The break-up of Shelbourne's championship-winning team is set to resume today with Seán Dillon expected to complete his move to Scottish Premier Division side Dundee United. The 23-year-old follows Joseph Ndo, Stuart Byrne, Ollie Cahill and Gary O'Neill out of the club.
The fee for Dillon, reported to be just €20,000, underlines the disarray at the club. His former club, Longford Town, are still owed a small portion of the original fee of €40,000 Shelbourne agreed to pay for him less than a year ago, and they are entitled in turn to a quarter of the sum Shelbourne are set to receive.
To put the sum in perspective, it is only around half of what Shelbourne are entitled to claim from Arsenal under Uefa regulations as their share of the £2 million paid by Sunderland yesterday for Anthony Stokes, who spent four years at the club before leaving at the age of 15.
What the Dillon deal does do is defer, at least briefly, a tribunal decision on whether players still ostensibly under contract at Shelbourne can leave for nothing as a result of a letter provided to them midway through last season by chief executive Ollie Byrne, in which he stated they would be free to depart in the event all future wages payments were not made on time.
Dillon's position was to be the test case on the issue, with Drogheda United and Bohemians chasing his signature. But the focus will now shift to Owen Heary, who looks likely to join Bohemians if he can secure his release.
Byrne continues to contest the validity of the letter, but there is an expectation he will lose the case at a tribunal. His decision to fight the issue has further dented his relationship with the players. Many are reported to be annoyed he refused deals that would have provided funding both for the latter half of last season as well as the campaign to come but which would have obliged him to step aside from his role at the club for 14 months.
Ossie Kilkenny, chairman of the Sports Council and one of the three businessmen who have for some time had an agreement to buy Tolka Park, made the most recent offer to provide the required funding to meet the bulk of the club's wage, tax and PRSI obligations late last year but stipulated Byrne would have no role in spending it. The money advanced, like similar previous payments, was to count against the eventual purchase price for the ground.
Kilkenny's preference was for the club's former chairman, Finbarr Flood, to take effective control until they completed their relocation which, it was anticipated, could be completed within the 14-month period. However, at a meeting before Christmas Byrne refused the money, insisting he had received legal opinion advising him against surrendering control of a club which he owns even for a limited period of time.
"The situation is that there's nothing breaking at present which would resolve the difficulties being encountered by Shelbourne," conceded Byrne yesterday.
Byrne has until the end of March before the next round of licensing will involve further scrutiny of the club's books. Failure to come up with alternatives by then could threaten the club's place in the Champions League qualifiers and leave it open to FAI sanctions.
