Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger in all he does » Imagine Arsenal supporters walking away and setting up their own new club
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FC United of Manchester was formed in 2005 by supporters of the bankrupt Manchester United who were so opposed to the Glazer takeover, they wouldn’t even go to the games any more.
Three promotions later FC United are in the Unibond Premier Division.
There’s a similar story in Wimbledon where supporters of the original club who opposed the move to Milton Keynes set themselves up, got into the non-league structure, and are now in the Conference.
If you take a look at non-league tables you might just notice that the Conference South was won by about 200 points by Newport County – who were once in the First Division, went bust, took on the League of Wales in a legal fight over which league they should be in, went bust, formed a supporters’ trust, and are now on the way up again.
This year, Chester went bust, and supporters are trying to work their way back together (or decide if they want to be taken over by a group of Danish investors). (Anyone who can unravel that one please do supply me with the data).
Notts County as we all know, were promised a journey into the EPL, if only the supporters’ trust would give all their shares away, which they did, only to find that they had been conned. Amazingly despite everything they are Champions of the Fourth Division.
Now FC United have reached a deal with Manchester City Council to lease land for a new 5,000 capacity stadium – in Newton Heath which is rather nice.
Or if we turn another way, Wrexham’s former chairman, Mark Guterman, was recently disqualified from acting as a company director for seven years. For the purpose of agreeing to the disqualification, Guterman did not dispute that in 2002 he “exploited” Wrexham’s “property assets” – the club’s tenancy at the Racecourse Ground.
The freehold was transferred to a company owned by a pal and the club’s lease changed to allow them to be evicted on 12 months’ notice.
Lurking behind this jumpy monologue is a point – clubs are taken over and smashed apart by owners whether they are at Manchester United, Liverpool, Wrexham, Newport or anyone else.
But doesn’t mean the end of football when it happens. Accrington Stanley were founders of the Football League, but only lasted a handful of seasons before going bust, then coming back for a while, then going bust again, and then coming back again.
But there’s another point. Just because a club is owned by its fans, it doesn’t mean everything is ok. The decision by Notts C trust to give away their club to a bunch of guys who had connections with North Korea might look to have come good this year with a trophy, but that does not vindicate their decision to throw away the club they had been given.
Bayern Munich are owned by their supporters and as far as I know that is a Good Thing. But so are Real Madrid and Barca also owned by their supporters, and both are insanely in debt with no chance of coming out of debt.
My point here is simple: ownership by fans, like any form of democracy, is on the face of it a good idea. But as we know democracies can vote in dictators. I am a total democrat, and will be casting my vote in the UK general election as I have in every single general, European, county council, district council and parish council election I have been entitled to vote in. But I despair of the fact that so many of my fellow citizens vote as Mr Murdoch tells them, rather than by looking at policies.
But I don’t think that in football it ALWAYS delivers the best result.
I do think that some of the other models of ownership on display are to be avoided however. Liverpool’s lurch into insanity has meant that not only do they celebrate 20 years without winning the league this year, and not only do they mourn the 25th anniversary of Heysel (at least I trust they do), they also find themselves with a manager who has just said that he needs five more players, doesn’t know if he has a budget, and doesn’t know if he is wanted at the club any more.
(Actually I might be able to help out here – the RBS want their £100m first – after that you can go and buy anything you like with the small change Rafa).
Birmingham City were supposedly preparing to spend £40m this summer, but had problems paying £2m to their bank. WHU have put everyone up for sale, and are on a suicide mission. Man C have all the money in the world, and use it by buying players who a year later they decide they don’t want any more, and so have another switch around.
Hull have seen the open door marked Portsmouth and are heading towards it, and Fulham, while wildly celebrating their Europa Cup final, are £30m or more in debt to the owner.
Fortunately for Fulham the owner doesn’t charge them interest on the debt, which is more than can be said for the owners of Aston Villa, Everton, Blackburn and Bolton.
And although it does seem, to be fair, that the owner of Fulham is happy to put his millions into the club, the reality is that at Fulham, as at any other club with a single big time owner, it can all end in tears if he decides to call it a day, or if he gets arrested, run over by a bus, etc etc (and I mean no harm to anyone, and have no inside information).
So my point is, there is no simple solution, no ideal approach that gives us a football club that behaves how we want. But I must say, as long as they don’t give their club away to a bunch of North Korean apologists in the meanwhile, I do offer my best wishes to FC United, Wimbledon, Newport County and all the other trusts that are working as trusts, and succeeding, often against all the odds.
Tony Attwood