Darlington FC

This thread seems to have grabbed a lot of attention and I thought I'd share it with you all to see, yet another club on the verge of going bust

Found it off otib

http://www.darlofc.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=15733

 

What a fantastic thread.I'm left thinking there but for the grace of god,and the eight.I do hope they survive,and i'm sure i read earlier today, that their ex keeper who now plays in the prem made a donation.Long live the little teams.I implore all of our younger fans to read this link,and realise this was how us old blokes felt those years back.

 

Darlington's problems are well documented and go back to their mental ex chairman (George Reynolds) who was a very shady character and who I believe is still in jail.

Their new stadium (called the Reynolds Arena when it was built a few years ago when they left Feethams) houses 25,000 people when they were getting average gates of 2,000.....what were they (and in particular George Reynolds) thinking of ?

 

A terrible situation that threatens the heritage of our game. Teams like Darlington, and all the other teams that have disappeared off the radar with barely a blip, take with them the history and roots of our beloved sport.

Having left England 36 years ago I must confess I have lost some of the nuances of today's game, but I see decisions made through the intervening years that have virtually destroyed the game as I knew it all those years ago.

Standing on the Wembley terraces in 1966 and watching the boys win the ONLY World Cup that our country will ever win. So you might ask why does Mike think that way?

Well, like everything else English we have sold it off or given it away and that is no more truer than with the game of football. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer and sadly the rich have absolutely no interests in the poor, despite the poor being the grass roots of the sport. The rich clubs continue to make players, who have no commitment to their clubs, richer than they ever deserve whilst putting the elite (by their own definition only) players out of reach of any club that doesn't belong to the exclusive club group.

Tell all (or most) foreign owners to get their noses out of our game and take their foreign players with them. I know I'm old and curmudgeonly but give me the days when just about all players were home grown which meant that they actually wanted to play for their employers rather that complaining the grass was greener in Abu Dhabi.

Went off course a bit there, now I feel better and unfortunately I know things won't change in time to allow teams that are teetering on the edge of extinction to survive. Multi-millions will be spent by out of control big spending clubs without a single thought to the plight of teams in financial trouble (some self inflicted I concede) and that is a very sad reflection about how football has changedfor the worst.

They think it's over - it is now!!!! (England's 4th goal commentary in 1966 World Cup Final). How ironic.

 

Funny Wize, Rovers came to my mind as I read this - we may laugh at them but it would be a dreadful shame to see them fall in the same way.

This is a beautifully written article and really makes you feel for the town and the fans that stick by their club no matter what.

 

Also, although their stadium may physically hold 25000, they are only ever allowed a maximum of 10000 due to planning restrictions, that's not going to help the finances, although they would probably take 10K at the moment.

I trust that the City board have applied for Ashton Vale to be able to accomodate it's full capacity. Would be a pyrrhic victory if it got built and then was reduced to 10K capacity so as not to upset the doggies.

 

The point is that in a relatively small town like Darlo with little or no football pedigree, they were never going to get 1/4 of the new ground filled.