Thetownend.com

Knock yourselves out :)

Not sure these are advisory board issues, trust issues, or unrealistic questions:

- Can we have explanation of the 20-21 accounts. If possible what are the terms of the debenture and "other loans" and when do they come repayable. [trust are on this]

- Who are kerachi FC. Who is funding this venture

- Is the non-playing budget being reduced 22-23

If John has 3 apples and Jane has 2 bananas, who won the cup in 1952?

Just giving us an idea on how the overall playing budget compares to last season while we were under embargo will answer a lot of concerns I think.

Do you mean Karachi?

:facepalm:

Indonesia, Pakistan, easy mistake to make

What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

No, she went of her own accord  ;D

24mph or 11 meters per second😀

It was said last night on the Supporters Club FB thing that next season's budget is more 'comprehensive' than last season's and that it is 'not a reduced budget' and that it will fund a 'larger squad'. I don't think that you'll get more specificity than that.

Fits in with what has been said then. Its a larger budget but will be used to fund more players, so still explains some players being offered reduced terms.

Of course you can.
- the non-playing budget remains the same/less/more
- the playing budget has increased (as stated)

Job done. Move on. But that's not exactly what was said.

And no I'm not demanding an answer before some jackarse goes down the "entitled" route. In all honesty unless there were brutal cutbacks its probably the least pressing question (other than for employees) given the playing budget is up.

As long as the extra players are quality ones and not here just to make the numbers up.

player recruitment - that's just business as usual.

I would rather have a smaller squad with quality than a big squad with players that aren't really good enough

Last season that approach prevented us from going up.

Obviously the plan would be to get a bigger squad of similar quality

A doorman size midfielder too.

That's not Garners...oh wait. Yeah one of those too.

I agree a smaller squad may have stopped us going up but others will argue it was more down to the mangers tactics and the failure to change things in alot of the home games.

I hope that we do get a bigger squad with quality but I'm sceptical if the budget will stretch that far but fingers crossed.

But he was limited with what tactics he could use and how he could change it because we had a smaller squad.  Let's face it, the team in the last 7 games picked itself and there were very few changes he could make due to the size of the squad he had.

Agreed and preference would be for a bigger squad as long as the finances stretch for extra quality players

Both of those things, for me.

The squad overall was good enough on its travels

Are the supporters trust able to go on record and say they have no concerns about the number of alleged and actual convicted criminals that exist ‘in and around’ board level.

- What is the status of ZA owers & directors test? Is he a board member?

- With regards to Karachi FC, ZA states 'this is costing our club and me a lot of money' in the below video, how much are the club putting towards this venture?

https://youtu.be/F-J_biGni9Y


- What is Adam Harts role at the club?

Who are Sweden Town?
https://youtu.be/F-J_biGni9Y
Seems a bit tin pot this

Did the woman at the start call him ‘Xavier Morfuni’?

The bloke at the ground called him what sounded like 'Xavier More-due-day'.

I thought Austin sounded AWFUL! Very arrogant and dismissive.
Alex Pike on the other hand - What a great representative of the club! Spoke very well I thought.

seconded

Thirded. The whole thing stinks of dodgy doings. Can you imagine the fallout on here if Pee Lower had set this up. Don’t like the sound of it’s costing the club a lot of money, would rather as a club we just invested in our own team and stadium than spunking it off on some not at all dodgy overseas project.

I am not going as far as dodgy doings

but the timing is well weird.

pay off debts, get the ground purchased, put excess into stadium and squad for now.

once that's done then look at links.

Also whats the chances of any of the 2 players making it.

I think the work permit issues may prevent it as things stand?

other than that, if they're good enough ...

it's also a good thing to do for their community.

but I've made my actual concerns as above.

From what i have heard and obviously you don't have to believe it but this isn't being paid for by the club

Zav had misspoken again!

probably needs clearing up through official channels.

well it's a bit odd if it's being funded by an individual, but as long as the club or fitc aren't dipping into pockets it's a start

Does anybody know of any Pakistani footballers who've made it professional? Anywhere in the world? I can't find one.

If this is all being done with good intentions, we obviously think there's kids over there with talent that don't get the opportunity to be coached and given an opportunity.

But with Karachi being the biggest city in Pakistan, surely if this had any legs, a much bigger club than us would already be all over this?

Even IF we are onto something here, how long until we reap the rewards? 4 or 5 years? why are we doing this now when we can't even bring a football league calibre player off our bench.

Seems dodgy to me. Not a fan so far.

My thoughts exactly, why haven't any of the big Premiership clubs tapped into the talent.

I’m all for thinking outside the box, but the whole thing is farcical.

It’s not a priority. It’s a waste of time, waste of money and because it doesn’t stack up, we’re right to be sceptical.

But with Karachi being the biggest city in Pakistan, surely if this had any legs, a much bigger club than us would already be all over this?

India like Pakistan are in real terms and measured against western economies are both relatively poor. Their demographics are such that those who can afford to buy into the premiership marketing machine % of population wise is very small. Plus competing with cricket and hockey makes it a market that is not worth trying to buy into. Plus the sponsors of PL clubs (alcohol and betting) is frowned upon certainly within the Muslim population. Is my guess. £50 for a replica shirt not withstanding is probably a years income for many.

Do not suggest anything that goes against the club, nothing negative or you will get shouted down, you cannot say anything against clem or zavi at all

this is opening the top of a can of worms, the trust need to be asking many of these questions mentioned on this and other posts, not saying clem and angus are part of any bad things but the rest are fair game

not anti clem at all but definately zavi has many questions that need answering

also why is all this happening now? surely its a bit ambitious for a club recently under new ownership making links with a country that has no footballing heritage? its all a bit weird, the arrogance of zavi is upsetting

Not sure anyone has anything against asking questions but it's when people post stuff that is happening that hasn't happened people try and be balanced. For what it's worth i don't think it's a great idea but nothing more than a  project for Austin who will no doubt try and benefit like Fitton did with any prospects he finds and sells on

thats forums are for tho, all fans speculate

thats fair and yes i agree i think there could be money in it for zavi somewhere

Very true, no need to get personal with people over these things i agree

If it was just Alex Pike there then I don't think there would be anywhere near as much noise about this.   

I know what you mean but I don’t think he came across TOO awfully. His ‘you understand magic wand?’ quip was definitely rather cringe.

DO. YOU. SPEAKAH. DA. ENGLISH?

It’s very odd how few Pakistani players or those from other countries in South Asia/Middle East have made it anywhere near the upper echelons of the game. In all British sport, in fact. Amir Khan is the only British Asian I can think of who became prominent (outside of cricket) from the top of my head.

Almost forgot our very own Iraqi Pirlo for a second then.

Talking of the Iraqi Pirlo, I found this on YouTube. 2:00 is one of my very favourite Swindon goals ever. On his day, the guy was something else.

https://youtu.be/42KRO0aRplk

Yes, that was one of the things I was on about, but I also didn't like some of the words.

It was very 'American' in a way. Talking up 'home' and how good things are back here, while talking down facilities.

I’ve rewatched it and must now take back my earlier comment. He came across like a complete cunt

Decent post and of course where is Mr Standing in all of this?
Season over and going to wait and see the outcomes rather than speculate. Will be interesting to see the calibre of Manager and players we are going in for.
Equally who is staying on the terms offered.

Alex Pike is just doing his job to the best of his ability, came across fine.

But regardless, how people come across is surely not the biggest point here

as a paying trust and OSC member id hope these things are being questioned...'ive heard ZA is funding it' doesnt cut it for me... black and white are the club funding anything at all here, yes or no would be good to clear up... presumably AP works for the club so expenses aside, the time hes spending out there on this project is time the club is losing out on his services in Wiltshire and at a cost to the club.

if the club are fully or part funding it, then hounding fans for refunds and a 400% suggested increase in certain concession pricing sits even more uncomfortably than it already did for me.

its fine to want Clem and Co to be the real deal, whilst also asking probing questions given everything weve been through over the years... after all if there is nothing to hide then theres no such thing as an awkward question. the narrative that anyone questioning the ownership is a troublemaker that is developing is dangerous IMO.

Zesh Rehman, British Pakistani defender from the mid 00s made a decent career for himself. Not many, for sure.

Otis Khan as well, done ok in L1 & L2.

That's not quite what I meant.     Zav comes across as a bit dodge and his background rightly makes everyone sceptical of anything he may be involved with.  The fact he's fairly unlikeable and has a big gob adds to that.

If he wasn't involved and it was led by the scouting and coaching team then we may all just see it as a bit of a punt.  Still question the costs, priority etc but not the intentions.

But he is so everyone's backside is twitching.

oh I see

I think I'd still question the timing, but yeah I guess the 'something fishy' aspect would be largely gone.

British Indian of course but Malvind Singh-Benning from Port Vale is doing pretty well.

Edit: And yep, Zav, Xav (whatever) comes across as a right cunt. On a par with the Pashunn man. Stinks more than unflushed longdrop!

I think the Austin thing needs a full explanation now as there’s so much conjecture and hearsay, my questions are:

1. He’s been around for he club for years so what was his role in the Power years?
2. Does he have an invested interest in the club or can it it be categorically confirmed he has no financial interest in the club?
3. We were told Austin was going through the fit and proper persons test but it has been radio silent on that since, has he passed or failed? If he has failed then the question needs to be asked is it appropriate he is involved in the club?
4. Can the Karachi thing be fully explained, Austin says himself he’s only been to Pakistan a handful of times so how has it come about, it seems odd if he has no real links to the country. How will it will benefit the club? How it is being paid for? How will it get around work permits and actually allow any players to play for the club?
5. Finally can the relationship with Adam Hart be explained. It goes beyond Mcfarlane Training Systems as Austin & Hart were business partners well before Mcfarlane were involved in the club and Clem had ownership. Can they understand why it looks iffy on the face of it having 2 convicted criminals, having been guilty of similar offences now involved with the club.

Can the Trust not release their due diligence research on Austin?

And the fact Pakistan is quite the route for some other "grade" of quality too...

Really didn't want to go down that route and get vilified on here but whilst people can change and do good, can a leopard (whilst holidaying on business in Karachi) really change it's spots?  :hmmm:

A different bag but what happened to the Glen Hoddle Academy in Spain. Is it still going and have there been any success stories where players have had careers at English clubs.

Couldn't work with English Clubs as it was third party ownership like the Tevez situation (which he said in his book) All over after being told that.

Cheers I couldn't remember

He stated he has never invested any money on the Monday night panel interview (I think) and nothing is on companies house as being a director/owner. 

Who knows what he was doing under the Power years?  He was one of Power's mates, who liked to be assosciated with a football club.

You can not be an investor in the club but still pay for things though

Diamindis ran the club and was not only not a director he was actually banned from being a director. What companies house says is irrelevant, he’s been around for years so does he have a vested financial interest in the club?

Your question was does he have a invested interest in the club - he has said no.  I'm not sure what else you actually expect?  

Rob/Clem are in control of the club, you have transparency for example on the debt front which has decreased by nearly £3m.  

Well the email from the trust today at least made it clear that not all fan groups or platforms are considered part of the "Let's work together" message.

It should be changed to "Let's work together, unless you want to challenge us or question our methods"  Starting to question my membership of both the Trust and OSC tbh, i am not sure that they really do represent all fans, only the ones that will accept what the club want to do without question.

For those that want to read, as not everyone on here are members..

Welcome to our June
TrustSTFC Newsletter
Hi Paul
I hope you’re having an enjoyable Jubilee bank holiday weekend, and with the extra couple of days off it's a chance to send you our first newsletter in a while.

We look back on the season just gone with great pride; our team did well to get within a penalty kick of Wembley and off the field it's been a complete transformation, as we now have an owner that respects the supporters, and a chief executive who is a Town fan himself, someone who understands the importance of the local community.

New faces on the Trust board
On the Trust side we've seen a lot of change. Once the dust had settled on the court cases last year, several board members dropped away including long serving Trust board member Cliff Ponting. Cliff always did a great job for us and we recognised him as a “Trust Hero” at our AGM.

Prior to that AGM Stuart Woollard our new secretary created a new and improved recruitment process which saw lots of new faces emerge onto the board, all from our existing membership.

We've always been an honest, open and transparent organisation and anyone who wants to get involved and commit their own time to helping our football club thrive is welcome to do so, it was therefore great to see an excellent response and some really impressive board applications.

We had a very slick Trust operation in the year just gone, where everybody understood their role, and we’ve now strengthened our ranks significantly with some great expertise coming onto the board.

Just like with football teams though it's not easy when there are so many personnel changes in such a short space of time, but we are making good progress and I’m confident we will do some great stuff this year.

Obviously, lots of new people have come in with ideas, and our initial board meetings have been about ensuring everyone has a role to play and something to own. We might make a few mistakes as we are still finding our feet a little, but I’ve been really impressed with the energy, enthusiasm and professionalism that all of the new faces have brought to us.

You will hear from them all soon.

The Year Ahead
We have a packed agenda for the year ahead which includes the County Ground purchase, and a new and improved website that will include fresh ideas and details about owning a share of the County Ground. At this moment there are still legalities that need to be finalised and these things take time however, as soon as the purchase has been completed we will be issuing details on how the share scheme will work.

We’ve got the Don Rogers statue to come and we will share more on that when we can, and we are also working with Swindon Town, the OSC and historians on our long-standing ambition to have a Club Museum. There are lots of ideas around improving our engagement with supporters, ways to generate additional income that will support other work including new environment and sustainability initiatives, and ideas to help get a more diverse and inclusive matchday experience, reaffirming our full commitment to developing the next generation of Town fans. We’re also going to continue to support Swindon Town women and look to work with charitable organisations around the Town and wider area.

On top of all that, we have other board members who are going to step up and start to communicate more regularly with you. Our aim is to involve our members all the way throughout this coming year, as without your support we wouldn’t be able to achieve anything.


Let's Work Together
Back in 2017 at our AGM, we made a plea to the club, the council, the supporters and the local media to work together and help this football club get back to where it belongs. “Let’s Work Together” was our rallying cry and in the last year we’ve seen that come to life, it’s been fantastic.

The club have been open with supporters throughout the year, answering questions on anything. I know from feedback outside in wider football circles that the Advisory Board minutes are something unique, the level of open communication is unbelievable to some. I don’t think we can ask for any more there.

The local media, like Swindon Advertiser and BBC Wiltshire have been excellent, reporting on things accurately and keeping STFC at the front of minds. Special mention to Jonny Leighfield at the Adver who I know works really hard to keep everyone informed, and also to Andrew Hawes at the BBC, who’s commentary and handling of post-match interviews has always been spot-on. 

On the Council front, we’ve obviously worked well with them in the last year, with the County Ground sale being approved and they have been very supportive overall throughout the lengthy discussions over the years.


The Sir Tom Broadbent Lounge
New media has also emerged and the recent addition of “The Sir Tom Broadbent Lounge” on Twitter has given lots of supporters a voice, through their regular ‘phone-in’ style interviews. 

Mark Hanrahan is one of the co-hosts, and a much-valued Gold-level Member of the Trust. His positivity shines through and so to see this new fan venture get off to such a great start was not a surprise.

If you haven’t tuned in yet, it’s well worth a listen and the recent interview with ex-CEO Nick Watkins was superb. (click here to listen to it) and you can access the old shows on Twitter (via @Safehandsstfc1) or catch-up through the other media platforms like YouTube, Audible, Spotify etc. 


The Official Supporters Club
Our relationship with the Supporters Club is probably the best it’s ever been and in years gone by (before my time) that was not always the case. We’ve collaborated and shared costs on a number of matchday related items that have really helped the club and the team, and it’s a great example of how we can make a difference when we stay positive and work towards common goals.  You can sign up and support their work via the OSC website.

Crowds were up dramatically, and in those last few games of the season it felt like the penny dropped for supporters – if we give plenty of vocal support on a match day, the team respond. Town fans form the final piece of the ‘Let’s Work Together’ winning formula.   

We have to keep working on that matchday experience, as it will make all the difference. It didn’t get us promoted this time, but we were close, and if we keep this momentum up off the field, we will soon see results on the field.


Finally, I wanted to say thanks on behalf of the entire Trust board to our new Joint Vice-Chairs of the Trust, James Spencer and Alex Pollock, who continue to be our main faces when it comes to fan engagement via the Official Supporters Club ‘On the Sofa’ events. 

It’s not easy to be on camera facing random questions with hundreds or even 1000+ watching and listening to your every word, but these two do a great job. 

Behind the scenes, we do ask the questions that supporters want asked, challenge the football club when they need to be challenged, and we try to relay feedback to the fans. The club has been inherited with many ongoing issues, and so it’s often difficult to pass on messages due to possible legal implications. It’s a delicate balancing act on what can be said and what can’t be said in the public domain, but these two get it just right. 

Alex and James will also continue to represent us at the Advisory board, and so if you have anything you’d like raised, please let us know via email [email protected] or via Twitter/Facebook (where Direct Messages work just fine).

Thanks for reading but as mentioned earlier, this is just a starting point - we are looking to increase communications to our membership, so you can expect further emails to arrive soon, with more Trust related updates.

Cheers,
Steve
 
Steve Mytton
Chairman, TrustSTFC

Honestly, I can’t see where you are coming from. Who are you saying they don’t represent?

I assume the absence of ls pod recognition and the interference of that being due to dare to ask questions.

not sure if that's correct (Bernie)

. not sure if that's the trust's intention even if I have interpreted it right

I’d be very interested to understand how you have gained the impression that the Trust “accepts everything the club wants to without question”?

Meh, I certainly don’t agree with everything the Trust do/have done but I don’t see what’s wrong with that email..

The fans and groups that question things, it seems to me they are quite often given short shrift and not much in the way of answers to those questions.  A few examples being, the Man City price hike, due dilegence of Xavier and his mates, the proposed ticket price rise after releasing ticket pricing..

I realise that this is the whole reason for this thread but it seems to me that the trust are more aligned with the club now when they should be aligned with the fans and working on the fans behalf instead of the club.  Some actions that I have seen from members of the trust recently have reinforced my view on this, am not going to go into details but I did not like what I saw.

If "Let's work together" is indeed the mantra, then surely that should include all fans that have questioned things and have been asking for a while, and should also include groups like GW Reds and LSPOD to name a couple.  It's no coincidence to me that these groups are potentially ones that would be more willing to question things at the club and these are the ones that don't get mentioned in the newsletter as part of that working together - it is clear that they only want what they see as positive influences involved - which in my eyes is a potentially dangerous president based on previous experiences with owners..

Berni, I think you know I have questioned this at several times earlier on. My gut feeling always was that since the RA move from Trust to CEO, the Trust has become purely an accepting mouthpiece and channel for Clem. I still think they hopped into bed too soon. It all feels a bit Nick Clegg with the Tories. Ugh.

I've stated it several times here, whenever there has been a question or a challenge, it often seems to be met in "defence" of the Club not to enact and take that forward and to then question the Club. That's not the role of the Trust to defend the club each time (I believe that's the Club's role). Yes, be a channel  or conduit to communicate but they are not meant to be mouthpiece/Spokesperson/outward PR for the Club. They need to realise their actual role because right now they've become far too "in bed" and lines are now becoming more blurred in this regard. There is less alignment to the fan base but this is the role the Trust should and always should play.

To be honest Chang, I can smell the spin dripping off that letter from here and as with many things, several often swallow it all up before it's too late; like a modern version of Romeo & Juliet ;)

The "Let's Work Together" mantra should maybe be changed to "Let's Say Yes And Not Notice The Elephant In The Room Together"

The Trust have lost their purpose currently, there is a blurred line between them, the OSC and the club.  They are obviously enjoying working closely with the club but it has come at a cost to their independence and objectivity, they are basically doing what I would expect the OSC to do normally.

I think a few Trust board members such as James Spencer need to step away from social media for a while as they really aren’t showing the Trust in a great light currently IMO and getting beyond defensive when questions are asked.  

Spot on

100 percent agree they have seemed alot more defensive lately. Still unsure though apart from that what they seem to have done wrong really. As far as i understand it the questions have now been answered that people want answering, if the Karachi and Hart questions are not answered that people seem to want by next advisory then yeah i get it but what is it they are not doing at the moment

This isn't me being argumentative either just intrigued to what some people see that i don't, and vice versa tbf. Maybe i am being blind to it myself

Allowing themselves to be used as the communication point to fans (in particular when bad news needs to be delivered) I would prefer to see them challenging bad news where possible on behalf of the fans.

Wearing the club hat when changes that would affect fans are proposed, such as price increases.  As a fan organisation you would expect the first reaction to price increases (whether for a special match or season pricing) to be no, but allow us to work with you on what might work to keep everybody happy.  Sending out a poll on twitter to gauge fan reaction and manage any potential fall out is not the way these things should be done.

Working day to day at the club answering emails and all of the other stuff that was stated online etc.  this all points towards them having the clubs best interests at heart over the fans.  I get it that sometimes things are in both sides interests, which is fine, but when the next thing comes along that isn't in the fans interest, the trust will find themselves in a difficult position to then pull the covers back and stand there supporting the fans, potentially against the clubs wishes.

For me it's not so much the Trust per se. I can see they are "triers", and there's nothing wrong with that. For me it's seemingly that Clem has played a masterstroke in appointing  RA as CEO; it's tugged at the heartstrings of several. On the surface that's a wonderful bit of PR but it has meant the Trust are appearing to vehemently nod and smile (I know James has said different but I don't fully buy it) all whilst ignoring bigger questions posed from the fanbase.

It's easy to address things like the continuation of physical programme sales and giving an 108 yr old the keys to SN1 for life and suchlike. Of course these things should be put forward and ensured the Club notices and then actions them. But when things become a little murky and more serious questions need to be fronted this is also where the Trust come in. Currently, they appear to have responded but responded as if they represent the Club and not representing a fan/supporter of the Club.

The guilt tripping from the off regarding season ticket renewals was such a red flag for me right at the beginning. I've continued stating I personally feel it doesn't look good but the Trust spun it to make it look like we were "all in this together". They essentially backed the Club stance (or rolled over) and if you didn't comply, then it made the fan/supporter look a bit of a cunt (it's moot as to whether they already were or not ;) ).

The short form in all of this is (and it's possibly regarding the CEO appointment) most of the time it's best not to mix business with pleasure. For me Clem knows what he was doing there and it's in no way detrimental to RA skills in business etc. I just feel that with him there it's given more time to the likes of Clem (and Xav/Zav) to crack on with whatever they are REALLY doing because on the outside, fans (and likely the Trust) will think "oh it's ok RA is there, we're in safe hands".

I would go as far as saying something else but I would rather discuss that one with my solicitors first :)

This escalated quickly - so what do you REALLY think Clem is up to?

Well I knew I'd get slated - especially on here; that's nothing new. Can you categorically say you have zero concerns?

To answer your question...It could be anything but I would hazard a guess it might not be in the best interests of STFC and more likely in the interests of Formuni and anyone connected to Formuni (what an ironic anagram).

Slated?  Seems like sensible questioning.   
You're answer is essentially saying  "he owns Swindon town so he must be dodgy."   

We all get that but it's not rational.   

It's more rational than anything coming out of our incumbent government's mouth at present (or ever) but then again, that bar is fucking low.

But actually my answer didn't say that, those are your words or at the minimum they are your interpretation of my words. I've simply stated his interests are more likely for himself or those connected to him.

Would hardly be a shock would it?! Headline: Businessman is ruthless in making profit for himself...

Where my issue lays is that I'd rather that not happen whilst it's under ownership of STFC. As fans we've every right to be uber cautious and extra scrutinous - theory being, we've seen it all before.

I'm still not clear on what you REALLY think Clem is up to, if you are implying he is trying to make a profit? Then i've no issue with that as to make a profit he would have to get STFC up the leagues.

I'm not sure I how 'slated' you, I don't have any serious concerns, no.  Maybe I'm more of a glass hald full than empty kind of guy.

Its not an outrageous comment.

No fucking way is it as simple as he fell in love with the club so he bought it. There's clearly an opportunity to make money somewhere, be it getting the club ship shape and flipping for profit or from the CG redevelopment...  which I don't have an issue with as long as the club is preserved and not run into the ground i'm more than happy for CM to gain from it.

My biggest, unsubstantiated, fear is that Clem isn't the true owner and just a puppet/ friendly face with limited skeletons to be the front man. People like ZA being involved and rumours of Standings continued involvement do little to ease these fears.

The last point I can understand, as that is what LP did but even in that case he wasn't a puppet.  The difference for me is that Clem has a business which actually generates profit and has stated that they will provide transparency, while actually delivering transparency on mutliple fronts.

Lots of clubs have ‘front man’ owners with the finance coming from behind the scenes. The piss stains have the little Thai fella fronting for some kind of consortium funnelling the money.

I have no idea if Standing is still in the shadows - that may become clearer once the court case with Power is settled. But let’s be clear, without his supposed £6m he put in God knows what Power would have done. Obviously had no qualms about putting the club in admin if it suited him.

And you’re right, what independent means did Power have to run a club/own racehorses.

Latest minutes Klaxon.

I see Greg Norman has taken time off from sportswashing in golf to file our accounts.

Nice one. Will read now. Hopefully the questions asked in this have all been addressed. Otherwise, what’s the point? Then it really does reinforce it being a tick box.

4,200 season tickets sold so far.

The first thing I noticed! Good to see he's been 'putting' in the accounts on time.

Alleged debts in respect of Mercedes continue to be discussed.... has this been mentioned previously?

Was about to post the very same thing. Perhaps this is the mysterious new debt Zav Austin alluded to?

Nothing much else stands out in there, apart from Jaybox getting himself an invite!

Surely our very own Rich Pullen from the Loathed Strangers Pod should be in line ahead of Cockbox?

Really solid number, in my opinion.

Getting a bit silly now. I don't know if it's just me but it doesn't come across very professional just having random people on the advisory board / attending meetings just to appease supporters.

Yeah that's really positive numbers to be fair. I had a feeling it would be less than that so it's good to read such good news.

100%

How many did we get to in the season where Fitton & Co made them about 1/2 price. (You only need to attend about half the games to make it cost effective)

I know they were aiming at 6k, but didn't actually hit that target.

none the wiser here then.

Please, no more flags  :suicide:

I don't think that is going to happen anytime soon after some recent Pods asked some pertenant questions about the trusts positioning with the club. LSPOD is probably still on the naughty step.  Some people won't want to invite people that might ask relevant but difficult questions.

Unsure what the number was before the season started last season. I'd heard 4,500 mentioned but that may have included half season tickets later in the season.

With prices going up and the situation around no card payments, getting close to that again has to be a result.

We could be on for some sort of record for the past couple of decades, if we manage to go up with card payments back in play.

Me too - that is great stuff at this stage, even before we have a manager or any confirmed new/existing players

I am pretty certain I remember either 4300 or 4700 last year..

He (cockbox) certainly doesn't ''represent'' me as a fan.

Within the notes it says that they hope to have all 4500 renewed before gen sale on the 18th June.

At least I thought I read that.....

Not sure anyone bar the Trust and OSC should be on it, fuck where do you stop if you go down that route, inviting the Facebook group to attend the meetings, a rep from TEf?

The general goal is to get representation from all parts of the fanbase, I think Jay is (from the way I read it, I don't know him) a one-off invitation. Whatever else you might think of him, he clearly does represent a part of the fanbase and is willing to put effort into organising stuff rather than just sniping from the sidelines. If they rotated that spot between various pods/groups/forums then I think that would be fine.

Mostly because I now absolutely want to make them invite FlammableBen to an advisory board. Go on Rob Angus, you know it makes sense. I'm only half joking - we might be a bunch of prats for the most part, but we are representative of a decent size chunk of the fanbase.

That will be the plan, let's get Rich on there

Jay's done a lot of work with the club recently regarding foodbanks and getting flags & displays done so he's well known to them. Don't think it's a regular thing. Also he's been helping with The Sir Tom Broadbent Lounge Twitter space and that's become fairly popular recently.

Think it's a good idea to have Rich & his contributors involved as well to be honest. Particularly as they've had some feedback recently, I'd be interested to hear them raise their concerns.

Just a thought - but if everyone gets a turn on the AB, then wouldn't we all be potentially getting too close to the club and end up toeing the party line, as we'd all receive the same facts at the same time.   

Surely we'd all prefer being a bunch of moany (mainly old) cunts and make shit up on here all day.

Why is JayBox being invited, who does he represent ? surely the Trust & SC are the correct ones as they represent their members and are answerable to their members, not sure I can see the benefit of sponsors wanting to come along.

Surely at these meetings certain things are discussed that are not for further public consumption at the time (for various reasons) and the invitation of these various people will stop that happening as they are unknown and cant be trusted for confidentiality.

He represents the people!

(https://www.pmlive.com/__data/assets/image/0010/1193752/hand.jpg)

In his own head.

I bet he's jizzing in his pants. Always looking for attention from players.

It's a no from me.

It does literally explain this in the minutes. He's been invited as a representative of the Sir Tom Broadbent Lounge (a Twitter fan group thing). The implication is further fan groups will be invited in later months and presumably rotated. The Trust and OSC have a regular invitation already.

What about the TEF World Cup Stunners Group?

Referring back to earlier posts, I do hope there is no genuine antipathy towards the (perfectly reasonable, measured) observations on the LS pod about the Trust’s governance and interaction with the club. I say that having been an orange hat / back of Arkells Diamandis basher, and Trust member. We’re very lucky to have the LS pod. Rich has always let the guests (fans, players, former players) take centre stage, just as a good commentator only speaks when they’re adding something. If the intention is for the club to engage with these channels, don’t go and exclude one just because they’ve put up a fair challenge. That constructive feedback should be welcomed.

Another fun past time ruined by the joyless modern society. RIP.

It sounds like noone is going to be excluded and it will soon have to be held in legends lounge.

Any media outlet can request interviews and ask questions directly, they are there primarily to entertain and are accountable to no-one.   The trust and OSC have hundreds of members some of whom will listen to the pods but I suspect the majority don't.

I'm not sure that the the AB was ever intended to be a press conference type of forum or a free for all, do we really want it to turn into question time?

Agreed, it is odd why they want to invite random fans just because they do a podcast type thing on twitter (not knocking LS as Rich has been doing it a long time and they are decent), the tom broadbent one for e.g. is fairly new, certain subjects and answers will surely have to be held back due to confidentiality.

Isn't that JayBox fella the one that used to brag about being in touch with Clem years ago before the takeover (and it turned out he used to message him on linked in) ?

Let's all go and start a twitter group and get invited along, maybe the mods from TEF can be invited as well to represent the TEF.

To me it takes away what the advisory board is supposed to be about and belittles it's existence slightly, be interesting to hear the Trust take on it as they ok'd it.

Maybe the bigger sponsors can add something as chances are they are high up in their business, or will it be inviting Bill the cleaner as well (no offence meant) because he is a lifetime fan can afford sponsorship.

Not the club, no..

Never going to ask any questions that might risk harming the cushy little relationship!

Why are Lee Power, Taylor Curran etc on that thank you plaque the club has put up?

seriously?

I mean did they have season tickets they didn't claim back? I guess testing everyone the same if so, but a bit odd to say the least

Yep they are on there, seen for myself. See it as a bit of a joke personally!

Don't panic chaps. It was reported earlier that it's a different Lee Power. I think it was mentioned at the Trust AGM or a Supporters' Club Monday night panel.

There can’t be another Taylor Curran…

Standing in on there as well.

Where is the plaque located ??

Townend wall next to the centre gate.

given it a bit of time to digest

I've no problem with Jay the person, seems a heart in the right place type and also be likes BBQ food so he can't be bad.

But I'm not  sure putting someone who is friends with Clem, or at least in contact with him is really adding to the objectivity of the board.

interesting he's been rebranded away from the great Western reds too.

I guess I consider the AB fun part information and cooperation, and part holding club to account. the latter isn't really very strong.

sponsors, yeah I guess they may add to commercials side of things but again it's this AB business.

I guess at least it's better in many ways to the power era.

it is it a different fan representative per meeting (rotating guests)?

if so, ignore the above

It's not absolutely clear but that's the implication as I read it. Would hope so - should probably be inviting the disabled supporters group and the LGBT one before random fans but no real issue with rotating.

yeah, rotation fine. at least fair anyway.

if the trust won't ask questions publicly I look forward to the two fans forums that the club should hold this season

Tansmedia getting an invite soon i hope

yes, it's one cunt per meeting, I'm next

Surely Tansmedia doesn't need an invite to report in depth on it?

Moving from the managerial thread - 2 recent questions.

* Did Zavier Austin pass the EFL fit and proper test and why was this not communicated? (if it was, then scrap this question)
* Why is Zavier Austin's name not on the Who's Who list if he is a director at the club?

Ok so from recent correspondence across threads it would seem that there are still unanswered questions for the Trust/STFC to answer. I'm more than happy to send the email to the Trust/whoever but I would ask that someone (I'm looking at you NMH :) ) could collate the remaining open questions into one list of queries which I can then put into an email? Hopefully we might then get these answered in the next Advisory Board to put minds at rest for the new season?

What is Michael Standing’s role at the club currently is another that needs to be asked. Seems we lose our FA charge defence of blaming everything on the Power era with Standing still involved with the club…

Good idea.

Better we start doing ourselves than asking trust to do it- as the last time we asked them they simply didn’t do it. Be good to see Angus and Clem on a phone in. Can’t swerve any questions then, last time they could as they were all football related. These will all be board related.

It will also be interesting to know why the club does not announce the length of player contracts.

I would expect the Trust guys (and girls) to interact with fans via a forum like this, even if it is to ask for some time, we know they frequent here.

Equally they need to shake the vision that they are not prepared to ask Clem & co any hard questions (which I'm sure is not true), they have put in a lot of hard work and deserve credit for it but don't want that ruined by being accused of being to close.

another Q

who is the long term debt owed to and when is it due.

We have £4M in debenture and "other debts" in addition to the current 1.xM due this season.

may not be callable until <insert condition> so not really an immediate concern ..

They are too close.  They need to take a step back over to the fans side.  A high number of the questions being asked in this thread should be being asked by the trust anyway, the questions aren't difficult to come up with, they are the same questions that a fans represented trust should raise without asking for us to list them out for them.

The trust deserves a huge amount of credit for what they have done, agreed, but they need to make sure that they don't forget what they were created for in the first place.  Yes to provide a financial and physical safety net for the fans/club by raising money and working on things like ground purchase etc. but the day to day role of the trust should be to help put the fans voices to the club and uphold what the fans would like to see, not put the clubs voice to the fans and not question what that voice is saying.

The trust members on here have turned into lurkers and only pop up when they want to be one of the ITKers.  The problem they have is that there are enough ITKers on here already when what they are saying is not entirely true because of how the club want to spin things and that is not a good look for the trust.

They could fix this pretty quickly by taking a step back from the club on a day to day basis and take a step back towards the fans.

bumping for the Karachi & Hart questions.



also the opening remarks of the AB talk about presenting a 1, 3, 5 and 10 year plan that will aim to carry and develop STFC into the future. when should we expect to see this? delete if we have and ive missed it.


thanks

https://twitter.com/mtholmes84/status/1539162752287227905?s=21&t=aGByRo7BuNTIeUH1-rupWw

Need more of this from people. Stating facts and holding those relevant to account. Pointless being a lovely bloke and pulling the wool over your eyes thinking this regime are whiter than white.

I'm confused - are you referring to the standing question as presenting facts?   If so is there evidence now that he's involved as I missed that?

Apart from he's no longer a football agent, making it legal (I believe)

But yeah, it doesn't look very good at all.

Great question.

Here is something else that might be of concern, and it might be a case of 2+2 = a million but here goes.

Our new assistant is going to be Jamie Day. Apparently he's close to the Welling setup, and which of our ex-players signed for Welling on a season long loan? Taylor Curran. It could of course be coincidence but I think it's worth getting the orange hats dusted off maybe.

Adam Hart is the other fella we need clarity around isn't it?

I thought I’d seen a comment re. Hart along the lines of he’s involved with the fitness company/staff the club uses, but I can’t recall if that was a comment from the club or from James Spencer…

SL played at Welling as well.....

If it is to be Hand I would hope our fans would be more kickered twisted about his links to Oxford and his most recent role at Port Vale...

But he clearly was involved to begin with when he was an agent. If you then base your whole defence is blaming it on the previous regime yet a lot of the previous regime are still involved it surely undermines the whole thing. Also the fact it comes out on here and Twitter rather than from the club or AB just makes it look like something they want to hide.

But that’s not the full story is it as he’s been a director on one of Austin’s construction companies prior to the fitness gig. Also what is his new role next season?

Again I must have missed something - where is the evidence that Standing is involved?  I'm genuinely interested.

Theakston - I hadn’t realised there was that link to be fair, just assumed the concern was around his previous criminal exploits! The plot thickens…

Sorry I made a total James Hunt of that. Jamie Day, not Jamie Hand.

I wanted an Adver headline

Lindsey Gives Hand Job

 :clap: :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

I think you will find it's Jamie Day and not Jamie Hand.

EDIT:  I see that you have already corrected, sorry

The Bangladesh manager?!

Day hasn’t been involved with Welling since 2017 and is currently manager of Bangladesh national team.

Any tie in with our Karachi con?

He isn’t anymore. Wiki just out of date by all accounts he left in 2021

Yeah I went on Wiki to have a look at Jamie Day and realised I had got the totally wrong person! Interesting that Day preferred a "Long Ball" approach when he was manager of Bangladesh.

Still been involved with Bangladesh much more recently than Welling, unless of course Curran has declared for Bangladesh now.....

He apparently is close to the Welling setup still.

He's not

‘Officially’.  It was even confirmed in here by our ‘ITK’ residents in here he’s still involved yesterday. Apparently it will be addressed on the OSC panel so let’s see the official line.

I think the official line will be "he's not involved" because he isn't.

Will happily eat humble pie if I'm wrong but I'm pretty confident on this....

I saw an interesting thread on twitter about that, are you the guy with the 3 initials and the picture of a car on it out of interest?

Think i will eat humble pie on that one. I was told by a few that he was involved. I have been told today by others that he is not so what it does highlight is the question needs addressing either way.

To be fair it wasn’t you that raised his name so I don’t think it’s just come based off your post and I’ve heard off multiple people he’s still lurking in the background. Of course everyone could be hearing off the same people who have got it wrong, but generally there’s no smoke without fire.

For me the club needs to respect what we have been through in the past and eliminate any murkiness behind the scenes. I mean we’ve even had a non-director pulling the strings previously so it not surprising people are concerned with some off the lurkers.

Just out of curiosity where has it been confirmed that Day is to be Lindseys assistant? 

Matthew Walker put it on his ''rumour account''. Make of that what you will.

Ok thanks.  Seems a strange appointment if true

The same account that said the two Scott’s had left, and 24 hours later revealing that one of them was going to be the new head coach.

Nothing official. Name I heard from one of my ITK sources! Muhahahah

That's the one  :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

I don't understand the no smoke without fire comments as the internet has made that phrase obsolete.
For example there's thousands of videos on you tube trying to explain that the earth is flat when it isn't.

The internet is a very efficient spreader of bullshit.   Take a good sniff first before you believe anything.

So you told people a rumour, then said it was false but still think the club should answer the question? Interesting.

It depends whether your blindly following accounts like Matthew Walker or if the information is coming from people you trust who do have legitimate sources within the club. Taking this site for example, and pertinent to Standing as it was he who brought him up yesterday but as much as he talks in riddles I think you’d be foolish to ignore what DoB says (unless it’s relating to Conroy  :) )
There’s enough to justify it needing to be properly addressed, and the Trust haven’t dismissed it out of hand just saying it will get clarified at a future OSC panel which in itself suggests there is something in it.

I think it's better the club answer the question than loads of us on the internet yes. I know what i think, others won't which is why they should probably address the question.. Nothing more sinister than that i promise

I wasn't suggesting anything sinister, I suppose the point I was making was it's a rumour that some one started, if the club answered every rumour, would they actually get anything done with the sheer amount of them

Yeah it's a fair point and one Tails mentioned earlier. I think sometimes if one has been going around a long time and is of importance it's worth responding to but again that's just my opinion.

I can imagine it gets tedious hearing a 100 different things about what you are supposed to be doing daily

I think you and I have the same source :)

More than likely mate!  :)

When will we see the transparency you quote.? I have seen numerous questions put to you about issues and you always seem to dodge the ?  Have we not learnt nothing from the past !

I think I think what you think..

Standing, Austin… it’s a tough one. If the Trust asked the questions, publicly, I suspect that they would be shown the door in no time. Morfuni has chosen to associate the club with rogues. Or the rogues are actually in charge and Morfuni fronts it, who knows. The Trust have a role for as long as they tow the line so they can’t realistically do everything we’d like and I think we know that they mean very well. The difficulty is that, because they are not arms-length but fully aware of goings on, it seems, that they’ll become guilty by association in the eyes of some if there are any future misdemeanours. Based on their past, I’d think twice about getting involved in any business with Zavier Austin or Michael Standing.

Why is the quality of the new kits so Bad?? Had two for my girls arrive today, no sponsors on the shirts and no badges on the shorts.

Seen someone missing a puma badge too. Bit odd. Would take them back mate.

I’m not aware of the mechanics of the customised shirts but are they actually made by Puma for small orders like ours or are they outsourced and then branded by Puma? Would explain the lack of badges, quality control etc. I couldn’t imagine a product leaving a Puma facility without their own logo on it?

Definitely need an embroidered logo or at the very least it be stitched on as they are always peeling off.

I ordered one and it had Oxford United badge on it

Not Swansea?

That one peeled off

I'd pay good money for a version of every seasons kit without sponsors on it, the good old days of GWR logos are gone, instead we've got betcunt or uninspiring business logo number 75.

Don't get me wrong I'm happy to be supported by some local business over a multinational conglomerate with disreputable ethics and tax status, but still... Imagine cruising...

I've got a 9-12 Month & a 3-4 Years you're welcome too  :wink:

So glad you quoted a post there

https://twitter.com/TrustSTFC/status/1541070259830022144?t=jkKf1B_ZJpJmJuqI3II1eg&s=19

Hi Town Fans we have the next Advisory board a week Tuesday so please let us know if you have any questions or topics you want raised. #STFC

Looking at the replies to that it’s going to be increasingly hard for them to dodge the hard questions as an increasing number of people are asking them which is good.

yeah, there seemed to be a good coverage of most of the big questions from here I think.

Interestingly when I spoke to someone close to the trust recently they tried to claim that ours is a different Adam Hart to the one on the most wanted posters.

I have also met Zav Austin twice through commercial work I do with the club. Both times he has given away news the club probably wanted to keep secret, I do not see how he can be trusted at all if he is so happy to blab to anyone.

so is it that Adam Hart or not?

if it is, and he's a third party simply providing training expertise it could just be a case of helping a mate out.

with all things STFC people, myself included, do fear the worst when it comes to something a bit smelly

Good news these questions are being consistently asked by fans. Time for the Trust to (attempt to) deliver.

As is the way, fans will forget many these things if the on pitch stuff is going the right way. But trouble when behind the scenes lurches from very very shady to incompetent, and we have a budget director of football, budget manager and have so far made budget signings.

Stand and bloody deliver Trust. We your investors want some answers.

Investors?

The trust is its members. The board are the people we vote in to represent us.

They are volunteers that I'm sure are doing their best

However that doesn't mean they get everything right, that they aren't a bit closer to the club than they should be right now.

for example, the Karachi thing (again). it's pretty inconceivable the board hasn't wondered 'wtf' themselves.

Maybe they know the answer, maybe they have asked without response. Maybe the response isn't adequate. who knows.

Buy it's not been communicated, so we the members have every right to ask if them what's going on.

Especially when transparency was made such a  big thing.

Especially if it's costing the club money given the tight financial reigns elsewhere.

I guess I'm not aiming this ramble at anyone in particular, just dumping it down.

All really good points, let’s hope we actually get the answers or an indication on what’s going on.

Would love to know who is saying this from the trust 😳.

Close to the trust he said. Important you get that right as that will be the next rumour flying around

Nowhere to hide from the hard questions now. If they aren't asked and detailed in the minutes then we have a problem.

What a club.

It's 1000% *that* Adam Hart too. And it's not just an old picture from November doing the rounds, he was at the CG on Thursday infront of my own eyes.

2+2 = 4

So, what is the link then?

We’ve appointed Jamie Day because Taylor Curran is there on loan?
Who does that specifically benefit and how exactly?

Do we know who brought Andy Curran to the club in the first place?

Power? Austin? Morfuni?

Yep

But is there a particular link with one of the three?

Horse racing and Lee Power I believe but could be bollocks.

Is there any evidence that he's still involved in the club?
There's nothing other than rumour that I have seen

Coming to a football club near you: https://manchestermill.co.uk/p/they-wanted-control-of-the-club-but?s=r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=direct

Again, what’s the link?

Taylor Curran goes on loan to Welling and their assistant manager comes to us because (??) he can help Andrew Curran try and buy the club? By doing what (??)

Sorry if I’m being really, really dense here but what is the actual link and what is the logic?

I'm pretty sure we wouldn't let Andy Curran anywhere near the football club.

Rob Angus is on the Monday Night Panel tonight, hopefully a few important questions get asked.

This is old news (thankfully for Rochdale!)

We know he was almost certainly paying for his son to play, as Agombar's dad did - That was under Power.
Why do you think he's still involved?

Sadly not, the disclaimer was given straight away that the questions directed at the Trust will not be asked and will be taken to the advisory board! ‘Operational matters’ only tonight

I think that's fair enough. as long as they get asked, answered

Ta, not watching so thanks.

Find it quite interesting how understanding people are when it is the supporters club. If it was the Trust tonight not answering the question they would be battered

Depends on what you consider the supporters club’s remit to be. I’ve always considered the trust to be the group who should be holding the club to account whereas the supporters club are unlikely to speak out unless we are on the brink

To be fair the supporters club have by and large been just that. Never really ones to get into the politics and running of the coin

Power was an exception, the club was going under

Find it interesting still that despite that you can see that their members are asking the same questions that's all. Good to see they said they will ask the questions so that's good

May end up joint owning one club and has links to the other. Unfortunately that is not the way round you'd hope for.

Wishful thinking.

This ownership were with him in the club when Power was at the helm.

Think people are forgetting that the current owner and previous owner fell out. They are still fighting through courts, its not as if they are pally

Says it all - what happened to transparency?

Not sure how that's relevant. Power may be gone but Clem, Austin, Curran, Standing, Hart, Karachi FC etc all still exist

They are still registered at companies House to Andrew  Black.   They are a debt not equity, so no voting rights.

Of course they are annoying but aren't anything new and is a legacy issue that the club need to work through.  I can't see any risk of him taking the club over even if he did own the debentures which he legally doesn't.

so power *didn't* buy the debentures from black?

one assumes Clem taking control of the club didn't trigger then

Well yes, that's a different point to what i was answering though isn't it. You mentioned they were close to Power, they were and fell out. That's right isn't it?

And at the risk of thinking i am sticking up for them i really am not there are a shit load of questions that i think need clearing up

Like everyone else I would prefer to think everything is all roses and ice creams. However, the specific details I have heard suggest I think the club is about to head down a very dark path. I caveat that I cannot verify any of these because I am far too removed from their origins, but they are so specific and keep adding up.

The problem the fanbase have, if this is correct, is it's very hard to turn on the ownership due to the cognitive dissonance of a year of believing "we've got our club back".  

However, if results go turn south then fans will turn a more critical eye to the off pitch. Power did a credible job of at least pretending he cared about results - appointing Sherwood, Brown, Flitcroft, Wellens might not all have worked out great but they all had a level of credibility. Appointing Sandro and Scott is at best extremely underwhelming, but more realistically a signal of the club's lack of interest on the on field results.

Or certain Pods when they do ask the questions..

Are you going to share with us, or just post a cryptic statement with no details that suggest something dodgy is going on?

The problem is it's easy to make allegations and start rumours, twitter is an echo chamber so these rumours get spread many times and then get quoted as 'fact' when the physical evidence just isn't there.

I've no idea if there is dodgy stuff going on but we do know that the legacy issues were always going to take a few years to deal with, the legal unknowns and covenant being the most difficult of them - so they need to be given that time.

Despite also being underwhelmed by managerial set up I still find it hard to believe that Clem doesn't want to win games.  

If Clem sold today he'd break even at best, if we get into championship then he would make a few million.

In addition if we are top of league 1 or in the championship we are far more likely to sell on players to prem clubs.   There are very few, million pound plus signings from league 2.
  

Legally Black owns them, whether he had a gentleman's agreement with someone else who knows and impossible to find out as relies on him to tell you.   Not sure I'd want one for £2m especially if the purchaser.

Also not seen legal docs on the covenant so can't answer 2nd point.   

The club have acknowledged the questions now so i think we will either see a statement or questions at the advisory board. I was speaking to Rich yesterday and he raised a valid point that people like us are sat in the middle of this and hear these complaints and concerns from fans but when you narrow it down it is a very small minority asking the questions  so it would be easy for the club to sweep it under the carpet. 15 or so posters on here and a 100 or so on twitter is a very small percentage of the fanbase

They are genuine concerns though and hope the club answer them soon, still feel no matter what they say here though people will not be happy.

"won't be happy"

Karachi  - depends who is paying

standing  - expect them to say he's not involved

Austin - doubt they will say "yeah he is a bit dodgy", more 'his post prevented him from obtaining EFL additional to sit on the board. he's paid his dues for previous, and is trusted by clem'.
--------
at least the standing position and Karachi will be on record.

I think you are right, the Austin thing will rumble on but it is what it is. If he were suddenly to be come an investor or take control of a portion of the club alarm bells would ring again

Agreed in the main, I am not one of those asking for those answers although interested in the response, i am more interested in seeing whether the trust will be realigning their position with the answers that we get rather than the actual answers themselves.  The actions of a few representing the trust when those pertanent questions came out made me question where their allegiences lay.

The reality is we probably won't know until the ground purchase is done.

I know what you mean, i think one got carried away tbh that's all. In the main the trust have been great

They did massive amounts of work getting Clem in. And things are hugely better than when Power was here.

Even just being able to ask questions ( other than "ya know Shawwwwn").

Its easy to give the impression that isn't welcome/appreciated.

I thought it had been rumoured that Power had leant the club the money to pay them off, so the club would have to pay him (plus interest on the loans) rather than Black (interest free)

No, I appreciate the trust big time for what they have done, but being a paying up member of the trust I would expect them to be my voice rather than tell me what the club wants me to hear.  Hopefully that will be more of their stance moving forward.

They have been too close to the club and hopefully they will adjust their stance on that.  Knowing who has been turned down for jobs at the club and posting that information on twitter proves that, if if you do delete it quickly after.

It was and I've no doubt Power took a shit load out of the business, but the club haven't repaid the debentures as they are still in the accounts and they are officially held by Black.

If any transaction did happen it was by handshake and never registered.

Is the catering company going?

I think so, Rob said they were bringing it in house on the OSC

the catering had finally improved as well!

not that it can't be good in house

Why do the club only seem to want to communicate through mediums run by friends of Clem and the trust?

Sandro was on with the supporters club last week wasn't and so was Rob Angus this week?  In fact i think that Sandro fella has been on every platform i can think of

Has it been ten years then,  since Jed sold off the catering for ten years under the asset stripping exercise?

They lost two years there due to the pandemic, but I suppose that was the same for any business. It has improved lately so lets hope it doesn't go backwards the other way, but glad the club will be making off it again after Jed no doubt comically ran away from signing it over with two bags of money with dollar signs on.

I was under the impression that Jed’s catering lot had been booted due to not being able to fulfil terms of their contract during the pandemic? Could be bollocks but that’s what I was told…

I thought the club had come to an agreement with the business that runs the burger van outside of the townend, could be wrong.

Ah, possibly. Unsure why they've changed it now then.

At least the concerns are now being shared by other Supporters.

This is what I understand to be the case.

Existing caterers are still going to have van(s) outside the ground but the concourse outlets are now being ran in house, which should be interesting given the club aren’t known for their slick operations off the pitch!

"Hey, I wanted a jumbo hotdog and all I got was a chipolata!"

And that's just Quagmire after pissing next to Jason Euell.

you say that but hasnt hospitality been run in house? thats always been superb

I believe it has

Bringing the catering back in house proves a source of revenue for the club rather than outsourcing it and getting very little, they have obviously allowed the previous company to continue the catering outside the stadium in their van for next season by the sounds of it, who knows maybe a reduction on price as the food at the CG was very high prices.

Wait and see what the in-house offering is first.

Believe the AB was yesterday? Look forward to the minutes- hopefully thorough and transparent.

A reminder of the commitments stated each month-


My commitments to supporters and the wider community of Swindon and surrounding areas:
I will always be open and transparent on all matters in regard to STFC.
I will provide regular engagement and communication with the supporters and the wider community of Swindon and surrounding areas.
I will build a sustainable future for STFC, investing in the infrastructure of the Club with the aim to take it forwards to being a stable Championship Club.
I will build a sensible structure and present a 1, 3, 5 and 10 year plan that will aim to carry and develop STFC into the future.
Further to all of the above, I will not take a salary or any personal fee payments from the Club for the time I own a controlling interest in the club



Wonder when we can expect the 1,3, 5 & 10yr plans?

What’s happened to the supporters trust by the way? Have they been muzzled? Ridiculous amounts of questions been thrown them/publicly on socials RE the regime and individuals in this regime….. all I’ve seen from them is them telling everyone how they stand with Rochdale in their ongoing battle. Or is it literally just a case of not answering to fans and just batting it all to the advisory board?

Furthermore, the club should have held at least two of these fan forums. It’s in the customer charter:


“The Football league have introduced a new regulation where by clubs are committed to meeting regulation 111 Expert working group (EWG) supporter Ownership and Engagement discussion. Swindon Town will be holding a minimum of two fans forum meetings per season with details of which being published on the official website and social media channels once dates for the forums have been agreed. This will be an opportunity for fans to attend the ground and have their say on significant issues regarding the stadium. The meetings will be held by Club Directors and Senior Executives.

24.REVIEW DATE

This Charter will be reviewed on or before 01 July 2022”

An advisory board that consists of *several* (please note the term several, before the cucks claim Im calling club legend Don Rodgers a yes man) yes men/women, for me, does not satisfy what a fans forum is. The fact that none of the questions we asked to get asked at the last AB sums it all up.

I saw a post from a Trust member saying that the Trust member questions will be answered on a separate slide from main AB stuff.

So questions were asked at the AB. We'll see what was asked when the minutes are available

I think they may well have taken a step back in SM terms - there was valid criticism of "too close to club" so maybe they are trying to work out how to re-establish and present the line.  Or the guy who does SM is on holiday :)

Or being mindful that as it stands they have entered into a JV with the club to buy the ground and it would be advisable not to fuck up that relationship until the fan base have their mitts on 50% of the ground?

True, but that works on a vice-versa basis. Its not in the interests of the club to fuck it up either. The council won't sell to just them (presumably)

Are you a trust member Mango out of interest

Indeed, I suspect both sides are pussy footing around the other to a degree until the ground stuff is signed sealed and delivered, albeit with some of the negative stuff floating about on here and elsewhere about the Trust I do wonder whether they will be able to mobilise the fans to get the cash they need to pay their bit.

depends if they have a leg up from Eady money or elsewhere

it may come down to numbers of people rather than hard cash

edit: The Eady money potentially being used is discussed here:

https://truststfc.tv/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/AGM-Pack.pdf

I was referring to previous AB, where all regime questions were ignored, Batch.

Yeah I am, but on verge of cancelling.

Are you a member, ShrivvyRoad?

Fair, but lets give them chance to change on that and see what comes up this time.

Must admit I do feel the same. My issue is that the Trust are now to close to the club & I'm not sure our interests are looked after.

They've been backed into a corner to answer, fan base has done well to unite in that sense, interested to see the detail of response they provide.

Agree.

Great job in the summer to help out Clem and keep fans updated, but gone rapidly downhill since. They have clem and co's best interests at heart, and not ours, in my opinion.

That's my concern & I'm not sure they will question the club in the manner they once did.

I am yes. I think we need to see what has been answered this time around. I don't buy into the whole backed into a corner thing by the fans. It's no more than 100 people asking, that's not to say the questions don't need answering i believe they do but the trust shouldn't be running to the club everytime a handful have problems or questions

The Trust are a shambles.

That is a damning statement.  With what authority?

Hi All, the AB only happened on Tuesday, its only Wednesday today and all is in hand on this.. The AB took place Tuesday, we presented all questions to the club and they answered all of them open and honestly. We have sent our notes to the club to check we have them 100% accurate on the clubs responses to the questions, and then they will all be released for fans and members to read. It has taken some time to answer all of these as there were a lot of them (several pages actually)  and as well as being released by us in terms of the answers the club will also include all of them in the AB minutes in the next 10 days when they are released on the club website. thanks.

Thanks for the update Jan, looking forward to some clarity soon.

Not sure if this goes here but I see the club have gone a head with the match day price increases. I wonder if the trust can shed the clubs thoughts on this seeing as it's on the article below. Money is tight for all which could backfire on the club. That's my opinion anyway.

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/july/league-and-cup-tickets-on-sale

Aren't they slightly lower than the proposed increases? Need to check AB minutes.

They are

Higher than 21/22
Higher than published in 22/23 season ticket literature
Not as high as prospective May/June pricing review

Making it up as they go along

Probably thought as long as they don’t change the headline £25 figure no one would notice.

I’m not sure it’s nefarious, I just get the sense the behind the scenes operation is a mess

Price increase in and of itself isn’t the issue (annoying, but a fact of life)

The way it’s been implemented is amateurish. Don’t publish ticket prices and then increase them again before you’ve even sold any!

Never attribute to malice what could easily be incompetence is a good life rule, and one I'm sure that applies here. I doubt they even intended to sneak it out in this article, it's just the advisory board minutes that probably cover this more clearly and in more detail were meant to be published first but aren't ready...

To be honest I get the same impression, it’s incompetence more than anything at the moment. The online store is a case in point, offline at the moment and seems to be offline more than online this summer, it’s not a great sign they can’t even make that work. Similar story with the digital season tickets. As I just said to Batch on Twitter, if the DRS speakers aren’t fixed I’m going to lose my shit.

Exactly that.

The online club shop is down https://www.stfcdirect.com/landing.php
It seems hard work to get hold of anyone with query regarding season ticket print quality (not based on a large sample!)
Are the phones better yet? Do you get a recorded message when they aren't manned?

It could be holidays are playing a part in some of this. Got to get them in before season start for some.

An avoidable PR disaster…sneaking details of the increase in at the bottom of that article is not ‘open and transparent’ in my view.

It's also the wording which I don't take too - almost like the fans need to pay for everything, last time I check we're not fan owned.

"The ticketing review suggests that the Club should look at increasing Town End tickets to £23, Over 65 to £20, Students to £20, U18 to £10 and U11 to £5"

The published prices are <price> (diff from march, diff AB proposed)

Adult 21 (-2, +1)
65/Student 18 (+2, -2)
U18 8 (+1, -2)
U11 3 (+1, -2)
U21 Scrapped

So gone up £2 roughly 8.5% so club could argue lower than inflation.

Again its the age old argument from football fans that tickets go up £2 disgusting, next breath why won't the board sanction £10's k's of new cash on players.  

You've missed Dave's point totally.

No I didn't, I just quoted that post as it made sense and built upon the point being made.

Where is the 40% increase in budget because we ain’t seen much evidence of it yet all we have signed is kids

This one looks more pricey.

Whilst you make a valid point there's 7 weeks left

After a fans 'backlash' it looks like the club have made a u-turn on the decision to remove the U21 pricing option for next season. Not sure at what price mind but that's positive that they have listened to feedback from fans.

Edit - £14 side stands, £12 Town End.

Fans on Twitter doing what the Trust now seems incapable of. Good stuff and sensible decisions by the Club.

To be fair the club have taken a bit of a kicking recently, some of it warranted, some possibly not. I think now with what looks on paper some good squad building as well as taking fans criticisms on board and making the relevant changes I hope it gets a bit more credit going forward. The last couple of weeks have been pretty toxic at times and last season's goodwill was in danger of going down Thomas Crapper Avenue.

It wouldn’t surprise me if they just forgot about that banding

Me either but let Theakston believe his 100 messages on every socoial platform is what done it  :D :D :D

glad u21 are back

they quoted my slow hand clap gif moan. So you can thank me, not the Trust or Theakston

😂 if they forgot about it I think I’d be more concerned to be honest… one way or another it was a complete cock up though.

And we don’t know how much players are being paid. How much we have to fork out for agents if any. Wether this 40% budget increase was playing budget or the overall club budget. And of course who we have and how many to sign.

I'm feeling a lot better now we've made a flurry of better looking signing....but I still think its pretty clear the 40% is overall club budget. Even with a few more good looking signings, I don't see it being 40% higher. Slightly higher wage budget? Sure, but nothing like 40%.

On the positive side, I think its obvious now the reported slashing of the budget isn't true either though. At worst its competitive with last seasons even with no more signings.

Not sure exactly how it works but if Khan joins then that is 3 players we'll have paid cash money for. Are those figures included in budget numbers, or is it purely wages? Obviously we paid 0 fees last season due to the umbungo.

Yeah that is true. Although I can't imagine the up front fees for players amount to more than multiple tens of thousands, its still something.

Agreed, I'd imagine the 3 players we have bought are all nominal amounts up front and bonus laden based on performance etc.

Here are the answers given to questions raised

• Clarity on growth of membership to AB; Why rotating sponsors? How to join? Are all fans represented?
○ CM: Important to rotate because we want different views, wide spectrum - as many opinions as possible
○ RA: Becomes a limit on number of attendees for making the meeting viable and relevant
○ ST: Sponsors want success for the club,and want to ensure we have a voice for improvements. Wide range of thoughts, feedback, views, and benefits from an input perspective
• Are the club’s legacy issues with the turnstiles now resolved?
○ RA: Predominantly, season tickets have now been sorted with correct barcodes on the new cards
• Has work been completed on the PA system?
○ RA: Still a small amount of additional work to do, but this is planned in - its not a new PA system, but a fixed PA system.
• Did any potential head coaches reject the chance to take up the STFC role?
○ RA: We did an extensive search - chose the best person for the job
○ CM: Met a lot of managers who didn’t fit the bill - really pleased Scott didn’t leave the club, and we could offer him the role
• Does the club have a (or any plans for) a mental wellbeing ambassador? Are there plans to offer mental health training to staff and stewards?
○ RA: We use a very good 3rd party for stewarding, but will speak with Platinum to pass on feedback. Supervisors have training. No current plan for specific ambassador.
• Great news on external debt being reduced, is there any “internal” debt to action?
○ RA: Internal debt references debentures from 2012, and CM is in discussions with relevant parties around those
• How much has Clem invested into STFC since taking full control of the club? And is this repayable via loans?
○ CM: £1.4m since I’ve taken over, and previously another £1.8m. Some of this is shares (c£1.1m) the balance are loans, and Ill probably need to invest more to deal with the
debenture situation. All loans are interest free
• Request for ZA to discuss Karachi project directly to fans: cost & funding, Club involvement, timelines, what does success look like?
○ RA: No cost to the club, other than sending Alex Pike (Academy Coach) for which we had to cover flight cost
○ CM: Zav is trying to drive interest in the club longer term, he is very passionate about the Club being successful and moving us forwards, it doesn’t cost us anything, I’m happy
with it. Zav doesn’t get paid anything from the club, he covers his own costs of travel, hotels, and matchday tickets. • What is the status of ZA on the club’s board? Did ZA pass the EFL’s fit & proper persons test?
○ CM: Zav is the club’s vice-chair. EFL approval is ongoing. Please remember that ZA played a crucial role in saving the Club and was the first to identify the damage made by the previous owner and enabled the change of ownership to CM.
• What is Adam Hart’s role at the club?
○ CM: AH runs the S&C perspective. Adam’s team helped reduce costs of department, improve fitness, decrease injury time etc.
• Who are the HerGameToo reps for STFC? Club posted in March 2022 for applications, but applicants have had no feedback ○ RA: I’ll chase up with HerGameToo, subsequently confirmed a HGT rep has been confirmed.
• When will the newly reviewed and confirmed ticket prices be announced?
○ RA: Being published over the next week or two (w/c: 11/7/2022) ahead of the new season, now that supporter groups have feedback on the proposals
• Is Michael Standing involved in the club?
○ CM: No. I’m the 100% shareholder & owner, he has no involvement. He has an outstanding court case with the previous owner, which is absolutely nothing to do with me.
• What are the overall strategy and aims for the 22/23 season? What does success on pitch look like?
○ CM: Always striving for promotion, and we are this season - but will never guarantee that, as this is football. We strive to do better than the season before, and always building
the longer term foundations.
○ RA: Budget is very competitive in this league, but not something we can publicly announce as it gives an advantage to our competitors.

Well, those are clear answers with very little remaining ambiguity. As long as they're all true, then great.

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/july/stfc-advisory-board-july-minutes-now-available/

Full minutes of the Advisory Board for July. 4800 season tickets sold feels good.

Brilliant effort again by Town fans.

Made me smile more than it should have.

q&a look good

Shame about the debenture seems to be giving unwanted grief.

"RA confirm(ed) that Lee Power and Winston Churchill are fans of the Club"  :D

 I am not sure the answer on Karachi is much kop to be honest.  The hope is it is indeed an at arms length thing that is not, in any way, sanctioned by the club as part of his duties.  It basically states Zav is doing his own thing and using his connection to Swindon - the stated aim, in public, is to get talent from Pakistan, so how Swindon can be fully at arms length still confuses me.  You are never going to get a sufficient answer in that type of forum though, especially if it is being used for personal reasons (not saying it is, just has the look of it).  Also a worry that Zav is still not approved by the EFL - especially as we have an FA charge hanging over us.

I have far less concern on the Adam Hart situation - no doubt all sorts of red alarms would be sounding off if he were on the Board or something, but he is employed via a vendor contract and at least seems to be delivering results in his now chosen field.  That is far easier to walk away from and distance the club if there ever were any issues.

Found this interesting:

New agreement extending STFC presence at Beversbrook as well as investing in facilities at Beversbrook

Got to train somewhere I suppose.

I'd agree it's the weakest answer there. But honestly, if Zav wants to play statesman in Karachi, it doesn't really bother me as long as there's nothing shady going on.

+ indeed its not costing the club money too (coach travel/costs aside)

I'm not worried about costs, well, not those being incurred to support this venture.  I'm worried about the sort of costs that could be incurred if anything untoward was ever discovered by authorities years down the line and Swindon were directly involved (Zav doing his own thing is one thing, having STFC on paperwork related to Visa's at some point makes it much more of an exposure).

Those are pretty much the expected answers I think, no massive surprises.  I did like the answer to the manager question, proper politicians answer right there :D Gave an answer without actually answering the question that was asked.

I think at some point the fanbase just need to move on and start to trust that this owner isn't the type of ownership that we have had in the past.  It's never going to be perfect, but as long as the Trust do their job right, it shouldn't be a concern in the short term and the Trust along with the joint ground ownership should mean that we have some sort of security blanket if it should start going down a path that we are not happy with.

That's fine, obviously massive destruction potential with this one . But they were never going to say "yeah fair cop, it's a bit dodgy". Still find it very odd. You have to play that one by ear.


Had it actually "cost the club a lot of money" I'd be pretty pissed off myself. Every penny is being accounted for (and wrung out of supporters at times). You can't do that then fund a vanity project/massive expensive punt.

At the end of the day the answers have been asked and given. Believe, disbelieve, bit of both. You pays your money and takes your choice.

It’s good that all the questions have been addressed, everything around Austin still seems very suspect though. 10 months to go through the fit and proper persons test really? The whole sentence around him being important to the club and effectively saving us feels like they are warming us up for him never being approved to me but time will tell.

With Adam Hart it would have been nice for his previous business relationship with Austin to have been explained but I’m less worried about him now.

Time will tell on Standing….

But anyway I’m looking forward to the working PA system in the DRS and not sounding like there are swarm of angry bees in the speakers during the game.

Of all those questions and answers the one that stands out for me is no Michael Standing involvement. This is contrary what I have previously been told more than once, different football sources which remain in confidence.

I will gladly rest this case and am more than happy to believe this statement.
Let the Power v Standing case get exposed for what is is and we can all move on. After all sick to death with ownership issues at Swindon and just want to support the football.

I hope Clem makes a success out of this project.

Karrachi/Zav thing still seems suspect to me, but I guess that was the answer I was expecting.

The politicians answer on any manager turning us down made me laugh.

The Standing answer was unequivocal, lets hope its true.

Npt sure about that. My question re disabled parking wasn't addressed, for one. We really need a decision on car parking season tickets soon.

oh, that's not so good. Have the supporters club been any help? Thought this would be their thing

Question for next advisory board:
Could the club please open the club shop on match days after the match? Even if just for an hour or so. They are missing a lot of footfall and potential business. I have wanted to visit the shop and had friends with me who wanted to spend money and would have done so if the shop was open but alas no opportunity.

Ditto, get a few more programs printed too. I cannot get to the Saturday games as early as I did last season but I still like to get one and surprise, surprise they’d sold out.

Can the club explain why they haven’t fixed the DRS PA system over the closed season as we were promised? Surely it can’t be that hard to find a competent contractor to either fix the existing system or run new cables and speakers. As a safety critical system it’s mind boggling that it has been allowed to be indecipherable for so long.

I’d like to add to that. On Saturday, on one particular song, the volume intermittently shot up every 20 seconds or so that it could damage peoples ear drums. The change in volume made me jump and I’m going to have to bring ear plugs next time. I sound like an old man but like all of us we only have one set of ears. As a “musician” I need to look after them more so. It’s dangerous.
God I sound like an adver letter reply.

Safety announcements run through a separate system don't they?

Lo and behold, the club has listened.

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/august/august-stfc-advisory-board-minutes-now-available/

August minutes up. Will go through and pull out anything interesting...

Not much really - 5,150 STs sold, new catering arrangements making 5x more a game than the old ones the main stand outs. HMRC fully paid off, other debts remain.

5,150 is an incredible number for League Two dross at the prices charged. Phenomenal backing from the fans.

Good news on catering even if it is a bit shite according to some. Hopefully they can improve it. Clearly never going back if it pays 5x as much.

On the catering, what on earth are they selling if it's "no burgers, hot dogs, pies etc"?

Excluding the Premiership season is that the most season tickets ever sold🤔

Pasties and sausage rolls I believe
Sure I read that somewhere

they have branded it like a pasty shop. I had a brief walk past and saw sausage rolls, pasties and chips.

probably the type of food which is easier to prepare and in large volume. might help with queue times in that sense. I have no issues with anything they sell, I go to watch the football. if I'm in a rush and need food there is always something available that I would want.

I'd have thought pies would fit well into that model, essentially STFC Greggs.  Fair enough, had visions of crisps and chocolate bars and wondered how on earth they had made x5 more on that!

Surely not

There are burgers in the vans outside still I think. The pasties did smell damn good on Tuesday night tbf. I'll have to sample a couple next time I can go.

The Burger van outside is different from last seasons and isn't that good. Small burger £5.

Well Danny Lee has left. Any staff at the club now?

Presume on to bigger things.  I saw what looked like a version of his role had started to be advertised.

wtf!

I thought he was decent whenever I've had contact with him

The exodus of staff across all areas of the club is becoming a bit alarming.

Who is Danny Lee (and what are his expected goals)?

Exodus? How many have left the club to this an exodus? Who is Danny Lee? What was his role?

Some member of the ground staff (i think) having a right rant about Marcus Cassidy on twitter

Link?

I think the fella you refer to is the assistant groundsman who resigned recently. He's not very positive about MC is he?

The first team data analysts left, if that’s new news to anyone…

Gone to Villa is be a young talent scout or something

I imagine he's referring to this:
https://twitter.com/AlexVeitch23/status/1560821039055224833

Oh the irony in calling out an alcoholic in a pissed up tweet at 3:30am…

You can see why ITK posts never get posted on social media sites.
Best to share with just a few trusted sources as what happens on here. Honestly some people are unhinged.

Tweet now deleted

Quite a few, even the club secretary has gone. You can apply for that job on LinkedIn.

Having the continuity of Rob Angus there is very reassuring - but is there a higher than usual level of staff turnover?

He was a sort of Head of Operations - in charge of Commercial, ticketing etc.  Responsible for the matchday hospitality being a big success in the last couple of seasons.  I would imagine he has been headhunted or seen an opportunity higher up the food chain.

King of prawn sandwiches, undoubtedly there are plenty of opportunities for someone like that that pay better. Let's not forget there's massive churn all over the shop with the job market as it is, so perhaps not a surprise we've lost a few backroom staff.

Reading the minutes, I'm confused why the lad that does the flags who seems to have got involved with the broadbent podcast suddenly turn up on the advisory board (wasn't it him that kept bragging he was in contact with clem before the takeover), then I read they have got to decide who to send if they rotate it with fans going along, surely this cheapens the point of the AB, I thought it was corporate club sponsors being invited and rotating it looks like the same corporate sponsor has been invited more than once now.

Why are people from fan podcasts being invited now, surely fan representation is what the trust and SC are there for ?!

Did the club put names in a pot and pick them out to pad out the numbers ?

I'm all for engagement but with the right people.

I also notice the debts on the FL loans are now not going down last couple of months.

Assuming these are still being collected by the Trust:

Chris Kiely has appeared in the programme as a Director of STFC. Can you tell us about:

- His background, and how and when he became involved in the club?
- Is he an investor, or shareholder, or just someone brought in to provide expertise?
- If he's providing expertise, in what areas?
- How does this affect or change the existing management structure of the club including Clem, Zav, Rob, Sandro and Scott?

And more generally:

- Can the club commit to introducing new directors in a clearer, more managed way in the future? A line appearing in the programme and nothing else can lead to unhelpful inferences and rumours spreading online

It is suggested he is something to do with Sandro and the data analysis system we use

That would be a perfectly legitimate answer, but it would be good for the club to answer it, and be in the habit of explaining appointments. Sandro himself is not a director of the club, so Kiely is "senior" to him in that respect.

Agree, I would have expected it to have been something the club issued a press release about, advising fans who he is and why he is a director of the club and any shareholding he has

all of this might look a bit smelly to some and i assume that more info will be given

September minutes out:

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/september/september-advisory-board-minutes-now-available/?fbclid=IwAR3TY1KcjYxY-FwrLiTrGpSQq0I-F3eWJ39FSydX8ezvu4q_0guykw_6cm8

- Centerplate have taken on the winding up petition, which should be heard today (!)
- Club looking to reclaim legal costs from Able (good luck with that)
- Various other debt disputes ongoing, but overall debt down to about £1.1m (down from £4.5m 12 months ago)
- Exchange of contracts on CG set for end of Jan 23, with deposit due then
- Tickets for the fans forum are nearly sold out, STBL are going to live stream it

No mention of the new director.

I must have missed it, what is the debt with Mercedes, is it Jeds motors?

I know I am a grumpy sod but in the big scheme of things, what is this obsession about building a statue?

https://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/22563291.swindon-town-fc-back-court-winding-up-petition/

We are indeed in court today with Centerplate (the catering supplier)

A point of clarity may be needed, especially when they start producing their own accounts.  Overall debt is not down to 1.1m - the ring fenced external debt they picked up when they took over is down to that level, but there was other debt and no doubt new debt since.  Of course, who that is owed to and the terms are all important to.

oh joyous day, chicken balti pies are back

2:16pm
Case adjourned

A short hearing, much shorter than expected, and the case has been adjourned off.

But a big update from today's hearing, and that is that Centreplate UK has been substituted into the winding-up petition in place of Able.

A new hearing will take place in the coming months to decide on whether the company that runs Town should be wound-up.

so the judge allowed substitution and away we go again

How does page 14 work with regards to the RAG ratings etc? There are 7 fan queries that have no comments/actions next to them with a RAG of Green even though it looks like there is no clarification or details on next steps to close out the fan queries?

We're allowed 5 this season so this bloody court case could drag!

Few other snippets;

2:18pm
But one thing to note from the hearing: Simon Hunter, who represents Centreplate, mentioned that his clients had not had enough time to respond to Swindon Town's letter disputing the debt.

When Judge Baister adjourned the case, Mr Hunter said: "If it should be the case that my clients don't want to go any further, they can pull it without any bother."

Able 'probably out of time' on appeal

Another interesting line from the short hearing was that the lawyer for Able acknowledge he was "probably out of time" to appeal a judge's decision to dismiss his winding-up petition.

Last month, Swindon Town had successfully argued that a winding-up petition was not suitable for this dispute, which related to a £100,000 'loan'.

Adam Deacock, representing Able, had requested permission to appeal Deputy Insolvency Judge Stephen Baister's decision, which was granted.

"You gave me permission to appeal," he acknowledge in today's hearing.

"And I haven't so far but we are probably out of time for doing so."

is that code for he opened the door for appeal as matter of course but the client, who is in no way linked to power in any way, has been unresponsive so he's giving up.

way to go not power/curran

• Sometimes in the past there has been certain items discussed in the AB that it wasn’t clear were sensitive or confidential that have been released by fans groups into the
public domain which the club were unhappy about. Its key that it is clear what is confidential and what can be released into the public domain post AB meetings.

Be interesting to know examples of this. Not unreasonable for sensitive matters to be kept private, but would be good to understand what kind of areas count as ‘sensitive’

Mercedes debt is from power ownership era not jeds
The statue is a wonderful thing that celebrates the outstanding players like Don R and John T. I get not everyone will want it/apreciate but in a poll of trust members it was overwhelmingly approved and celebrated aa a positive step 😀

Certain promotional marketing campaigns for new shirts being launched on certain days which were designed to be a surprise which were discussed outside AB withiut knowing the club were keen to make this a surprise was primary example.

Out of interest, how much does a statue cost Jan?

I completely understand the need to celebrate our past and the previous great players we have had, but wonder if the money spent on statues could have been used to properly fix the PA system in the DRS, or the toilet facilities around the ground which are on the 'to do' list.

Fuck me this negative stuff is contagious!  :no:

I don't think its negative, just seems to be a rather strange thing to be so high up the to do list, especially considering I suspect there is every possibility the thing would have to be shifted once ground redevelopment starts anyway.


TBH if said leakers are so desperate to be ITK to people and cannot identify what is likley to be commercially sensitive information for themselves they are probably not best qualified to be attending these meetings anyway.

Can we have a statue like the Ronaldo one?  :)

The club is not spending anything on the statues and it is a different pot of money to the repairs.    The club have said many times that they won't spend much money on such things until the ground ownership is resolved.

100% correct this is outside money not from the club
statues cost anything from 30-100k depending on size, quality etc etc
Also the statues will be placed in areas where ground development wont impact them, so they wont need to be moved etc so they are a perm fixture

Out of interest, what was the wording of the question?? Was statues chosen from a list of options, or was it ‘we want to build a statue do you think it’s a good idea??’

Fairly ambivalent to them myself - not going to get up in arms about it and appreciate many will like it, but at the same time can’t shake the feeling the money could be better spent elsewhere

Its not about desperation to provide this information at all. There are some things that the club haven't communicated or may have been lost in comms that fans aren't aware about so the fans groups are encouraged to make sure this information is openly communicated or reaffirmed with fans, its all about fan engagement and transparency for fans. A lot of fans don't read minutes of AB or miss facts so if the fans groups can reinforce those communications then it makes fans more aware and informed. Its all about effective fan engagement and openness which is important. Its certainly not about who can leak juicy facts the quickest as thats not what the AB is about. There is huge amount of work that goes into the work for the AB from the fans groups that fans done always see and we have to remember that fans groups members have full time jobs and they do this for the love of the club and to make things better for fans on and off the pitch, including being open and ensuring fans are well informed.

People attend the AB to to ensure fans are in the know on facts and things going on in the club and its not seen as a mass scramble to be the first to get this sensitive important out to the fans, its trying to he informative to fans so they feel they are more part of the club and informed compared to the radio silence from past ownerships of the club. But as I said sometimes its not obviously that maybe the club were wanting to keep something private so as no to ruin the impact or surprise of say marketing initiatives for shirts etc. Its all a learning experience.

From memory it was more certain than that, do you want to allocate funds and proceed type question, but can't be arsed to look it up.    Did you take the opportunity to vote on it when the trust asked the question to its members?  

The wording was essentially on the surveys : would fans welcome the creation of statue(s) to celebrate past players such as Don and John

The questions (and there were multiple questions) were resounding Yes fans would welcome this

Then we looked at other football clubs who have done this, Manu U, Liverpool, Newcastle etc, got recommendations from other clubs and then asked statue makers to provide quotes based on requirements and other statues we liked. We also consulted with the club on this as to location of them and also the players themselves. Then we looked for an image from the archives for the statue in terms of the pose etc and provided that to the statue makers and got them to come up with a mock up, we then narrowed that down to a single statue maker and we now have an actual small model of the statue made up and we are working with the statue maker now on a few tweaks until we get it right. We will then go back to the fans for feedback on the statue design and get their thoughts before hopefully going ahead.

Do you know of any plan to introduce Chris Kiely JAM? I'm not for one second suggesting he's any sort of malign influence or peddling conspiracies, but it seems against the general open approach of the current owners to not introduce a new director?

Mate I can’t remember what I had for breakfast yesterday let alone if/when I filled out a survey months ago

Nothing to worry about , it was incorrectly suggested in the year book he was a director of the club, don't believe he is. Ex footballer who as i understand it he will be working with the academy (Academy Director). Believe Clem/Rob will address at fans forum next week.

Hi James - Where would the statue be located? I don't have an issue with a statue per se but it could be quite inconrous having a high quuality statue in the car park behind the town end (for example). Suggest the best place would be to set it within the grassy area between the Don Rogers Stand and Shrivenham Road - maybe with some general upgrades to this area such as footpaths, benches too? I think the setting is as important as the statue itself - any thought?

I think i did see on the plans for redevelopment where they would be. I will have a search for you Bob

Great stuff - thanks for clarifying Pookemon and Jan.  :clap:

Hi Bob, the location you mention is the preferred option yes on the grassy part so as well as when walking to the CG you walk past, get to see it people also driving past on the magic roundabout can also see it etc.. And yes i think what goes around it is as important as the statue so that will be looked at too.

I’d stick the Don’s statue at left wing. Still do a job, I reckon.

Best player I’ve seen in a Swindon shirt - bar none.

A life-size diorama of the rounding of Bob Wilson sprawled in the Wembley mud would be good.
Not sure permission would be forthcoming for that from young Bob though.

Taking into account vandalism/graffiti...

Yes we have some plans around that to try and minimize/stop that occurring..

Bit of friendly and free professional advice, I would speak to the Council early doors re siting as from personal  experience Highways are not big fans on interesting things being sited where they can distract drivers.

Thanks Horlock appreciate that, we certainly will :-)

They,ve had a big flashing tree and now a huge advertising board flashing. If a statue tips them over the edge i will be shocked :)

Personally I am not a big fan of statues. They often look a bit crap.

Just don't commission the guy who did the Ronaldo one that looked more like Raul Moat for a start

Agreed. No the chap designing this one is very well respected and been well researched .. no point on doing it on the cheap .. do it properly first time and use the best 😀

My fear would be the vandalism of this by certain moron's around the town, then of course it needs the general upkeep to ensure it is not covered in birdsh1t and just left for e.g. 5 years time.

As has been said though surely it is also around what goes round it as well so the statue is not just plonked there and looking out of place with everything around it.

I hope we get the Michael Jackson one from Fulham.

That's an example of getting it right.  A fitting tribute to a club legend.

October advisory minutes

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/october/october-advisory-board-minutes-now-available/

5100 STs is good

That makes pretty good reading

It would be good if there is a key maybe at bottom of each page of who is who as when reading something and seeing initials its frustrating scrolling back to the top of the document to work out which initials belong to who.

It also seems that there are certain people named that never attend the meetings.

They are at the top of the first page in the attendees section

Yes but when reading the minutes and seeing the initials you have to scroll back up to see who the initials belong to

Third world problems  ;D

Why are the staff in the food kiosk in the Arkells refusing to give you a lid on a cup of tea? Just after 2pm I was told (very politely) that they have been told they can’t allow lids with the tea cups. She had no idea why - but that’s what they have been asked to do.
I am 65 years old - I could do more damage by spilling hot tea on myself or on someone else as a result of having no lid than I can do with a cup and lid. Absolutely ridiculous!

We get lids in the DRS, for coffee anyway, can't speak for tea though.
Maybe the former is deemed to be more of a threat to safety than the latter?
Don't know.

that's just odd

It’s like when they serve you a bottle without the top. Everyone goes to the game now with a lid in their pocket which you put straight on the bottle they give you.

If the cap fits use it😁

I think you probably just had someone who misunderstood the no caps on the drink thing

Suggests there is a serious flaw in training staff. To be honest not having a lid on a hot cup of tea is a scalding hazard and if we were in the states could see lawsuits being raised.

Is it really that serious if that is what happened? On that basis it should be a legal requirement to keep the lids on the tea but we can take it off when we want

What about bovril? Everyone knows that is the footballing connoiseur drink of choice. Do they have lids on?

I thought I saw in the advisory board minutes that they were now doing hots dogs - asked for one yesterday and was greeted by a dumb stare! Was asked to look to see if it was on the menu board.  When I said I couldn't see it dumb stare turned away and served the next customer!!  Service at its best
 

In the grand scheme of things of course not, but if an elderly person scalds their hand/arm because they haven't been provided a lid on the cup of tea they've been given because of a misunderstanding between staff it's not ideal. It was serious enough for someone to post about on here.

I like a lid on my Bovril . easier to take back to the seat, keeps it warmer longer.

Take a flask😀

A plastic bottle with its lid on is a danger, but a flask is ok 🤷🏼‍♂️

My Bovril came without a lid so I took one from the counter and popped it on (Arkells). Easies. I reckon things are going well if we are reduced to moaning about lids.

Have they said the reason for not supplying lids😀

That is interesting. You’re not allowed a cap on a bottle of water or pop bottle (hot drinks at certain kiosks) but the two blokes in front of me in the DR have a flask!? Fantastic heavy weight missile if you want to launch onto the pitch or at an opposition fan if you’re close enough. Doesn’t make sense.

Health and safety never does

It makes no sense if that is the reason they have stopped supplying lids.

more likely cost/plastic waste, surely?

Nice that the 'issues' are a little more trivial than they have been in the last few years!

The club said at the Q&A that it was a rule given to them by the health and safety

sorry, I meant the Bovril cup lifs

I already smuggle in b&m bargains coke + a spare bottle top just in case.

I draw the line at plastic lids for Bovril!

I like Bovril but their social media team seem to support Oxford for some reason the cunts.

We should seek alternative beefy drink options.

When does it ever? Covid restrictions were a fantastic example of making up shite as you go.

Tricky as Oxo is a little bit on the nose, Oxford wise as well. Where do we go from here?  :hmmm:

We should make our own pork stock flavoured beverage, in honour of our name.

They do it’s a mobile hot dog stand and is normally positioned close to Digbys bar in the Don Rogers stand.

aaaah, I'd also assumed it was at the normal food things.

So you asked for something that wasn’t on the menu and got annoyed when you got a blank look?

Well, they could have just not updated the menu!

The advisory board minutes didn't make it clear it was from a separate stall out of eyesight of half the stand concourse - still now we know now.

What's the chicken balti pie situation - do I need Ranulph Fiennes to work out where they are being sold, or are they at the main kiosks :)

A flask generally requires a financial outlay to purchase so is less likely to be discarded by popping to the bogs, topping up with water, putting the lid on and launching at the opposition fans/ ref/ annoying twat further up the stand who keeps shouting FORWAAAAAAARD!

Clearly you've never bought a coke from the kiosk £££ :)

Civic Type R man? He's an interesting character, I alluded to him in the Colchester MDT as I had the (mis)fortune of sitting behind him. (of course if it's the same fella)

Health and Safety is not a 'thing' which has gone mad, despite what the Daily Mail is desperate to tell you.

Ultimately I would imagine that someone will have done a risk assessment which will have noted that a full bottle of water can be used as a fairly handy missile should someone to choose to use it and thus would also provide an opportunity for anyone hit by such an object sold by the club in such a state to then sue the club for negligence, thus the clubs public liability insurers will probably be asking for such a policy to be adopted to reduce litigation risk.

In the main such rules are not caused by 'H&S' and instead wholly by the habit of human beings to sue at any opportunity to gain a few quid, often these being the same people who maon incessantly that bloody H&S has gone maaaad.

Not aimed at any posters, just a bug bear of mine having been involved in assessing claims against various public organisations over the years and realising that a) people will sue for just about anything despite what a clueless prick it will make them look like and b) unless paperwork and policies are in place liability is normally proven. Not helped by the fact that many places who self insure do not bother contesting claims <£4k as the staff time costs more than the settlement, and the no win no fee solicitors know this!

P.S Be interesting (not really) to see how this is all affected now more and more drinks are being flogged in bottles where the lid stays attached to prevent  littering, more paperwork for someone.

Do better with your wordplay next time Bob  ;)

Post this weeks AB and both Trust and OSC feedback around the U16 policy and alternative options given fans feedback on this and to improve this and given the improved behavior seen over the last 4-6 weeks the club have now decided to amend the policy and align more to other Lg2 clubs policy on young fans attending games. https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2022/november/club-update-on-young-fans-attending-sn1/

13/14/15 year olds don't carry ID, how on earth are they going to police this?

Remember Brentford refused me entry at 15 pay on the gate and I had no ID and only enough money left for a concession ticket. Think they caved eventually and let me in as the game was kicking off.

To be fair, I did look about 23 and was about 6 beers deep.

It’s what most other clubs do, isn’t it? Gives stewards a bit more discretion to root out the clear trouble makers.

So was it the under 16's who were specifically doing the vandalism then?

Bloody kids

Got it wrong to start with, but a good exercise in getting it right and evidence of the AB and trust/osc participation

Wasn't exactly sure where to put this but this thread kind of seems the right place.

For the Colchester and Tranmere games, our tickets which we have downloaded on our phone haven't worked. For Colchester we showed our tickets to the girl who let us in but on Saturday after the scanner returned a 'check ticket' type message we showed it to the girl who after some time said we are entering the wrong stand!! She let us in but are there still issues with scanners? Is there anything I can do to resolve this issue?

I don't know the system they use at the CG, but from frustrated experience with the system that Northern Rail use at stations it could be as simple as turning up the brightness on your phone screen, I had a right palaver on Saturday afternoon trying to get through the barriers at Manchester Ox Rd (no doubt with a queue behind me wondering what the twat at the front was doing) only solved when I turned my phone up and it worked fine after that.

Cheers Horlock but I don't think there is an issue with the brightness. In fact, when I open up the ticket the brightness automatically increases so I am pretty sure it's not that. The scanner seemed to scan the ticket as it came up with the 'check ticket' message. No idea if it's relevant but I buy an adult and an OAP ticket but I 100% made sure I had the adult, and my dad had the OAP ticket.

Were they the same seats both times?

Are they being stored into a "wallet" on your phone, or are you just using the PDF bar code?

Probably worth contacting the ticket office.

Seen in the news a Kaiser Chiefs gig was having issue with tickets disappearing and people now being able to get in.

Digital tickets are fucking shit.

No, the first time we were in block D3U and the second time D6U. We both store them in the "wallets" on our phones. Mine is android and my dad's is Iphone, neither of us can get the bloody thing to scan.


Oh absolutely. I just wondered whether anyone on here had experienced anything similar.

All the time in the TE, usually have to get a steward to let me in  :)

how odd.

a friend went on a Matchday ticket Saturday but

 - he was in the town end
 - I think he scanned the bar code on the pdf -  straight off the phone.

No suggestions, but we'll see if anyone else has the same issue.

 Didn't sound like you are doing anything wrong, well it's kind of hard to.

Tickets on android phone work ok

Printed copies have caused grief a couple of times

One time I was told that I had booked a ticket for another stand when I tried to get in the town end . I got in eventually

Haha, same as my experience. I did find it quite amusing when she said I was in the wrong stand. Having sat in the DRS probably 100+ times I think I know the stand I buy tickets in, but of course she wasn't to know my SN1 history.

Reminds me of the Man City game last season where these Italian people were looking for their seats in the DRS. Some helpful fans took a look at their tickets and advised they should have been in the Arkells! Quite how they made it as far as they did should be a mystery, but given the CG staff recently, hardly surprising. Maybe that's why I was told I was in the wrong stand on Saturday! :)

We have the plastic season ticket cards, they only work about half of the time in the DRS.

Ironically, last season I sat with some friends in the Arkells as I was on my own and used a screen shot of a friends ST and it worked fine

I've not had an issue with the cards all season, much better than last year.

One of the few actual real life use cases for NFTs but nobody seems to have twigged yet

get the patent in !

Question for AB - What is the situation regarding alcohol sales in the townend?

Is the van around the back not there anymore?

I don’t think it is - anyone who knows otherwise please feel free to correct me.

Its been added to the list for next weeks meeting :-)

Jan, can you also ask what the delay is in paying the final £120k that we owe SBC? Has been stuck at that amount for months now which seems odd considering we need to be in their good books ref the CG purchase.

I guess the point of your question is clarification, but we aren't necessarily in the bad books.

i.e. could be as per repayment schedule.

I wonder if it’ll be paid with the World Cup money and that’s why it’s taken a back seat

Could well be an annual payment rather than monthly.  Pay your debts when they absolutely have to be paid, demand your creditors pay you when you want it.

Its part of the payment plan and when we complete the deposit on the CG purchase it will be paid off as part of that, that's why it hasn't decreased in recent months..

I figured it would be that. IIRC the deposit is due on the 31st January 2023 isn't it?

Correct

Thanks for confirming :)

Assume as its a joint venture the club would be paying the extra £120k on top of what is already going to be paid as part of their 50% deposit ? i.e. just clarifying that the debt is not rolled up into the purchase price ?

Thanks for clarifying.

revisiting this one- when can the plans be expected?

Couple of questions for JanAirplanMan

Firstky, can the findings of the recent poll on this forum debating whether SL should be kept on be presented at the next AB meeting?

I know this constitutes a very small percentage of the fanbase but the overall result is unequivocally in favour of SL leaving so Clems perspective on this would be welcomed.

Secondly, once/if the ground purchase is completed what would the annual saving on rent payable to SBC be? & would these savings be reinvested into the club directly or would they be used to offset the internal debt that currently exists, presumably of which the majority is owed to CM?

I want Lindsey gone as much as anyone, but you can’t present a poll in which just over 100 people voted as evidence the fans want him gone.

Very much along the lines I was going to suggest, so clarification would be welcomed.

Totally agree, and there is no way that Clem & Rob would make their opinions on Lindsey public, that would be unprofessional and would undermine Lindsey's position whether they think he is doing a good job or not.

I agree, the AB should be about matters off the pitch etc. However the 2nd question from FreddySTFC is perfectly valid, and a question that should be asked

Agreed.

Discussing the contractual position of someone under gainful employment by the business would actually open the club up to a world of trouble at an Employment Tribunal in the future, steer well clear.

The rent will be in the order of 100k a year or so.  The payment was structured based on attendances, from memory, so we'd be paying a little more in the past season or so.  Pre-Power, I think we actually published the number each year in the accounts.

9 years ago the BBC reported it was £17k a month so £204k a year, it came out when Power was in arrears again and arguing about the maintenance costs the club were facing despite it being a full repairing lease.  

As for the Advisory Board discussing peoples employment where does it stop, player not playing well, fans have a poll and that's it he's kicked out, they tried that at Ebbsfleet, didn't go well.

£225k per year is the number I heard/remember. Depends on attendances and league position I think.

It may have been covered before, but are the fans charging rent on our 50% share of the ground?

I thought that it was a yes, but the money was going to be used for ground improvements & maintenance

Well it would appear SL has left the club so that might not be relevant now, buts lets see.
On 2 and the rent, believe the current rent is approx £200k a year and new rent post sale will be around half that number. I will ask formally at the AB on Tuesday and update.

Thanks as always Jan.

I probably should have been clearer on my first point. I wasn't expecting a detailed response from Clem on SL's performance thus far & the liklihood of him being retained etc. More a case of making him aware of the current discontent amongst the fanbase.

I know the numbers polled were small but it was likely that the outcome would have been reflected across the wider fanbase.
Looks to be academic now as you mentioned though.

I'd argue this forum is less knee jerky than other mediums though.

A mass twitter/facebook poll of thousands would be even more damning, I suspect.

It is knee jerky enough

Did the scheduled meeting go ahead today ? :sherlock:

It did yes.. minutes to follow soon
No discussion on manager situation

I suspect i know the answer to this but any insight onto a timeline for us announcing the new manager?

Yeh, didn’t expect them to share news on the manager hunt with those that attend an advisory board meeting.

However, I do expect (or like to think) that the supporters trust representatives, amongst other attendees, pressed the club officials hard on I’d say 95% of supporters concerns regarding the complete silence from the club this week. I kinda get the silence on the manager, legalities and all that BS, we got mugged off last summer with Charlton and garner so as fans we are used to the club being taken mick out of.

What I don’t get is why the club are radio silent on a massive landmark announcement regarding the news this week on the Trusts JV CG purchase. It’s a big deal. Yet nothing. Not a peep.

I also find it bizarre we’ve not sold this Saturday at all: what happened to Pack the CG for Austin’s return? Biggest signing in years. Could have sold it out easily. Fucking poor. Once again, not a peep. A manager doesn’t stop you tweeting.

Oh, and we had a competitive game yesterday, and our head coach was absent, but you wouldn’t know either of those as the club didn’t mention a peep. They’ve done Chippenham wrong there in all as identified by Dan Hunt on Twitter, could have easily shifted 100-200 more tickets with some promo about the game.

Cowboy/circus setup is the vibe I’m getting.

Yeah I get not saying anything about the manager situation on twitter, but not to sell an upcoming league game and not comment on us playing even in The Wiltshire Shield is bizarre to say the least.

That and hearing a perfectly adequate appointment in David Artell who has publicly announced his interest hasn't even been contacted.....just adds to the WTF nature of everything.

Crawley announcement
advisory board meeting notes
The right new manager appointed

In that order within the next two days please. Really need to step this up as its becoming worrying.

ST renewals are just around the corner too, keeping fans in the dark now isnt going to play out well for that marketing push.


Hopefully these are just innocent mistakes that will be learnt from going forward, the Swindon fan in me naturally worries theres more to it and something major (bad) is happening in the background.

what possible previous experiences as a town fan would make you think that.

oh yeah 😁

Best case scenario is admin has been working hard lining up a whole load of excellent content to announce the SL departure, inform fans on reasons for the delay, explain progress in new manager search and push Saturday's game hard, all starting this afternoon.

We'll see.

latest minutes.

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2023/january/club-releases-january-advisory-board-minutes/

Who asked the question about tippy tappy football?

New minutes up

https://www.swindontownfc.co.uk/news/2023/january/club-releases-january-advisory-board-minutes/

Particular highlights from supporters questions include why are the players still taking the knee and why were there no players at the christmas carol service

Cheers.

Couple of queries for the Trust really...

Now the voting thing has finished when will it be possible to open up for members again as I would suggest now is a good time to encourage people to join. Plus also note that 'The details of how to obtain shares in the Trust and the County Ground are online and a brochure will also be produced for any who cannot access online.' where is this, can't find it on the website?

ffs

Exactly my reaction when i read it, whoever sent that in obviously has nothing else to worry about

Thanks for questions.. will try and answer below:

1. We are working on re opening the membership part on the new website, we will launch the CG society share purchase at the same time as re-opening up the membership as both go hand in hand, we expect this to occur in a few weeks and will update fans on this. We are just finalising all plans for this. But it wont be too long.. :-)

2. The brochure is due to go to the printers soon and in upcoming home games Trust board members will issue these to fans. Again watch our socials on this.

3. The details of the County Ground purchase and vote result are online on our new website truststfc.com, as well as the structure of the deal and FAQs, there is a typo in the AB notes saying the mechanism to purchase shares is online, this should have read "The ability to purchase shares will follow soon on the new website". Apologies for the misunderstanding here.

thanks

Cool, cheers!

Final question (for now ;) ), which has probably been covered elsewhere in the past. In terms of the £2.3m purchase price, is this being wholly funded by the Nigel Eady Trust at least upfront to complete in July and if so I assume that the Supporters Trust will then reimburse them via the proceeds of share sales and the club via the pockets of Clem?

No more questions your honour.  :D

I didn't even realise they did, I  wait for all the pre match shenanigans to be finished before I get in the ground.

You time things very well. They literally do it 10 seconds before kickoff.

Not a problem, happy to help

Your right the Nigel Eady trust will fund the full £2.3M, its likely this may be completed as a single transaction earlier than July but yes we have until July to complete the full payment to SBC.

The Nigel eady Trust in paying for the CG are in essence then funding the CG purchase through the Joint Venture (JV), which is owned 50/50 between STFC and the Trust. That money does not need to be repaid.

Any additional money put in via Clem and the Trust (through fans buying shares/additional contributions on top etc) will then go towards the urgent works needed to develop and refurbish the CG. There is at least £1m of work needed immediately to address various lack of maintenance issues for example, and then there are the costs of the redevelopment of the ground.

I hope that makes sense? shout if you have any further questions

So any money raised by the Trust from members doesn't actually buy the ground (which is already bought by the Eady Trust and effectively donated to the Trust/Club through the medium of the CGJV), it essentially becomes a "CG Improvements and Maintenance War-Chest", right?

(Which is fine by the way)

Sorry, so that it’s clear as I may have miss read what was said, the Nigel Eady trust are paying for the CG in full & then it’s owned jointly between the club & trust?

I wasn’t aware that was the case if so, as long as the ground is protected which I guess it will be under the agreement all is good.

Thanks

Correct, but the trust 50% we will then sell shares in to fans, all monies will then go towards the renovation of the CG
all of which is protected.
If the money wasn't being provided by the Eady trust then it would take all involved much longer to purchase the CG and undertake the redevelopment.

Correct, we have £1m minimum urgent maintenance that needs undertaking on the CG ASAP and then the redevelopment costs.

What will be covered by that £1m urgent maintenance fund?

Good shout, I’m intrigued too.

Up the Nigel Eady, what a legacy.

Absolutely. Deserves something very significant named after him, and I'm sure that will happen.

Town End Bar

Thanks for the clarification

Its a really big list
Some things will be addressed as part of the redevelopment
but some urgent things need to be addressed asap like roof issues on stands, urgent leaks, floodlight repairs, repairs all across the stadium and surrounding areas etc etc.. Like i said its a huge list, but the key thing is ensuring we only spend what we have to and ideally look for most items to be addressed as part of the development, but some things cant wait.

Started a thread, it probably deserves its own.

How about building some atmosphere ?

:tumbleweed:

Does anyone know why Bar 71 has been closed for away fans this season?

Youth team use it. It’s also used for steward briefings.

Met him a few times at events when he was alive.
What a legacy.

Biosphere II was not really a success.

Fuck all away support mean it's not worth opening?

I'll bring the nitrogen, why don't you bring some argon (bugger to get that much though)?

All the best chemistry jokes argon

Fabulous!  :clap:

On the floodlights, I think I remember seeing something about this before but i've noticed (and it might just be from the Ifollow feed rather than at the ground) during night games and later on in second halves how dim the light appears to be. Are there any plans to do anything with the floodlights in order to either replace the bulbs, or change them to bright energy efficient ones?

Appreciate they are ancient and these things cost and arm and a leg but I was curious.

I suspect a lot will depend on the schedule for redevelopment as the norm seems now for them to be incorporated onto stand roofs, which would in turn allow an up to date and no doubt brighter and more efficient system to be used?

I'd like to think that certain things that make the CG unique (the floodlights, the clock, the scoreboard, the lack of any atmosphere - arf) will be retained in some shape or form. There is something special about the walk to the ground when the lights are on, the structure of them looming over the area gives them a kind of majesty and I hope they are retained and given a pedestal.

Unfortunately it may well be that we have to go along the incorporation into rooves territory but I hope that isn't going to be the case.

I don't know how the floodlights would work with the light shows they have nowadays. A choreographer may need to check

Keeping the clock is imperative. Keeping the flood lights as they are would be nice, but might not be practical with the new Town End stand with the hotel and offices and everything in.

Would be a bit odd, but would keeping two up the other end and then having lights on the top of the new stand even work or would that make for uneven lighting?

Good question re the lighting. It will be interesting to see/hear from the club about the visual plans for the ground development that I presume will follow after the purchase has actually happened.

This, everything else (including the legendarily bad Stratton bank bogs) is replaceable

Just seeing Arsenal kept the Highbury clock, although you never see if because the stadium is so huge. Looks shite anyway compared to ours.

I imagine that all this money and effort will be spent on redeveloping the ground..............and us nostalgic oldies are gonna hate it!

A shame we couldn't have bought the cricket ground and done it properly!

The side of the car park, the cricket pitch shouldn't really be needed.

After a new roofed Stratton Bank and boxes in the DRS, we should really be able to get everything we need in a new Town End and have an overall increased capacity.

Its much more appealing on the eye than a whole new stadium in my opinion, which however you might try always ends up to seem a bit soulless.

Can't see them getting shot of the clock, and it can be made much more of a feature that at the Emirates as obviously the revised CG will be so much smaller.

WRT floodlights whilst they are a great old feature I imagine that they are a pain  in the arse to maintain and actually quite the liability so whilst I would imagine its no doubt the case that they (or at least a couple) could be kept once the TE is done it will be whether its viable to do so, I would imagine in the medium term it would probably be cheaper to replace those at the bank end with those single column ones you see at many newer small grounds which seem less of a complicated structure than lattice work pylons like we have.

I've never managed to find an image of what was eventually approved on the bank end to get an idea of its height or suitability for lighting, but anything can be done with money.

I've seen drawings of an exact copy of the DRS for the bank previously, shorter obviously, but the exact same design. not sure if it was actually ever approved.

Deepdale style floodlights would be a decent compromise.


New Town End must be single tiered IMO.

I know that whatever was finally approved was approved about the same time as the DRS so it may be the case that they are similar (and if that's the case the club may as well go down that route again as the precedent has been set, just a pity no one was savvy enough to make a technical start and implement it).

Despite having been there a fair few times I had no recollection of the Deepdale floodlights, after googling, their design and siting seems more to do with the roof design employed within the whole ground rather than any specific design decision, as our place, at best, is going to be a bit of a hotchpotch in the medium term probably not really an option, albeit they look very nice.   

Are we knocking and rebuilding the bank or just putting a roof on it?

Putting a roof the current bank seems a big pointless with the amount of facilities that need an upgrade and the state of things in the corner by the DRS.

Something basic like the away end at Adams Park would work and shouldn't break the bank, no pun intended.

Might be making this up but I’m sure I read somewhere the budget for the Bank was only £1m. That means a roof and general tarting up.

I think it was seen as £1m and more like £2m now, unless I'm misremembering.

Would a stand as basic as the example at Adams Park cost more than that?

It would have to an all seater whatever it is. A new build is, I think, around £3000 per seat. So a 5000 seater would be £15m.

Seats already in the Bank so a roof and new facilities would see something like the away end at Fratton Park

The issue with building a roof over the existing bank is what you are going to found the thing on, historic football terraces are basically made ground which is inherently unstable for building anything on and normally means a lot of expense getting the foundation down to a suitable level to actually found anything on, in the case above whilst I don't doubt the structure would be fairly light, it would also need a fuck load of foundation to stop it being badly affected by the wind, especially in a ground with a built in wind tunnel like our place.

Makes sense. The main cost will be too facilities I expect and sorting out the absolute shit pit in the corner dear the DRS. Could facilities go around the back as well?

That, plus a tidy up / new toilets and a food kiosk is all the bank really needs at the moment

I think as part of the Trust's Joint Venture arrangement we have to have started (not sure if this is got planning permission or completed the work or not) a project for at least £1 million quid within 3 years or the Council can buy the ground back.

I suspect that's where the £1 million quid figure came from and was seen as an 'easy fix' that would meet these requirements.

Would work for me - good size and cover, and then you can put the food concession and toilets in a separate building in the corner like they do- or even use modular buildings for the interim

I think you're right. The bank is exactly that. A bank of earth with the steps and seating set into it, rather than a cast reinforced concrete form supported on piles like the DRS.

I'm not sure if there's a practical design option to just "bung a roof on it" or how rational an investment it would be. There's not much space at the back to build the structures required for a cantilevered roof and if you had traditional pillars then the span you'd need to clear the bank itself at either end would probably need a central stantion and who wants to build something with one of those in the 21st century.

As long as there is something for Spurs fans to torch during their next visit!

Think pillars would be the only option for putting a roof on it and new facilities, like Portsmouth.

Am I right in thinking that money was spent several years ago on some sort of feasibility study regarding putting a roof on the Bank and some sort of explority work was undertaken to see if the supporting pillars could be set in what is basically a mound of earth with very old concrete steps on top ?

Q: Is there any possibility of relieving SdM of his duties (in regards to shortlisting potential managers/head coaches/club mouthpieces/cone carriers) seeing as he doesn't appear to have a clue when it comes to managerial recruitment?

A: We'll be having a separate advisory meeting to advise upon the advice we will take on the steps forward to determine whether the advisory meeting will go ahead in order to decide if we take advice on the next steps to take at the annual general meeting. In the interim, nothing will change and everything will be the same. All clear?! Thanks; next question...

Wait Wait. Going back a few pages. IF The Eady Trust is paying for the CG In Full, isn't Clem as full owner getting half a ground for free?

Got to admit I thought the Eady money was just paying the Trust’s share of the JV.

Are there any restrictions on what any owner of the club can do with the club’s 50% share?

Listen to the various pods, OSC, lspod, stbl last week all of these questions were discussed in depth.  Also articles in adver and total sport.
Trust website also has a good explanation of it.

In short there are loads of restrictions built into the JV agreement.

So I guess you know the anwer then? Is it trust 50% eady. club 50% clem money. Or is Eady covering all of it?

Cos I'd ask the question Why doesn't the trust just own 100%

Given the hours of content out there on this with questions being asked directly to those involved in the deal, it would be unfair for me to paraphrase in a sentence  or 2 on here, which is mostly full of bullshit anyway.  Why trust my word when it's on the actual Trusts website ffs.

The County Ground has had no investment in it for decades because no-one will invest in someone else's asset.   Would you put an extension on next doors house?  That situation wouldn't change if the Trust owned it all.

And yes 100% from eady, with club and supporters trust owning 50% each in a joint venture.   

Didn't mean to come across as someone who is deliberately being misinformed to create some sort of internet drama.

I honestly thought that clem and his lot were funding their side of the ground purchase. I don't keep up with stuff as much as I used to, and maybe it was knowledge to everyone else and I've just missed some bits. But was suprised by that. I'm not saying it's a problem or anything - although not gonna deny my years of distrust of club owners is hard to get over.

Just a suprise in that I thought I'd kept up on stuff enough to know details like that. Suprised and disappointed in my own ignorance.

I understood that the club has a long lease of the ground. I understand that this is different to your example of building on your neighbour's house.

I was trying to keep it simple.

There is a big difference between a resi lease and a lease of a run down football club as the former can be traded on the open market the latter cannot.

Most investors would prefer to buy a big bit of land and stick a new ground and loads of resi on it rather than spend millions modernising an old in use asset as its easy, cheaper and a far bigger, quicker return to do so.

From the Trust FAQs:

What stops the Club from selling its share of the County Ground?

For the Club to sell, assign, move or change it’s shareholding in the County Ground, the JV (joint venture) would have to unanimously agree.


Basically, the Trust can stop the club selling their share to unscrupulous parties.

Doesn't remove the fact that the ground was/is leased to the club on a full repairing basis so whilst you wouldn't invest in improvements the club should have at least kept up with basic maintenance which they obviously haven't done with the suggestion that it needs millions spending on repairs now.

I wouldn’t feel too disappointed Ben as you were not alone in your thinking, I also thought Clem was throwing 50% in the pot !
I have now educated myself via the very informative Trust website.  :-[

Agreed but it's not as if you can evict them and replace with another tennant.  The council had little power (no pun) to force the issue.

How much does the club pay in rent currently to the council? I assume the money saved going forward will be going directly in to the improvements?

I also haven't looked in to this as much as I probably should have, to be honest.

I seem to remember thinking it was something in the region of 200k per year but that could be completely wrong.

Back to the advisory board- would prefer the club are pressed on publishing the short/medium/long term strategy  for the club under clem than ask silly questions about taking the knee tbh.

Was apparently £17k a month, 9 years ago. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-30586435

Agree, do people not have much to do in their life then to think of silly questions.