I'm not impressed with either the interview or the way it's been done. If the Prince/board wanted to set a few things straight they could have released well worded statements through their own outlet. This seems to be a reply to social media, it could be a rant from Facebook Karen.
I don't know whether there is just enough truth in it to be believable, or a lot of truth in it just from a certain perspective, but it will obviously be lapped up by those who already support the Prince in this.
A lot of it simply doesn't ring true though. First of all, let's be clear, this is a seasoned and wealthy businessman who's been in the game a long time - and successful with it. There's nothing naive coming from him and I'd be cautious about believing he's being honest and open. I always keep in mind the ownership wrangle and the court case. He was devious and manipulative and was judged to have been wrong in the trial - where a lot of dodgy carry on was exposed. He was fortunate in that McCabe was more stupid than he was devious and that won him the club, but let's not imagine he's some straight-talking up front guy.
The £4 has been eagerly jumped on. Firstly, it appears it was Wilder's agent who started that one rolling and was probably only an opening position. I didn't know he had one and detest their presence in the game, but at the end of the day it's their job to try for these things. Then the Prince says he wasn't going to pay him it if he resigns, yet we are all still of the opinion that he's been paid off - and with a NDA. So if he did pay him off, how does that sit with the Prince saying you don't get a pay off if you resign? Did he not resign - well then how does that sit with the Prince saying he did?
He is contradictory about the board's involvolvement in recruitment. There is no DoF, no plans for a DoF, but the board are doing essentially what a DoF are doing, except Wilder wouldn't agree to take the players. They were all great players with reasonable costs who are now doing well, but Wilder wasn't interested. Yeah, that plays into certain accusations on social media but doesn't sound right to me. Wilder was in sole charge, yet Wilder himself says Brewster was agreed by everyone and the Prince thinks he's a foundation player for the future. So just all the others then, Brewster's signing followed a different pattern?
Now it appears there is no wage structure, never was. Wages isn't a problem and we pay high wages. And Wilder had a huge amount of money available to him and was in sole charge of who he brought in. So in fact there is practically no reason we couldn't get whoever Wilder wanted to get. (Unless it was in January, of course). Again, this doesn't ring true. All the players we missed out on were because of completely different reasons? Which we didn't hear about and somehow kept hearing that it was financial? Does anyone really believe that?
And as a general, overall picture, Wilder wasn't leaving because he was unhappy with anything apart from his own performances. Right, because that's the general noises Wilder has been making for the last few months. What do people have to say who've been accusing Wilder of never shouldering blame? If this is really true, I would have expected Wilder to have made completely different comments in the lead up to his departure, including a "I'd like to thank the board" moment. But no, nothing, even though he had everything his own way, money to spend aplenty and wasn't unhappy with any of the things currently going around social media.
In fact it was the board who were unhappy with him. They said so in the video conference that was supposed to keep him at the club, which "went well" and then they couldn't understand why Wilder didn't want another conference. Yeah, that all adds up.
That's all just my first impressions on a first listen off the top of my head. As I've said before, I don't think Wilder is completely blameless in his own departure and could have stayed if he'd really wanted to, but to take this video interview at face value and believe everything is itself naive. I don't necessarily think the Prince is deliberately lying, but at best it is a very one sided way of looking at things and at worst it's manipulative and full of half-truths.