PART ONE: Wigan Athletic: The 12th Man - 'We are in pure survival mode at this point. We don’t need an owner with an ambitious five-year plan. A five-day plan for paying the players and club staff would suffice...'

Matt Auffrey:

Our beloved club is clinging to life by the thinnest of threads. Our owners refuse to properly fund the club and, with each passing day Phoenix 21 remains at the helm, Latics will continue to sink into a deeper and deeper hole. Mr Al Jasmi will hopefully agree to an immediate takeover deal with one of our legitimate suitors and give the club a fighting chance to remain in the EFL and build on a future that looks more bleak by the day. However, the chance of Latics losing nearly all of its assets and being left to wither helplessly in administration seems to be an all too likely outcome. There is no possible way the Phoenix 21 era of Wigan Athletic can be looked upon as a success. Our owners artificially inflated our balloon to a healthy degree, only to slowly release all of the air over the course of last season. Even while we are completely deflated, they have continued to puncture our material, leaving so many holes we have become a very unattractive project to repair. The ‘Believe’ bus is ready to be towed away to the scrapyard. It was a vehicle that did more than its share of double duty to get us to the finish line of last season. We are in pure survival mode at this point. We don’t need an owner with an ambitious five-year plan. A five-day plan for paying the players and club staff would suffice. Starting the season on -12 points hardly seems like a penalty if we keep a hold of Shaun Maloney and are given the means to complete the season. There is little else to dream about in our current situation. We desperately need a hero to emerge. Our next owner’s background is less important than ever. We just need the funding. The rest can get figured out along the way. These last few weeks have marked a very dejecting period. I encourage all of our fans to closely monitor their own mental health during these tough times and be supportive of others who may be experiencing challenges. There is no guarantee that brighter times are ahead, and there is very little we can control with respect to our club’s future. If there's any reason to maintain an ounce of faith then we'll continue to hold on to whatever is left. Stay well, everyone.

Statto:

Wigan Athletic...where the next day is even more bizarre, distressing and downright miserable than the last. Wages are late again, people not being paid despite a pledge of an eight-figure sum landing in the bank account. Again, this didn't happen. The two British-based directors have resigned. 'What the hell is going on' is a question all the fans, players and staff want to know. Then a ray of hope that there's an agreement to sell the club, and we go to bed thinking we could be saved. Next, the potential buy is a pop man from Birmingham, who's spent the last six months trying to convince the EFL that he's fit and proper to buy Morecambe. But has now turned his attention to Latics. On closer inspection by Latics super detectives, the paper trail for what little there is seems to have the wealth of a lad working nights at Amazon. Keep your eyes peeled for the next instalment of the 'Wigan Athletic disaster movie'. Stay safe.

Charlie Keegan:

Can we be saved from a second major crisis in the last three years? Social media, mainly Twitter, has long debated the answer to this since it became apparent our current ownership and board (prior to the dual resignation) were no longer able to run the football club as it needs to be, and as we, the supporters, staff, and players, want it to be. Ultimately, there is a way out of this mess and a path towards a brighter future. However, discovering which road ahead is the one we need to take is the next big challenge. It is important to remember that, while we are all examining and providing information arisen from fan due diligence (we need to keep this up, by the way!), some of the players and staff STILL remain unpaid from the last pay-day - and that is absolutely disgusting. Soon after the departure of two board members, the club released a statement they had agreed a deal in principle for the sale of the club - subject to EFL approval. Now, the news came with mixed response. Some were happy to see the current ownership may soon be out the door to whoever. Some held all reservations until the prospective buyer was to be named and investigations could begin into who they were and what they wanted with us. It didn’t take long for the news to break that the potential buyer was a 21-year-old soft drinks ‘tycoon’, who also had been trying, and failing, to get involved with Morecambe FC. Putting aside the fact they are barely able to legally drink in the USA, and they were becoming known as a headache to many Shrimps supporters, the investigators between us quickly found out what we needed to know. To go from our current ownership - who have failed to pay wages on time six times, and have thrown tens of millions at poor business decisions with nothing really left to show for it - to a business ‘tycoon’ who can’t even ensure his small businesses file accounts on time, would have been a major disaster the EFL would most likely not even approve in the well-known ‘fit and proper test’. I’ll tell you this for free - put your money away - they were never ever going to take over Wigan Athletic. And I cannot believe the option has even been explored by those making the decisions. Around 10 minutes of investigation was all most of us needed to decide that.

Anyway, next. But, who is ‘next’? Well, there has been plenty of speculation about who else is in line to propose their bid. However, we will not be privy to that information due to confidentiality agreements and all sorts of legalities. While frustrating, unfortunately that’s just the way it is, and all we can do now is trust those in charge are making the right decisions for our club. So to answer the question, yes, we can be saved from another major crisis. However, the paths ahead need to be carefully examined and all due diligence done in order to ensure the road we choose to drive down does not end in a third consecutive disaster. The saying ‘third time lucky’ is one I am holding onto hope with, and I really do hope the saying comes true. Our supporters and staff deserve better, and the action taken to create donation pages and support those within our club who need a little extra help is beautiful to see. Keep it up, ‘Tics. When we are united, we are bigger than ANY adversity that comes our way. Keep the faith.

Michael Richardson:

Another week, another set of late wages, another set of broken promises and yet another (this time brief) statement. Blink and you may have missed it, but we started off with reports of wages being paid late through the day, and calls from a collection of fans groups to sell up, promised wages not turning up through the day, silence heading into the weekend, and then a day full of news on Sunday. A scathing - and some may rightly say attempt at face-saving - resignation from directors Tom Markham and Oliver Gottmann, which shone a disturbing light at the chaos that has gone on this year, and also set out the bizarre range of promised funds that has happened in recent weeks from the chairman and owner. Heading into the evening, word of a sale breaks, with the concerning statement that the club is up for sale, but the new owner will sort out any liabilities. The wording seemed odd, when it takes weeks or even months to go through, while wages, among other things, are already owing. Monday came and the identity of the aspiring owner was revealed, with all the excitement brought about by the sale announcement falling flat, like a cheap knock off pop brand, you may say. After about five minutes, it was clear to all with access to the internet that this 'potential owner' wasn’t the one. Alarm was raised at the prospect of the owners having to wait the same length of time for approval as Morecambe have - several months - given they said the new owner would cover all liabilities. Somewhat tempered by another promise from the owners to continue funding the club, seemingly when it suits them, along with links to other potential interested parties.

The story of a sale is welcomed, but it is a distraction from the fact wages are late yet again. Hopefully the EFL doesn’t roll out another four-point deduction, but who would blame them? Hopefully they’ll hold the threat of further charges over the heads of the owners to force them to get on with a sale, in the knowledge further deductions would scupper any sale and any prospect of recovering money from a sale The directors who resigned, while they provided some useful information into the goings on, can’t wash their hands of the mess they were front and centre in overseeing, along with Mal Brannigan and Talal Al Hammad. The positivity built up by coming out of administration, avoiding relegation and the championship-winning season, has been undone by the signing of player contracts, commercial deals and sponsorship that were naive at best and unthinkable at worst. The seeds of this disaster were planted the summer the club was being rebuilt, and it took two years for the roots of those seeds to nearly choke the life out of the club. My hope is that a credible, competent bidder comes in soon with a deal agreed, then we can move past the nightmare that Phoenix 2021 has turned into. But I said that after the Choi/Au Yeung debacle. They say it's the hope that kills you and all that…

Ed Bazeley:

What’s currently happening at Latics is very sad, and it’s an epitome of the awful place the UK football scene has found itself in. If current owner Abdulrahman Al Jasmi doesn’t sell up pronto, then it’s difficult to see Wigan heading anywhere other than another administration situation as seen for nine months across the second half of 2020 and early 2021. The fact he is now selling the club could be a good thing. Or it could be the case that we’re better off sticking with the ‘devil we know', rather than one we don’t. I see a lot of talk in relation to ‘cautious optimism’ when it comes to updates regarding the ownership race. Personally, I now struggle for optimism at all. According to one report, there are three more groups interested in buying Latics. We know one of these interested parties is Sarjbot Johal, a 21-year-old soft drinks entrepreneur. In football terms, it is most notable that Johal has been attempting to purchase fellow Lancashire outfit Morecambe FC. He has not yet passed the EFL’s Owners and Director’s (fit and proper persons) Test in a reported time window of six months. Therefore the conclusion could be made that Johal would not be able to keep Latics afloat for any longer than Al Jasmi. What’s more is we all know how easy it has been to pass the EFL ‘fit and proper’ test in recent years, yet Johal has managed to fall short of this hurdle in his attempts to buy Morecambe. Surely he has no credibility in trying to rescue Latics.

Whether or not the other reportedly interested parties have more credibility remains to be seen. It's just terrible this has happened to us. The first responsibility of any sort of business is to pay their staff. Failing that, at least don’t lie if you haven’t fulfilled that first expectation. This board has acted in a truly unacceptable manner for far too long now, and I can’t blame Oliver Gottman and Tom Markham for disassociating themselves with this madness. Although that duo may not have been innocent in all of this...but who knows? And that sort of lack of transparency could prove to be one of many factors which may go on to kill this football club of ours. If we do end up in administration, I think we should really consider some sort of community ownership. No, we probably wouldn’t ever get above League One, but we’d have a club run by those with honest intentions at heart. It’s better than chasing a childhood dream of Premier League football, which will result in the whole club being at the mercy of a random rich bloke who doesn’t care and could pull the plug at any time. Don’t be sad that the Dave Whelan days are over, be glad that they happened. Those words are not ones to live by if the whole club collapses, though. Lastly, if any members of staff at the club are reading this, I hope you’re doing okay, as you never deserved this. Neither, of course, did club legend Shaun Maloney, the players, or the fans. Take care folks.