On Wednesday evening, whilst the lads were kicking pieces out of St Mirren, members of the FOUL committee met with United’s owner, Firoz Kassam, for a debrief and to ask some (we hoped) penetrating questions. Some of the responses were given under the understanding of confidentiality, which was fair enough seeing as these referred either to named individuals or to ongoing negotiations, but some of the other information Kassam revealed is interesting and relevant enough to be passed on to the wider supporter-base of the U’s.

Firstly he was possibly more confident and upbeat about the future than he has been before. He thought that the Company Voluntary Arrangement, due to be heard on Tuesday 27th, would go through without a hitch, with most of the major creditors (including Keith Cox) supporting it, as they realised that the alternative is probably administration and that they would therefore receive nothing. This way they would at least obtain 10% of what they are owed. Interestingly Cox’s claim doubled from the original ?300,000 as a result of “non-prompt payment”, although Buchler’s might well question the validity of that particular item.

Kassam was also bullish about the likelihood of the multiplex cinema application being called in, claiming that Tony Banks, amongst others, thought that it was unlikely, and that a decision would be forthcoming before parliament goes into recess, also on Tuesday 27th – potentially a big day in United’s history. There is still a possible problem to be sorted out with the City Council’s Strategy & Resources Committee, which wants to protect United by withholding permission to commence construction on the leisure site until the stadium is completed and occupied, which means that Kassam will have to fund the ten million pounds stadium project from his own funds with a long delay before he will be able to begin recouping his money. However Kassam was confident that a compromise arrangement could be reached.

Should things work out the way that Kassam wishes, and he is optimistic about this, he was explicit that money would then be made available to Shotton to strengthen the team throughout the season. Kassam said that he felt United’s rightful place was in the top half of the First Division and that he felt it vital, for commercial reasons, that we started off in the new stadium as a First Division club.

Obviously words are cheap and Firoz Kassam will be judged on his deeds, but at least the intent is there. So much depends on both the planning permission being speedily granted for the cinema application and the success of the CVA, and hopefully by Wednesday we will know the outcome of both these issues. Kassam has never claimed to be anything other than a businessman who wishes to use United for his own commercial purposes, but he is aware that without United these aims will fail and he will therefore pull out all the stops (short of investing stupid amounts of money in the club, at least not until he is certain that any investment can be recouped) to ensure that the football club not just survives, but thrives.