It’s been almost a week now since Laurence Bassini went on TalkSPORT to talk about buying Birmingham City, and I think I’ve only just caught my breath from it. I’ve said all along that Bassini is a fantasist who shouldn’t be entertained when it comes to buying a football club, but even I didn’t expect him to blow up so spectacularly live on national radio.
As the Laurence Bassini and Keith Harris-led takeover “deadline” of June 30 came and went, Birmingham Sports Holdings did in fact make an announcement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. However, rather than inform shareholders that it was selling the club, the only news BSH had the was departure of director Hsiao Charng Geng.
June has almost come to an end and as it stands, there is no official word that Birmingham City are any closer to being takeover. While there have been rumours about Laurence Bassini visiting B9 in the near future, there has been no direct quotes from the Bassini camp in recent days and his self-imposed deadline of tomorrow may well come and go without anything being completed.
It’s been just over a week now since the HKSE announcement from Birmingham Sports Holdings confirming that Vong Pech had agreed to sell the 21.64% stake in Birmingham City plc that he owns. Since then there’s been a fair few newspaper articles, a radio interview complete with wild promises and potentially libellous accusations – but nothing of any actual official value. What’s going on?
The first official communication that a partial takeover of Birmingham City is underway was made yesterday as Birmingham Sports Holdings made a voluntary announcement to the stock exchange. The announcement confirmed that BSH had been informed by Vong Pech that he was selling his 21.64% stake in Birmingham City plc.
Once again, takeover fever is in abundance in Birmingham City fans. According to the Mirror, even the grammatical tense surrounding the takeover has changed with reports that Laurence Bassini has bought the club. With lots of rumour flying around and precious little actual information I wanted to put together some reasoned thoughts on what the hell is going on.
Despite there being no official news, takeover rumours regarding Birmingham City have taken hold in the last couple of weeks. I’ve already written a piece about the mechanics of how a takeover would work but I think the bigger question from many people is about who exactly wants to buy Blues – and will they be successful?
