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Next Game: Banbury Away On Friday March 29th Kick-Off 3.00pm

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Trust Asks For Help Raising £220,000


HUST vice-chairman Martin Watson has said that Hereford United needs £220,000 in the next six or seven weeks.

He told BBC Hereford and Worcester that despite chairman David Keyte suggesting that almost all clubs lose money, fan owned clubs such as Halifax and Chester aren't doing so badly.

"Chester aren't having a great season but they've got their fans behind them, they've got consistantly decent gates.

"They are building something back from having been at the abyss and the same with Halifax.

"We played them at Leicester. We won promotion to the League, they went bust. That was the situation.

"But they've built themselves back up stronger than they ever have been.

"The problem is that over the past eighteen months the club has been constantly calling for cash.

"We were promised last summer that sensible budgets would be put in place and they were not.

"The budget as we found out just before Christmas has a £360,000 hole in it. That's not sensible."

Andrew Easton then asked Watson 'so what are you asking for here'?

"We are looking for pledges towards the Trust that we can use to clear the immediate debt, take over the running of the club and put a sensible plan in action so that the club doesn't have to keep on going to what is now getting to be a very dry well.

"We had a winding up order in January, another in April, we're expecting another one in June. 

"That can not continue, that must not continue.

"You can't budget a team with a £360,000 hole in the budget with no idea of how you are going to fill that hole."

Easton asked if there was any money in HUST's kitty?

"We got a very strong five figure sum and we're getting good people offering good money every day but we need more.

"The deal that is on offer is that the club is up for sale for £1 on the back of guaranteed investment into the club.

"This sum we're getting together, £1 would go to the existing board to buy out their debts and shares and the rest of it would go into the club as an investment.

"We've got three choices at the moment. Selling the club to a property developer that David Keyte appears to be talking to. Selling it to the fans who will look to keep it for generations to come or we've got an empty space in the middle of Hereford.

"We've had enough pledges in the first 48 hours to give us a reasonable belief that there are enough people out there who want to keep this club going."