Parry could be sold

Paul Parry could be sold by Cardiff City to help lower their debt situation. Reports in the Welsh media suggest that Stoke City could be interested in the former Hereford United player.

Oatcake, the Stoke City site, has reported the following:

With Cardiff City cashing in on as many players as possible all of a sudden, Stoke have been linked down in Wales with moves for defender Chris Barker and winger Paul Parry, according to Welsh radio reports. Ex Stokie Graham Kavanagh has already made a £400,000 move to Wigan Athletic this morning.

Stoke are short of cover at left-back following the release of Marcus Hall and it's a position Barker did well in covering during his loan spell at the start of the season. Parry meanwhile, described as an aggressive left winger with pace to burn, has also been linked with a move to The Potteries.

Cardiff City are said to be £30m in debt and according to Chris O'Brien of Bluebird to the Bone failed to pay their players and staff last Monday.

The revelations started on Tuesday. Concerned employees of Cardiff City contacted the local press after they had not been paid. Sam Hammam and the club were quick to squash any rumours of a financial catastrophe. The blame was placed on a administrative error, everything was fine, and the players would wake up the next day to a nice boosted bank balance. There was a bad smell - with debts of over £30million, was this just an honest mistake?

24 hours later and fans can now see things are worse. We still don't know the truth, but reading between the lines of hurried press reports, the money troubles at Ninian Park are getting progressively worse. Hammam has drafted in auditors to study the financial problem at the club, jobs are set to be axed and, to boot, we have had another delay in the tedious "building" of our shiny new Leckwith stadium.

With a monthly wage bill of over £750,000, it is hardly surprising that the debt is mounting. Our highest paid player earns £12,000 a week, and though he remains a mystery figure, there is not one single player in the entire squad who deserves that kind of pay cheque. Staff have still not been paid, and the talk of a computer error would appear to be more lies. The club hope to have paid all staff by next week.

Paul Parry was rumoured to be on £8k per week but there is no confirmation of this. Whatever the figure it seems unlikely that he, and all the other players at Ninian Park, will continue to be so well rewarded.

The situation is not unlike that at Hereford in the middle nineties when the club overspent to try and keep their position in the league. In the end, Hereford went into a CVA and it took seven years to get out of it. Cardiff will be very wary of a CVA as they would be deducted ten points and so drop to bottom but one in the Championship.

Cardiff are at home to Sheffield United tomorrow. A good crowd would bring in much wanted cash but with the mood of supporters at boiling point with chairman, Sam Hammam, some may boycott the match causing more cash-flow problems.

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