During the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon claimed on national television that “There can be no whitewash at the White House”, yet history shows that there was indeed a whitewash and Nixon orchestrated it through delusions of power and presidential etiquette. It seems that time has taught people nothing about that lying whilst hoping no-one notices usually causes more of a fuss.

This week has seen the Portsmouth financial crisis reach such a point that they’ve simply stop talking to the press because, incredibly, no-one believes anything that comes out as an “official” statement. It is reaching the proportions of a footballing farce but the players have finally been paid after deadlines came and went on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Coming after the chief executive Peter Storrie said that he didn’t know when the financial situation would be resolved and players would have to be sold to keep the club going, today executive director Mark Jacob said this wouldn’t be the case but every player had his price. So two employees of the club and two separate versions of events. Add to that the Premier League are diverting January’s installment of the £7 million TV revenue money to Chelsea, Tottenham, Rennes and Lens and the on going battle with the HMRC, which Portsmouth claims is a mistake and the story gets murkier and murkier.

You see, throughout the last couple of weeks we’ve been told just how much the new owner Ali Al-Faraj had spent dealing with debts for the club, apparently £40 million, but they’ve had to get a loan to pay the wages and can’t clear the transfer debts they owe. So how can things be fine when they are still scraping around to pay wages and have to get more debt to pay existing debts? The Premier League don’t trust them to pay their own deals and I can’t think of another club that has had to have it’s TV money diverted to other clubs.

This situation is spiraling out of control and no-one knows where it’s going to end up next. When club employees don’t know which version of the truth to offer out, how on earth are the fans supposed to have a clue what is going on? With former owner Alexandre Gaydamak also weighing in claiming he’s still owed £28 million, how on earth did it come to this? Yet lets be honest, if Leeds United can implode so spectacularly as they did back in 2003/2004, can Portsmouth really find away out of it.

When I lived in Gosport many years ago and used to make the daily trek to the training ground out in Eastleigh, people would always show their love for the club be it in Fareham, Southsea, wherever. There is a real sense of pride in the side throughout Portsmouth, they are a tenacious and dedicated bunch of people and some of the best fans in the country. If you give your all for the shirt, they’ll give you their unconditional support and you can’t ask for more than that. I just wish the relationship was working the other way around and the club gave as much back.

If they gave a damn, they’d sort out this whole sorry mess and go into administration now. By doing so, they can clear the debts and take the ten point deduction on the chin. Hell, they may even be able to sign some players that could pull the deficit back in time. If not, then they can regroup ready for a promotion assault next season. I just wish the club would stop treating the fans with such indifference, they deserve better.

Is there a worse chairman in the history of the Premiership than Sulaiman Al-Fahim? I’m struggling to think of anyone who has misled, misinformed and treated the supporters of a club so clearly as Al-Fahim has in his 8 month relationship with Portsmouth. Today the HM Revenue & Customs have issues a winding up order against Portsmouth F.C. which will see the club declared bankrupt unless all debts can be settled by February

Now, for me, the Premiership board have to take a long look at themselves over this situation. They allowed a man who clearly didn’t have the financial muscle to own a Premiership club to purchase it and then sell 90% within 6 weeks to Ali al-Faraj who promised to invest significant sums that have still to materialise. Where is all the money going at Portsmouth?

So here we have a situation where the 2008 F.A. Cup winners are facing going under in 6 weeks. It is an absolute disgrace that this situation has come about and the club have just commented on this story, wholly denying the accusations but does anyone believe them anymore? The club are banned from signing anyone until the footballing debts are settled, the ground needs major redevelopment or a new ground and now the tax man has come knocking.

Going into administration would see them hit with a 10 point deduction immediately and would seal relegation for them. Selling players would leave them weaker than they currently are and it would seem highly unlikely that anyone can step in to bail them out financially. It’s a nightmare situation that has echoes of the crisis which engulfed the club in 1999 when Milan Mandaric rode to the rescue.

Yet football has changed immeasurable in the ten years since that crisis. Administration now means a points deduction and yet, when al-Faraj bought his 90% of the club in October, the debt to the Inland Revenue was claimed to have been settled. It now seems that once again, it wasn’t true and with the amount supposedly £2 million, where did that go? The statement from the club claims that they’ve paid £9.7 million but the HMRC have still sought a winding up order. Who’s telling the truth here?

Mandaric has actually stated just before Christmas that he wouldn’t be buying Portsmouth back which would be bad news for anyone hoping to see him return to the Solent. Yet the club has been hemorrhaging money for the last 3 seasons, losing over £40 million up to the end of the 2007-2008 season. Since then, the club have sold over £80 million of talent, but still owe money to Chelsea, Watford  and Rennes. The next allotted amount of TV revenue, which is £7 million could be diverted to those three clubs but it still wouldn’t cover all the outstanding monies.

The monthly wage bill at Fratton Park is £1.8 million and the only other option is to sell playing assets to try and keep going, but the wages have bounced twice already this season and with everyone aware of Portsmouths situation, they will do well to receive an actual value for those players that matches what they need. All in all, it’s a dire situation and there seems no light at the end of the tunnel for Portsmouths long suffering fans. As always these days at Pompey, they are the last to know anything. I could do a better job than the current incumbents at Fratton Park and I suspect most Portsmouth fans could.

Well, you wonder if sanity has left the South Coast this summer at Portsmouth, with weird takeovers, scraping around for signings, the chief executive being charged with tax evasion, another takeover, being banned from signing due to unpaid debts and now Paul Hart being moved out of the managers seat. What have the Pompey faithful done to deserve this mess?

Of course, Paul Hart is entirely to blame for Portsmouth’s misfortune isn’t he? Yep, everything that has gone on over the summer is all Paul Hart’s fault. It was Paul Hart’s fault that self publicising loudmouth Sulaimin Al-Fahim didn’t have the money he said he did. It’s Paul Hart’s fault that the previous owner, Alexandre Gaydamak refused to finance the club any more and it is all Paul Hart’s fault that he spent most of August trying to sign players as he had no team.

The statement from Portsmouth’s owners through Peter Storrie is typical of people who have absolutely no idea about football or sport in general. “Paul has worked under very difficult circumstances with the financial restrictions the club has faced since he took over, however, the board feels that the team should have accrued more points to date and that we need a new man in charge to ensure Premier League survival.”

What planet do these owners live on? Paul Hart has had to watch as an entire team is dismantled in front of him, then the all shouting and all singing Al Fahim turns up, promises the world but has no money, gets a loan to pay the wages and then sells 90% to someone who doesn’t know anything about football. Did Al Fahim ever have any money? I don’t think he did and he made a packet in 6 weeks for making outlandish statements and walking about with a replica kit on.Well done.

Manchester City’s owners jettisoned him soon enough after he continued to make stupid statements every other day. Al Fahim is well known as a celebrity chaser and loves the limelight ahead of any business sense he may have. He promises to buy the club and then the deal takes forever because he’s having trouble getting the money together. Al Fahim claimed he had £100 million to invest and did that ever appear?

Hart watched on as player after player was sold to keep the wolves from the door and the manager was left with the bare bones of a team with days to spare before the season started. Hart then spends every avenue open to him to try and create a team in a fortnight and they treat him like this? It’s pathetic at best and a disgraceful turn of events.

The board feels they should have more points? Could they clarify how a team thrown together in a fortnight is supposed to be winning games off the bat. Portsmouth have been playing alright over the last month or so, despite a transfer embargo and delayed wages again, Pompey were slowly coming together. These owners are out of their minds to treat Paul Hart like this.

Of course, Avram Grant’s there now, so I would expect he’ll jump at the chance at this poisoned chalice to try and prove that the rumour about Chelsea almost winning the Champions League in spite of him is untrue. Nicknamed the man from the B.B.C (balls, bibs and cones) during his first spell at Portsmouth due to the amount of input he actually had, this will be a real test of his abilities.

Yet, I feel real sympathy for Paul Hart. I’ve been critical of his managerial abilities before, because his record, other than at Nottingham Forest wasn’t all that good, but that was another situation where he had a talented side that was sold under him. Of course, the fact that David Platt had caused that situation before scuttling off was no fault of his but he had to carry the can and ultimately paid the price.

How can anyone be expected to manage a side with the chaos that comes pouring down from the boardroom at Fratton Park is anyone’s guess, but to do such a callous and despicable act to someone who has acted with the uppermost dignity throughout the last 6 months at Portsmouth is a disgraceful affair. Once again, I feel for the fans at Portsmouth, no club deserves the owners they’ve got their now.

What the hell is going on at Portsmouth? Despite Sulaiman Al Fayed passing the fit and proper persons test that the Premier League subjected him to, he’s still not completed the takeover at Fratton Park. The fans of Pompey deserve better than this, it’s not fair and it’s getting beyond a joke. The club has had no additional finances for over 9 months now from current owner Alexandre Gaydamak, so desperate is he to recoup his overall investment.

Perhaps someone should point out to him that you get a lot less for a team that is either in the Championship or nothing for a team in administration. Portsmouth are clinging to the cliff edge by their fingernails and unless the deal gets sorted immediately, they are in serious trouble of lasting until the transfer window shuts.

On May 17th 2008, Portsmouth fielded the following side in the F.A. Cup final; James, Johnson, Hreidarsson, Distin, Campbell, Utaka, Mendes, Diarra, Kranjcar, Muntari, Kanu. Subs: Ashdown, Paramot, Diop, Nugent, Baros. Of that match day squad, 10 still remain at the club with another 8 who were either not at the club or unable to play that day, which swells the ranks to 18 first team players.

The Premiership season starts in 11 days and at this moment in time, it has now become clear that there is no guarentee that how many more of the remaining squad members will still be there come 3pm on the 15th when they face Fulham. That is unacceptable for Portsmouth’s fans, who always seem to be the last to know anything these days.

The protracted takeover for the club by Sulaiman Al Fayed has still not been completed and today the club inadvertently revealed the financial woes that the club faces. There’s nothing worse than sending a confidential e-mail to suddenly realise it’s become major sporting news.  Portsmouth’s Chief Executive Peter Storrie has opened a can of worms this evening after such a scenario revealed the state of Pompey’s financial woes. Storrie’s e-mail stated that “The business has debts to pay and the banks are not releasing funds, so this leaves the club with no option but to sell to keep going.”

The Premiership season begins on August 15th, just under four weeks away and for most clubs in the top flight, July has seen them scurrying about trying to strengthen their squads. At Fratton Park however, Portsmouth find themselves hampered by the current process of due diligence for Sulaiman Al Fahim’s proposed takeover to be completed. As such, no new players have come in and the board have allowed Glen Johnson to leave for £17 million.

The board have now accepted an offer of £12 million from Peter Crouch and it seems a simple matter of crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s. The only question is where Crouch will end up. Sunderland were in the driving seat but the player would like to remain in the south of England which would have put Fulham in the driving seat until Harry Redknapp threw his hat in ring. Having signed him twice before, Redknapp would now appear to be the favourite to see Crouch finally return the club where his professional career began.

Of course, this misses the bigger picture here, that of Portsmouth Football Club. The last few seasons have been eventful at Fratton Park, even by Pompey’s standards, but overall it has been a significant, if not a completely positive period in their history. Until Redknapp left for Tottenham, it had been a period of continual improvement and the F.A. Cup win was the icing on the cake for the whole project. The first team squad had the most quality it had seen in years sprinkled throughout it, with England internationals in every department.

That squad as of today looks threadbare even before Crouch’s departure. So far, 9 players have left the squad. Johnson, Davis, Djimi Traore, Lauren, Little, Thomas, Pamarot and the loan deals of Jermaine Pennant and Amand Traore have concluded. At the moment, the club have 15 professionals on their books. Kanu and Sol Campbell are currently considering new one year deals to extend their time at Pompey.

Now I know that takeover’s seem to take a matter of days when it comes to Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City’s buy outs, but they did take time, we just weren’t so aware of the facts that we are when it comes to the Portsmouth deal. Yet the clubs fans need it resolving as soon as possible. The playing squad needs strengthening as a matter of urgency because if not, it could be too late to get a squad together before the kick off in August.

The news that the shirt manufacturers, Canterbury, have also gone in to administration has meant that Peter Storrie has been having to work hard to secure an alternative. Yet, when you’re the third highest paid executive in the Premier League, it shouldn’t take too much to bring in a new shirt manufacturer, with Umbro leading the charge to take over the contract.

By all accounts, the deal should be concluded in a matter of days, but with no manager, no shirt manufacturer and now the smallest first team squad in the Premiership, Sulaiman Al Fahim is going to need to hit the ground running to get the club ship shape. A new manager is paramount as a first decision to get the transfer targets already positioned; I’ll be amazed if Al Fayed hasn’t got a manager already on board to takeover. For all the good work that Paul Hart did to rescue the disaster that was Tony Adams’ reign, he has made it clear he wants to return to the academy.

I just hope everything get’s sorted soon for Portsmouth and their fans. It’s a terrific club, with some of the most passionate fans I’ve ever come across. They don’t deserve to get caught in the blocks once the season kicks off, three relegation scares in 5 years will be pushing their luck.

Ah, isn’t buying a football club the easiest thing in the world. Look how quickly Abramovich bought Chelsea, the Glazers bought Manchester United and the Abu Dhabi group picked up City. Compared to the protracted nature of the proposed takeover of Portsmouth, even buying Newcastle United may be easier.

When Sulaiman Al-Fahim reappeared in May to announce he was to buy Portsmouth, I wasn’t surprised, just perplexed. I’d forgotten that the buyers of Manchester City had quickly jettisoned him last autumn when he started making wild statements to the press about transfer targets and wages. Well, now here he is again and it seems another can of worms has been opened over the takeover.

The English press, well known for its balance and refusal to use knee jerk headlines, has been all over the Pompey takeover this weekend. From the Guardian, to the Sun to the, erm, Daily Star, rumours abounded about who was actually involved in the deal. First we had Premier League Chairman Dave Richards getting embroiled in the takeover before going on a media blitz to say he had no involvement or had set the deal up.

Then amazingly, international fugitive and former owner of Manchester City, Thaksin Shinawatra then came out claiming he was not involved at all after he was reported to be involved. Finally, expecting Adolf Hitler to be involved in some freak time machine/cryogenically frozen worm hole scandal, disappointingly it then seemed that Al-Fahim’s Hydra Group was owned by the brother of Manchester City’s owner, Sheikh Mansoor.

Ok, have you followed this so far? Good. Now after all that, what must the Portsmouth fans think of it all? The Fratton Park faithful, who have seen more than their fair share’s of ups and downs over the years, must have thought they’d seen most things, but even this little pot-boiler must be an unusual set of events even in Portsmouths history.

With no manager with Paul Hart’s temporary contract now having run its course, Glen Johnson tipped to leave very soon and now Peter Crouch coming out in the press to admit his disappointment and frustration at events, it could hardly be duller. Add to that Chief Executive Peter Storrie’s annoyance at the wild speculation surrounding the Al-Fahim’s bid and Crouch’s comments and you have a situation that will have the Pompey fans wondering if Godzilla may turn up coming out of the Solent next and stomp his way through Fareham on the way to the cricket ground.

When the dust finally settles, I truly hope that Al-Fahim is as good as his word, the Portsmouth fans deserve it. The last 10 years have been like a day out at Southsea fairground for the loyal fans of Pompey. This is a club that deserves and needs some investment on a continual basis, as great a ground for atmosphere Fratton Park is, it looks well past it sell by date. The new proposal for the ground that came out last year looked fantastic; it’s such a relief to see a ground so different to the normal identikit shoeboxes that seem to pop up these days and let’s hope the new owners agree to it.

New investment is crucial though for Portsmouth to compete both on and off the field and the sooner Al-Fayims due diligence is completed, the better for the fans. After all, they’ve a certain other clubs recent relegations to warn them of the promise of good times that are always around the corner but never arrive.