Fittons interview in the program

How are your nerves holding up at this stage of the season?
My nerves are pretty good. I’m not the sort of person who gets too nervous about things really. I tend to be pretty measured about these things. In fact, I’m probably at my best when things are difficult.

The board have always been confident we’ll avoid the drop, is that still the case?
Absolutely, but I think we’ve been surprised by how difficult it’s been this season. We might need 50 points to make ourselves safe this year, but we’ve seen that any team in this half of the table - and it’s not just the bottom half - is capable of beating anyone else in this division. We’ve done well against some of the top sides and struggled against some of those in the lower half, so there are no easy games. It’s a cliché, but it’s true.

And the big games keep on coming, Brighton on Saturday, Leyton Orient this afternoon…
I think from my perspective I don’t tend to get too focused on that. They’re all just games, aren’t they? You have to take one game at a time and you can’t get too hung up about who it’s against or where they are in the table around you. What’s most important is for us to play at our best. The reality is that it’s in our own hands and so we can only focus on our own performance, our own squad. If we play to our best, we’ll have no problems.

Fans spend hours trying to work out where the necessary points will come from, do you do the same?
I think you do, but when you do that you’re confounded by it, and events have proved that it’s not that easy to do! For example, we won three games and I was expecting to win a fourth against Yeovil, and we didn’t do it. I expected to beat Crewe, but there didn’t look as though there was going to be a winner in that game, so as much as you try and predict what will happen, it’s difficult; we’re all capable of beating each other.

Are you disappointed we’re still fighting for our lives at this stage of the season? Could you have imagined this situation at the start of the campaign, and has this been the most difficult element of the job?
It is. I felt at the beginning of the season that our squad was good enough to be on the fringe of the play-offs. The statistics show that if all the games ended in the 85th minute, we’d be in those play-off positions. That’s been very worrying.
But I don’t think you can single out any area of the pitch that has been a specific weakness. Certainly, since Danny arrived, we have been looking to improve things at the back and in the middle. We’ve made changes and things have been better. And when you improve one position, you then look to strengthen the next, so it’s a constant battle to enhance the team and solve the problems, but I thought we were better than this. We’ve certainly learned a lot, we’ve learned that you need to get on a confident, winning run, because nerves have undone us a few times.

We never really got going …
I think we got into the habit of losing. The other thing is that we do better against the better sides. I’m sure the manager has spent time thinking about this, but it’s like the players feel they’re more able to play against the top sides. It happens with other teams, even Liverpool and Manchester United. I don’t know if it’s psychological – do they think they’re going to win easily? I don’t know… We just always seem to raise our game against the good sides, then look a little bit lacklustre or tired against the weaker sides. But like I said, on their day, the teams at the bottom are still capable of beating anyone, they’ve shown that.

How would you assess Danny Wilson’s tenure so far?
What Danny has done is to show a structured approach. He knows what he wants and he knows how he wants the game to be played, and he looks logically at how and where he needs to strengthen.
He identified early on that he wanted more width. We had a good player in Anthony McNamee but he wanted more options, and we’ve seen the benefits when we’ve got Macca and Hal Robson Kanu on the pitch. He saw we needed to strengthen the midfield and he bought in Owain Tudor Jones, and that’s had a knock-on effect with Michael Timlin; he’s freer and we’re seeing the best of him, he’s able to distribute the ball and play to his strengths. And again at the back, there were obvious issues. Again Danny targeted that area and identified a solution, and you can be rest assured he is doing that looking forward as well.

So the manager has transfer targets in mind already ahead of next season?
We’ve talked about a lot of players as the months have gone on. We have an issue this year in that there are a lot of our own players out of contract, but also there will be a lot of players available because I think a lot of teams will be looking to cut their squads this summer. That creates an opportunity for us and we’ve identified four or five key players we’d like to bring in. If we can get them in, we can start looking for the other players to build a squad. One thing’s for sure, it will be a smaller squad.

Are you hoping to get these targets in early?
We’ve got an advantage this year, and to be fair it’s not something Maurice had, and that’s having a lot of our players coming out of contract, meaning we’re looking to bring in several more faces. Of course, some of our players will be given new contracts and we’ll be negotiating with them, but we have an opportunity to rebuild early.
It’s important to get the spine right. By that I mean someone leading at the back, someone in the middle and a strong goalkeeper to create a spine that plays every game. Once you have those elements you can hang the other bits on the edge. Danny’ very focused on that.
We hope this will happen quickly, and if I was a player I’d be looking to get a quick deal this summer; there will be a lot of players – good players – who won’t find homes because of the cut backs. But equally, we want to move quickly to get the players we want and we’re focused on that. If we have to play the waiting game for one or two, then we’ll do that as well.

Many Town fans see Gordon Greer and Simon Cox as part of that spine. Have you made any attempt to make Gordon’s move permanent, and will Coxy be wearing a Swindon Town shirt next season?
I think one of the things Danny and I have been keen to do, is to let our league situation resolve itself before we do anything. We’re in a battle and we don’t want to get involved in contract negotiations [because they can be distracting]. We would like to have some conversations with Gordon - he knows that - and we’ll be sitting down with him, but it won’t be until after Easter. We don’t want to distract him or others. Timing is everything; if we get six points this weekend we’ll feel much more able to sitdown, because we won’t feel at risk.
With regards to Simon’s position, it hasn’t changed; he’s a Swindon Town player. I’m a real believer that Swindon Town as a club has to make itself a shop window for players to come here, whether they be youth players growing within our team, or players coming down from a higher level to kickstart their career – like Simon. Is he for sale? Well, no, but if the right opportunity comes up and someone wants to buy Simon Cox, and it’s a good move for him and the club, then it’d be wrong for me to stand in his way. People shouldn’t confuse that with us having to sell for financial reasons.
I want to see Simon Cox become a top footballer. I want to see him play in the Championship; I would prefer that’s with us, but I can’t stand in his way. It’s a difficult balance, but you have to be honest, realistic – you have to give players that opportunity to attract them in the first place, they have to know you’e not going to prevent them from building their careers. They have to know that if they do a job for us, we’ll do a job for them.

Has the board found it difficult trading in the current financial climate, and are there plans in place for next year?
Football clubs are generally losing money and we have to have on eye on that. Our plan [for next season] has been finalised and will be adopted in the next few weeks. We have both a draft budget for next year and a three-year plan, in draft. We’re looking to do work on both of those before we adopt them, but we’ll be looking to implement them at the end of April.

Is there a back-up plan if we go down?
They say you must hope for the best and plan for the worst, so the answer is yes. I wouldn’t say it’s a back-up plan, for us it’s about making adjustments if the worst happened, or using sub-strategies. It’s a bit like an Olympic rower like Steven Redgrave; he’s planned his campaign carefully for four years ahead of the Olympics, so if something happens and things don’t go to plan, and he has a plan B to get back on track.
For us this is a long-term game. We didn’t expect instant success and we didn’t expect that this was going to be easy, but our plan was to have a place to get to within three or five years. I don’t think anything has happened so far that interferes with that.

Last year you looked at getting 6,000 season ticket sales. Does the number we sell this summer impact on any financial plans?
Swindon is a well-supported club at this level, but it has the potential to be much better supported. Historically we’ve had bigger crowds and we have to build back to those attendances, but we’re one of few clubs that have seen a rise in attendances this year. Many clubs have seen a fall of 5/10 per cent. We’re up this year and we want to continue that trajectory.
I don’t want to nail it down to a number of season tickets for next season, because I don’t think that’s necessarily the most important thing. It’s good to have a base, of course it is, but I would much rather have an average gate of over 8,000 than x thousand season ticket sales, that would tell me we’re building the club back up. Don’t get me wrong, I would be disappointed if we didn’t see a similar number of season tickets as this year, but it’s not our only focus.

How important is a good start to next season to help improve crowds further?
No-one knows the answer as to how many people a good start will bring to the gate, but do I think a good start will help? Yes I do. Do I hope we’re at the top end of the table? Yes, Do I hope we’re playing good football? I think we’re already doing that under Danny Wilson, and I think that will continue next season.
All the work we did last summer, it’s all a crucial part of getting extra people through the gate. What I want to see is an extra 500 people through the gate on average each season. There’s no point me saying we’re going to get 15,000, because it’s not going to happen, but I can plan to get from 7,500 to 8,000, then 8,000 to 8,500 and so on, and get back to the levels of support we’ve had historically. That way we’ll have a football club that can sustain itself.

You mention the changes off the field last summer, are there any more in the pipeline?
There are, but not quite as dramatic. It’s not difficult. Last summer we spent a bit of money – not loads – on making the place have a bit more pride in itself. It makes a difference to people, it can change attitudes. Our focus now is to continue to improve things, but also to start seeing the next step. Is it ground development, a ground move? That work is going on behind the scenes but it is taking a lot longer than expected.

Is the ground share with Bath Rugby club definitely off as reported last week?
Yes, it’s off. We’ve gone past the date where it would be natural for it to happen. Rugby is suffering its own recession, and Bath probably aren’t sure what their crowds will be next season either. Rugby at that level is planning for it’s own down turn at that level.

You spoke of football’s recession earlier in the season, are you surprised more clubs haven’t gone into administration?
I’m staggered, not because I want them to, but because I thought they would. I think there will be clubs disappear, and I mean disappear and going out of business. There aren’t as many people with the money to help pick up the pieces. I’m very concerned about clubs like Southampton...

But you see us as one of the club on a more level playing field?
We’ve still got to go to another level. When we came to this club, frankly, it was in a mess. Now it’s in less of a mess but it’s still not financially sustainable without a lot of thought from its shareholders and directors. There are clubs out there that do manage to keep themselves profitable, and I think we must get to that level. I think we want to create something that’s sustainable whether I’m here or whatever. I could get run over tomorrow, and we don’t want to get into a situation where the club’s in jeopardy because I’m not there, or Sir Martyn Arbib’s not there, or Jeremy Wray, Andrew Black. It’s not good for the supporters or the club. Too many football clubs are losing money where the shareholders can’t finance them. There have been many wealthy benefactors who aren’t as wealthy as they were, or they have to keep their own businesses alive, and I don’t want Swindon in that position.

Can you shed any light on the court case with Bill Power?
I can’t say too much about Bill Power, although the case is finished and we’re awaiting a decision after Easter. It’s a very unfortunate episode. It has done great damage to the football club both in terms of reputation and finance. I’m disappointed the people involved allowed it to get this far and didn’t sit round a table to sort this out.
It will have cost the club a lot of money. What I’m really saying is that ending up in court is never a good answer. I‘m guessing the combined legal costs of both sides will come close to a million pounds, and that’s not a good answer.