Everton chairman Bill Kenwright has addressed shareholders over the controversial departure of Dan Gosling for Newcastle United.
Speaking at a Shareholders' Forum at Goodison on Wednesday night, the Chairman responded to a question from the floor about the episode.
He said: "It was a nine month joke of an episode between Gosling's agent and this football club. If you can't rely on people's word and a handshake in this world then we live in a world I don't want to be in."
The Chairman insists that, had the ruling been in the Club's favour, any compensation payment would have been significantly lower than figures quoted in the media.
He added: "The agent said he would never have signed the contract (anyway) but the compensation would have been nothing like the figures quoted in the papers. It was a sad and sorry situation. This Club has been here for well over 100 years and it has never happened before and it will never happen again.
"Why did David Moyes and I go to a hideous tribunal and hear hideous stuff we did not want to hear about how someone did not want to play for this football club? I apologise to anybody who thinks somebody at Everton let them down but I don't think they did."
