I've always avoided starting a Leyton Orient thread here, as no doubt of little interest to most members, but the last 10 days has seen amazing news. First we manage to fend off a winding up order and manage to actually stay in existence, which looked very touch and go at one point, and then if that isn't enough we get taken over and are even rid of the terrible owner who had us in such a downward spiral in the first place.
Too many poor owners ruining football clubs, hopefully the new lot will invest in the club and get it back where to belongs in the football league.
That guy who owned Orient always struck me as one of the most clueless and incompetent owners of a football club I've ever heard of - and that's really saying something, given how many bad owners there seem to be in football.
I think he (Francesco Becchetti) could be the worst ever seen in this country. This season Coventry, Charlton, Blackpool, Blackburn and Morecambe have seen protests against the club owners, but none of these can match the chaos and meltdown at Orient.
Portsmouth owners in the season 2009-10 deserve a mention here. The club began that season under the ownership of Russian Alexandre Gaydamak, but he sold the club to Sulaiman Al-Fahim from Dubai, who in turn sold to Ali Al-Faraj from Saudi Arabia, who unfortunately couldn't repay his debts he incurred in buying the club and lost ownership to a Nepalese businessman based in Hong Kong, Balram Chainrai, who promptly put the club into administration. The administrators were therefore the 5th people to run the club that season, before Chainrai bought the club out of administration and assumed control once again.
Another big development at Leyton Orient - we've signed a player!
The reason this is so significant is that we now have a total of 11 players - so enough to field a team. The newcomer is aged 24, which makes him easily the senior player in the squad, as the next oldest is age 20.
There's been a real signing spree - now 10 new signings in total, including 5 aged 30 or more.
What happened to Leyton Orient was a disgrace and the FA SHOULD of stopped it, but they don't care really below the premiership especially a then league 2 club. Clubs like Leyton Orient are the true football not the PL and seeing clubs like them suffer is bad for our game as a hole. Hope they can bounce back quickly.
I would like to think the FA should be investigated for allowing what happened to the Orient happen I agree it is a disgrace that clubs below the PL have to suffer the shit they went through and FA should have done something. what is even more disturbing I would not be surprised if the owner had failed their fit and proper test originally but they still allowed the takeover to happen. IMO what we fans now need to see is what exactly is the criteria for that fit and proper test to be made public for us to see what exactly any new owners to agree to and we are allowed a big say in any takeover bid in future and we are given the opportunity to oust owners who we think are not promising the things they promise. Having a fan representative on every club board would be the best thing so that clubs know exactly what the feeling is on the terraces when situations like orient arises and clubs have to listen to fans more in those situations.