Spirit of '69

[4D]

I honestly don't remember why orange was considered significant last time round and why it remains relevant now (apart from obviously a fair few having orange hats left over from last time!)

Sure it was to do with the orange revolution in Ukraine.

[RobertT]

Sure it was to do with the orange revolution in Ukraine.

Yes it was.

[Audrey]

It might function fine, but would it function sufficiently fine to the acceptance of the fan base. Was reading something the other day about Portsmouth who basically ended up in fan ownership after a trail of shitty owners and what became rapidly clear is that under fan ownership it could just about tick over as a business but until the guy from Disney came in with cash behind him it was at best treading water.

Albeit treading water sounds like fucking heaven compared to where we are now...

Yeah. Treading water is way better than drowning.

[Ƭ̵̬̊: The Artist Formerly Known as CWIG]

My fear is that anyone who buys the place off Morfuni is going to be a shitty chancer who doesn't do due diligence (as nobody in their right mind would pay any sort of cash without seeing the books) so will it be a Jed plus the bloke with silly hair sort of 'deal' replacing one dubious group lacking a pot to piss in with another one?  

Yeah that's pretty much the myriad we've been in since Black sold up. Its sadly the most likely scenario time and time again but fuck me we've hit what feels like rock bottom at the moment, although rock bottom has a basement and its called non league. 

[Bob1978]

My fear is that anyone who buys the place off Morfuni is going to be a shitty chancer who doesn't do due diligence (as nobody in their right mind would pay any sort of cash without seeing the books) so will it be a Jed plus the bloke with silly hair sort of 'deal' replacing one dubious group lacking a pot to piss in with another one?  

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money) and playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

[Wobbly Bob]

Orange is the traditional colour for political protest apparently.

Bit too marching band from Norn Iron for my liking.
A nice shade of green to reflect early STFC history would have been nice.
Too late for that I guess.

Still. Never, Never, Never. We will never surrender....

[Bob1978]

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money), only the arkells is open on match days, and we are playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

[Batch]

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money) and playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

Valid concern. There are no guarantees.  The flip side can be seen in those clubs that have won the gamble.

Personally I'm at the point where I think we are headed to worse case anyway. Maybe we'll scrape another season of EFL football, but ultimately will end up non-league in the near future.

I'm not asking you to agree, but you can see once you hit this mindset there is little to lose.

If there was any evidence of things being put in place to get better, and any sign of addressing the football side issues then maybe your point would resonate stronger with me. I'd gladly swap owners with Carlisle even if we both have the same chance of exiting the trap door.

[doversparkred]

what are your thoughts on fans throwing tennis balls on the pitch between the 6th and 9th minute of matches, as a form of peaceful (if slightly disruptive) protest?

[UTR]

For those concerned about the possibility of selling from one underperforming ownership to another, I went through the same thought process during the last ownership and with this one and rationalised it in one way.

What’s your personal opinion of our realistic trajectory under our current ownership vs what’s the roughly worst case scenario if we moved to a worse performing ownership.

My personal opinion is that our current trajectory is almost certainly towards dropping into non league, if not this season then the next. Once we’re down there, it’s very easy to keep going down and would require a monumental shift in approach, organisation and finance to turn the tide towards moving back upwards. So I think we’d likely rot there or drop further before we had any chance of moving back up. From there we know it’s only a matter of time before the club is lost.

What’s the roughly worst case scenario if we sold to worse performing ownership? Likely very similar to the above.

When that’s the case, what is there to lose with rolling the dice?

[Posh Red]

Partially as a Dundee United colour having Paul Sturrock as manager I think, but there were other reasons it was settled on, I'm sure.

I thought it was this, also Orange is a colour that wouldn't normally be seen at a Town game & is quite visible in the crowd.  (I guess the fluorescent green would work the same way)

[tans]

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money), only the arkells is open on match days, and we are playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

[tans]

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money), only the arkells is open on match days, and we are playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

Nothing wrong with Banbury United, thats my non league team!

[RobertT]

My concern entirely- it could be worse. Think 10 years down the line we are sharing our ground with supermarine and or a rugby club (to make some money), only the arkells is open on match days, and we are playing the likes of Banbury Utd.

Like Batch is, think about how that "could be worse" scenario comes to be - you'd need an incompetent owner, a lack of investment in infrastructure, a lack of footballing competence in management positions throughout the club and complete lack of a plan to arrest any of that decline.

Now think what we have in place - it ticks all the boxes, plus has the added bonus of less than ethical people involved and possible use of the club to line personal pockets.

Assume Clem walks - assume the Trust grow some balls and step in - that is not any worse than what is outlined above because we are already on the worst case plan footballing wise.

[Freeloader]

For those concerned about the possibility of selling from one underperforming ownership to another, I went through the same thought process during the last ownership and with this one and rationalised it in one way.

What’s your personal opinion of our realistic trajectory under our current ownership vs what’s the roughly worst case scenario if we moved to a worse performing ownership.

My personal opinion is that our current trajectory is almost certainly towards dropping into non league, if not this season then the next. Once we’re down there, it’s very easy to keep going down and would require a monumental shift in approach, organisation and finance to turn the tide towards moving back upwards. So I think we’d likely rot there or drop further before we had any chance of moving back up. From there we know it’s only a matter of time before the club is lost.

What’s the roughly worst case scenario if we sold to worse performing ownership? Likely very similar to the above.

When that’s the case, what is there to lose with rolling the dice?

Totally agree that there isn't much to lose.  On May 15th of this year, Charlie Austin was quoted in the Adver article, "Charlie Austin Says Swindon Town's future is on a Knife Edge", in which he voiced concerns about the lack of footballing knowledge within the club.  He was worried then that relegation is a real possibility.  I believe that the individuals behind The Spirit of ‘69 protest group are rational and level headed and have weighed the situation including that we fans have lost the club as we know it.  Let's face it, with the current regime is only a matter of time for relegation even if Holloway pulls a rabbit out of the hat.  The only spirit is at away games, the County Ground has been like a dilapidated morgue for too long.