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Sunday, August 31, 2014

Norman On BBC Non-League Show


MP Jesse Norman was interviewed on the BBC's Non-League Show about the problems at Edgar Street and his debate on football governance.

BBC Hereford & Worcester's Trevor Owens was also interviewed, and asked by host Caroline Barker if yesterday's loss to Burnham was the club's last match:

"I wish I knew to be honest, it's all still shrouded in a great deal of mystery. It's smoke and mirrors really. Ten days ago, the Hereford United chairman Andy Lonsdale told H&W the situation was looking much brighter. But since then we haven't heard any concrete news."

They played Keith Hall's comments, published on BN earlier today, then Barker and Owens discussed the potential of a phoenix club and the leases of Edgar Street. 

Barker then moved on to MP Norman, whose Parliamentary debate on the future of non-league football is this coming week. Barker asked what the future for football in Hereford was:

"Herefordians deserve their football and if they can't get it at Edgar Street because Hereford United are letting them down as badly as they are then they are going to go to other places and see football where they can. 

"What we really want is a club that can go back to Edgar Street, play there, attract more supporters and start to make progress up the leagues."

Barker asked about the content of his debate: "You don't get a lot of time in these debates. I'll only get 10-15 minutes or so and I want to pay tribute to all the good things that are happening in non-league football in Herefordshire. There are 120 clubs for young people, 40 Saturday and Sunday teams playing, it's a very vibrant scene here.

"But, as regards Hereford United, it's perfectly clear that if we can get past the current situation we're going to need to have a club that is based, grounded, and supported by the local community.

"It might be a community structure, it might be a co-op structure, but you need that balance between supporter engagement and bringing some money to the table so you can start to build it. 

"There's a balance to be struck between those two elements, but it's got to be locally led and driven, I think. "

Asked whether MPs should be more involved, Norman added: "The key point is the authorities that run the regulatory bodies, in our case the FA, Football League, Southern League, those folks. They need to understand more that football teams are public institutions as much as they are private institutions and you've got to have regulation that reflects that. 

If you just have regulation that thinks that these things are just in the private playthings of a few rich individuals then you are not giving proper justice to the fans who turn out every week, buy the season tickets, club merchandise, and keep the club moving forward. It's that balance I really want to focus on."

"We want to know how we can make the leagues better run, better regulated, more attune to fans' interests, less forgiving of some of the behaviour of some of these owners.

"The truth of the matter is that it took the footballing authorities a heck of a long time to wake up to the situation at Hereford United, and their behaviour has not been ideal by any means. I'll be talking about that on Thursday during the debate."

Barker then asked if the Owners and Directors Test was inadequate at non-league level: "The trouble with the test is that it relies purely on compliance by the Directors and Owners themselves.

"What I would like is a much more closer interrogation, energetic scrutiny, so you can detect these people that, in some cases, have some serious criminal records and majority shareholdings in football clubs. That's a very bad thing."