So if MCFC decided to take response
You have mixed in and around the club, talked to people there. Why do you believe that they do not take action against people in the media responsible for the defamation ?
I've had a number of discussions about this.
Initially it was orders from above and I can see why, as there was no desire to come out with all guns blazing and put the backs of the media up. But we did take action when warranted, including against The Sun for a untrue story that Sheikh Mansour had gifted each player and expensive watch. There was also the story that Mancini had been in the crowd at Hughes' last game.
I was also told that we did a lot of work behind the scenes, so if we weren't happy with a story we'd approach the journalists then their editors. And I'm told there have been cases where there has been substantial sums paid to charities for untrue stories.
There was also a general view that everything would calm down once we were seen as a successful club. Quite clearly there was an astonishing level of naivety over the attitude of our detractors in hindsight, and the level of control and influence they had over people in the media.
The next tactic involved trying to bring selected journalists onside, by giving them more information and generally being more open with them. Sadly those selected journalists appear to have included Nick Harris, Conn, probably Winter and Ziegler, and possibly even Delaney as well. I know they flew Conn out to Abu Dhabi for an exclusive with Khaldoon. That tactic obviously ended badly.
By 2019 the scales had finally fallen from their eyes and one senior club official dragged me into a quiet corner muttering darkly about the US-owned clubs and geopolitics. There were also interesting snippets about specific journalists, including Delaney. He'd turned between us winning the PL at Brighton in 2019 and the FA Cup Final that completed the quadruple. I was told he was definitely being fed his lines by another red-shirt wearing, US-owned club.
I also suspect there's also some reluctance to wield the big stick as we don't want any unfavorable comparisons with press freedom in the UAE. But, as I've said before, we should be publicly acting against stuff likr the baseless and unsubstantiated vitriol put our by Herbert. Make him justify his allegations about us wanting to destroy financial regulation in football in a courtroom. That's not stifling the freedom of the press. The other shills would think twice if we did that.
