Frequently Asked Questions... 1. âAssem Allam has put in his money so surely he can do what he wants?â We remain eternally grateful that Dr. Allam guaranteed the future of the club by securing the debt run up by the previous regime. Without his input the club would have faced liquidation. We believe that the owner should conduct the business in any way that sees the football club prosper. But that shouldnât give Dr. Allam the right to do whatever he wants with the clubâs name and tradition. A football club is a part of a community. The fans are informal stakeholders in the club. Many fans have spent an awful lot of money following Hull City over the years, and in bad times the fans have propped the club up. Dr. Allam loaned the club an eye-watering amount of money. Itâs important to remember that many fans spend a huge amount on following Hull City too, in relative terms. Collectively, fans provide the club with a significant proportion of its income. Dr. Allam must be allowed to make decisions on how the club is run. However no football club owner should be allowed to dismiss a clubâs history, tradition and its place in the community. 2. âWhy would I protest against the Allams after everything theyâve done?â This isnât a protest against Dr. Allam or his family. This isnât a protest against the way theyâve run the football club or an attempt to force them out. This is a campaign to save the name of âHull City A.F.C.â. When Dr. Allam purchased the football club, he declared it a âgift to the communityâ. We want to show Dr. Allam that the community loves and values the football club and feels that the name is an important representation of that community and the city. We will show Dr. Allam the respect he deserves for the work he has done at the football club and for what he has achieved. But we will continue to urge him to re-think a decision that would dismiss the history and the tradition of the great club that he worked so hard to save. 3. âIâll still be able to call them whatever I like wonât I?â Fans currently call the club âHull Cityâ, âCityâ or âThe Tigersâ on a regular basis. This wonât change in the short term. As it starts to change the whole crowd wonât be supporting the same team. Some fans will have Hull City shirts and some will have Hull Tigers shirts. Some fans will sing Hull City songs and some will sing Hull Tigers songs. It wonât be as enjoyable for anyone. The future generations of supporters wonât call the club âHull Cityâ or âCityâ. Our children and grandchildren will only know âHull Tigersâ. Eventually chants like âCity till I dieâ and âCome on Cityâ will fail to make sense and die out. While we may still call them whatever we like, âHull Tigersâ will become the common name. It will be âHull Tigers vs. Leeds Unitedâ on the fixture list, âHull Tigersâ on the kit and the badge and should we ever win a trophy, it will be engraved âHull Tigersâ. 109 years of tradition will be dismissed. How many MK Dons fans still call their club âWimbledonâ? 4. âWhat if I donât like Hull Tigers but I can live with Hull City Tigers?â âHull City Tigersâ is not the goal. Dr. Allam stated that âCityâ is a lousy identity and that a brand name should be as short as possible. He has been referring to the club as âHull Tigersâ in media interviews for a while. 5. âWouldnât you rather be Hull Tigers playing in the Premier League than Hull City playing in League Two?â This isnât a choice that has to be made. We are already âHull Cityâ playing in the Premier League. Hull City have achieved remarkable success in the last ten years with the name as it is. Hull City achieved the third quickest rise from the fourth tier to the top tier of English football in history. Hull City drew crowds of over 20,000 in the fourth tier. Hull City holds the record for a fourth tier crowd in the modern (Premier League) era. That happened because the community cherishes Hull City. The community supported people who invested in its future. There is no proven case for why the club shouldnât continue to be successful. Dr. Allam has not provided evidence of any market research or expert opinion that would support the need for change. The club already receives a huge amount of TV money. It already has a strong identity with the unique striped shirts, the highly marketable badge and one of the best and oldest nicknames in English football. We support Dr. Allam in his quest to attract interest and investment in the football club. If he feels that he can take Hull City on to another level then he has our backing. We urge him to do so while staying true to the history of the football club and recognising its position at the heart of the community. 6. âWhy donât you move with the times?â There may well be other industries, sports and even football markets such as America and Australia where this sort of thing is seen as a means of progressing. That isnât the case with football in England. English football is still special. It is still viewed with awe around the world. Millions of people in Scandinavia, mainland Europe, America, Australia and Asia support clubs in England that they have never seen in the flesh. These people grew up watching and adoring English football and they still do. They love the traditionalism. They love the names, the nicknames, the colours and the badges. For all the changes that have been embraced in English football over the past 30 years, some things remain sacred. Even clubs who now travel over 20,000 miles in pre-season to sell themselves to emerging markets recognise that the history and tradition of the club is a massive part of the reason fans on the other side of the globe can feel a part of its community. 7. âWhere does my donation go?â The campaign is a strictly not for profit operation run entirely on a voluntary basis. All funds raised go directly towards materials that will raise awareness of the issue. So far, funds have been spent on printing leaflets, making badges and commissioning flags. Additional items of merchandise (such as scarves and wristbands) will be sold to members via our website, as a way of raising extra funds. We also have an ethical sourcing policy so that wherever possible the funds will go back into the local economy. We will prioritise sourcing in Hull in the first instance, in Yorkshire in the second or at minimum in the North of England. Also wherever possible, we will support independent suppliers. Details of what donations we have received and how the money has been spent are available on request. 8. âWhat are you going to do if Dr. Allam doesnât change his mind?â The campaign will concentrate initially on uniting the fans who want the name to remain âHull Cityâ and emphasising the strength of the fansâ feelings. Any change of name must be ratified by the Football Association and the Premier League, who require evidence of fan consultation. Our group intends to offer our assistance to Dr Allam and the football club to help ensure a fair, inclusive and rigorous consultation is put in place. If Dr. Allam does not consider the wishes of the fans then we will appeal directly to the FA and the Premier League to ensure that they do not endorse the change. However, we remain confident that when Dr. Allam realises the strength of feeling that exists amongst the fan base for the 109 year old history of the name and the club then we can reach an amicable conclusion. http://notohulltigers.tumblr.com/post/64014122494/frequently-asked-questions
You can support the campaign by buying a City Till We Die scarf, they're a fiver each, will all proceeds going back into the campaign fund... please log in to view this image Details of where to get them from will be announced shortly.
Very well put and reasonable statement of the campaigns position. Although I'm not a supporter I like the way they've laid out their argument.
With the exception of number 4, 7 and 8, the bits in bold are why the campaign is pointless. Leave Dr. Allam alone, it's his business, he can do as he likes with it. Same as we can make our own choice whether to remain customers of his product or not.
I wont go into each point - Ive nailed my colours to the mast from the start - but just on this point the answer is NO. I'd rather be Hull City in the conference than Hull Tigers in the Premier League. The other one that annoys me is the amount of people who have said "as long as they don't change the colours I don't mind". What?!? The name is MUCH more important than the colours. I suspect if we were changing colours the same people would say "as long as they don't change the name...etc, etc". They just want to rollover no matter what.
The point is he can't, he found this out when he tried to change the name without following Premier League protocol, it got rejected and he was made to look an idiot.
Dr Allam is the current custodian or honorary steward of our great and historic club, not merely the owner. I wonder if anyone has ever expressed those sentiments to him? He is a self-confessed non-football man, in all likelihood surrounded by other non-football folk who will be similarly unaware of this aspect of his role.
That last post was admittedly a piss take, having read this now, the concluding sentence is false hope I believe. I think the "amicable conclusion" will be the business being called Hull Tigers. Dr. Allam has already stated his strong desire to go forward with this more than once and I really can't see him turning back unless it becomes an impossibility. Which is where the campaign has it's only offensive opportunity. Obviously it's important to get your own house in order first, but in my opinion, backing will have to be gained from the whole country's football supporting population before it can be stopped, and fast. The rules are very brief and open to interpretation, consultation could easily be interpreted by Allam stating his intentions in the press as enough. I don't need to tell anyone what the football hierarchy is like in this country, we all know they're unlikely to step in Allams way even if a double fistful of fans from a minor club oppose it. A whole country of fans and national press though and they may have to do something about it. Even if all that is is define their rules on changes, we as fans know where we stand and what opportunity we have to save the clubs name. At present we could be barking up the wrong tree for all we know, we may be powerless to stop any change short of grovelling and pleading until Dr. Allam changes his mind. I would start by getting in touch and joining with Cardiff fans, and possibly Everton, dropping the individual club groups and creating one big nationwide group with the aim of protecting every club in the country from rash changes by rash owners customising their new play toy, anything from the name to colours or crest, by campaigning to the authorities to force club owners to properly consult fans and only approve changes with an acceptable level of agreement. That is the best way to go about it in my opinion.
Great stuff The thing that get me is that when Dr. Allam took over the club Im sure (I may remember this wrong) he said he was doing it for the fans, for the city and for the people from Hull in general, now its all its my club my money I will do what I want.
Erm - look at post 2. Of course I read the title - I'm interested in the campaign! I'm just pointing out that the first shots appear to have been fired, which will de-rail this thread into another great argument.
He also said he wanted to make the stadium complex a first-class facility to benefit inner city disadvantaged kids. Yeah there's loads of them in Melton isn't there...
Stop calling him Dr Allam, its an insult to anyone who's ever worked for a doctorate, the fact he address himself as Dr Allam when it's just an honouree doctorate says everything you need to know about him!
We're already working the the FSF to pool our collective resources and this campaign is being fought on many fronts, the campaign locally is just one of them. Another campaign is taking place with the FA and Premier League to make sure that fans opinions can't be ignored.
