SWEET NUTHIN

11 October 2023

Josh Wander

600 Brickell Avenue

19^th Floor

Miami

Florida 33131

USA

Dear Josh,

Thank you for your letter dated 7 October 2023,

I was burnin’ that summer with the big dreams I had
And the songs I’d written, well, the world needed bad
But a pretty girl needs more comfort and gold
Than a beat-up black notebook is likely to hold

Dallas Wayne: Raelene Wheeler

Prospective new owners of Everton Football Club 777 Partners have been on a bit of a charm offensive since the football club assassin Farhad Moshiri let it be known he was selling his 94.1% of the toffees to the Miami based organisation. I have written already on the subject of 777 Partners and why, as it stands, they would not be a good fit for the blues. See Dealing with the Devil: bagfulloftoffees737918539.wordpress.com/2023/09/17/dealing-with-the-devil/

Many more blues are also questioning the suitability of 777 Partners becoming the new owners of Everton Football Club. Not to mention media and investigative journalists. for example see:

Everton Fan Advisory Board: Key Questions and Talking Points for 777

Everton-FAB-Key-Questions-and-Talking-Points-for-777-06-Oct-2023.pdf

777 Partners – Moshiri’s final Misjudgement?

777 Partners – Moshiri’s final misjudgement?

Dealing With the Devil Article

bagfulloftoffees737918539.wordpress.com/2023/09/17/dealing-with-the-devil/

It is probably due to the large amount of scrutiny about their questionable business practices, not to mention their football operations, that 777 Partners have launched their charm offensive. This charm offensive came in the form of a message from Josh Wander, 777’s Managing Partner. The message from Josh hit the in box of Evertonians on 7^th October, a few hours before the 3-0 win over Bournemouth at Goodison Park. It was also posted on the club website.

Bobbing down the Royal Blue Mersey comes a message in a bottle from Josh Wander. (If you think I am going to reference that absolutely shit band and its crap song you have another thing coming!!). The sailing bottle was fished out of the Mersey at Bramley Moore Dock. It contained a letter torn out of the black notebook of Josh Wander’s songbook, with a message that “The world needed bad,” or at least Everton Football Club according to Josh. So, when the cork is removed from the bottle and its contents are released, we get:

Message to Evertonians

https://www.evertonfc.com/news/3725746/777-message-to-evertonians

The message opens with super blue Josh, which he obviously is from the over the top opening paragraph, gushing about how he and 777’s other Managing Partner Steve Pasko, were literally reduced to jelly at the start of the home game against Luton Town. But what we actually get in the “message from Josh” is basically a void. Just a bit of spin to make the supporters feel happy that 777 Partners are about to land one of their planes from their dodgy airlines at John Lennon airport with a promise of a new era for the toffees.

Let’s have a quick dip, a Wander through the message’s contents, (I know it’s not even funny!!). A ramble no less, (time everyone started to listening to the Rambling Toffee podcast by the way), through the musings of Josh.

The opening paragraph is all cuddly nonsense.

“Last Saturday was the first time Steve (Pasko) and I attended a match at Goodison Park. We stood in anticipation of the whistle as the “Spirit of the Blues” turned into the siren and Z-Cars, as the fans welcomed the team to the pitch. Despite the outcome, the experience of being in the stadium and the unwavering support of the Goodison crowd reinforced our commitment to this great club.”

“Jesus christ! All hold back your tears if you can!”

(If 777 Partners do become owners, see that siren you mention, please get such nonsense dropped Josh my friend, I will be forever grateful).

But if you’re going to write such tear jerking stuff as the opening paragrapth Josh, here is how you do it:

But if I were a poet

I’d write about your eyes

If I were a Pharoh, Darling

I’d paint your face on Egypt’s skies

If I were a mystic warrior on the plains

You’d be my sunrise

And I could ride off in the sunset

And be happy all the days of my life

Steve Young: Love Song

Anyway, as we have seen Josh waded in with his bit of gush. He is no Steve Young, but stick a guitar in his hands who knows!!

I had to stop laughing, or was it throwing up, at this ridiculous opening hyperbole of a paragrapth, before I could carry on writing!! Come on Josh lad surely your better than this sort of cheap feel good crap. Did Prenno write that paragraph for you by any chance. We even get Alan Ball’s “Once Everton has touched you,” quote in the final paragraph of the bible according to Josh!

For God’s sake we don’t need this touchy feely nonsense Josh mate. What we want is to know your plans. How you plan to progress the toffees if 777 Partners take over, not such happy clappy rubbish which you open your message with. On 777 Partners plans for Everton Football Club, you actually seem rather quiet on, in the message. Well to be perfectly honest you totally avoid this important, and only relevant question.

But let’s move on to the meat on the bone, or lack of it in the message.

“We recognise that change can be unsettling. We also acknowledge that there have been a number of misleading and concerning reports in media which have created a perception of instability and unrest around our proposed purchase. Rest assured, in this case, that the truth is far more boring than the fiction.

“Don’t worry everyone we recognise change is unsettling” but don’t worry we are responsible people is the message here, which we are to just swallow hook line and sinker. Josh simply gets his magic wand out and with a simple “Abracadabra” brushes off all the plentiful media reports around the business practices of 777 Partners with a “rest assured, in this case, that the truth is far more boring than the fiction.”

Sorry Josh buddy, but a bit of evidence refuting the medis reports is needed. We need a bit more than you just saying the “truth is far more boring than fiction.” I know you have court cases and all that, (bet thats a bit of a drag), which you probably can’t comment on. But don’t tell me you can’t refute some of the copious damning media reports about 777 Partners business practices, with at least some counter evidence. I mean even I don’t believe some of the more outlandish stuff 777 Partners are accused of. But you basically say nothing. With this deathly silence the questioning about 777 Partners suitability to own Everton Football Club, which I and many others have written and spoken about, will continue to haunt you and 777 P I’m afraid.

Further on we get the Wander narrative about 777 Partners businesses:

“777 is not a typical private equity firm that purchases large healthy businesses with third party capital. We have had entrepreneurial success through building businesses from scratch – or acquiring businesses in poor condition and transforming them. Similarly, we have applied these principles to the football industry. We currently control four clubs directly: Genoa in Italy, Standard Liège in Belgium, Vasco Da Gama in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, and Red Star in France. At each of these clubs, we have improved sporting results meaningfully while reducing costs and increasing player value. Our success both on and off the pitch is clear to see.”

On the banks of the river
Where the willows hang down
And the wild birds all warble
With a low moaning sound
Down in the hollow
Where the water runs cold
Its was there I first listened
To the lies that you told

Now I lie on my bed
And I see your sweet face
The past I remember
Time cannot erase
The letter you wrote me
It was written in shame
And I know that your conscience
Still echo’s my name

Front Country: Rock, Salt and Nails (Songwriter Utah Phillips)

(Plenty of great versions of this classic, but Front Country do one of the best)

I detect a few little fibs here Josh. Sorry but I don’t want to listen “to the lies that you told.” I don’t want to be filling my shotgun up with “rock, salt and nails.” But you are not exactly building a case to stop me doing this. 777 Partners may have reduced costs at the clubs you directly own in your multi club stable, “you don’t say, nice one”. But you forgot to say that these clubs are all losing money cumulatively:

Talking the Blues Podast: 8 October 2023:

Talking the Blues Podcast, Bournemouth (h) 3 goals, 3 points, 3 sevens

Bit of short term memory loss is it Josh?

As for the improved sporting results, pinch of salt needed here mate. At the time of writing

Vaco De Gama with twelve games left to play in the season sit in the relegation zone.
Genoa are 15^th in Serie A
Standard Liège are eighth after an awful start to the season in Belgium. They have improved of late.
Red Star at least are top of the French National third league at the time of writing.

Then there are the clubs which 777 Partners also own at least some part of, and you conviently forgot to mention in your letter. Although you like to splash around on 777’s website. Maybe you should have a quick look at your own companies website, it might help. Incase you have forgotten them I will refresh your memory:

Seville (15%) 14^th in La Liga.
Hertha Berlin (64,7%) ninth in Bundesliga 2.
Melbourne Victory 19.9%) finished next to bottom in the Australian league last season..

The league positions of the clubs which are part of the 777 Partners multi club stable seem to contradict your statement that, “At each of these clubs, we have improved sporting results,” would you not say Josh. Few white lies and all that!

Oh yeah supporter protests at Vasco da Gama, Standard Liège, and Hertha Berlin, care to make any comment on them, Josh mate?

But we move on. Let’s see oh yes:

“We need to be clear – there will be no magic wand, nor quick fixes – the path to creating a sustainable business that then translates into on pitch success is laid with hard work and difficult decisions. Our background is in building successful businesses; holding and investing in them for the long term.”

Josh my friend you are saying nothing here, “hard work and difficult decisions.” Why not drop a few more cliché’s in while your at it, you know, working 24-7, that sort of thing.

Well, I’m a gonna raise a fuss, I’m gonna raise a holler
About workin’ all summer just to try an’ earn a dollar
Everytime I call my baby, to try to get a date
My boss says, no dice, son, you gotta work late
Sometimes I wonder what I’m gonna do
‘Cause there ain’t no cure for the summertime blues

Eddie Cochran: Summer Time Blues

Words are cheap and easy Josh incase you don’t know. How about a few words on 777 Partners plans for Everton Football Club. You know stuff like, how you plan to make Everton a success, your strategy, plan, and vision, that sort of thing! Instead, what we get is cheap and meaningless “hard work and difficult decisions.” Cheap talk. As if we are all to just swallow these hollow words which anyone can utter, and everything will be fine!

Wandering on we find:

Today, football clubs are much more complicated businesses than ever before, while remaining vital community assets. But there is one eternal truth – we need to win matches. We can’t promise you that will happen immediately. We can promise you that we will instil a culture that demands and inspires two things: effort and accountability. That starts with Steve and I and includes every member of the organisation. We will seek to earn your approval through effort and accountability, creating a sustainable business and by putting a team on the pitch that respects the club’s proud heritage and reflects the character of the people who support it.

There you go again with meaningless words such as “effort and accountability”. These should be givens, although sadly lacking at Goodison Park for far, far too long. You can say we will bring “accountability and effort” till your blue in the face Josh. It means nothing. How about a message on how 777 Partners actually plan to bring about this “accountability and effort”.

At the end of the day there is nothing in the message from Josh Wander except vacuous feel good words. He does not:

Address any of the questions around 777 Partners questionable business practices, including in football.
He does not address how 777 Partners actually plan to fund the planned takeover, paying off the Monaco based clown, finishing the new stadium, running costs of the club, not to mention a transfer kitty to be met.
He does not address the relative failure on the pitch to date, of the clubs in the 777 Partners football stable.
He does not go into how 777 Partners multi club operation actually operates, and what its vision and ultimate goal is.
He does not address how he sees Everton Football Club fitting into 777 Partners multi club operation.
He says nothing of how 777 Partners plan to grow Everton Football Club commercially.
He crucially does not address 777 Partners vision, short and long term for Everton Football Club. He says nothing about the plans and vision for the future.

Josh, if this message is the best you can come up with, it is a bit pathetic. It is just a load of feel good garbage. You can sing David Alan Coe as much as you like:

You can count on me, girl
You can count on me
I won’t ever let you down
You can count on me

You say you want a working man
To bring the money home
Someone to be good to you
And never do you wrong

David Alan Coe: You Can Count On Me

but this sort of gooey nonsense just won’t wash.

The only reason for 777 Partners to take control of Everton Football Club at present is that they cannot be worse than the football club assassin Farhad Moshiri. A man who has spent seven and a half years slowly killing the toffees. That is not a good enough reason for 777 Partners to become the next owners of Everton Football Club.

For this to happen we need to hear how:

777 Partners plan to finance Everton Football Club.
What is 777 Partners vision for the future of Everton Football Club, in both the short and long term.
How 777 Partners see Everton Football Club fitting into the multi club operation.
How 777 Partners plan to grow Everton Football Club commercially.
How 777 Partners will restructure the board of Everton Football Club.
Most importantly how 777 Partners plan to turn Everton into a competitive team once again.

This message from you Josh is a piece of sweet nothings. It is just a sweet kiss on the cheek of all Evertonians. It does not address the concerns about 777 Partners held by many Evertonians in any shape or form. We need more than a few mama’s apple pie words from you I’m afraid.

“Bill it all works out in the end”

“When”

“At the end of time”

“That soon”

(Guess the film time. I am sure I have used this one before, but anyway it is such a great piece of dialogue. Clue, it is the only good sequel to an original film. It would have been as good as the original if it was not for the studios insisting on the stupid ending. Now come on after all that it should be easy. “It’s a wonderfull life.”).

Josh my friend, either go and redraft this piece of nothingness, or maybe do another letter answering the questions I raise, or the fourteen sent to you from the Fan Advisory Board, or the many questions raised by other supporters. As it stands I am not convinced on you and 777 Partners, not one bit, I’m afraid Josh old bean.

Your message Josh, although welcome as a start of a dialogue, says nothing. In reality it is all spin and nice safe words which can be spoken by anyone. Maybe the truth is that just like “Jimmy Brown,” 777 Partners and you really do have “Sweet Nothin’.”

Oh, sweet nothin’
You know she he ain’t got nothing at all, whoa-whoa
Oh, sweet nothin’, yeah
She ain’t got nothin’ at all
Oh, let me hear you

The Velvet Underground: Oh! Sweet Nuthin’