Alisher Usmanov said at the weekend that he does not want to be on the board of a "trophyless" club. Perhaps that is because he knows he does not need to be on the board in order to know Arsenal's financial operations in as much detail as any director.
The Russian billionaire has built his stake in the north London club to almost 28.5% in recent days, after putting out an open offer of £14,000 a share. That exceeds the £11,750 a share that Stan Kroenke paid to take his holding to 66.64%, with an offer that closed on Saturday. If Usmanov's offer takes his stake beyond 30%, he will under Premier League rules have the same access to management accounts as any director. And that will mean seeing the wages paid to Cesc Fábregas, Robin van Persie and every other Arsenal player.
When the Premier League rules were written it is unlikely that an intended consequence was to open such access to accounts to minority shareholders whose relationship with their club's owner might be described as strained at best.
However, it is clear that Usmanov will be able to use the rules to gain more insight into the workings of the club than any other fan. The rules state that anyone with a stake of more than 30% is considered to exercise "control" over a club's policies, affairs or management. This confers the right to have access to "brief particulars of each material transaction sufficient to identify its date, its amount and nature". These "material transactions" include all transfer fees, player remuneration and payments to agents and other third parties.
Usmanov is said to believe that by taking his stake above 30% he can "make sure things are done properly".
Hard road for Stortford
As an aftershock of the catastrophe at Rushden & Diamonds, the 137-year-old Bishop's Stortford club has been placed in peril. Diamonds' expulsion from the Conference means that Bishop's Stortford have been forced to switch to the Conference North. Next season will therefore entail the Blues taking total road trips of 6,800 miles, up from 4,052 last season, with several journeys requiring overnight stays. Gates will be hit, as derbies against Chelmsford City, Dover Athletic and Dartford – who each bring between 200 and 300 fans – will not take place. Players will also expect more money, to compensate for time off work. "We are run so tight on the lines in the Conference South that this could tip us over the edge," said the club's football secretary, Ian Ketteridge, who has, understandably, lodged an appeal with the Football Association and the Conference. If the Blues do relocate, the northernmost club in the Conference South will be Boreham Wood. They are inside the M25, so English Football's north-south divide will begin in Watford, rather than Watford Gap.
EA Sports stays in the game
EA Sports, the computer-software developer behind the football games in the Fifa series that have done more than anything else to turn football's world governing body into a household name, appears to be standing by the embattled governing body. Senior EA Sports executives have in the past privately expressed their discomfiture regarding the activities of certain Fifa executive-committee members, but although several such members have now been banned from Fifa, this has not translated into EA Sports deciding to dump the Fifa brand in order to protect its own image. As EA Sports is so proud to say, it's in the game.
Lamb in for Sheepshanks
Keith Lamb, the long-serving Middlesbrough chief executive, will replace David Sheepshanks on the Football Association board, to which Barnet's Tony Kleanthous has been re-elected for a three-year term. Lamb will be the Football League's representative on the board, after the decision was reached at the League's summer conference in Cyprus. Blackpool's Karl Oyston, Shaun Harvey of Leeds United and Colin Sexton of Bristol City will be challenged by a newcomer, meanwhile, to be the Championship representative on the League board. Leonard Brody is a 40-year-old entrepreneur from Canada who became a Coventry City director last November. But Digger gets the feeling his relentlessly upbeat style – as evidenced by his use of Twitter on Tuesday regarding a venture-capital exercise he is promoting: "Yo... Deadline for GrowLab coming up fast. Bring your A game" – might prove to be a little too out there for some of the League's dustier citizens.