I'm Right Naive Me!

As Reeves and Mortimer used to say "I'm right naive me".

You see, I assumed that when a bid to buy a business is turned down, it's because a better plan has been submitted by someone else. Judging by the last few days, perhaps that's not always the case.

The WST were, of course, the losers in the bidding process for Wrexham Football Club. They were rejected, according to Geoff Moss, on two grounds: a lack of experience in running a football club and a financial inability to fund it in the medium term.

As a key tenet of the WST's bid was that they would appoint professionals to run the club, the argument that they could not do the job as "the people who run the Trust all have full time jobs" is surely irrelevant. And as for the lack of a financial plan, well if the thoroughy professional pitch, supported by a top table packed with experience in running football clubs, made in the William Aston Hall wasn't good enough, then Jon Harris' must have been stunning! Considering the fact that he seems to have nothing in his background to suggest he's worth more than the trust, he must be able to sell icecubes to eskimos! And we all know he's operating alone, apart from the odd expert advisor, of course.

And there's the strange thing. It seems Geoff Moss has, since opting for Harris' bid, has asked for funding from the trust. That seems a bit like Simon Cowell picking Leona Lewis as his winner and then asking the runner-up to sing us out! But wasn't Harris' bid water-tight? Didn't it contain sufficient funds to provide for the club's medium and long term future? And isn't long term future what the Centre of Excellence is all about?

I know there's been a funding gap at Colliers Park since the Football League's money dried up. I also know that it's sometimes hard to get people to invest in the future when they're fixated with the present, something football fans are more guilty of than most. But I also know that if you want to raise funds, it helps if you have credibility. If there's one body which fans are happy to give their money to, it's the trust. Pity they weren't in a position to run the club and tap into that deep well of goodwill, eh?

But like I said, I'm naive. I'd have thought the sheer professionalism of the WST bid, its moral mission to give something back to the community, and its enhanced financial potential as a result of the goodwill the trust enjoys, would have made it a very attractive bid. Yet it turns out a bidder who's begging for funds before the contract's even been signed is more attreactive. Like I said, I'm right naive, me!