Sandgaard Update to CAST

It was good to hear first-hand from Thomas Sandgaard as he answered dozens of questions from nearly 200 supporters at a very well-run CAST zoom forum (link to notes at the bottom of this post). Thought I'd chip in on the main points as I saw them;

- he was asked if he remained as ambitious as he was two years ago and if he still had the personal finances to move the club forward. No surprise at all that he said he remained as determined to stick as closely to his five year plan as possible in spite of the 'slow start.' He was also quite forthright about having already made a lot of money since floating his US business through share sales. These are documented and fair to say he has the money if he still wants to spend it on the club.

- asked about his longer term intentions to acquire the Valley and Sparrows Lane, I was surprised to hear him jump straight in and say that he has been in dialogue about this recently and was exploring options although nothing imminent as things stand. 

- he was questioned over his recent claim that the club lost £100m under previous owners dating back to the Premier League period and that, somehow, Duchatelet had improved things! This has already been pulled apart by Rick Everett (who's figures I would put my money on). Thomas tried to gloss over this and got a tad irritated and closed it off by saying he won't be questioned on his maths because he understand numbers. Not sure what point he is trying to make here other than perhaps making his existing losses look far better but we aren't comparing Paolo Di Canio here with Alex Gilbey. 

- Fill the Valley also got an airing and he acknowledged mistakes but appears intent on continuing using a paid third party agency to help distribute tickets. I    cannot understand why he doesn't involve fans who intuitively understand this and would do it for nothing. Specifically he said he was working on a new Season Ticket deal that would be attractive and deter holders from going week-to-week, free-deal-to-free-deal....

- Finally, and the most important piece for me was the debate about our recruitment plans for this year which obviously touched on last Summer. He said that Adkins was unhappy with the delayed recruitment last Summer and that they had had words over that, but he dismissed it as being down to greedy agents who allowed us to be gazumped on a couple of deals. That was a major under-call as far as I am concerned. Your Summer recruitment shouldn't be derailed and run until the last day of the transfer window two months into the season because you don't get two deals done earlier. In response to the question about his plan for this year he made the statement that some players will stay, some will go and there will be loans which tells us nothing. Pressed on numbers following the radio show this week where he mentioned bringing in two new players, he said he was looking at "two to four" and later added "maybe five" and then "maybe six." He then said that he expected one of these to be an experienced quality player and the rest 'investment players.' This was worrying because his view of 'investment players' on experience so far are players who aren't immediately able to play at the required standard week-in-week-out - Kirk being a prime example. If that remains the case, I can see his actual intention being closer to his original claim of two or maybe two-to-four. Loans would be additional but that he said he was looking at more affordable 'quality loans' than we have been used to. Numbers-wise, five or six replacements and five loanees would allow us to churn 10 or 11 which is the minimum I think we have to see if we are to change the mentality and culture in the current squad. If we can't do that, I can't see what will change.

Full CAST Notes at https://www.castrust.org/2022/03/thomas-i-am-still-as-ambitious-as-i-was-before-i-bought-the-club/