friesWhen you cut to the core of why fans are frustrated by the protracted takeover of Leeds United, it’s not because they believe Massimo Cellino is saviour in waiting, a man who will invest heavily to guide us to the promised land. Not for most fans, anyway. We’ve heard all the promises before and until actions follow the comments, it’s not worth getting our hopes up.

No, the reason fans are so desperate for the takeover (any takeover) to be completed is because the financial situation at Elland Road is a precarious one, the club are haemorrhaging vast amounts of money every month and few believe the current owners have the means (or the will) to keep us afloat.

David Haigh’s move to address concerns about the club’s financial well-being yesterday was utterly tragic. The Managing Director of Leeds United tried to explain to the Yorkshire Post how his £2m loan to the club demonstrated the healthy situation the club is in, which is like trying to explain to the fire service that the blazing inferno in front of them is ‘under control’ because you’ve just poured petrol on it.

In fairness, Haigh was trying to use the £2m loan he’s provided the club with as evidence of his own belief in our future, but that doesn’t explain how we’ll make future wage payments and why he’s putting his faith in owners he no longer works directly for (GFH) who haven’t paid the club’s wagebill themselves in months.

At this point, I don’t know whether I should be more concerned by GFH’s absence (where is our chairman these days?) or David Haigh’s faith in them?

Haigh’s interview with the YP did serve to shed some light on his past however. In an explanation as to how he learnt the value of money, Haigh claims to have worked for McDonald’s as a manager at 16 years of age. Now I’m not familiar with McDonald’s operations and they do appear to have an incredibly young workforce, but no company on earth gives that amount of responsibility to a school-leaver, do they?

I work in a retail management position myself (I actually train, develop and often hire managers these days) and find it difficult to believe McDonald’s don’t have similar policies to our own. Some of the courses we require our managers take (especially the Health & Safety ones) are 18+. Maybe that’s a company specific policy, but there’s also a progression factor to becoming manager. You don’t just hire someone at 16 and make them manager, they’d be promoted to a Senior CSA, followed by Supervisor and Assistant Manager first. That’s just common sense.

And if Haigh was the manager of a fast food restaurant, why the hell does it take so long to get served at Elland Road?

But I digress, whether our Managing Director’s CV features a few white lies and whether he really was the greatest burger-flipper McDonald’s have ever seen is a matter for another day, Leeds United have more pressing concerns, chief among them being March’s wagebill.

I’m not going to excuse the performances of our players and manager these last couple of months, if they weren’t footballers they’d have been justifiably fired for poor performance weeks ago, but concerns about their own future must be weighing on their minds.

On the one hand we have David Haigh claiming the club have money despite them needing loans to pay for things, then we have Cellino saying he’s no longer willing to bankroll the club until his takeover is confirmed and these concerns are then compounded by the total absence of those supposedly in charge.

Forgive me if your words sound hollow Mr Haigh, but as reassuring statements go, yours is akin to McDermott telling us our defence will be fixed by the reintroduction of Roque Junior.