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Thoughts from the Editor

It's a Conspiracy
29 August 2004

Wayne Rooney: Sold months ago

It's Sunday; the day for all sorts of stories in the media and on the internet.  So how about this one?

There were very strong rumours appearing months ago from very well respected Evertonians that Wayne Rooney would be sold this summer; and Manchester United was always going to be the destination.  Why?  Because of Bungling Bill Kenwright's dreadful financial mismanagement of Everton FC Co Ltd — that's the gist of another wide-ranging allegation we have received from a life-long (four generations) Evertonian:

I'm not big on conspiracies usually.  And let's be honest, at any given time in our city, there are about two million far fetched and utter horseshit stories surrounding both Everton and the RedShite.  99.9% of them are entirely made up - anyone remember "Andrei Kanchelskis and the Ukranian Mafia" for instance? 

Funnily enough, I heard the Rooney in a brothel rumour about six weeks ago and dismissed it as bullshit.  D'oh. 

At ToffeeWeb Towers, we received this message on 11 July 2004 but we decided to ignore it too:

I've lurked on this site for some time, and thought you may be interested to know young Wayne was caught with a whore yesterday.  My source I wont reveal but is 100% accurate.

I only got this info in the last few mins and failed to ask exactly who he was caught by (police/press???). Whether this will come out or not I don't know, but it happened.

Anyway perhaps if it does come out it will be a valuable lesson: stay away from the limelight at all costs.

I'd like to think none of you will give a shit if it's true or not (it is) but deep down we all like a bit of gossip — remember where you heard it first.

I suppose we could have scooped the redtops... ah well.  Back to the main story:

From the same source comes another story... decide for yourselves:

Kenwright never wanted Wayne to stay.  Why?  Because the Club's finances are terrible.  So bad, Trevor Birch walked out in under six weeks.  They are not 'long term and controllable' debts.  We are talking about massive short-term loans that come due very soon.  Basically, the wolves are at the door and we're at the verge of administration — and the resulting points penalty would result in CERTAIN relegation.

Kenwright knew he'd face a Boardroom challenge this summer.  And he knew that, without money on the table {like Gregg has) he'd lose.  Kenwright LIED about the Russian money.  There is NO sugar daddy.  There is no sad Russian bastard prepared to stump up even twenty roubles to put in.  We're on our own and we're fucked. 

The only source of money Kenwright has is the boy Rooney.  Initially, my source says, Kenwright wanted to flog Wayne as soon as England went out of Euro 2004.  However, Wayne's injury and the slower than anticipated season ticket sales put an end to that.  So Bill switched to Plan B — hold on to Wayne until the very last minute, THEN sell him.  The advantages are thus:

1. A couple of thousand poor bastards have bought season tickets they otherwise wouldn't have bought {as well as new Rooney shirts etc}
2. Chang Beer would NOT have signed on the dotted line without Wayne in the squad - and that money kept the club going for six weeks.
3. The transfer deadline's imminent arrival means that Bill can't be blamed for spending none of the Rooney cash - "...because it's too late"

My source reckons we can expect two, maybe three signings on Deadline Day.  Their total value won't exceed four or five mill at most.  My source basically reckons Kenwright can't be believed on a single public statement. {His exact expression was "If Bill told me the sky was blue, I'd have to go and check to be sure"} 

He also reckons that the reason Bill was getting clobbered by Gregg so badly in the press was because he had other things to worry about - namely laying the groundwork for the sale of Rooney without massive fan revolt.  I would say he has succeeded.  Six months ago the sale of Wayne would have resulted in open rebellion amongst the support.  Yet now, the overwhelming opinion is that the Club is entirely innocent, and Wayne merely a money grabbing scally.

[ Interesting how good the Club have become at dodging any flak from the sale of Gary Speed, Francis Jeffers, Micheal Ball... — all born Evertonians — and now the most valuable of them all: Wayne Rooney ...]

He does provide some circumstantial evidence to back his claims up.  Such as:

• The Robbie Savage fiasco came about because our financial situation is much worse than popularly thought. 
• Rooney's family box at Goodison was given up - IN JULY!
• The club attempted to buy out Dunc's contract for £½M in July also. This was the Chang Beer money - if Dunc had accepted, the Club could have taken another £1M on the overdraft.

Wayne and his advisors have been totally unable to speak with Kenwright despite numerous attempts — "too busy with Boardroom dealings and securing new investment".

The "contract offer" to Wayne was utter horseshit.  The "£50,000 a week" figure is a nonsense.  The three-year deal started at £17k/wk, ring to £30k/wk in the second year, and again to £50k/wk only in the final year.  Kenwright knew Wayne would be long gone before he collected that — but he had no problem leaking to the press the £50k/wk figure.

Our "Russian investors" have publicly said {in the Moscow Times!} that they never were planning to put a bean in.  Their take: "This man Kenwright is just saying these things to be a hero with the fans" 

Basically, Wayne is going because he believes

• The club doesn't want to keep him and
• He was sick of being kept in the dark by Kenwright and his cronies.

It probably didn't help that we've added a sum total of one class player in the entire time Wayne has been in the first team — Joseph Yobo.  Obviously, his agent also played a role but in this scenario he's merely a peripheral bad guy.  It's Kenwright who's the real crook here.  Hmmm, it makes more than a little sense, eh?

For me, Wayne Rooney is Everton's future.  To see him sold is an admission we don't have one.  This is very hard for me to accept.  I feel we will stay up this season, however it's hard to summon any energy to care.  No matter what you believe, this is a dark time indeed to be an Evertonian.  And no matter what you believe - this much is indisputable: we deserve a hell of a lot better.

From a very dejected fourth-generation Blue

A number of Evertonians have been working hard over the past few days to get the truth out, so that fans might understand Wayne Rooney is not leaving willingly; he is being forced to leave. 

• Yes, he has been offered a contract but refused to sign;
• Yes, he has said nothing about Everton all summer long;
• Yes, he does appear to have seriously fallen out with David Moyes;
• Yes, he has handed in a transfer request, citing the need to be playing football at a higher level;

And yet all of this has enabled so many Evertonians to turn on him as a Judas and a money-grabbing mercenary.  Well, wouldn't that be just what Blue Bill would want us to do if he was really engineering the sale so that he could keep control of the Club? 

The bottom line is this: Wayne Rooney, the best prospect in modern football, is being forced to leave the club he has supported all his life.  Yet he really doesn't want to leave.  That is what we are being asked to believe by a number of significant and well-informed Evertonians who are convinced of The Truth. 

Michael Kenrick

Reader Responses

I think the only safe assumption to make is that all sides have been telling porkies or sowing disinformation, each to serve their own ends.  When so much money is at stake should we even be surprised?  I do wonder if we'll ever know The Truth.  Didn't someone once ask "What is truth?"!
Chris Jones

I have to disagree with your article.  Rooney wants to leave.  Kenwright, for all his faults — of which there are many — wanted to keep Rooney; he offered him a contract, that is a fact!  Why if Rooney is such an Evertonian would he not be satisfied with a contract that offers him an initial £17k a week?  How much money does he need a week to live on?  It must be hard trying to pay the bills when you only earn £17,000 a week.  Your site should in no way ever defend Rooney for his actions.  He has spat in the face of all the kids who looked up to him all the people who chanted "Rooney, Rooney".  We should not forget this.  His actions are despicable; you do not speak for the Everton fans when you attempt to defend him.
Matt

What a load of bollocks.  If Wayne Rooney really is getting pushed out of Everton then why doesn't he step forward and say so?  Surely that would deflect all the flak that he is now receiving from everybody.
Owen Harrison

I must protest at the biased view being given out by the ToffeeWeb site.  Why was the People article taken as a viewpoint today?   I know you quote that it isn't necessarily yours was given but if you had given the Sunday Times report then you get a totally different view.  You also give plenty of coverage to the ridiculous "TRUTH" leaflet handed out at Goodison yesterday which fortunately was taken with a pinch of salt by most supporters I spoke to.  It should be an editor's aim on this forum to give a balanced view; however, I think your articles are biased and malevolent.  I have supported Everton for over 40 years and, as a season-ticket holder,  I hope like everybody else our club moves forward positively.  I do not think your bias is positive and can only serve to prolong trouble within our club.
Phil

Phil, I think if you looked at the range of articles we post — cogent thoughts from anyone who takes the time and effort to string them together in a readable and relevant fashion — various viewpoints get published here on ToffeeWeb.  They are not all going to be "positive"; if you want positive, go here: www.evertonfc.com. 

It is true that we have an aversion to material from the Murdoch stable, not least because The Sun is absolute garbage, and The Times is at times little better.  Secondarily, many of our readers who live overseas cannot access Times / Sunday Times articles directly without paying a ludicrous subscription for what is distributed free to British IP addresses. 

Personally I agree with you that The Truth leaflet and the protest it planned was ill-conceived at best, but it reflects the deep frustration felt by many Evertonians (not a "positive" feeling, I'm sure you'll agree) at what is going on inside Everton FC.  Our self-imposed mandate is to inform Evertonians of such things, and we shall continue to do so.  — ToffeeWeb Editor

I just read the "its a conspiracy" article.  I just want to clear something up about the £20M investment proposal from Russia.  The writer of that article claimed that Kenwright lied about the Russian Investment by claiming that a “sugar daddy” was bankrolling it.  The so-called sugar daddy he is talking about is Boris Zingarevich the Russian billionaire.  Kenwright and the club have never claimed the investment proposal involved any money from the Zingarevich family.

The money is from The Fortress Sports Fund, which consists of investments from other rich Russian businessmen.  Zingarevich runs the fund in a purely managerial capacity; none of his family’s cash is invested in it.  The honourable British press claimed he was bankrolling the investment to make it a more interesting story (Chelski of the north and all that bollocks).  When this claim was made in the papers the club released a statement saying that these reports were incorrect.

The article in the Moscow Times that the writer of “it’s a conspiracy” referred to simply says that the Zingarevich family have no money invested in the Fortress Sports Fund which is looking to buy into Everton.  This is what the club said when these reports came out.  So Kenwright didn’t lie about that.

The quote from the article, “This man Kenwright is just saying these things to be a hero with the fans” was taken from a statement made by a spokesman for the Zingarevich family but whoever made that statement is wrong because Kenwright has never claimed the Zingarevich’s were putting their money in, it all came from the press ignoring the facts to make a better headline.  In fact, on the day these reports came out Kenwright released a statement saying that Zingarevich was not investing in Everton, the press chose to ignore this statement.

With regards to what is going on behind the scenes with the Rooney transfer and general mismanagement of the club, I know the same as every other Evertonian, which is fuck all.

ToffeeWeb is a good site but you should check the accuracy of the articles you publish because that crap he wrote about Kenwright making up a sugar daddy can really affect the fans opinions of the people in charge which is fair enough if what he wrote was true but it was bullshit.
Neil Brown

Oh right, okay, we'll make sure we do just that from now on Neil... now, how do we know you aren't telling porkies?

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