Den moderna fotbollen... (angående Sheff. Wednesday)

Dear Sir,

I am one of the many Sheffield Wednesday supporters that the club is looking to sue. If Dave Allen and the other board members get their way, I face bankruptcy, losing my home and jeopardising my 7 year old son's future.

What could I possibly have written on a internet messageboard that could trigger such a fierce retaliation? I expressed an opinion that the club's activity in the transfer market was not as genuine as it appeared. I used no foul language, I merely expressed my genuinely held opinion.. I named no-one. Yet apparently, this constitutes defamation. I am also aware of another life long supporter of the club who is subject to possible legal action for suggesting that Chris Brunt would be sold and that we would have a poor start to the season. Both of which are now evidently correct.

Is this what Sheffield Wednesday have now stooped to ? Is there really such tyranny in the boardroom that any dissent amongst the paying customers is met with such excessive action ?

I am advised that if all of the defamation action against the supporters of this club comes to fruition, it will cost the club in the region of £8 million pounds. To what end ? Are the club really going to spend that much money to pursue targets that have little or no money in a bid just to stifle any questioning of their handling of matters in the boardroom ? The action cannot be taking place for financial gain. It is merely bullying and intimidation.

Supporters of the club should be made aware of this. How would fans feel that £8 million pounds is available for these lawsuits, yet we cannot afford to strengthen a team that , given the progress made on the field last season, should easily be challenging for promotion this year ? If supporters knew that this is where their money was being channelled , would there be an outcry ? Would there be fewer attendees ? I guess it's not possible to speculate as supporting a football club is generally a matter of the heart and it is difficult to switch off one's passion but I am aware of many supporters who will no longer contribute to the club to fund such a repugnant course of action.

I am copying this letter to the Football League and the FA as I feel that the actions taken by the Sheffield Wednesday directors are harming football in general. Damaging the product. Football has long been a game of opinions and if Sheffield Wednesday get their way and proceed with legal action against 40 paying customers, it will rip the heart out of football in this country.

I implore you to investigate and report on these actions. As journalists, it is your duty to get to the truth and to report accurately on exactly what is transpiring in our football club. Recent articles show a disgraceful bias toward the club. nobody in particular will not be chairman of Sheffield Wednesday for ever, but the fans will always be here and you should bear that in mind when you publish letters and stories without getting a proper balance.

Unfortunately, I cannot provide my name or address as nobody in particular is unaware of my details, he needs these to proceed with legal action against me and, despite the clubs crippling debt, he continues to spend the clubs money to acquire them.

If you have any sense of fairness, you will print this letter, but given the current levels of sycophancy towards the club, you will appreciate that I harbour doubts as to whether you will."

Hello all,

you may or may not be aware that Sheffield Wednesday are looking to take action against upto 40 people for comments made on internet messageboards just like this one.

The first case is due in court on 27th September for which the club are looking to sue one of it's fans to the sum of £50,000 !

There has been local media coverage about this and it looks like it will go national very shortly.

We would welcome your views on this subject from fans of other clubs and so to help you out with the story below is a message from the owner of Sheffield Wednesday messageboard http://www.owlstalk.co.uk which is also under threat of being sued by Sheffield Wednesday's lawyers.

Hi,

We are in an incredible situation at Sheffield Wednesday

This month our football club issued legal action against one of our fans Darryl Keys

They wanted to sue him for suggesting that one of the SWFC directors had been talking to ‘Wednesdayite’ which is our fans association with 1200 members

The club fired off legal letters to Darryl saying they were suing him and so Darryl had to appoint a lawyer to advise and represent him

Thing is – Darryl was telling the truth 100%

When the club did some asking around in the boardroom they found that it was indeed true and dropped their action but have left Darryl with a legal bill of £4800 to pay

Next up a lifelong fan of the club who’s family have strong ties to the club is in court this month on the 27th for criticising the Chief Executive. If he loses he will lose his house, his job and possibly his partner after a year of stress leading up to the trial takes it’s toll. This person is being sued for £50,000.

It’s worth noting that this person has been the secretary of the shareholders association at SWFC and has been responsible for fundraising over the years for many initiatives such as raising money to buy a huge flag that our supporters used, enjoyed and are famous for (it was the biggest flag in England at the time) and a collection for the ticket office staff at Hillsborough after they worked under serious pressure to sell tickets to fans for the Cardiff playoff final that we attended and won a few years back

Finally the main story is that the club have started legal proceedings against me personally as owner of http://www.owlstalk.co.uk to force me to hand over the names and addresses of 34 users of the site and their posts for the last 12 months (because they want to see if there’s anything they have written over the last year that they can take action over ??)

They are looking to take action against these 34 people who include elderly people, students and even a direct relative of Martin Luther King (yes – seriously !)

Our lawyers estimate that if all these court cases go all the way it will cost between 4 and 8 million pounds at a time when we can’t afford to buy players, our online superstore isn’t working etc

This action is being taken by a board who’s chairman have called fans ‘scum’ ‘cretins’ ‘that lot’ ‘yobs’ and even one fan a ‘venomous :censored:’

Here’s some media on this story:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o51gpNaPNK8

http://www.owlstalk.co.uk/media/tf.mp3

Listen to this:

http://www.owlstalk.co.uk/media/Part1.mp3

http://www.owlstalk.co.uk/media/Part2.mp3

http://www.owlstalk.co.uk/media/RealRadio.mp3

It’s also worth watching these:

http://www.youtube.com/v/78AsOlC4E-I

http://www.youtube.com/v/37JfB7Ovjs4

I’ve created a guest account for you on Owlstalk.co.uk

Username – guest01

Password – guest01

All your users are free to use this account to read the posts on the site

All the best


Neil Hargreaves

http://www.owlstalk.co.uk