Who's the banker in the red?

Meet the new boss… same as the old boss!

West Ham has been “taken over” by CB Holding (CB stands for Claret and Blue), which is in fact a new company set up by Gudmundssons’s main creditors. Which at least avoids Gudmundsson’s holding company Hansa being declared bankrupt and the Premier League docking us nine points, plus another 301 points or so for Tevezgate.

The biggest stakeholder in CB Holding is the Straumur-Burdaras, an Icelandic investment bank, which has appointed its director Andrew Bernhardt as non-executive chairman. CB Holding has supposedly paid £100 million for the Irons, although basically that just seems to mean they’ve knocked £100 million off Gudmundsson’s slate.

At least Bernardt has been making the right noises, assuring fans that there will be investment in new players and the existing structure kept in place.

Only today’s Guardian suggests that Straumur itself is near-Brassic and may be forced into bankruptcy “within 72 hours”, if an Icelandic court doesn’t grant it a six-months extension to an agreement with its creditors. It would thus probably fail the Premier League’s “fit and proper person” test, claims the Guardian.

Still, at least Guddo left with the words: "I will remain forever a West Ham fan and hope I will have many returns to West Ham..."

Thus he joins Bobby Zamora, Sergei Rebrov, Teddy Sheringham, Chris Powell’s dad, Eggert and numerous other stars who as kids dreamed of tiptoeing through the North Bank. Yes, Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson, grew up among the geysers dreaming that one day he'd own his beloved Irons and then, erm, lose £301 million...