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Martin Calladine Profile picture
Martin Calladine
@uglygame
Author of 'No Questions Asked: How football joined the crypto con' (https://t.co/xlGMI1Q7vJ), 'Fit and Proper People' with @againstleague3 and 'The Ugly Game.'
Feb 21 • 31 tweets • 11 min read
Wish the club the best, but the reality of the new owner's business track record doesn't seem to match the rhetoric.
1/
Image The announcement describes him as being of "Winners Worldwide," implying that this is the most significant part of empire as a "businessman, angel investor and philanthropist." Winners Worldwide is an 11-month-old limited company with £1 of share capital.
2/ Image
Jan 16 • 26 tweets • 4 min read
Giving evidence before the DCMS committee, Rick Parry says that Premier League's cost control proposals would limit Championship clubs to spending £20m a year while relegated PL clubs could spend £110m! - more than five times other clubs and worse than the current set up. This would be replacing the parachute payments system with a jetpack system.
Dec 4, 2023 • 31 tweets • 6 min read
Bombshell events in Morecambe as the board of directors release a statement attacking the owner’s failure to sell the club, calling on potential buyers to contact them directly and implying that, unless things change, they will resign en-masse. Never seen anything like it.
1/ Trying to make sense of what's going on:

Unlike most football club boards, the Morecambe directors, while appointed by the owner, are not his placemen. They are largely long-standing fans of the club trying to steer Morecambe through financial turmoil.
2/
Nov 10, 2023 • 21 tweets • 8 min read
I saw a piece about the new £100m London mansion of Reading owner's Dai Yongge. Doing some digging, there may be a more interesting story here: not only does he not own it, he rents it from a business rival, who is now suing him and whose UK representative is... Reading’s CEO.
1/ Image Curious – well, nosey – I had a poke around. A reverse image search shows it’s 6 Buckingham Gate. It’s pretty swish and, as the article implies, quite a contrast with the straightened circumstances of Reading. However, all may not be what it seems…
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Oct 12, 2023 • 25 tweets • 9 min read
When Rich Energy, the drinks business of William Storey, the would-be buyer of Reading, went under, the liquidator received creditors’ claims for over £68m. The company had £1,700 in the bank.

A bit about his business history…
1/ Earlier, I recounted how Storey was found by a High Court judge to have repeatedly lied in court submissions and in his oral evidence in a legal case. You can read that here. If you’ve already read that, on to his business affairs.
2/
Oct 12, 2023 • 13 tweets • 4 min read
“Mr Storey’s evidence was untruthfully given.”

It’s important to understand that when I call Reading’s prospective owner, William Storey, “Billy Bullshit” it’s not just that he’s full of shit. (Although he is.) It’s that a UK judge found he repeatedly lied to a court…
1/ In 2019, a company called Whytes Bikes sued Storey’s drinks company, Rich Energy, for copyright infringement for having a *very similar* logo. Not only did Rich Energy lose, the judge absolutely tore Storey apart. Let’s see what she said…
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Jun 5, 2023 • 17 tweets • 4 min read
This is mindboggling. Man who has spent six months being unable to pass the EFL Owners and Directors Test to buy Morecambe is now presenting himself as a suitor for Wigan? This is terrible news for at least one, probably both clubs. The situation is simple: despite claiming to have lots of money, none of Johal's UK businesses show any significant profits. The main ones are a drinks "empire" which sells a drink you can't buy and where two companies are late with their accounts.
Jun 5, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Saudi Arabia just nationalised Ronaldo and Benzema. Very eager to hear Fifa explain how the head of state of Saudi Arabia owning four clubs isn't government interference in the running of the Saudi game. Image
Jun 5, 2023 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Define "works."
theguardian.com/football/blog/… Image "The basis for B teams in a serious league setup is sound enough. It works in other countries."

Should read:

"B teams exist in other countries."

Anything else is going beyond the evidence.
Jun 5, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The nation's most snakebit club reaches back into the new owner tombola with its fingers crossed. "There's no way the new owner can be as bad as the last one," the fans say. Again.
Jun 3, 2023 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Obviously City were always going to obstruct the investigation, but I wonder if the PL didn't slow play it in the mistaken belief it would become less salient. Instead, disastrously, City are more dominant now than ever and even more titles have an asterisk against them. They probably thought Klopp would make Liverpool perpetual challengers and United & Chelsea would have a resurgence. In their cowardice, they failed to recognise the awesome organisational and coaching talent of City, and the club's ruthless desire to snuff out fair competition.
May 15, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Prospective Morecambe FC owner, Sarbjot Johal, has been nominated for ‘Man of the Year’ at the British Sikh Awards 2023 for the achievement of… buying Morecambe. Something he has spent over six months not achieving.
1/ ImageImage Can't help but feel this somewhat cheapens the achievements of the other nominees.

The shortlist was issued on 18th April, with the results due to be announced on 31st May. It would be very interesting to know who nominated Johal for this award.
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May 13, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
It looks like it's all over for The Fans Together, the crypto collective which tried to buy a stake in Sunderland last year. Its website has gone, its twitter is silent and emails are bouncing back.
@RokerReport #safc ImageImage The group, which originally announced plans to crowd-fund the £1bn+ purchase of a Premier League club and 14 other teams globally, only managed to get as far as acquiring a 20% in a team in the Greek regionalised second tier.
May 10, 2023 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
Thread on the disastrous Fit and Proper Limbo that Morecambe find themselves in, post-relegation, with the EFL unwilling or unable to break the club's ownership logjam, leaving the club in crisis and facing an uncertain future.
1/ Morecambe have been up for sale officially for eight months, unofficially for longer. The owners are seemingly out of cash and have to sell. It's been reported that there have been a number of offers, but one, in particular, that blows the others out of the water.
2/
Feb 23, 2023 • 9 tweets • 5 min read
Congrats to Forest on their new sponsor, 6686.com, a gambling firm without even a working website and which is licenced, as they always are, through Isle of Man white label shop, TGP.
#NFFC While the holding site claims it will serve UK punters, the name 6686, which is composed of numbers traditional regarded as lucky in China.
Feb 22, 2023 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
Bizarrely, the crypto ponzi scheme carrying the branding of Sarb Capital, the would-be owners of Morecambe FC, has reappeared. The site, offering 35% returns a week, was registered in mid-Jan and vanished late on 9th Feb, shortly after it was publicised.
sarblimited.com Sarb Capital have failed to respond to any of the dozens of questions I've sent them since their takeover bid became public in early January, including questions about their relationship, if any, to this crypto scam.
Feb 20, 2023 • 10 tweets • 5 min read
Something weird is going on with Everton fan tokens. Despite the price being in the doldrums, in the last month, the volume of trading increased overnight by 15x, something not repeated on any other Premier League token. More details below. Explanations welcome.
1/9 Here’s the Everton token price since 1st December. The tokens are currently worth about 45p, which is where they’ve been for about two months. (Listed in late Oct 21, they’ve been below their £2 launch price since 16/11/21.)
2/9 ImageImage
Feb 10, 2023 • 27 tweets • 12 min read
Sarb Capital, the company which is seeking to buy Morecambe, had a crypto scheme offering 35% weekly interest. The website has been taken down, but analysis of the content links it to more than half-a-dozen dubious crypto schemes.
1/23 Background 1/3
As I reported in January, Sarb Capital is a year old “private equity” firm which doesn’t appear to have any money. Its owner’s claimed wealth is supposed to come from Sarb Capital and two drinks companies, one of which he claimed would be worth £1bn+ by 2025.
2/23
Feb 8, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Another Morecambe article where no fact has not gone unchecked. Why are you writing "alleged" when you could go to Companies House and check the accuracy of this claim in literally two minutes? Image
Oct 31, 2022 • 36 tweets • 13 min read
Wanna hear a story of one of football’s fastest ever crypto partner collapses? Then turn your clocks back to 28 Feb 22, when Birmingham City announced a two-year deal with “Ultimo GG” which would see the club being the “first Club from the EFL to enter the Metaverse.”
#BCFC
1/14 The website of Ultimo, doubtless keen to assure users that it wasn't just another crypto fraud, profiled its founders and emphasised the experience of the Ultimo Group and its execs. And it's true, there is a company called Ultimo Ventures and Ultimo Warrior. But...
2/14
Oct 30, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Fulham's official Pyramid Scheme Provider, Titan Capital Markets, has redesigned its website (which is geoblocked outside of the developing countries it is preying on). It now illustrates its services with pictures of pirate treasure. Fulham remain proudly party to this fraud. The only other significant addition to the site is the endorsement of Fulham. Meanwhile, on the ground in West Africa and South East Asia, the company's organisers continue to make hay with the deal, using Fulham as explicit evidence of Titan's trustworthiness.