Hornchurch Demise

[Cyclops]

Quote:

hornchurch have lived the dream and have experienced so many highes. not many if any other clubs will play live on t.v, have their chairman arrive in a helicopter etc etc (setting u up for jokes about your chairman and chopper there! ha ha). i was pleased to see it and really wished them well. now its all changed what im saying is i dont feel sorry for horchurch fans, would you take what they have had in the past few years, i know i would. what i am saying is i really feel for the people who now have to find their wages from another source to pay bills. i dont mean that in a horrible way.

i make you right ST players come and go but fans are their through out! dont mean i have to feel sympathy tho, not when they have had so much! i think all non league fans are quality. really do, real genuine fans....except town fans of course! ha ha!

I know what you mean and can see where you're coming from even if I don't fully agree with you (I do to a great extent).

To me this is just another reason why supporters should aim for mutual status (OK, I'm a supporter of Enfield Town and we've got it now, but we never used to have it as EFC members/fans). More clubs should look to the Football Governance Research Centre web site for help in making sure that their supporters get the benefits (although they will also have to shoulder some extra burdens) of mutuality.

If you have a club where no one person can have more than one share you will always have a situation where every supporter feels needed because every person's opinion has as much clout as every other's. It does mean you are less likely to get loads of money thrown at your club because any one backer won't be able to buy any more control than any other backer, so they won't perhaps want to put in the money, but on the other hand, the supporters end up with a club which is theirs and which can't be taken away just because somebody else has more money than they have.

It also means that players promised a deal by the club don't have to worry so much about whether they get paid because the fact that a backer might pull the plug is far less likely to enter the equation.

All in all it is a far better way of running a sports club at the level which is represented in this country by, say, Football League Div 1 (old Div 3) and below. It certainly seems to have worked at a higher level for Barcelona and, in American Football, the Green Bay Packers. Long may mutuality fend off the carpet-baggers!

[Football Man]

Quote:

did their chairman really arrive on chopper? when was that?

The owner used to turn up by chopper in the early days. However, all the local residents were up in arms about it so the council passed a motion preventing the take-off of all helicopters (except the air ambulance) in the local area after 4pm at weekends and after 8pm on weekdays. This effectively meant that he could come to the game by chopper if he wanted to, but wouldn't be able to get back home again. Very clever thinking and it did the trick!

[The Realist]

Amber

Quite happy to be a has been. At Romford and Enfield Town and other ESL teams we are doing things slowly and trying to avoid mistakes. Good luck with your new stadium, I shall follow it's progress closely. In a couple of weeks the has beens of Romford will play the has beens of Enfield Town in front of 300 loyal and passionate supporters, why not come along if you have no game, we will make you very welcome.

[Mr Happy]

Yeah, you do know what a crowd is don't you Nectar!?