Anyone get the impression Dundee and John Nelms are being wined, dined yet still are some way from feeling inclined?
It seems to be that Dundee – with Nelms strings no doubt being pulled by his paymaster from across the pond – are playing hard to get and certainly enjoying the thrill of the chase.
Neil Doncaster certainly seemed to feel he’d clinched the winning of Dundee’s decisive yes vote for the SPFL’s proposal – if media leaks were to be believed- yesterday. But then again if the man was chocolate he’d eat himself. His high opinion of his talents is rarely mirrored in results and his evidenced inadequacies to close are certainly being shown up.
It looks much like the original vote the SPFL chief executive has gone off half cocked again. High fives to his pals in the press as he crosses the dancefloor only to return thirty seconds later doing the walk of shame.
Instead of yesterday’s 5pm SPFL meeting resulting in a conclusion, Dundee’s website crashed and all anyone got when they refreshed their browser was the date requesting a rain check: “Over the past few days, we have entered into various positive discussions with reconstruction at the forefront of these.
“Given our discussions and considering all aspects, we don’t feel we are in a position to comment further on the resolution that was put forward.
“We understand that this may bring more questions than answers and we will look to give a much more substantial account of the past few days at the conclusion of this process.”
If this was Neil Doncaster telling his pal’s he’d sealed the deal he got the equivalent of being invited up for coffee, getting a cup of Kenco instant and a ‘we should do this again sometime’ with the door closed behind him. That quote from the Office describing David Brent comes to mind: “I’m not saying he’s unlucky but if he fell in a barrel full of tits he’d come up sucking his own thumb.”
Whatever has been offered to Dundee shows this whole vote is open to corruptive influence. Yesterday we were hearing talk of friendlies being agreed with one of Scotland’s ‘big hitters’ as a sweetener to vote yes. On top of that we’ve already heard on The Celtic Star of job offers apparently offered to ‘No’ voting Scot Gardiner CEO at Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
Anyone wanting to get Dundee into bed now is going to have to do more than the footballing equivalent of visit to Nandos and a two for one night at the local Odeon. A visit from The Treble Treble winners for a pre-season friendly isn’t going to cut it, they realise they don’t need to sell themselves short.
Dundee are looking for a league reconstruction and they won’t be happy unless that involves them starting next season in the top flight. You can bet their favoured solution is a 16 team Premier league and whether we’d all agree or not it’s not going to happen.
The time for withdrawing this proposal – let’s call it null and void for arguments sake – and getting another more palatable proposal on the table is already overdue.
Even if Dundee were to fall for the advances on offer the whole sordid affair is going to be bogged down for weeks in a series of legal battles. Anyone thinking this particular chase is already getting tiresome, will soon find the fallout from a vote the electoral commission would show as an example of how not to do it on day one of their induction training, is going to run for weeks. Time Scottish football clubs simply don’t have.
Dundee’s wish for a sixteen club league might be by accident rather than design as that may be all we are left with if this rumbles on for much longer.
As the saying goes; ‘You can’t play hard to get when you’re already hard to want’
Neil Doncaster certainly isn’t a silver tongued Casanova and last time I checked I wouldn’t put Dundee up there with Audrey Hepburn as a winch. Let’s put paid to this painful to witness fumble in the dark. Rip it up and start again.
Niall J
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