• HMRC set to appeal against company voluntary agreement
• Administrator admits ban would remain for ‘foreseeable future’

Portsmouth face being under a transfer embargo until October if Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs appeal against the club’s company voluntary agreement.

Pompey’s administrator, Andrew Andronikou, fears HMRC will lodge a protest against the agreement between the club’s creditors before the deadline of midnight tomorrow.

The move would mean the club staying in administration until the appeal is heard, and Pompey would therefore remain under the transfer embargo due to Football League rules.

Andronikou told the News: “We believe the HMRC are going to appeal, that is the indication we are getting. It’s going to be an irritant and, to put it simply, the embargo will stay for a longer period.

“As long as there is an appeal process, the registration embargo will continue to be in force for the foreseeable future. However, we expect any appeal hearing to be held in October or November. Before then, if the squad is below 20, we can still bring in players, regardless of the embargo. That is allowed and is something we are looking at.”

PortsmouthBusinessguardian.co.uk

• Figures contained in administrator’s offer to creditors
• Portsmouth paid one agent £2.3m for work on one deal

Portsmouth’s administrator is expected to reveal today the full extent of the club’s debt when he makes an offer to creditors in an attempt to restructure its chaotic finances.

As the administrator, Andrew Andronikou, has previously claimed, the figures are expected to show that between £80m to £90m is owed to unsecured creditors, including the taxman and previous owners.

A further £14m is owed to Balram Chainrai, the club’s fourth owner of the season, in the form of a secured loan. Chainrai is expected to be repaid in full under Andronikou’s company voluntary arrangement (CVA) plan. The club’s total debt is put at around £105m.

However, a further £14m is owed to finance houses which forwarded funds based on transfer fees yet to be received. This debt is considered to be off the balance sheet because it is effectively underwritten by the football authorities, according to the football creditor rule.

According to figures on the Soccernet website, £9m of the £105m debt is owed to 15 agents. In one deal alone, an agent is owed £2.3m. “There are agents and scouts owed over £9m,” Andronikou said. “There are agents such as Pini Zahavi, who is owed £2m, but there is one agent who is owed £2.3m for just one deal alone, the transfer of [Lassana] Diarra. It is staggering. There must be something like 15 agents owed money, which illustrates how the club were buying and selling so many big-name players.”

The breakdown includes: £90m owed to unsecured creditors – of which £38m is due to three previous owners in the form of loans – £5m to trade creditors, and £9m to agents. There is also £1m owed on hire purchase.

“I do not believe that the figures will come as a surprise to anyone who has been interested in buying the club, when they do due diligence it is there for them to see,” Adronikou told Soccernet. “So, for that reason, it is not unexpected, although, of course, the figures are vastly different from what has been reported.

PortsmouthBusinessguardian.co.uk