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Q&A SPECIAL: Chairman McCrory responds to fan queries
           
           


  AT A meeting organised by the Swindon Advertiser last month, Swindon Town chairman Jed McCrory pledged to answer fans’ questions on various topics to do with the running of the club.

           

http://www.thisisswindontownfc.co.uk/news/headlines/10406655.Q_A_SPECIAL__Chairman_McCrory_responds_to_fan_queries/?ref=rss
           
           
           

Well the answers to the Trust were brief!

Not sure I know that much more now than before but I guess that was inevitable; emphasis on youth, training facilities, self-sustainability.

Not sure I understood what happened to the £1.2M either!

He did sort of confirm 'the incident' though.

Ok, I'll go first. I've tried to be rational, balanced, measured. No. What a complete prick he is.

I think my problem with Jed is I just don't like the bloke. First impressions weren't great and I can't see what he's adding to the club.

Having said that I'm happy to admit this is probably more down to me than anything Jed has actually done.

Good luck to him and the club, but I don't have a great feeling about all of this.

As with MacDonald, a lot of fans have already made their minds up on Jed. Doomed if he does, doomed if he doesn't.

I don't really have much of an opinion tbh, bit sick of all the negativity towards the people in charge when to me, they haven't really done anything wrong. Think I'll just stick to being a happy clapper and worry about supporting the team next season.

As much as anything, it's taken weeks to dish up answers that have largely already been given. It doesn't say a great deal for his productivity does it! I'm with Jan aage as well. As well as being one of the most unprofessional plebs associated with our club for years, I just don't like the bloke.

I guess this is relevant in some ways: BBC RS reporting wage bill to be halved to ~ £2M per anum from > £4M this season.

I guess that should set expectations.

Any idea how this compares to say smaller (Walsall/Yeovil) Medium (Brentford this ear) and larger teams (Sheff U) in the league?

All of this smacks of a business opportunity.

It's not unreasonable to try to make the club self financing. However, my feeling is that they will try to get the club ticking along with the day to day money that the club itself generates leaving them to take a wage or consultancy fee with the real pay day for them coming from the summer concerts. That is until someone comes along and buys them out for a handsome profit. In the mean time Kmac establishes himself as a manager and will then leg it when someone bigger comes knocking.

Glad it wasn't just me, trying to be pragmatic I wonder whether its just the way the Adver has formastted it and the Supporters Trust ones were answered first as there is quite a bot of duplication.

It doesn't actually say anything that we didn't know, in some ways I welcome the straight nature of the responses its limited on corporate bollocks and happy clapping positivity and does admit that change is a foot.

On the negative side I did find myself thinking on most questions 'I haven't really got a clue whats going on here, but if you asked me that question and I was bullshitting thats the same answer I would have given'.

See what happens with squad over next few days and then move forward, if our wage bill is as massive as rumoured (as compared with others in league) I would be interested to know the figures as I do fear its a little scary in scale as it stands.

The Trust want people to look at Jed's answers, make their own minds up about them and then let us know what they think and what they'd like to see us do next. For now, here's our reaction:

TRUST STFC REACTION RE JED MCCRORY ANSWERS TO FANS QUESTIONS
9 May 2013
 
The Trust thanks Jed for taking the time to answer the questions put to him. Not every chair in his position would have done the same and we welcome his willingness to meet with fans representatives and his stated agreement to ongoing meetings. We look forward to working with the Supporters Club to make these meetings as effective as possible. We also want to praise the efforts of the club to engage the community – the big screen event over the weekend was a great example.

However, whilst we believe this should mark the start of a positive, structured relationship with fans groups, it is disappointing that not all of the answers to these questions are as detailed as we had hoped. More comprehensive responses to some of the more contentious questions would have helped address concerns widely expressed by fans – who asked us to put these questions to the board. We believe that openness, transparency and accountability are extremely important to well-run football clubs which serve their communities.

We would encourage fans to review these answers carefully, contact us with their thoughts and, most importantly, join the Trust. We want to represent the views of as many supporters as possible, as accurately as possible. 

Having encouraged the Board to improve their communications with fans we are also looking to improve the ways we engage and interact with supporters and will share our approach in the coming weeks. We welcome any views, comments or ideas around this. 

We want to praise the staff at the club, especially the players, for their efforts over the season and during the play-offs. A top six finish, after promotion the season before and the off-field issues was a real achievement. Despite the extremely disappointing end to the campaign, there are reasons to be positive too and we are looking forward to playing our part in a successful future for Swindon Town Football Club. 

So to be honest like most clubs at our level. I don't have a problem if they stabilise and sell at a profit (although I imagine Black has some clawback provisions to cover that), we were in the deep shit and they at the very least prevented even worse things happening so good luck to them.

As I said before (and this isn't aimed at the post above), Spencer and Paolo took something in the region of say £1m (agents fees for 1 year were £400k, plus salaries etc) out of the club, yet people are banging the wall because Directors want salaries, it makes no sense.

If KMac buggers off the a bigger club in time it means he will have done well here and had success, so win win and happy days.

Taking note of the brevity of his answers this should take them all of 10 minutes.

I have no issue with our wage bill being reduced, as it was quite high. But what I don't understand is why when Jed first came in be said the wage bill will be very similar to what it was this past season. Why get the supporters hopes up?

£4million was a Top 6 budget, similar to Doncaster, Notts County and Preston. £2million will put us with the likes of Leyton Orient and Shrewsbury.

Reasonable comment, however, my point though maybe not made that clearly is that they IMHO see us as money making opportunity. Unless Kmac does a SAF and gets us promoted with a bunch of kids then it is mid table mediocrity for us for the foreseeable future.

With a £2 million pound wage budget we are unlikely to attract players with the quality to get promoted.

Also so answers aren't really thought out. No structure to them, and very little given away. Disappointed.

Franchise i heard has a 2.5 million wage bill.
Have been trying to find a full list. would be interesting to see.

It's a different model but you only have to look at blackpool in the championship to see it's possible to punch above the salary weight.

Take Ritchie and Caddis off that wage bill and we're a quarter way there i would have thought

 Well, that was illuminating...  Well worth the wait.

This is sort of interesting although of limited use...

http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2011/10/30/english-football-wages-since-1984-85-301001/

The problem with MK is they have a low wage bill, but go for quality rather than quantity. They have 15 very good and expensive players, but their downfall every year is they get injured and have no strength in depth.

There is nobody willing to cover the losses of the football club, its that simple. As a result wages need to be brought in line. Its not the news i want as a fan but its what has to happen to keep the club going unless a benefactor can be found. We've seen what can happen when a benefactor leaves as well this season!

A self sustaining model is something all lower league clubs need to move to. Lets move on.

Yeovil can do it with a small budget, why can't we!

Also i imagine a a lot of those savings are made just by not having PDC and his back room staff there, wasn't his pay doubled in the summer?

No great shock...

Im hoping for a season of mid table hopefully after all this bollocks.

The Fire Sale will hurt no doubt, especially when we see good players fucking off to the likes of Bmuff etc.

Well we had a 4 million on this year and we failed, so your point is

I imagine apart from 2 or 3 clubs that's the same for all league one teams.

Some big teams coming into the league this next season.
I'm happy to see the start of a new look Swindon and to just worry about football on the pitch for a change.
Be sad to see so many of them go.
I'm just hoping they hold onto Collins and Foderingham, Take up the options on Flint and Ferry (if reports are correct) and then get money for them if bids come in.

If other have to leave so be it.

It'll be harder to compete at the same level with a smaller budget. Its not rocket science.

Thanks for those that put £2M in perspective. I literally had no idea whether it left us on par with most cubs our size, somewhere underneath where others spend or slightly more.

I'll hate a budget reduction, I think we all will, but there is no other choice right now. Simple as.

What is massively important is Jed really does keep us at an even keel, and does not fuck the club over.

Whilst there is nothing to suggest he will do anything of the sort (to the latter) to say I am underwhelmed by his start is an understatement. Its almost all down to a lack of transparency and lack of communication - except tell 'em what they want to hear on twitter. But that's my opinion, its what they do that counts. Which is why it is important for bodies like the Trust to keep asking, keep watching.

Brentford's budget this season was reportedly £5m - so a bit more than ourselves.

There must have been so must waste in our £4.5m budget - it might not notice that much, player-wise, next year

Morshead seems to think the wage bill will be 2.4M, so close to Dongs then.

The clearest signal that our wage bill is too high was Alan Navarro's picture on twitter of his motor.

Looks dodgy as fuck like it has from the outset. Doesn't add up I'm afraid. The stuff about youth investment yet wage cutbacks rings alarms bells. How can we have an u21 development squad yet stay inline with clubs in our division with cuts? Clubs in our division don't have u21 squads and operate like us already. The squad would have to be bigger-academy status , etc.

This lot have no idea what they aren't doing imo. All that's time to come back with that? Jeez

Not if the U-21 is also the first team squad

Actually, DiscoDazzer (Darren S, not agent Darren) made a point about lower league clubs starting to offer youth players pro contracts for development squads much earlier to protect themselves against EPPP. I'm quite sure I don't understand EPPP properly, but I guess cost/benefit calculations of this approach have been made.

playing first team and development football? costs money though. No good with cutbacks as mentioned. Doesn't add up.

Is PDC's salary included in the £4m ??

In that £4m/£4.5m budget last year we need to remember this included wages paid to Perrett, Bostock, Martin, Coke and Bessone..All wastes of money to some degree.

Big wage signings in Collins, Ward, Williams, Roberts, Miller, Navarro, , TAH and McEveley…The first two I would say have been value for money, Williams and Roberts to a lesser extent but the rest have not justified their big wages this season and wouldn’t care if we got rid of  most of those.

We paid around £350k in fees at tribunal for TAH & Collins.

Paid off Risser’s contract

Had players out on loan or in the bomb squad whilst paying their wages or some of their wages.. Benson, Caddis, Rooney & Cox.

We have also lost Ritchie from the wage bill without replacing him with a similar earner, so saved money already.

Having wasted most of that £4m budget a £2m/£2.5 budget spent wisely and prudently might not be a disaster.

Dunno. Morshead is chasing this up.

If the 4m does include agents fees and other salaries then that would make a big difference.

I know he doesn't want to be too open about intricate business dealings, but the brevity of those answers is a little unnerving. Why not be open and honest?

Those answers took THAT long to draw up?

Ho-hum.

Well if PDC was included and if he was on the rumoured £800k then thats a massive chunk, less Ritchie less all the shit loanees then you are going to be well under £3m.

Im not sure how much difference the drop in budget will make IF it includes PDC salary and agent dealings as this would make up a significant chunk plus all the duff signings that were made and consequently paid off.

I guess once we find out the retained list later on we may see how severe these cuts are.

Well at least we now have it in the open, what some have been saying all along, despite the efforts of the wishful thinkers this isn't good.   The main problem is that Jed is working on funding the wages from crowds remaining at the level of the last 2 seasons...they won't.

The fellow at O*ford tries to run a similar sustainable operation, their wage bill would be comparable to our new level, but because, they've been shit, a 1000 have voted with their feet so they've lost a mill on the season. STFC fans are just as fickle.

KMac, now becomes pivotal in this, we were told he had a 2.5 year contract...which seemed to fit in with the need for a manager happy to work with kids, we now have in te open that we'll have a side with a number of kids, so his role becomes crucial. Yet we've also been told he in fact doesn't have the 2.5 years, but just til end of season.

He needs to stay...many of the MacDonald outers, are the same lot who wanted PdC out, because of his rambling post match interviews.

Next season then, becomes a try and get 50 points, to maintain Div 3 status season, anything else very much a bonus.

Yay.

Didn't see that coming.  ::)

It's important that the fanbase have a realistic perception of where we are.

You and your realism.

Even with the cuts we'll still have a playing budget in the top 10 or so, yet 'realistic Reg' thinks that is enough to send us down.

You can see Jed replying to those answers with a pint in hand...RAAAAAAAAAWWWWWRRRRRRR!!!

Was certainly hoping for a bit more meat of the bones in terms of the answers, looks like those responses could have been written in 15 mins.

No major surprises in the answers really.  As mentioned if agents fees, staff salaries aren’t included in £2m then its puts us middle of the pack in terms of budget, could be a lot worse.  With a bit of luck we could find ourselves top 10/pushing for P/O’s.  With a greater emphasis of youth the appointment of Kmac looks more and more sensible.

why's that then?

Exactly right. Our fans aren't going to pay £25 a pop to watch us in mid-table or fighting relegation. The 8000+ are there to watch us win games and have a crack at promotion anything less and its down to 6000 with our current prices.

Also, am I right in saying we're now paying four people to do the job that Nick Watkins did on his own?

If PdC has not been appointed in the first place I would guess the budget would have been, roughly, what we are getting for next season.

PdC has skewed everyone's perception of what sort of club we actually are.

I don't remember Swindon having a massive budget. comparatively, when Ardiles and Hoddle were successful.

Then again, I don't remember much these days

Out of interest does anyone know what our wage budget was the season we made it to the play offs under Wilson?

 

About 4.3m

http://thewashbag.com/2012/04/24/counting-the-cost-of-failure/

Well those answers took ages to write and there is nothing to them.

They were short and seemed snappy to me - almost like he was being questioned by the police.

As for the wage budget being slashed in half, unlike some on here I have no idea how that breaks down or compares to other teams in this league what so ever.

I can't however imagine cut backs improving our squad. I will be somewhat relieve when we hit 52 points next season...

Football's different these days. The financial gap from the Prem to the Champ to L1 is huge.

Some numbers:

In 93/94, Man U's wage bill was (depending on your source) between £8 - £11m. Don't know what our wage bill was. Our turnover that year was £5m, so it might have been £3/4m largely depending on what we paid clowns like McAvennie, Fenwick and Kilcline. So it was a big gap, but not unimaginable that a team could get a few results.
 
In 2012/13 Total wages in the Prem were £1.6bn. Man U's were £162m. (Man City £202m, Chelsea £173m). Swansea's was the smallest wage bill at £35m.

Hoddle and Ardiles were playing a completely different game.

You only get to step up a gear with investment. Without investment, you're at the level you're at.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2013/apr/18/premier-league-club-accounts-debt
http://www.footballeconomy.com/content/swindon-town-football-company-ltd-swindon-town-football-club

When you're using kids in a side, they're going to make mistakes...what they don't need is to get slaughtered for so doing. They'll be trying, but it's a hard thing to make happen. Similarly it's tough for the manager, he doesn't need to get slaughtered for showing a bit of faith in youth. In MacDonald's case it's what he's been brought in to do, and it's a hard job.

I know I'm being unrealistic for fans to have a bit of patience and try and support, but it's something that has pissed me off down the years.

Don Rogers used to get stick, because he didn't tackle, head, or come off the pitch covered in shit. Roger Smart used to get stick because he buzzed around like a blue arse fly, 90 mins of graft, but somehow wasn't quite as good as Ernie Hunt or Don Rogers.

Paul Rideout...used to get it, because he was single minded and clearly knew he was good. Rideout was the jewel in John Trollope's young side....which was an austerity response to Bob Smith's spending...Peach, Cockerill, and high wage earners lie Rollings, Barrett etc..... we got relegated. The Arkells then turned on JT, and he was ousted.

Fitzroy Simpson...seen as a big time Charlie.

Most of those mentioned survived because they were good enough, but some might need a bit longer ...I recall the slaughtering of Lloyd Macklin, again by the Arkells, v Orient. He'd only been on the park a few minutes.

Many reckoned N Thompson terrible, when he first appeared on the scene, yet a bit of patience has been rewarded and hopefully we might benefit rather than some other club.

Think you'll find that includes all the non-playing staff as well, whose wages totalled £1.1m which would have made the playing staff wages about £3.2m.

On that note. I wonder if we will see KMac actually bring in a backroom staff. All he has bought in is Cooper so far.

It is all a bit ambigous really.

I wish somebody would define just what 'playing budget' means exactly.

Black was apparently expecting to pump in £3 million per season with the level of spending we had last season and the one just finished. Turnover for this season was probably between £5m and £6m which would put total expenditure above £8m.

Replacing PDC and co with cheaper alternatives and cutting £2m off the players wages could get close to a £3m saving but there are a couple of problems.

First, crowds are unlikely to hold up with a cheaper side and we are less likely to get any decent cup runs or play-off income so turnover will almost certainly fall.

Secondly its very easy to say we're going to lop £2m off the playing budget. It isnt that easy to actually do it. Players on big wages will not be volunteering for a pay cut or a transfer unless their new club will match their wages. That means the cuts may have to come from moving on younger players who are easier to shift and/or can bring in a fee. We've effectively already seen an example of this by the sale of Ritchie in January.

Remember chatting to an old Town fan who sadly passed away a few years ago, he used to say to me the biggest stumblinb block in Town's success over the years has been the fans. We are not a well supported club, both in numbers (the catchment area is massive) and otherwise. Stuff like this proves his point!

My fear is that some of our fans will now turn their back on the club because they are trying to do the right thing in becoming sustainable. Im looking forward to "lack of ambition" and "on the cheap" being thrown around in the coming months.

Reading that was a total waste of time. No questions answered, merely dodged.

Maximise season ticket revenue

Jed comes across as some dodgy wideboy car salesman with these answers - and this is only crystallised with his twitter chat.  As someone else said, he sounds like he's giving answers to the police.

I am not a pessimistic type of person, but the future is not looking at all bright.

Has Crouch gone now? and wheres Fredi's response?

I think the only thing linking Crouch to us is a LinkedIn page here (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/steve-crouch/2/358/b5b). If he's still undergoing the strenuous and probing FL tests then that might explain why Jed wouldn't confirm anything.

Fredi has disappeared off the face of the earth since Sam Morshead attempted to contact him/her.

Q: Can Jed confirm rumours that a “SC” is potentially joining the board?

A: To be announced.

I think I could of wrote those answers, Jed must have been laughing when he wrote them

And why the wait until after the PO's so as not to de-stabalise everything ? crap, convinient that he gives his answers and then goes on hols for 2 weeks straight away

Q: Hi Jed, are you making this up as you go along?

Don't bother answering, it's a rhetorical question.

And by his comments about fans representation. We're all a bunch of busy bodies don't you know?!

If he thinks things are bad now, wait until a few fans mobilise if we're not doing well next season. We'll see how big a headache he has then eh?

Very worrying times ahead. More questions than answers after reading that.

In fairness, that's more or less the same as the previous board - Wray only became keen on fans on the board after he was sacked as chairman, he was similarly dismissive of the idea while he was in a position to deliver it (and be affected by it)

I really want to hear from Crouch.

He seems to be the real deal and could, hopefully, diffuse some of the concerns.

Me too. And let's hope so

what's all this about Power and his supposed links with Diamandis? It's news to me.

Someone posted it the other day on here...can't remember who. Frankly I don't believe it.

Yes, I don't think (meaningful) fans representation will ever happen.

It was just the abrasiveness of the answers towards the busybodies which pissed me off.

Not a wonderful set of replies to some very valid questions but realistically I was not expecting anything else.

I am not convinced either way about the board as yet only that they none of them were in the Sunday Times "rich list" (which does not mean that much as to put a load of money into a lower league football team is not the most sensible of ideas), but having a couple of hundred million in the bank or having top business acumen certainly helps and tbh I do not see a great deal of that yet.
 
As said elsewhere, Swindon fans are pretty fickle it must be said, it takes ten good wins on the bounce to get the floating supporters up and a couple of bad results to lose them and that has always been the case. If the reduction in wages means that we end up as mid table mediocraties with gates of 6000 then so be it, but I do not want to see us struggling from the opening day with a small squad full of untried youngsters. On the other hand if KMac stays then hopefully he may be able to pull in some younger players from higher division clubs who have not quite made the grade, they are around Ritchie/Caddis/Ferry being prime examples.

[url width=333 height=250]http://i.imgur.com/gTqoXHf.gif[/url]

Not looking forward to next season.  :cry:

Which muppet asked about Power having an involvement in racing stables in Oxfordshire? :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

What an embarrassing and irrelevant  question. If I was Jed I wouldn't have even bothered responding to it.

Was there an allegation made (Ferdi?) relating to this, or was it just a random question?

I don't believe Fredi mentioned anything to do with an Oxfordshire stable, so it must just be a bizarre random question.

Read this at work today. It seemed like a very divide and conquer piece. The responses to the trust were very short, direct and slightly dismissive. Whilst the Supporters Club got some jokes and 'chat'.

Makes me want to sign up for the trust again.

No idea why the play offs were used as a reason to delay responding.  Unsurprisingly the answers are fairly uninsightful and will do little to ease the concerns floating around.  It feels a bit like he's taking the piss out of us all tbh.

I got paid a couple of beers to write those answers 8)

I'm glad someone else put it like that. I felt like I was being dismissed as unimportant for even thinking he should have to answer such questions.