 Thursday, 10th Jan 2013 08:04 by Micah Hall A lot of people have been asking me where I've been in recent weeks. The simple answer is: helping the Trust prepare to hit the ground running. As soon as we wrest control of our club back, the process of healing the decades of underinvestment, poor decision making and downright villainy can begin.
PKF were asked by the League only to put forward someone they were confident would pass the Owners and Directors Test. PKF put forward Portpin and were told they were unlikely to pass the test and to do a deal with the PST instead. Now the concerns the League set out in a six-page letter can't be satisfied because they relate to Portpin's history with Pompey, that is to say putting us into administration twice. You can't change the past. The reason they have not been told categorically they have failed is because they were not invited to apply. I've never even heard of anyone who has been told not to bother applying. It would be difficult to envisage a situation in which they could pass the test. The League are heavily involved in meeting with PKF and the PST regularly. There has been no change to the status of Portpin. They are not alternative owners. Still some people seem to think that they represented a route back to being an aspiring Premier League club. History lesson: as I've demonstrated before, they actually took over Pompey in October 2009 as part of the Falcondrone/Portpin consortium, with them holding the whip hand. We WERE a Premier League club. Far from using their overwhelming influence to try and keep us in the Premier League they sold our best players, took the money and put us back into administration. They took us over again in October 2010, when we were a mid table Championship side - and they spent ZERO on players. Instead, they ran up a large amount of debt which CSI had to pay off. There is an interesting little story about 2010-11 season ticket money and why the club wanted it in cash at that time which I may well be publishing soon too... In November 2011, when Portpin forced CSI into administration the Directors of Portsmouth FC asked Portpin to support the club financially to avoid relegation and keep us in the Championship, from where it is easier to be an aspiring Premier League club. They did not. We went back into administration and went down. Portpin have had three opportunities to make us an aspiring Premier League club - yet each time they have taken control they have left us looking downwards. As a salutary reminder - they dropped their projected £4.5m wage bill for this season to £1.5m overnight - throwing all of Appleton's plans into disarray. Fans who have reacted badly to the departure of several first teamers should bear in mind that we are now getting down to the level of budget that Portpin proposed from day one in August. Aspiring Premier League club? Meanwhile, the fans' bid continues to grow stronger every day. The hour really is the darkest before the dawn. When we take control, life will continue to be difficult because you can't put all this damage right overnight. However, we will work together to make this club as proud an institution as it has ever been. Have confidence - once we are through the court cases we can all concentrate on a bright future full of opportunity, and forget the shabbiness of our recent past. Play Up Pompey! The views of Micah Hall are his own and don't necessarily reflect the editorial view of pompey-fans.com. Any proceeds of this column are donated to Action Aid. To convert your pledge or buy a share visit www.communitypompey.co.uk
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