Thetownend.com

http://www.bbc.co.uk/wiltshire/realmedia/sandygray_150905.ram

I have just sat and listened in utter disbelief at the above interview with our Chief Executive Sandy Gray on BBC Wiltshire.

At first I thought perhaps Ed Hadwin has decided to interview the cleaner as some sort of behind the scenes feature at the county ground and managed to catch the poor confused old dear in the middle of mucking out Andy King’s office toilet.

I couldn’t believe that the woman he was  interviewing was Sandy Gray the Chief Executive of Swindon Town FC.  

Now don’t get me wrong it would be easy for me to sit here and mock the poor womans afflictions.  There’s nothing funny about a lisp and stutter outside of Open All Hours so I’ll leave well alone. W w W wWweeevsy…..

In all seriousness though the woman has the articulation, vocabulary and confidence of a timid child stood in front of the school awkwardly trying to describe what she did during the summer to three hundred blood hungry peers.

While the delivery was dreadful the content was even worse.

It was clear that Gray was thrown by even the most simple of questions and stumbled for any sort of cohesive answer often relying on Hadwin’s prompts and repeating everything he had said word for word.

Having sat and listened to that what little I know about Gray suddenly fits all to well.  She clearly isn’t the sharpest tool in the box and it's an absolute wonder how she has been put in charge of a football club.  

In the absence of Bob Holt there's not another active board member to which Gray is answerable or accountable to.  I dread to think what's happening behind the scenes.  At best you would have to hope that the damage is limited but for someone that managed to rack up a shortfall of 750k in just under 12 months you have to worry.

Clearly yet again Mike the dirty Greek’s influence seems to be at play.

Gray Out

It is truly frightening.

I have never felt quite so fucked off and concerned for the club ever before.

Listening to that I can only describe the sensation I got as wanting to scrape my eye balls out with rusty razor blades.

It really is a case of what the fuck is that?

I can’t even bring myself to rip the shit and take the piss out of a lot of the stuff she said it’s so god damn fucking bloodcurdling.

Make her please, please go away…

and she has a say in Kings future!

I think say may be going a bit far.

We are fucked then. Shit :(

That's about the size of it.

ive always said ive never liked her.

Whenever I've heard her on the radio I always thought she was steaming drunk! Either way it doesn't bode well  :|

The worrying thing is she has a say in who to appoint next and that does worry me greatly. As much as I think appointing Reeves or Iffy would be a mistake in a way I kind of hope it is someone like that just because I'm terrified otherwise she'll apoint Brian Tinnion or reinstate Gorman or someone like that. Hopefully this will turn out to be an irrational fear. In PR terms she is awful, just not cut out for this kind of role at all.

Whilst Devlin was here he did a lot of things which wouldn't normally be too popular,  like raising ticket prices. The big difference is Devlin's PR skills were excellent, he kept everyone informed of what was going on and always seemed to be in control, the club seemed to have a sense of direction. With Sandy Gray this is not the case.

Personally I felt that the club recieved a real kick in the teeth in July 2004, first Mooney leaving, then Crosby leaving then Devlin leaving and no replacement. Worse still was when the board refused to let King spend any of the money earmarked for Mooney. In my opinion the combination of these factors is the reason that we didn't quite replicate our 2003/2004 form last year and the main reason things aren't now going so well.

All very true and its a source of major concern, because as ever the KOB are missing the key issue, nobody with any realistic notion of seeing things beyond the end of the season would allocate a senior job to someone so ill equiped to discharge it.

 Its almost like the Producers........

Spot on analogy there Reg - how many on here will get it?

Can just imagine J1mmythekraut strutting his "Springtime for Hitler and Chermany" :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

I just listened to that .

Unbelievable.

Im listening to it now and she sounds like a fucking tard, weve lost Reevesy? and!?  :shock:

She actually thinks we can make the Play-Offs!, classic comedy. :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

I doubt she knows whats the play offs are...

she's an accountant not a public speaker....

Is this is supposed to justify such an apparent incompetence? ANY good accountant would know their market anyway. Just shows why we need someone like Devlin

She mumbled and stuttered her way through that interview and to think she's our Chief Executive is shocking. :twisted:

She may be ok as an accountant although the vat thing is worrying. However chief executive is a role where it's essential to be good at public speaking, I don't think she'd even claim to be ideal for the role.

It seems indicative of just how poor a state the club is in that she was forced to take it on.

You cant tell me that Mark Devlin didnt do a good job?.

Who do you mean me. Me? If so no why would I. I thought Devlin did an excellent job, that's why I said losing him was a kick in the teeth.

That has to be the best summary of Swindon's last couple of seasons, and does make me worry about King.  It seems to be a case of we're damned if we do, and damned if we don't.  A possible replacement of King could be potentially disasterous, but the way he has alienated so many fans just nails down his coffin for me.

Yes you laddy!, ok i'll let you off. :)

Why the hell was she left here in the first place when Dunwoody Sports Marketing were forced to pull out of the club?

In fact I thought she did actually resign when Dunwoody pulled out with Nick Prescott.

http://www.thisisswindontownfc.co.uk/News_Headlines_Story.asp?NewsID=1504

How the hell is she still actually here and to what degree does she still represent outside interests?

 Good hunting Dazzza...I think the withdrawal of DSM was only a technicality,  namely they said they were withdrawing from a contract but didn't withdraw from the club.

  Mrs Gray first came to our attention at  an AGM....when it was announced she was doing the club a favour by doing accountancy for free...on secondment from DSM.

  Somehow she's ended up as the person supposedly running the club...this situation needs to be fully explored at the Fans' Forum, as it just seems wrong.

Dunwoody Sports Marketing is actually no more and has been re-packaged as two new separate companies...

Dunwoody Management Services Ltd
Dunwoody Marketing Communications

I suspect the change in name was forced as anyone entering DSM into an Internet search would have seen a rap sheet to make Charles Bronson blush.

A quick check at Companies House shows Sandy Gray is in fact a director of Dunwoody Management Services Limited.

It all stinks to high heaven and while Diamandis may not be employed by the club in any official capacity and untouchable to a degree Gray as chief exec is obliged to answer questions and reveal external interests.

 This is the kind of stuff, that needs to be aired at the fan's forum

 I'd have guessed SG would have been in the services arm rather than the communications..

Of little relevance now but another recently departed Chief Exec of ours also happened to be a former Dunwoody board member and employee a certain Mark Devlin.

That surely must amount to a conflict of interest at the time Dunwoody were under the cosh?

No surprises they also happen to be involved at QPR.

Dunwoody were involved at QPR before Devlin went there.   :|


I seem to remember that QPR have either had some sort of dodgy dealing going on and lateness of accounts and stuff (but I can't remember where I heard that)...

Coincidently Mark Devlin was sacked last month after a board room coop at Loftus Road.

http://www.queensparkrangersfc.com/newsaugust2505.htm

I’d wager it won’t be long before he’s back in some capacity at STFC and despite past tedious links for the love of god he’s a hundred fold improvement on Sandy.

Seems his tenure wasn't without controversy....

http://www.qpr-lsa.co.uk/

scroll down a bit for the story

Greek Businessmen?

Couldn't be could it?   :shock:

1st or 2nd stint?

May have my dates wrong but I thought they arrived during his 1st stint at Loftus Road.

possibly during his first then (I'm not good with dates)

I'm tempted to go to the fans forum and ask her some awkward questions.

Any suggestions?

Her name!    :P

Something regarding her and Mike the Greeks ties and Dunwoodys unofficial influence in the running the club.

 Do so.....Cirencester women have a bit of previous here....I'm sure we all remember Diana Gould who exposed Thatcher's terminological inexactitude over the sinking of the Belgrano.

If anyone's got a spare few quid I always find it's good to pull the accounts from companies house for this kind of stuff - that way you can prove if there's any financial link on the books between the two companies ...

 What sort of money are we talking about?

The last set of stuff I pulled from Companies House was about £15 quid for director records.

If you check here: http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk/ tomorrow you'll get the price list.  I'm sure it's less than twenty quid.

At least it will show if there's any official link between the two.  Of course, if there's a 'gentleman's agreement' of any sort it won't show up here ...

So its a bit of a gamble as to whether it'd show up something of interest or just be a waste of money....I'd like to see someone with a forensic mind..like Mrs Spacey...try and  discover what the hell is happening in the background at STFC.

Yes, of course it is.  I've found more often than not that pulling this stuff up usually gets you something ... even if it's not what you want ... you might get a lead to something else.

The situation hasn't changed since 3 years ago. Dunwoody Sports Marketing (as it was then) and the three or four new offshoot companies it has been restructured into around last Christmas are the wholly owned property of Mike Diamandis, as indeed is Sandy Gray. Mike Diamandis is running the club (insofar as anyone is) in "big picture" matters (Sandy Gray does the day to day stuff like Mark Devlin used to) on behalf of the Wills family. He has been put into this position by the Wills family as he is their trusted adviser and they've been ripped off badly before dealing direct with the club so they're using him to do their direct handling of the club. What's worrying about this is that Mr D's previous businesses have not all been rip-roaring successes, to say the least. Sandy Gray is there because she is, and always has been, a "bagman" for Mr D and because now that Bob Holt seems to have removed himself from the picture and Mr D's fallen out with Nick Prescott, she's the only one left he can promote to Chief Exec without coming out of the shadows himself. The alternative of course might be to appoint a properly qualified football person as Chief Exec who might be able to steer the club back onto the straight and narrow but that would mean brining in a non-Newbury outsider and strangely they don't seem keen on that option.

Incidentally, I wouldn't worry about Sandy Gray having a direct say in the replacement of Andy King - that decision will be taken by Diamandis and the Wills family. And the decision will largely be based on getting someone in cheap, so promotion from within or an outsider whose looking to (re-)establish themselves in League management will be the most likely outcomes. For all those of you praying they don't promote Reeves from within, look upon the name of Booby Gould and quake with fear.

Perhaps with enough pressure Mark Devlin may come back into the fold now that he's parted company with QPR after all he’s another old Diamandis stooge

Gray is just hopeless it doesn't matter what level of responsibility she has, she doesn't sound like she could wipe her arse with any sort of confidence.

At least with Devlin you got a shafting with a smile.

 Perhaps that’s a tad unfair because he did a good job of fronting things and came across very well and managed to deal with some difficult circumstances within the club.

 :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

And professionally applied lubricant ...... erm, I've taken that metaphor just a bit too far haven't I?

I've only just caught up with the latest on this topic......seems to have caused a stir on the Trust website.....what's that all about?

If anyone wants accounts from companies house, give me a shout.

I can get them free (within reason) through work.

Erm, embarrassing storm in a teacup. Tony N got his nose all out of joint because some of the info in this thread was part of the stuff the Trust put out three years ago (when Dunwoody supposedly disengaged from the club but really just went deeper into the background) and at the time we got a lot of flak for upsetting SSW. I think he feels annoyed that we got slated for uncovering and publicising info that people are now starting to get worried about. But the way he expressed his frustration was extremely high-handed to say the least - I know I'm not the only Trust board member to be embarrassed by his comments. So then a load of people piled in on his comment and slated either him for the comments (reasonably enough) or the Trust generally on the back of his comments (quite unfairly). Then it all degenerated into the usual squabble these things do.

Like I say, storm in a teacup - the bigger picture is what matters, not who said what to who and when.

I've just spoken to Tony N about this and he said he was surprised at the fuss some people were making at pretty much a throw away comment.

But for those not in the know there are details on the Trust site about Dunwoody apparently PaulD failed to mention this.

But anyway, but it's all stuff on the Trust forum - As I am new to these forums, I haven't seen the Trust one yet so I'm not fully aware of what was said.

Storm in a teacup as PaulD said.

Sam