roll Call

That other poster who wrote about Udinese's turbulent times and the establishment of a new group of executives was me.

Your repeated statement that Giampaolo Pozzo or one of his companies actually 'owns' Watford, or even that he still has a stake, isn't borne out by any actual evidence as far as I can see. Can you provide something please cos I'd like to know if it is the case? According to every credible report, Giampaolo handed sole ownership and responsibility of WFC to Gino years ago.

I don't mind a bit of speculation but imagining a theoretical scenario and then assuming it to be true is a bit strange.

 

You appear to be trying to create an argument where none exists, wfcmoog. I never mentioned Pozzo in my comments. I was only discussing Petchey. He may have "left us at pretty close to net zero", but he insisted on the repayment of Elton's loan to himself (which Elton had expected to be wiped off when he sold the club) and Petchey's lack of investment in the team resulted in relegation to League One.

 

The original post I made in response to Knight, to which this has all been a sequel, was that the 90s era saw much improvement to the ground, but that has been somehow dismissed because of how it was funded, whilst Pozzo was being credited with building the SEJ stand as some sort of mitigation for the debt and other complaints against him.

If you weren't arguing against that I'm not sure what your point was.

 

Thank you for the clarification, EnjoytheGame. I asked the question because I was remembering the press conference in February 1996 when Graham Taylor and Elton John first announced their return to involvement in Watford.

 

Aye – GT came back as manager / figurehead, with Luther and Kenny as his management team in Feb 96 but it took a while for the ownership to change. GT, LB and KJ were all sort of equals – I remember they took turns to 'write' the programme notes when they first came back.

Elton's return was happening in the background but it took them more than a year to put together the consortium to buy out Petchey. As others have said, the whole thing almost fell down because Elton was aggrieved that Petchey insisted on the debt to the owner being repaid. Of course, this was money lent by Elton to the club and left on the books when Petchey took over so, in effect, Elton's consortium was paying back money Elton had lent the club. All very messy but they got it sorted out.

In the meantime, GT went upstairs and Kenny soldiered on with the fairly thankless task of trying to get promoted while Petchey kept a very, very tight hold on the purse strings. GT came back as manager in summer 1997 and went on a relatively rampant spending spree (for the division) – Micah Hyde, Jason Lee, Peter Kennedy, and the most expensive of the lot Ronny Rosenthal. For Division 2 it was a colossal signing and Rosenthal bought a very nice family home very close to Swiss Cottage with a combination of his signing-on fee and first year's wages! (A free transfer but as GT said, about as far from free as you can get!)

 

Fuxbury and the clappers out, Gino in.

 

My goodness, some revisionism in there. Petchey ran the club like a corner shop. Absolutely no vision beyond the bottom line. Some of the most dour, least enjoyable seasons in the past 50 years, zero communication with supporters. It's as if the premise for this was: "I know, Petchey was really unpopular, let's just present an alternative reality."

 

Yes. Very odd.