• Premier League

Cardiff owner Tan lifts Mackay sack threat

ESPN staff
December 22, 2013
Suarez double leads Liverpool to win over Cardiff


Cardiff City owner Vincent Tan has lifted the sack threat over manager Malky Mackay with Bluebirds chairman Mehmet Dalman telling the official website that he has been charged with finding a solution to the issues at the club.

Mackay's position has come in doubt this week after Tan sent him an e-mail requesting him to stand down or be sacked after the manager said he wanted to try and sign a few more players in January,

During the 3-1 defeat to Liverpool on Saturday, the away fans chanted his name - and held up 'Tan out' banners - with Mackay insisting afterwards that he would not walk away.

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Now it appears that Cardiff are prepared to try and find a solution with Dalman postponing a Christmas holiday to France to rectify the problem.

"My definition of diplomacy is to create space for dialogue," he said. "I have spoken to Vincent Tan and he has agreed I can go into bat to try to bring a solution to this situation.

"The important thing is that we try to find a way through this predicament. There is goodwill on Vincent's side. I've not had a chance to talk to Malky just yet, but I will obviously do that as well.

"We need to have further dialogue to see if we can get through this together for the good of the club, which is the most important thing. We managed to create space for everyone to work together back in October and we have to see if we can do that again in order to move forward.

"At least we have a platform for dialogue, which gives us a chance to try to work our way through this. If we wish to work towards a reconciliation, Vincent Tan has offered us that opportunity to move towards that.

"If it works, it works. If it doesn't, it doesn't. But at least I as a responsible person and chairman of this football club have tried my best. I'm not taking sides in this, I'm just trying to do my best for the good of the club. Let's see if we can fix it.

"We can't keep having the club under a cloud, so this is it. We managed to get two or three months leeway last time and we need to create something similar again. I'm not putting a time scale upon this, but we have to try. If we want to find a way forward, we at least have a platform, a base, from which to work."

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