Yesterday it was announced that MSP Sports Capital have withdrawn from a proposed investment in Everton representing the latest setback to afflict the club.
To put it mildly, it has not been a good start to the 2023-24 campaign for the Blues with two consecutive defeats, five goals conceded, none scored, more injury problems and now this.
You do feel Everton really are cursed sometimes when you see all this bad luck and ineptitude combined in one football club.
Constant struggles on the pitch, transfer disasters and an almost comical managerial merry-go-round – which has seen seven permanent bosses in charge of the team since Farhad Moshiri took over in 2016 – have been the hallmark of the past five or six years.
The only bright spot in all the gloom that has consumed this Toffees team for so long now, was the new stadium build.
Despite all the endless catastrophies and failures on the football side of things, Everton had managed to get a hugely complex and expensive stadium project off the ground, literally.
The first question to ask is how is it that the people who run things at the club can achieve this, but seem incapable of getting the football side right, no matter how many times they try?
Anyway, the new ground at Bramley-Moore Dock is almost complete but there is now still a need for additional finances to finish things.
This essentially became the case when Moshiri’s pal billionaire Russian Alisher Usmanov, who had put money into the Blues, had to cut his ties with Everton after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year.
Since last year Moshiri has therefore been searching for new investment both for the stadium and the club and after takeover talks last summer led to nothing concrete, eventually he settled on two US-based groups 777 Partners and MSP Sports Capital.
The latter group ended up in exclusive talks with the Toffees owner and earlier this summer it was reported that they had agreed to commit about £130 million in investment capital.
Now, it appears that deal is off.
And while it seemed yet another commentary on the problems and failures of this club, just this evening as I write fresh rumours claim that 777 Partners are back and ready to invest or possibly takeover the club instead, so what is going on at this football club!
One thing you can certainly say is that for all the troubles and strife, it is rarely dull being an Everton supporter.
Whatever the truth about all this investment and takeover talk, the Blues are in desperate need of stability both on and off the pitch and fresh financial resources to secure vitally needed playing reinforcements before it is too late.
The nightmare scenario we can all see potentially happening this season is the Toffees get their stadium built only for the team to be finally relegated to the Championship just in time for it’s opening in 2024.