Source: Team_Talk
Robson reviewing legal options
Former West Brom and Middlesbrough manager Bryan Robson is taking legal advice over this week's Channel 4 Dispatches programme.[LNB] Robson is alleged to have offered Thailand businessmen advice about getting around strict rules on football ownership.[LNB]The Football Association are monitoring footage before deciding whether to take any action against Robson and his position as a Manchester United ambassador has been called into question.[LNB]On camera, Robson claims: "I disagree with people when they say football is a sport. Football lost its sporting thing when the money started coming in and Sky TV and all that. Football's a business."[LNB]Robson was also acting as an advisor to London Nominees Football Fund - a group that invests in 'football clubs, players, franchises, merchandising and sponsorship'.[LNB]London Nominees were offering to broker the purchase of a club in exchange for a 20% stake and a five percent management fee.[LNB]Robson met what turned out to be a team of undercover reporters alongside his then boss, Joe Sim, chief advisor to the Thailand FA and also involved with London Nominees.[LNB]Sim boasted of his friendship with United manager Sir Alex Ferguson, showed mobile phone pictures of the two together and claimed he could get the Scot to loan players once a club had been bought.[LNB]Ferguson's lawyers have already distanced the Manchester United manager from the programme, claiming Sim has vastly overestimated their relationship.[LNB]Now Robson has had his say and is clearly intent on defending himself in the strongest possible terms.[LNB]"I am aware of (but have not yet seen) the Channel 4 production - Dispatches - How to Buy a Football Club," said the former England captain.[LNB]"I have seen certain newspaper articles written about it and I would like to make certain things clear.[LNB]"I am an advisor to the London Nominees Football Fund and was engaged to provide advice and assistance on the football side of investments only.[LNB]"While it may have been unwise to enter into discussions with unknown parties, much of the footage of me is unrepresentative of the views I expressed during the course of the meeting and has been presented in a way that is totally out of its context.[LNB]"The journalists were repeatedly told by me and others that owning multiple clubs was a breach of the rules and could not be done.[LNB]"I am appalled to learn that footage has been edited to suggest that I was involved in an attempt to try and breach these rules - which is something I would not do.[LNB]"This entire episode is yet another example of some representatives of the media behaving in a totally unacceptable way in the manner in which they obtain and then present information.[LNB]"As a result of this, I am taking legal advice on the way forward."[LNB]Robson is currently with United in Seattle and was accompanied by Red Devils chief executive David Gill in addressing home supporters before their traditional 'March to the Match' ahead of kick-off against the Sounders this evening.
