MOORS FOOT
SOLIHULL Moors director Simon Hawker has refuted Mike Turl’s status as the club’s chief executive and suggestions of a takeover involving current Oxford United owner Darryl Eales.
The double rebuttal comes at the end of a challenging week for the Moors that at least ended well after stadium licensing authority Solihull Council’s Safety Action Group (SAG) gave the go ahead for Tuesday’s home clash with Barrow.
Moors were left kicking their heels eight days ago when National League officials called off their curtain-raiser against Chester after SAG had prevented fans from entering the ground until “required safety systems are in place”.
The saga was shrouded in uncertainty until Friday when SAG and the league confirmed it would go ahead without restrictions.
But Moors still have to contend with an FA investigation into director Turl – the subject of a twoyear ban by the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) which ran until April 2015 – over his Owners and Directors Declaration and the nature of a meeting with a representative of Oxford United.
Hawker confirmed that representative was ‘Us’ owner and chairman Eales, but insisted the meeting had been about prospective loan players and external investment from other parties.
Paperwork
Moors chairman Trevor Stevens last week confirmed Turl had been the club’s chief executive for “three or four years”, a spell that would have overlapped with his BHA ban, but Hawker offered a very different account in an exclusive with The NLP.
“Mike has been a volunteer for some years. He was asked by the then board to help them get out of a hole they were in,” said Hawker, who politely declined to comment on the FA investigation itself.
“He always called himself a volunteer and never held formal office. He only ever worked via the board. Mike never had control of money, nor did he have his name on the chequebook.
“Most of his time was spent