Is the ‘Curse of Lembit’ back?

A month ago it was announced that the Daily Sport had hired Lib Dem MP Lembit Opik to be the newspaper’s political columnist; today The Guardian notes under the headline, Daily Sport publisher in financial difficulties:

Daily Sport publisher Sport Media Group’s share price plummeted 40% in early trading today after the company revealed it had broken one of its banking covenants. SMG’s share price had fallen by 3.75p, almost 42%, to 5.25p at 11.30am today, a 52-week low.

The company, which is releasing both a trading update and preliminary results for the year to the end of July tomorrow, said it had been given a two-month extension by its bank on its current finance facility. SMG added that it is seeking to plug the funding breach through discussions with its backers while also looking at other financing options. …

n November the Daily Sport saw its circulation fall 1.64% compared with October, to 77,964 copies. ABC does not publish a year-on-year comparison for the title. In the same month the Sunday Sport saw circulation fall 3.31% month on month and 16.01% year on year, to 76,009 copies.

* the phrase ‘curse of Lembit’ became common currency in 2007 – noted by Lib Dem bloggers Peter Black AM and Jonathan Calder – and was deprecatingly acknowledged by Lembit himself.