Billy Joel - We Didn’t Start The Fire 

Sister Sledge - We Are Family 

1 minute ago, arbitro said:

That's daft mate - you are implying that our lot know how to operate an oven.

😃😃

No he’s not, he’s just forgotten to mention why it took longer - they forgot to turn the oven on 😁

Roy Orbison - Pretty Woman

2 minutes ago, Mercer said:

Disagree with your legal perspective.

Law is either statute or case (established by precedent and there always has to be a first case which becomes a precedent and this could be it!).

Feel certain Forest or O'Brien or both will have a pop at us.

All parties had signed contracts and execution was only frustrated by one body failing to meet the timely requirements of its regulatory body.  I think negligence could be construed to have caused financial and other loss.

Only the next few days / weeks will tell but I strongly suspect Rovers haven't heard the last of this.

Do you agree with my interpretation I posted a while ago?:

Loan agreement entered into - ‘sueable’ losses

Permanent contract agreed but not entered into - no ‘sueable’ losses

1 minute ago, Gav said:

That would imply that actually give a shit......

Or even know about the losses…

2 minutes ago, den said:

I haven’t read all the posts on here. The LOB appeal was based on rovers running out of time because of “complications” over required clauses? 
 

What were rovers reasons for submitting the straight forward deal for the Rochdale lad late?

I don’t think anyone knows because that one hasn’t gone to arbitration 

Based on the O’Brien one I guess we’d all go for incompetence…

4 minutes ago, Mercer said:

You would think our owners and Pasha would want to know why we keep losing 'legal' cases, Berg, Shaw etc and now EFL.  Both costly and embarrassing.

A look in the mirror might suffice…

39 minutes ago, J*B said:

I agree with every single thing you’ve posted here in the last 24 hours - there is absolutely no way LOB or Forest have a leg to stand on RE any form of compensation. Essentially we proposed a deal and - through our own negligence - didn’t get it approved by the EFL. The contract is worthless until it’s signed by all parties AND approved by the league. Forest could have told him to come back to Nottingham at any point on Deadline Day and there was nothing we could do. 

Reading through the order of events it just makes me even more infuriating that Waggott was at Birmingham that evening. There isn’t a single explanation which I’ll accept about what on earth he was doing there - and I certainly won’t accept “there’s an unwritten rule that the CEO attends every game” which was the explanation at the time. 

To be absolutely clear we had our CEO and Owners Representative in Birmingham, our Secretary at Ewood and our DOF in Manchester (then Brockhall) with the player. Absolutely astounding. They should have all been at wherever is best placed to deliver a transfer, whether that is Ewood or Brockhall. We put LOB through club media in the key hour period between 9:45pm and 10:45pm where the EFL where waiting for details of the transfer - INCREDIBLE!!! Do the fecking media the following day!

As I’ve just mentioned, we didn’t just propose the loan agreement (a contract in itself) we also executed it.

What we didn’t do is execute the playing contract related to a permanent transfer - we merely agreed what that contract would be should the option be exercised.

23:28 of the timeline confirms the loan agreement had been fully executed - this is a standard form of which I can only find the Irish FA’s version but this states…

‘Upon execution of this standard professional contract the club shall submit the registration of the player to the IFA in accordance with the relevant regulations’

Assuming the EFL version has the same clause, then we’ve breached it and could be subject to provable losses related to the loan only

20:47 mentions a contract that would be entered into if the option (to buy) was exercised.

Given this means this contract (following a permanent transfer) hadn’t yet been entered into we can’t be subject to losses in relation to this.

Edited to add:

We also entered into an option deed - to breach this we would have to have been promoted and then refused to sign the player.

I still can’t see the claimable loss from this as if we go up we could still offer to buy him at the same fee and on the same terms to the player.

Clearly either could reject this, but what they couldn’t do is reject this and also sue for losses.

3 minutes ago, jim mk2 said:

The other parties can easily prove loss. That much is obvious. Not sure where you’re going with this but if you’re trying to portray Rovers as the innocent party that isn’t at fault or won’t be taking a financial hit I think you’re deluded 

I imagine we will have to pay the EFL costs

i can see an argument for having to pay O’Briens appearance bonuses and having to compensate Forest for his basic salary.

I’m not seeing any other provable costs.

I absolutely think we’re at fault - you can’t not do so having read the judgment.

20:47 refers to a draft contract that would be entered into if the option was exercised.

So the contract hasn’t  been entered into and therefore no losses can be linked to it.

That’s my interpretation anyway.

3 minutes ago, Mellor Rover said:

It does mean nothing in this case. 

I wonder if it hinges on if the contract includes something along the lines of ‘subject to the successful registration of the player’?

1 minute ago, Penwortham Blue said:

I don’t see any grounds for a claim from O’Brien as there is no financial loss, he is employed by Nottingham Forest and getting paid handsomely. In addition, Rovers made Forest aware of the issue in order that he might be included in their squad and they elected not to do so. An absolute first class show of incompetence at our end and we might pick up EFL legal costs but it ends there.

Could they have included him in their squad whilst an appeal was pending? I genuinely don’t know

Just now, Mellor Rover said:

The 'contract' is a piece of paper with a name on it until it becomes legally binding. Means absolutely nothing.

It doesn’t mean nothing but it doesn’t mean everything either.

4 minutes ago, DaveyB said:

O’Brien’s career is on hold for 6 months because Forest chose not to include him in their 25-man squad - not because Rovers f*cked up the transfer. We could have changed our mind and pulled out of the transfer at the last minute, or LOB could have done, and the outcome would have been exactly the same. 
 

Transfers break down all the time for all kinds of reasons - yes we don’t come out of this smelling like roses, but any claim for compensation from either Forest or LOB would be laughed out of court.

If not presumably we can claim compensation from Nice for cancelling the loan of that striker at the last minute, or from Denis Undav for changing his mind and deciding to stay with Brighton 

I think you’d have to prove negligence for costs to be playable.

At what point incompetence becomes negligence, I don’t know…

I don’t think Forest could have chosen to put O’Brien on their squad list whilst we were appealing but I may not wrong.

I personally think the squad lists are a bad idea in this case without them Forest could now choose to play him should they wish to do so.

9 minutes ago, 47er said:

Its an utter embarrassment. No other team did it but we did it twice.

You just can't get around that.

Did we take the other one to arbitration too! Im only asking as I’m wondering if we made identical mistakes or different ones!

1 minute ago, Mercer said:

Well for starters, Forest are now paying wages and employer's NI at 13/14% that they wouldn't have been doing should he have joined Rovers on loan.  Seemingly, Rovers were meeting O'Brien's wages in full so that's at least £500k.

If Rovers get promoted, Forest would have pocketed a £10million fee and would have freed themselves of the remaining obligations on O'Brien's contract - that's likely to be no less than £5million.

Then you have what O'Brien might want for Rovers stalling his career and maybe putting it into regression.

Should Rovers narrowly miss promotion when O'Brien might have given them an edge then that's perhapsa £500million opportunity cost including parachute payments in the event of relegation.

What a sorry and potentially huge financial mess.

Wake up and smell the coffee.

Purely on the £10 million fee, surely you’ll concede that if we’re not promoted Forest wouldn’t have been due the money and if we are they could still choose to sell him to us for the same fee.

I think they’d find it hard to prove , if we don’t go up, that we would have done if the signing had been completed.

Huge potential losses indeed, but I’d argue very few provable ones.

Still a big fuck up though!

Why would we have to pay O’Brien’s wages when he still has a contract with Forest?

Appearance bonuses etc I could just about understand but not basic wage 

O’Brien himself would have to mitigate any perceived losses - I believe he can still move to the MLS, it might not be ideal for him but it is still an option that’s available.

2 hours ago, Roverthechimp said:

Anyone else get the feeling that Broughton will be deemed responsible and removed/resign in the summer so that the circus can carry on?

Now we know why he wasn’t exactly comfortable doing the video about the appeal/failed transfers

I think if they wanted to do that they shouldn’t have gone to arbitration because we can now all see in black and white that it wasn’t (solely) his fault 

11 minutes ago, K-Hod said:

League position, I think that’s it.

To be fair though (as much as it pains me to admit it), Burnley are well clear at the top of the league, so surely they’d be a shorter price than the other Championship sides…

Shouldn’t who they’ve drawn be a factor in the odds?

Just now, BRFC_Polky said:

 

Currently 82/1 to win the FA Cup with Sky Bet!

Go on Mercer…

4 minutes ago, sympatheticclaret said:

All joshing aside, which legendary Sportsman actually DID have five fingers & a thumb on both hands ??

Sobers?