Sports journalist Ben Jacobs has been speaking on the latest edition of NUFC Matters about the proposed takeover of Newcastle United.
This followed on from a few new bits of information that were revealed last week.
The first was the correspondence that The Chronicle received from the government, which indicated that in June last year, they were preparing for the takeover of the Toon by PCP Capital Partners, PIF, and the Reuben brothers to go through.
It was also revealed that Mohammed bin Salman tried to contact Boris Johnson to force the takeover through, so some interesting developments.
One of the topics that Jacobs spent some time on was how the Premier League handled talks at the time, and he feels as if they might have been portrayed to be worse than they are.
He said: “I find the whole correspondence between the Premier League and the DCMS and the wider government quite bizarre because although if you took it in an isolated context, you could argue that there was a load of back and forth, no one knew what was going on, there appears a lot of delays, no one wants to commit.
“Prior to all of that, on the very first day that the June correspondence started, the Premier League had already written to Newcastle United with a clear provisional conclusion, and that was entitled the decision letter.
“So everything after that is a little bit bizarre and is slightly strange, and maybe there’s a kind of Chinese whispers with the government getting conclusions, not just from their correspondence with the Premier League, but the Saudi Arabian side, and even the media as well.
“I think the other thing that paints it in a worse light than perhaps the reality is the reason the Premier League were unsure, in my opinion, anyway, is not because they didn’t know where things were heading, because as I say, they’d already written that letter on June the 12th but because they were waiting for a response from the buying side.
“So, when all the other emails are coming in about could there be a decision today? At that point, the Premier League were still waiting for a response from the club and the consortium as to how they would proceed and respond to the provisional conclusions specifically on separation.”
Do you think the Premier League have been treated harshly?
No, they have ruined this takeover
Yes, it isn't their fault
TIF Thoughts on the Premier League…
This seems to suggest that despite talks between the Premier League and the DCMS continuing in June over the takeover, the league had already made their decision and told Newcastle and the consortium what they expected.
We know that this went no further as the consortium withdrew their bid on July the 30th and the Premier League confirmed the reason the deal collapsed was because of this separation issue.
This is certainly an interesting take, and it seems to suggest that there was a lack of communication from all of those involved in this takeover process.
In other news: ‘Sickening’, ‘Absolutely embarrassing’ – Many Newcastle fans flock to Mehrdad Ghodoussi’s post