Portsmouth slide into administration - where did it go wrong?

Portsmouth will now be 17 points adrift from safety (Sky Sports images)



Portsmouth FC have today confirmed that it will be going into administration after totalling debts to the tune of around £70m.

For a club that is already 8-points away from safety, it is a further kick in the shin for the club and its fans. Some could say they have nobody to blame but themselves. In the past 24 months, which included their FA Cup success in 2008, Portsmouth sold over £90m worth of players including Peter Crouch, Lassana Diarra, Jermain Defoe, and Glen Johnson. To still be around £70m in debt is still giving the fans a real headache.

At least the club cannot be liquidated, as the meeting with the High Court over its winding-up order has now been suspended. The club still lives, for now.

So who is to blame? Well the Premier League as a brand is the most watched league in the world. In the height of a growing economy, and revenue increases, businessmen would only be a fool not to purchase a majority share of a club. That's what Malcolm Glazer did at Man Utd, Tom Hicks and George Gillett with Liverpool, and Sasha Gaydamak with Portsmouth.

But one has to wonder why Gaydamak significantly gambled on the club's future in exchange for virtually instantaneous success? The club's infrastructure was not there to generate the level of revenue of the Man Utd's or Liverpool's, but continuous spent to the level of those football giants. They did not have European football to fall back on for further income.

It was good while it lasted. Crouch and Defoe were a great pairing at Pompey, and still are at Tottenham, while the marauding full-back Johnson and the midfield tenacity of Diarra gave fans always something to shout about at Fratton Park. But paying players a high level of wages was never going to be sustainable for a club that can only attract a maximum of 17,000 fans at the Fratton Park turnstiles, while Old Trafford is 75,000.

So what about the recent owners? Have they deceived the club, and more notably the Premier League through its 'Fit and Proper Person's' test that it had the finances to been the club out of trouble? Sulaiman Al Fahim owned the club for just over 40 days before relinquishing his shareholding to Ali Al-Faraj. The Arabian never attended to any of Pompey's games, and defaulted a £15m loan pyment to one of the club's major creditors, Balram Chairai. He currently owns the club, but has reiterated that he won't be there for the long-term, making sure his major investment in the club is safe. There are other rumours circulating that gaydamak has still yet to receive his £9m installment of a £30m debt the Russian is still due.

With the club at the hands of administrator, it is difficult to be optimistic of the club's position. The club is still riddled with debt, and as it looks to pay off its creditors and pay its staff, more players may need to be sold to avoid a collapse of one of England's most historic clubs.

Terry dismissed as England captain, Ferdinand takes over honour

John Terry's dismissal as England captain culminates a new era for Rio Ferdinand, who has been strongly indicated to lead England into the World Cup by national manager Fabio Capello.

And there will be niggling doubts whether Ferdinand is the right person to captain England. His off-the-field antics during his career has been almost as controversial as Terry's, including missing a drugs test in 2004 which prompted his absence at the European Championships that year.

Chelsea defender Terry was embroiled in a media frenzy in the past week over his alleged affair with model and ex-girlfriend of fellow England colleague Wayne Bridge, Vanessa Perroncel. A gagging order to censor information regarding his private life was lifted by the High Court last Friday, which meant stories over his affair surfaced the following day as he continued with club duties until Capello had recuperated from knee surgery in Switzerland.

Capello, who was granted by the FA to be the decisive figure in whether to keep Terry as captain, met the Chelsea man at Wembley on Friday. In a meeting believed to have lasted 12 minutes, Capello came to a sharp conclusion of dropping the defender as captain. The story has gripped the nation for over a week, and some media outlets have even viewed that the decision was more of a moral one than a footballing one. But either way, this will likely put a spanner in the works of England's World Cup dreams.

It completes a tumultuous week for the Chelsea skipper. He scored the winning goal in the away fixture against Burnley, and then announced in a statement that he would not offer his resignation despite ongoing calls to do so by many pundits and journalists. The Capello decision is also likely to affect Terry's sponsorship deals, similarly to what has happened with Tiger Woods in previous weeks following an eyebrow-raising scandal over his infidelity.

Capello's decision is one that has to be respected by most. He clearly wants to diffuse an extremely awkward situation in quick fashion, and is also reassuring that no figure in the team is dominant over another. His disciplinarian approach commands great respect among the players as he reasserts his authority on the squad.

I think most pundits will look at Ferdinand's form for Manchester United and England with a great deal of intrigue. He is currently serving a four match ban for an elbow incident in last 4-0 month's win over Hull, and will need to perform at a high standard on a consistent basis if he is to prove the critics that the choice of captaincy is not an incorrect one.

Murray vows to break Grand Slam hoodoo after demoralising defeat to Federer

Federer has now won the Australian Open on four occasions (Guardian)

It is 74 years and counting since a British tennis player last won a Grand Slam. Andy Murray fought valiantly, but was comprehensively beaten in straight sets to one of the greatest players in the game's history, Roger Federer at the Australian Open Final in Melbourne.

Outsmarted and definitely outplayed, Murray was chasing tennis ball shadows over at Rod Lever Arena. Initially billed as a clash that may change the face of tennis, Federer reminded the world just how dominate he is in the men's game. His elegance in his movement around the court coupled with deceptively powerful groundstrokes, had Murray scampering around throughout the whole match.

Federer held serve at consummate ease on many occasions and ominously threatened to break the Scot's serve in a number of hair-raising moments for Murray and his legion of fans back home. While geed himself up on a number of key points, he was powerless to stop Federer's potent forehand, to an extent that Murray was clutching his thigh and back in between points such were the physical exertions Federer was putting him through.

With the Swiss star two sets to the good, Murray refused to give in despite Federer's apparent dominance. He broke to lead 5-2 in the third, but the 28-year old Federer used his experience and class to snuff out any opportunities Murray had to close out the set by winning three games in a row. This led to a tie break. As the breaker slowly unfolded with both players winning points from their own serves in nervous fashion, Federer found with a second championship point at 10-9. As Federer played an almost reckless drop shot attempt, Murray dragged his tiring body to stoop low and clip his shot on the line, to Federer's shock. But that only galvanised Federer as three tantalising points later, Murray netted a backhand as Federer screamed in relief.

A lack of risk-taking on break point opportunities proved Murray's downfall, in combination with sheer Federer brilliance. But there is a very little doubt that Murray can pick up his maiden Grand Slam. His emotional speech after the match shows how driven he is to break his Grand Slam duck. Although his game is not penetrable in the slow and low-bouncing surface of the French Open clay, his all-action play is at Wimbledon and even more favourably at the hard courts at Flushing Meadows.

Meanwhile, it is 16 Grand Slams and counting for Federer. At age 28, Federer is arguably still at the peak of his powers and still in the devastating form that we have known to see from him over the past six years. On this current form, Murray may possibly wait until Federer's retirement as there is no sign that he is relinquishing his current status as the best player in the game.