Iles response to his ban.

A MATE of mine in the business phoned up last week and asked: “Remember when we used to write about corners and throw-ins?”
   
I certainly can. There was a time covering Bolton Wanderers when a working week was spent entirely focussing on what was happening on the field, rather than off it.
And I know which one causes more sleepless nights.
When Wanderers went close to going out of business in December 2015, I’ll admit I felt totally unprepared for the subject matter I found myself writing about. Winding-up orders, validation orders, transfer embargoes – it really was a foreign language.

But thanks to the help of some people a lot wiser in these ways, some of whom were connected to the club, some not, we got there.
When the dust settled, I looked back at what I had written, the questions I had put to the former ownership before the major problems took hold and asked myself: Was it really good enough? I admit it was not.
So when new ownership came in, I made a promise that I would raise my own game, be more analytical, make sure the people in charge of the club were answerable for the decisions they made. I believe I owed that to the readership of the newspaper.
I’d still rather be reporting on the football than the finances but, alas, there have been few occasions since Ken Anderson and Dean Holdsworth walked through the door as co-owners in March 2016 where I have been able to do that exclusively.

Mr Anderson inherited a tough restructuring job at a club which had lived beyond its means thanks to the incredible backing of Eddie Davies. His efforts to sustain Bolton Wanderers have also not gone unnoticed.
But to run a Championship football club competitively is a costly business, and it has become increasingly clear that Mr Anderson does not have the financial wherewithal to do this in the long term.
On a weekly basis, we are given examples of how increased cost-cutting, unpaid bills, bonuses and, most recently, wages, are affecting staff at the football club. This information comes from people who work at the stadium, the hotel, the training ground and out on the pitch. So on December 5 we asked: Should we be concerned about the immediate financial future of the club?

We are yet to get a satisfactory answer.
Shortly after breaking the news that players and coaching staff had not been paid, I did get a text from Mr Anderson congratulating me on my fair and balanced reporting.
As time wore on, however, promises were not kept. At two press conferences, Phil Parkinson maintained Mr Anderson would sort the problem by the time the newspaper hit the streets the next day. On both occasions it did not happen.
Throughout the last couple of weeks I have maintained regular contact with Wanderers’ communications department to ask for comment or guidance on the information in my articles. On each occasion it has been a case of “no comment.”

It has been quite clear from the owner’s recent columns and private communication that he has been looking for a reason to issue a ban. I did not think for one second that the straw that broke the camel’s back would be a tweet involving the Muppets Christmas Carol!

Hand on heart, the GIF which accompanied the news that staff and players were being paid their November salaries was actually an in-joke about Christmas being saved, rather than any direct pop at the ownership. In hindsight, I wish I’d just stuck with the text.
That triviality aside, there are serious issues which have not gone away.

Those affected by financial problems at Wanderers are in a difficult position – be it staff who cannot get invoices paid on time, or who have to dip into their own pocket to pay for supplies, players who cannot get a warm shower at the training ground, or anyone who has to wonder if their pay will be in accounts at the end of the month. That kind of environment does not make for a functioning football club.
Just as I am duty-bound to reflect the views of the newspaper’s readers, as the Bolton Wanderers correspondent I am also obliged to flag up concerns from within. And they are very real.
People involved may not be able to say so in public. But I am 100 per cent sure I have their backing and support.
Others looking in from the outside may feel otherwise, perhaps even that the newspaper has been overly-critical of Mr Anderson during his time at Wanderers, or that the financial problems have been too heavily scrutinised. And that’s OK. Differing opinions are what it is all about.

Bottom line, this newspaper’s fortunes are inextricably linked with those of the town’s football club and have been since the first day someone kicked a ball in anger at Pike’s Lane. When the team does well, so do we.
But we cannot pick and choose what to report. When things are going badly, we need to say it. This team has won once in its last 17 games, so we have to ask why.
Whether I’m in the press box at Wanderers on a Saturday, watching from the stands, or typing away in the office, I’ll be working to provide the best possible coverage of the club I can.

The Bolton (Evening) News has done that since day one at Wanderers. And that won’t change.

https://www.theboltonnews.co.uk/news/17300073.why-we-wont-stop-asking-questions-at-bolton-wanderers/

Pity he didn't stick to reporting rather than his less than professional behaviour on twitter.

This is what I posted in reply to the following post from Marc505

"What else was he supposed to do though? Not reflect fans opinion on players not being paid for a fortnight?
Fair enough maybe his analysis of the situation might have been different, so what does he do then? Try to justify a 2 week delay in wage payments? Or try to pass it off and accept the party line?
Fair enough I believe he took too many of the more extreme views to heart and began to broadcast them too much. But if he didn't at all? What kind of coverage do we want from our local paper? Twitter carries a bigger representation of fans' views than Wanderers Ways does, whether that's a good or bad thing. 
With everything going on at the club, I don't think Marc Iles is the problem". 


Well maybe if Iles had just tweeted once that with Burnden Leisure being a limited company that it was NOT the responsibility of Anderson to pay the wages from his own pocket.

Maybe then this bigger representation of Bolton fans on Twitter might have been a little better informed and not as angry against the owner as so many of them now are.

Maybe if he hadn't tweeted 'likes' on his twitter account to people implying Anderson was a crook in some way, then maybe some of those many on twitter might not be thinking the same way as they are now.

Maybe if he hadn't deliberately put out on twitter extracts from the accounts about payments to Anderson company for 'consultation' services and joined in the unfounded belief that he was paying himself over half a million in year in wages, then all his twitter followers wouldn't have taken it as gospel that Anderson (and his son) were!

It's not about Iles being asked to toe some party line or other it is about Iles being professional and impartial in what he is reporting on.

If he left it at writing his articles rather than become the self proclaimed voice of the people on twitter (based on opinions and personal bias rather than facts) then maybe people would have been better informed and not out forming lynch parties to get the Anderson's out as many seem to want now thanks to Iles.

Marc Iles may not be the problem at the club but there's no doubt he's added considerably to them recently over his personal agenda with Andersons and how he's gone out of his way to shit stir the twitter gormless to start to turn things toxic against them on the terraces.

http://www.wanderersways.com/forum/topic/89299-iles-reporting-pfa-pulled-out-of-funding-wages/?page=9&tab=comments#comment-1840048

Sluffy
Are you actually telling us that the 2016/17 accounts are wrong and that Ken did not pay himself consultation fees of over half a million? What's the proof of your claim? If it really is the case then the Head of Finance and the auditors should go.

maconman wrote:Sluffy
Are you actually telling us that the 2016/17 accounts are wrong and that Ken did not pay himself consultation fees of over half a million? What's the proof of your claim? If it really is the case then the Head of Finance and the auditors should go.

Read what I wrote again.

'Consultation' does not ecessarily equate to KA's 'wages'.

The fee was paid to one of KA's Inner Circle companies.  Do you (or anyone else know) how many employees/consultants it employed at the time, what consultation work they did for BWFC, whether KA himself was actually involved personally in the consultation that the payment was made for?

Has the consultation continued into BWFC's next set of accounts or was it just a one off?

You, don't know, I don't know, Iles doesn't know and all those on Twitter (including at least two current or former ST Board members) definitely don't know - but the universal belief propagated on there and given validity by the likes of Iles is that 
he does.

Ten Bob gives a compelling argument that the 'consultation' money was a means of funding the purchase of Holdsworth's remaining shares from the liquidator of SSBWFC.  If so there is no reason to believe KA has taken anything more out of the club since or believe he's been paying himself this mythical monthly £65,000 in wages to himself ever since.

If you have any facts to the contrary and can prove that KA has been drawing a wage then please feel free to let us all know on here.

Otherwise you will have to agree that the allegations and inference from those who say so on twitter are based solely on gossip with no factual evidence anywhere whatsoever.

In my youth when you heard a story that someone had been told by a bloke down the pub - you always had a healthy scepticism of how truthful the story actually was.  These days it seems that any nutjob can say anything they want on social media and the rest of them seem to accept it as gospel.  Iles should know better and be more professional than tittle-tattle on Twitter in view of his job as a journalist whereby he is required to report impartially and without bias.

Of course I don't know if it was a one off or not. We'll just have to wait until April for the 2017/18 accounts. It is a fact though that he received that amount in respect of 2016/17 through Inner circle. My guess is that it is termed 'consultation' fees for tax/insurance reasons.

maconman wrote:Of course I don't know if it was a one off or not. We'll just have to wait until April for the 2017/18 accounts. It is a fact though that he received that amount in respect of 2016/17 through Inner circle. My guess is that it is termed 'consultation' fees for tax/insurance reasons.

That is the point though - nobody knows, we can only guess at what it was for and if it was a one off or not.

However there's been plenty like Iles who have tweeted 'like's' to others who tweet that money was for KA and LA's 'wages' and that they are taking the equivalent of £65k+ per month out of the club, whilst not paying players and suppliers.

This has directly led to the vast majority on twitter truly believing it to be the case and directing their anger at the Anderson's for doing so - even though they may not be at all!

Iles should not be party to such a smear (if indeed it is) unless he knows they are paying themselves for certain - and in which case he should put it into print saying so and be able to back that up if he was sued for saying so.

Even if he was - he's doing nothing illegal just as long as the club remains solvent to trade - and despite many scares - nearly all of them reported by Iles - usually on twitter first - and all of them coming to nothing so far - we remain to be.

At the end of the day Iles should know how to act professionally in his position as a journalist and tweeting inflammatory shit on twitter against the clubs owner clearly prejudices his ability to write about him in the paper in an objective and unbiased manner.

While I pretty much agree with you vis a vis Iles' behaviour sluffy I don't think banning him from the ground is going to help Anderson deal with the anti- or even just the doubters who have been influenced directly or indirectly by the reportage to date. Personally I would have challenged Iles directly to validate his claims and had Iles failed to do so (as I am certain he would because almost everything he's published has been conjecture at best and malicious deliberate falsehood at worst) gone to the BN and asked them to replace him with an actual journalist who believes in reporting facts.

What Ken's done here is actually give Iles a much bigger platform and worse, given him the aura of a 'martyr' being punished for daring to speak the truth when in fact I doubt Iles would recognise an actual fact if it danced a salsa on his desk! The doubters will have their doubts reinforced, after all why ban Iles if Ken has nothing to hide? Forget the 'anti' brigade, they're on the same level as the people who think the CIA is reading their thoughts and a tin-foil hat can stop it. The middle ground which is the vast majority of BWFC fans simply want to know in as simple terms as possible what is going on with the club and a rough idea of what to expect. Iles has never produced that and frankly the BN should be kicking itself for failing to replace him but now they've got no choice but to 'stand by their man' or be exposed as completely irresponsible and incompetent themselves.

Personally I think Iles is at best a fool and at worst deluded in calling himself a journalist of any sort but Ken's response was the wrong one. It won't help him in the long run and it just adds fuel to the fire of malice perpetrated by the likes of the ST and swallowed whole by the likes of wanderlust. I sincerely hope the BN will see this as an opportunity to assign someone else, someone competent to cover BWFC matters but Ken, at least for the moment has backed them into a corner and that was a daft thing to do right now. Things ON the pitch are problematic enough without deliberately adding to the problems OFF it.

Ken knows a lot of people  have a problem with the 525k Consultancy fee.They think Ken is drawing the equivalent of 10k a week while he isn't paying some of the bills and wages on time.
If Ken didn't pay the consultancy fee to himself to spend as he wished he could make himself more popular by explaining who the consultancy fee was paid to and what it was paid for.

Peter/Growler, you both raise two separate points but they can both be answered by me in the same way as follows.

The vast majority of fans are not really bothered at all what goes on behind the scenes if a club is successful on the pitch.  If we were again signing Okocha's and Djorkaef's and racking up massive debts that could bring the club to its knees in a few years time they wouldn't be bothered in the least because we were playing attractive and successful football again.

So because we aren't some people use the fans dissatisfaction with our current poor performance on the pitch (in particular how dour, defensive focused and negative it is) to further their own agendas.

If we had been showing heart and a style of football more pleasing to the eye and managed a few wins, even with the squad of players we had, it would be that much harder for some to whip up the hatred that has been done against Anderson - a run of positive results for us will goa long way to quell the current hatred of him by many - as we football fans are notoriously fickle creatures.

Removing Iles from tweeting his constant and growing, and his ongoing undermining of Anderson was necessary because it was clearly not going to stop voluntarily - he was clearly mounting a personal campaign against him - Iles himself more or less said himself that the picture of Scrooge he posted was a personal laugh he was having with his mates inside the club (aimed against Anderson directly).

Clearly that had to be stopped dead at that point - and quite rightly so.

Although Bolton News bosses have publicly backed Iles (and I wouldn't be surprised if Iles ban is quietly lifted in a few weeks time) it wouldn't surprise me in the least if he has been bollocked in private and told to cease using his own twitter account for airing his personal views or opinions against the Andersons.  

I think therefore that the general fan based displeasure with Anderson is/was at its highest point and the removal of Iles as a daily rallying point for those against him will now lessen without the constant agenda led shit stirring and the focus will once again be more team led and although we have lost our last three matches the signs have been there that maybe a bit of a resurgence might be coming soon for us - which in turn again will take the focus further away from the constant vendetta by some against KA.

Similarly at this time there is little to be gained by KA explaining anything to the 'social media' public about the 'consultancy' money paid to one of his companies as most Twitter and Facebook (take everything they read on there as gospel) peoples minds have already been made up that he's a liar and a crook anyway - so anything he says will simply not be believed by them anyway!

Time's a great healer they say, and whilst I doubt many of those who swallowed every word that Iles uttered and 'liked' on twitter as gospel will ever change their now fixed opinion of KA, their heightened growing daily hatred of him being fed to them by those such as Iles on twitter as now stopped and they will nowfind something else for themselves to stress and vex over instead.

Maybe a few wins over Christmas and a more attacking and attractive team to watch will quell the anger for now and all will be forgotten again until the next crisis hits the club.

At least following Bolton isn't boring!

Growler wrote:Ken knows a lot of people  have a problem with the 525k Consultancy fee.They think Ken is drawing the equivalent of 10k a week while he isn't paying some of the bills and wages on time.
If Ken didn't pay the consultancy fee to himself to spend as he wished he could make himself more popular by explaining who the consultancy fee was paid to and what it was paid for.

KA could explain it if he hadn't been required to sign a non-disclosure agreement. That would be normal in this type of case.

Iles knows about this because I commented on it to Paul Holliday in the presence of Marc Iles immediately after the shareholders AGM a few months back. PH made no comment. Iles acknowledged it.

But the £472K Inner Circle paid for Holdsworth's shares is only part of the cost to the club. There's also the £250K paid to Sports Shield BWFC in May 2016. I expect HMRC would also have wanted tax on the £250K (probably at 32.5%).

Then on top of that there was Holdsworth's salary, legal fees and compensation for loss of office.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:

Growler wrote:Ken knows a lot of people  have a problem with the 525k Consultancy fee.They think Ken is drawing the equivalent of 10k a week while he isn't paying some of the bills and wages on time.
If Ken didn't pay the consultancy fee to himself to spend as he wished he could make himself more popular by explaining who the consultancy fee was paid to and what it was paid for.

KA could explain it if he hadn't been required to sign a non-disclosure agreement. That would be normal in this type of case.

Iles knows about this because I commented on it to Paul Holliday in the presence of Marc Iles immediately after the shareholders AGM a few months back. PH made no comment. Iles acknowledged it.

But the £472K Inner Circle paid for Holdsworth's shares is only part of the cost to the club. There's also the £250K paid to Sports Shield BWFC in May 2016. I expect HMRC would also have wanted tax on the £250K (probably at 32.5%).

Then on top of that there was Holdsworth's salary, legal fees and compensation for loss of office.

Thanks Ten Bob, a far more detailed and likely explanation than mine above although I do think most who follow blindly on twitter wouldn't believe a word KA says now even if he was free to tell them the full facts behind the 'consultancy' payment.

At the risk of Natasha telling me I'm sucking up again, I'd like to say how delighted I am (and no doubt the other 'Nutters' too) to have someone on the site who can give us an informed and fact based narrative giving a more plausible and likely explanation as to what as actually occurred based on a far more forensic approach to the public accounts of the business of all the main players own or have been involved with rather than take as gospel the views of events that have almost certainly in my opinion originated from a small core of people connected with the early formation of the ST and their agenda to seek ownership of the club for themselves.

At the end of the day no one knows (unless they were directly involved) which of the two scenarios are correct but I know I much prefer the one based with factual documentation is far more likely to be nearer the mark than someone simply guessing that a 'consultation fee' is simply another word for Anderson's private wages.

Sluffy wrote:

Ten Bobsworth wrote:

Growler wrote:Ken knows a lot of people  have a problem with the 525k Consultancy fee.They think Ken is drawing the equivalent of 10k a week while he isn't paying some of the bills and wages on time.
If Ken didn't pay the consultancy fee to himself to spend as he wished he could make himself more popular by explaining who the consultancy fee was paid to and what it was paid for.

KA could explain it if he hadn't been required to sign a non-disclosure agreement. That would be normal in this type of case.

Iles knows about this because I commented on it to Paul Holliday in the presence of Marc Iles immediately after the shareholders AGM a few months back. PH made no comment. Iles acknowledged it.

But the £472K Inner Circle paid for Holdsworth's shares is only part of the cost to the club. There's also the £250K paid to Sports Shield BWFC in May 2016. I expect HMRC would also have wanted tax on the £250K (probably at 32.5%).

Then on top of that there was Holdsworth's salary, legal fees and compensation for loss of office.

Thanks Ten Bob, a far more detailed and likely explanation than mine above although I do think most who follow blindly on twitter wouldn't believe a word KA says now even if he was free to tell them the full facts behind the 'consultancy' payment.

At the risk of Natasha telling me I'm sucking up again, I'd like to say how delighted I am (and no doubt the other 'Nutters' too) to have someone on the site who can give us an informed and fact based narrative giving a more plausible and likely explanation as to what as actually occurred based on a far more forensic approach to the public accounts of the business of all the main players own or have been involved with rather than take as gospel the views of events that have almost certainly in my opinion originated from a small core of people connected with the early formation of the ST and their agenda to seek ownership of the club for themselves.

At the end of the day no one knows (unless they were directly involved) which of the two scenarios are correct but I know I much prefer the one based with factual documentation is far more likely to be nearer the mark than someone simply guessing that a 'consultation fee' is simply another word for Anderson's private wages.

You are right that the usual suspects would accuse KA of lying if he said today was Sunday.

Anyway I can attach links after all. Check out the business description here:

https://www.networkalbion.co.uk/business/sports-shield-investments

And here's another clue for which I am grateful to Worthy4England, former poster on The Wanderer:

PFA wrote:However, it has been brought to the attention of the PFA that a recently formed company, Xpro Enterprises Ltd, has been writing to some members requesting authority to obtain personal information regarding individual members’ pensions. Xpro has no association or affiliation with the PFA and we are aware of instances in the past where Xpro have published misleading information concerning players’ pensions. Should you require any information concerning your pension, please contact the Pension Administrators.

Above from PFA's website in 2013

And you might wonder from another clue published in a national newspaper in 2015 which impoverished footballers Xpro was helping (or if you like why the PFA wasn't doing that).

Football charity fears
It doesn't seem fair that the Professional Footballers Association could award their multi-millionaire chief executive Gordon Taylor - one of the FA ambassadors in Alicante last night - a £2million bonus in 2014 for his hugely lucrative long service, while the future of football organisaton Xpro management, which also helps impoverished former players, is in doubt after its fund-raising arm went bust.
It went under after former Wimbledon star Dean Holdsworth and another un-named former player took the company to court for alleged unpaid wages worth around £200,000.