what happens next then

[Guest]

We could indeed play at the rugby club, and it may well come to that if as you believe Deaner will walk away. Trouble is that it will be in the east-berks inter-pub league on a Sunday Morning.

The land down by the rugby club is either

a) in green belt or in Windsor and Maidenhead or both. The chance of getting any commercial development on it to support the club at Ryman or avove is zero.

At the public meeting he stated that the fortunes of the club are tied to his family's ability to make his business a success. I hope the abscence from games is a sign he is busy on his real job.

You may not trust Mr D but for better or for worse for the last 6 years he has been the only show in(or out) of town.

[Staines-upon-Thames Rebel]

I dont think its a question of trust as Martyn has put his money where his mouth is so far.

 

However it is the future that concerns me.

 

At some point in time Martyn will either not be able to or not want to continue to put money into the club, at that point we either hope a new fairy godmother appears or us as supporters have to pick up the responsibility of running and funding the club.

 

The trust is the first step to ensuring there is some future, but could the trust find/generate £150k a year, every year?

 

I will keep on doing the lottery in hope of the jackpot, but can anyone sugest a viable way of us finding this amout each year - even pimping Dominic wont work as KOC found out!

[Barry Scott]

there's no money in the pimping game anymore

[Burnham Lad]

The question of the debt, Staines Rebel, is an interesting one. On the other thread about the FA Cup money, Anonymous poster said that the £650k ws owed to Mr Deaner, which is a possibility. If the money he has pumped into the club is as a loan, then it will need repaying, unless he agree to forgo it and the same applies to the interest. The other issue is that this is old data - the Club at my last check, admittedly a month or so ago, had not filed the accounts for the subsequent financial year, and are already into fines for failure to do so. So the situation could be better, it could be worse.

 

You may remember that Mr Deaner did offer to sell the club a few years ago for £1, the catch of course being that the lucky purchaser picked up the debts as well.

 

So as the anonymous poster said, we are OK until whoever is funding the Club at the moment, probably Mr Deaner, continues to do so. I think in his own way he does love football, because nobody would run up this kind of financial situation, without a very clear exit route, in the absence of a way to make some money out of it. Without Wexham Park as a club asset, gambling on getting a new ground with the Hotel etc, was always a dodgy bet for anybody and as Mr Deaner once remarked, his wife thinks he is totally barmy.

 

But this thread is about what happens next and we do not know what Mr Deaner and his other Directors have in mind to do or if they have no idea where to go next - and my inclination is to think that this may be the case.

 

Sadly, as I said elsewhere, the fans are the last ones to find out what is happening, yet if this is a business we are the customers, and since our money is helping to keep it afloat, I think we have some rights in the matter.

 

We do have the Trust who represent a large group of the fans although not all. I think we must now face up to the club and ask, where is this all going? Do we have the 25K promised by Mr Deaner for the rent next year? DO we have the money to pay the wages and other bills. I really don't think the Board can ask us to go through another summer not knowing if we will have a club to support next season, or even the season after that. We have to ask them, Mr Deaner, Bernard Devine and Jonathon Freese, what is going on and not give up until we get an answer.

 

All the time the clock is ticking and whilst this goes on it plays into the hand of our enemies, Messrs Stokes and Co, who only have to wait until we are on our knees, when they can laugh. They don't need to do anything unless they are forced. In fact many of the councillors only hold their seats by a small majority. If we can identify enough fans in each ward, we can see many of them off at the next election, so we need to ask questions about what councillors are prepared to do to help the club, and publicise that as part of the debate at the next election.

 

This post is already a mile long, so I will shut up - but just make one plea - and I am going to shout it - WE CANNOT LEAVE THIS UNTIL THE END OF THE SEASON - WE DON'T HAVE LONG ENOUGH TO EVEN TRY TO ESCAPE DISASTER WHEN IT IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING.

 

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[Ted]

Very good post, especially the penultimate paragraph. Probably represents our best way forward in dealing with the council. Other ideas have been mooted, but this one has legs.