Smelling the Coffee

If I took three points away from last night's Fans Forum hosted by the newly assembled Management Committee, they would be these - 

One - We're going to experience a cold dose of financial reality

Two - It's comforting the club is currently being run by people who are first and foremost Poppies supporters

Three - If we are ever lucky enough to have another owner / chairman / benefactor half as good as Ritchie again perhaps we shouldn't spend quite so much time trying to push him out of the club

It's clear we are going to be living hand-to-mouth for the foreseeable future.  Even though we've travelled many miles down the path of potential oblivion due to our financial shennanigans we still have far too many supporters who believe we are a big noise in football and who's idea of footballing mathematics looks a little like this -

700 people x £15 every fortnight, divided by 16 players and a manager = Over £300 each.  Plenty to stay in NLN or piss the Southern League.  Add to that bar takings and FA Cup runs and we're rolling in money.  Happy Days.

Hopefully last night has given us all a bit of a wake-up call.  Yes, we can still have a competitive football club.  But without a backer the onus falls on us, ALL OF US to help and contribute more.  To show exactly how much we actually want a football club.  Alternatively, we could sit at home and wait for the next benevolent millionaire owner to make Ritchie an offer he can't refuse.  Or, perhaps while we await this impending saviour, we can see what we can do to help our own club.  On the night the suggestion that entrance fees are likely to remain the same next season, while not cheered to the rafters was understood and broadly agreed with.  The club has bills to pay.  Lots of them.

Most in the room seemed glad that the whole farce of "Frenchies Field" was given short shrift by the Management Committee.  The idea we might end up playing on an inaccessible patch of unprovisioned waste ground seemed to have been kicked into touch at long last.  The tatty scrubland's only claims to fame are that it is, if you squint hard enough, in Kettering (kind of) and a full half a mile closer to my house than Latimer Park.

Unsurprisingly the same Social Media Big Noises who helped Ritchie decide being Chairman of the Poppies wasn't worth the grief were (A) not at the meeting, and (B) sat on their phones post-meeting, moaning about the cost of the games they were going to pick and choose attending next season and questioned why the club wasn't still rushing full tilt at building them a new ground.

Believe me, you'll thank me when you turn on "Twitter"