The Six Thousand Mile Gap

The intermittent saga of the Birmingham City takeover seems to have gone into another hiatus with absolutely nothing coming from either Paladini or Pannu in the past seven days. With less than six weeks now to go until January the likelihood of a deal being completed before the transfer window is slowly evaporating and the patience of Blues fans is being tested.
I’m hesitant to write about this at the moment – whilst nothing has happened in the past week there have been more twists in this saga than in a Chubby Checker concert and I wouldn’t be surprised if Thursday turns out to be a day when all hell breaks loose again. However whilst I can’t offer much if anything in the way of new information I still think there is a need to discuss what is happening; the mood is ugly and the whispers of protest against the board are raising their ugly head again.
The truth of the matter is at this moment in time Peter Pannu holds all the aces. The club is his (by proxy anyway) to sell and it would appear he has no rush to do so. It might be that Blues are slowly circling the drain in terms of finances and that the spectre of further player sales is becoming more of a reality but I honestly don’t believe that matters to Pannu or Carson – the club will be sold when it suits them to do so and in a manner that profits them best.
I think the geography of the situation doesn’t help either. Because we’re all over here and they’re all over there, people are reduced to electronic means of communication to try to wring some facts out of this sorry mess and I don’t believe that is conducive to painting a clearer picture. It’s easy to ignore a text message, a phone call or an email and I think that plays into Pannu’s hands as he can answer things at his leisure and on his own terms. I’ve seen people say that there needs to be some tough questions asked of the parent company but it’s my belief that if they are asked by these methods they will just be ignored. Similarly, I think Mr Paladini is going to struggle to come to some sort of agreement by following the same methodology.
It’s my belief that if Paladini and his backers really want to buy the club then it might behoove Gianni to get on a plane to Hong Kong, seek out Pannu face to face and thrash out a deal there. Similarly, I think the only way the media will get any answers is if someone doorsteps Pannu and/or Carson, shoves a dictaphone in their face and starts demanding answers from them. The big problem is that no one in the upper echelons of the media cares enough to stump up the airfare for a reporter to the fragrant harbours of Hong Kong due to “budgeting reasons” and thus we’re left to feed off the scraps that BIH and Pannu deign to feed us via infrequent statements.
The six thousand miles that divide the club from its parent company allow the directors of BIH a lot of leeway – I doubt they’ve seen the anger here and because it’s all online and far away it’s nothing to worry about. Whilst I wouldn’t commit to saying that I want Paladini in as a new chairman as I’m still unsure about him I am sure that a takeover needs to happen at Blues sooner rather than later. If we as fans are to do anything to force the hand of Pannu then we need to find a way to bridge that six thousand mile gap – and I will be honest, I’m not sure how that can be done.

bluenosekev wrote:

Protests ? - best way to protest is with ones feet, saying that I already got me Palace & Burnley tickets so can we put any boycotts off to the new year ?