Harwood Bull Looks ahead.
Very shortly this sorry season will be over and we will know whether we will still be in a national football league or demoted to the regional ladder. Whichever way it goes we still have a far bigger question to answer: how do we keep this football club alive?
David Keyte’s time as chairman started full of optimism and ends (maybe) in bitter disappointment. Of all the things he has said, the one that I think it’s very hard to disagree with is that a club the size of Hereford United cannot make a living based on football income alone. There was much astonishment that we started this season with a budget that showed us making a £360,000 loss. I think we have to accept the figures as broadly true, and although it sounds crazy, the truth is that £360,000 represents the difference between the cost of running a team in the Conference for a season (even with a very modest budget for playing staff) and the likely income from football related activities, i.e. gate money, shirt and match sponsors, programme sales etc. etc.
The challenge was, and always will be, how to bridge that gap. The allocation of TV money did that in the Football League days, money put in by Keyte and other directors, and by the fans putting their hands in their pockets, did so for a while this season and last. This clearly an unsustainable business model, and as many have pointed out before, if football clubs were run according to the same standards as ordinary businesses, most of them would have been wiped out by now.
The only way forward that makes sense to me is re-establishing the club as a community based club owned at least partially by the fans. Many others have said this and the supporters trust is pursuing this agenda. Personally I would be prepared to pay an annual amount into the trust or some other body to sustain the club, in exchange for some concessions on ticket prices, and other benefits (can’t think what at the moment). I would be prepared to pay between £100 and £200 a season by monthly instalments. I don’t know how many would be prepared/able to afford that but it would need the commitment of a significant number (1,000?) of like minded people before anyone should sign on the dotted line.
I wouldn’t expect to take anything out, get any dividends, share of profits (not that there would be any!), but I would expect to be represented on the board by trust members, as is the normal supporters trust way. I would be more concerned about the sustainability of the club than the league we play in. Recent matches have shown how home grown talent can deliver, and I would want the new regime to believe in and commit to a youth programme. I confess to not knowing the detailed ins and outs of the supporters’ trust ownership model, but it has been made to work in many places.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21058754
http://www.theguardian.com/social-enterprise-network/2013/nov/27/fan-ownership-football-premier-league
In the meantime, let’s hope that we survive this afternoon, and that sadly for them, Chester don’t. It’s a jungle out there.