Wigan | Page 8 | Vital Football

Wigan

It is well worth a listen. Doesn't really give much extra information, but it does give an open and frank assessment, with a knowledgable and passionate fan facing the fact that their club may "go the way of Bury".

One gem is that this year is the 10th Anniversary of the FA Cup Final appearance.

Another is that the owner seems to have provided a £20m investment over 3 years and the controllers managed to spend it in 18 months. Since then they have been surviving on gate receipts and Season Ticket Sales to pay wages and seemed to be intending to hold out until the transfer window when they can operate a fire sale. Problem is, why would a club buy someone when they can get them for free by waiting a little longer - (if a player wants a move and hasn't been paid, they can walk away under breach of contract and there is nothing Wigan can do about it, so the player can pocket a signing-on fee)?

Finally, the controllers seemed to believe that Sarb was actually a legitimate potential buyer, while the fans just see it as another farce in a long line of farces.
 
Wages were due a week ago (2 June) but the players did not receive theirs.

Wigan's owner said on Monday (5 June) that the players would be paid their overdue wages by Friday (today) - guess what?
 
Well, if the EFL is going to do anything serious, like expel them, they need to do it in the next week or so, before the fixtures are sorted.
 
I am not sure if it is standard, or just a request when clubs have problems, but isn't it quite common in these situations for the EFL to give deadlines by which a club has to provide evidence that it has enough money to complete a season. I know Derby had to do it in March 2022 and Bury famously failed to do it after the season had started before being ejected from the League. I don't hold out a massive hope that the EFL will resolve this quickly. I expect them to keep extemdomg deadlines to the owners of the club until the last minute, with the owners clinging on with false promises in the hope that someone will come in to buy them.

Only other option is for the Bahraini owner to put in a temporary cash injection, but as the debts build up, that would have to be a large amount of money for pretty much no return.
 
Wigan's unpaid players were given an update last night:

"Senior management have been in touch with the chairman on numerous occasions today, to chase the outstanding wage payments [which were due on 2nd June 2023] which Mr Al Jasmi committed to paying earlier this week.

"As things stand, no funds have arrived from the ownership despite being told they would cover wages.

"As stated in the update on 7th June 2023 we are aware any potential takeovers do take time to complete, so again we will continue to push the ownership group as best we can to fulfil this commitment of funding the outstanding liabilities.

"We will continue to ask the questions over the weekend and into next week regarding wages."

Keep asking those questions, you're doing a grand job!
 
There must be a point at which players can walk away from their contracts if there's a non-payment of wages? A month or so? Not sure how it works.
 
Luke Imp said:
There must be a point at which players can walk away from their contracts if there's a non-payment of wages? A month or so? Not sure how it works.
Click to expand...

It seems it is a little complicated. Unilateral cancelling of a contract can be done under 'just cause', but that isn't fully defined.

Any contractual breach does not constitute just cause, so even if the football club or the football player fails to fulfil its contractual obligations, it does not necessarily give the other party the right to terminate the contract. Past cases and football law show that a contractual breach must be material (of significant seriousness) to justify termination with just cause

For a breach of the player’s contract to reach such a level that the player is entitled to terminate the contract unilaterally, then a violation needs to be considered material, persist for a long time, or be seen in relation with other violations as meeting the necessary standard, 'just cause'.

While it can be specifically covered by a clause in a player's contract, (which takes precednece and means it could be different for different players in the same circumstances) it seems 3 months unpaid is solid foundation. Beyond that, the player can argue that a number of smaller infringements have built up to mean that the player has lost confidence in the club and in the Premier League standard contract there is a provision to say you can't do it until the end of the season.

One potentially important aspect in the Wigan case is that players who haven't been paid need to give the club 15 days notice of termination, during which the club have the opportunity to make the payment to prevent the termination.

There is a reasonable discussion of the nuances here,

https://www.sportlawmusings.com/post/when-can-a-footballer-terminate-his-own-contract

and there is a more detailed version here,

https://www.easportslaw.com/news/unilateral-termination-of-a-football-players-contract
 
cherryexile said:
It seems it is a little complicated. Unilateral cancelling of a contract can be done under 'just cause', but that isn't fully defined.

Any contractual breach does not constitute just cause, so even if the football club or the football player fails to fulfil its contractual obligations, it does not necessarily give the other party the right to terminate the contract. Past cases and football law show that a contractual breach must be material (of significant seriousness) to justify termination with just cause

For a breach of the player’s contract to reach such a level that the player is entitled to terminate the contract unilaterally, then a violation needs to be considered material, persist for a long time, or be seen in relation with other violations as meeting the necessary standard, 'just cause'.

While it can be specifically covered by a clause in a player's contract, (which takes precednece and means it could be different for different players in the same circumstances) it seems 3 months unpaid is solid foundation. Beyond that, the player can argue that a number of smaller infringements have built up to mean that the player has lost confidence in the club and in the Premier League standard contract there is a provision to say you can't do it until the end of the season.

One potentially important aspect in the Wigan case is that players who haven't been paid need to give the club 15 days notice of termination, during which the club have the opportunity to make the payment to prevent the termination.

There is a reasonable discussion of the nuances here,

https://www.sportlawmusings.com/post/when-can-a-footballer-terminate-his-own-contract

and there is a more detailed version here,

https://www.easportslaw.com/news/unilateral-termination-of-a-football-players-contract
Click to expand...
I’m having a bit of a mind blank but did we sign someone from R & D on this basis quite a few years ago?
Can’t remember the players name, the club or if it was this or they’d gone into admin. Apart from that I’m fairly sure.
 
Alan Power and Sam Smith both signed on 6th July 2011 having previously been at Rushden & Diamonds.

Only the intervention of the PFA prevented the Diamonds' players refusing to play a game against Mansfield Town in March due to unpaid wages.

R&D were expelled from the Conference National on 11 June 2011 because their unstable financial position meant they could not guarantee being able to complete all their fixtures in the 2011–12 season.

The club entered administration on 7 July 2011

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/lincoln_city/9531617.stm
 
Red Wimp said:
I’m having a bit of a mind blank but did we sign someone from R & D on this basis quite a few years ago?
Can’t remember the players name, the club or if it was this or they’d gone into admin. Apart from that I’m fairly sure.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure it was Richard Butcher.
 
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