Surely individuals in the boardroom discussing financial overspend was the cause of Bristol Rovers getting the boot from Eastville,that didn't make BRFC cheats did it...?
Precisely the reverse wiz. The Rovers Board took the monumental decision to leave their rented, traditional home at Eastville to save £30,000 per annum preventing the club spending more than it could afford.
'In May 1986, to save the club an annual cost of £30,000 plus expenses to hire Eastville, Rovers' board of directors took the historic decision to leave the club's spiritual home. A groundsharing scheme was drawn up with Bath City, whereby Rovers paid £65,000 per year to play home matches at Twerton Park'. Save £30k to spend £65k that was some moumental decision.. Anyway I don't think BCFC are cheats in any way,shape or form.....
No no No wiz Put your argument into perspective. The South Stand had just burned down. Terry Cooper had just successfully achieved another relegation campaign for the club. Quite obviouslty the financial equation was that the costs of staying at Eastville were £30.000 in excess over moving to Bath.
To be honest Saph my argument is in perspective, calling Bristol City FC cheats because of financial catastrophe in 1982 is as strange as the points previously mentioned with regard to BRFC.. I was using the BRFC analogy to demonsrate neither of our clubs are actually cheats,a club consists of the suits,shareholders,staff and supporters,surely if one element fails you can't brand the whole fabric as cheats.
Actually I played both cricket and football at local level - I ALWAYS walked if I hit it in cricket, but at football I appealled for every decision, that's the nature of the 2 games. It's your use of the word "cheat" that's the issue - don't think it's particularily the right one when talking about financial problems??
OK wiz. I would not disagree with your point of view if you include the supporters and the lower level and playing staff in your perception of 'the club'. I have always referred to the club in its business capacity. We both know that the suits run the business and they are responsible for the club as it appears on the company register. Only they are responsible for the financial activity of the club. Sometimes unfortunately!! Both Bristol Clubs have been run on a completley different business plan over the years. City's funding has been greatly influenced by the generous contributions of Harry and Steve. The worst financial bottom out for City came after Harry's input came to an end. Rovers have been run on a different strategy. Since the end of 'No buy, no sell' policy Money through the gate and Godfrey Vaughan's money raising Kudos were the bread and butter eg the North Stand at Eastville. They have also been highly successful as a feeder club. 'Finding' players in lower leagues; grooming them; then selling them on. Rover's have often only just scraped by financially, but rarely been in serious financial difficulty. My original suggestion for this thread was that the Rovers scenario should be the imposed rule for football club financing. BUT I have no problem accepting that if big money wants to invest in a club, that is fine as long as all contractual arrangements with player's salaries and are covered by monies already deposited in the football club's bank account.
Again your point is similar to mine. In one you have more time to consider what us the better thing to do. The definition of cheating is 'unfair' amongst others of course. How many times do Portsmouth have to use 'unfair' financial tactics to convince you?
Sapphire, a major reason for the financial problems at City in the early 80's was significantly due to the great Alan Dicks. Also the board had failed to provide adequate funds for signing new players after the initial group of Hunter, Cormack and Garland in the first season up and followed by Royle and Fitzpatrick the next season. Thus we ended up in 1979-80 season with almost the original promotion squad plus some very ordinary cheap free transfers. They really did need fresh ideas to have a chance of survival on the field. In 1978, freedom of contract came in and the first player in England to exercise his right to leave at the end of his contract was Gary Collier who went to Coventry with a fee decided by tribunal. AD's reaction was "That is the last player to leave without my permission!" and managed to persuade the board to dish out 6, 8 and 11 year contracts to a significant number of his first team. Some of these contracts went to very ordinary players like Alan Hay and Julian Marshall. Thus when relegated to Div Two in April 1981, we had much lower gates than Div One, with almost the entire squad on long contracts. The club desperately tried to sell players, Gow went to Man City, Royle to Norwich, Ritchie to Sunderland. All of these went for peanuts! Reputedly Clive Whitehead refused to go anywhere and spent a long time in the Reserves on top money before he went to WBA. If we'd managed to stay in Div Two, we might have got over it, but once we ended up in Div Three it was pretty obvious that we were going bust. Financial incompetence and contractual stupidity! But not I think deliberate fraud. Perhaps a bit like Portsmouth over the last few years. And one more bit about the Rovers. If their board had not sold Eastville in the thirties for a paltry amount, they might have survived there til the present.
Virtually every club in the Premiership is living beyond its means. There are exceptions such as Everton, Swansea, Norwich and co but when a club owes tens of millions and is only covering the debt by the overpaid assets on the pitch or billionaires who came by their money by dubious means, then there is something fundementally unpleasant about the whole sorry story.
The points made by Cider and Angelica support the point of the Thread that hard and fast financial rules should be put in place. If you get flashed by a speed camera. The rule says that you pay the consequences. No amount of excuses of innocence have any bearing. In Cider's case a set of catastophically incompetant business decisions caused the City's downfall. In Angelica's case if the sponsor's money was compulsorily deposited in the club's bank account then the club would be financially secure. In each case if the financial rules were in place it wouldn't matter if clubs went into administration by design or by accident the penalty would be the same.
And we all agree that Bristol City FC are an honourable club and they don't cheat as had been suggested,1982 was down to individuals way back in the depth's of history....
Perhaps a final word, certainly from me on this thread. In the past, Football clubs together with many other companies / organisations which had large amounts of cash inflow - cafe's, restaurants, fairgrounds, travelling circuses etc, were able to "divert" large amounts into pockets and other illegal methods and not declare it as income. Hence the laughter at football grounds when a full house attendance would be declared as only 80%. So City, Rovers and everyone other football club cheated the VAT/tax man, had less police than required at games and fed some of it to the players and management via "boot money" which wasn't declared as income. Now with the fact that most tickets are paid by credit/debit card, the cash taken at the gate is a small proportion of the income and as even cash payers are issued with a ticket, this type of cheating has diminished. although it may still exist an a small way at some clubs. For the future, I do not have a problem with stricter financial controls at football clubs, but I would be unhappy if any wealthy director was unable to put his hand in his pocket to strenghten the team. Certainly at our level and with our attendances, that is the only way City can compete with the ex Prem clubs in the Champinship who are getting big sums of "parachute" money. That type of income, makes it a very unbalanced and un-level playing field which means right from day one of a season, it is an unfair competition.
