The Club is not run properly!

oh well no thats fair enough.

we've got cones to seperate the school and the club!

Warnock and Grayson are obviously bloody blind, did they not see the outline round the pitch and the cones!!?

 

I said I wouldn't say any more but you are right. Of course matters are in place relating to use, they are all in the Agreement. To my certain knowledge there has never been any conflict/ prevention of use with or by the school and I would have felt I had failed in the drafting of the Agreement if there had been such conflict.

In terms of not understanding the arrangements then that is a matter of how interested Grayson was and how he communicated matters to the likes of Warnock and others. Only he can answer that.

As far as help or guidance 'from above' is concerned, if you can find Edin, ask him how much he gave, I could answer but it may differ from Edin's.

 

Does anybody remember that time Roger Owen came on and bollocked somebody because they let slip about the club shop moving, because it wasn’t true....Yeh, me neither.

 

Only because we were bringing the shop in-house and the Operator had not been informed of the change and should have heard it from the Club.

 

Yeah where is Edin? I wonder if he’s stinging from this relegation too.

 

Where did £20million come from? Lincoln recently built a new facility which cost £1.5m (equipped with everything) funded by their FA cup run a few years ago. Mansfield spent £2m although that was probably funded by their wealthy owner. Now these clubs may have already owned the land they used, which we don't, but its hardly going to make up another £18m is it. So please don't start branding about exaggerated figures like that as then to many it will seem we haven't a hope in hell of ever obtaining our own facilities like these clubs have. We should be admiring what clubs like Lincoln and Mansfield have done and aspiring to be like these clubs who are building for the future. Otherwise this losing mentality and unprofessionalism which has swamped the club for the past 18 months/two years will continue to linger, if these excuses continue as to why we can't/won't compete.

 

Been an issue for longer than two years pal

 

I would ask Lincoln City fans, what is you want? You're own purpose built training facility or the money put towards promotion? Oh hold a minute....

Now in league one with their own facilities. Seems like a plan...

 

Andy Pilley has obviously bankrolled all this and is a fan of the club, but he ain't stupid. He hasn't thrown all that money at the facilities without thinking of how it can help pay for itself. A very astute businessman with a clear plan for the future.

 

Completely agree Den. Now we are back to square one and the depths of league 2, the implementation of a long term plan is essential for long term development of this club. And because the the gap between the top two and bottom two divisions gets bigger (see the comments of Andy Holt at Accrington), clubs need to think outside the box and not just treat the business as a game day revenue based investment. And thats where Rupps intentions need to be focused if he thinking of being a the club for more than the next season or so.

 

Doesn't @wetherbywhaler pay to be on the board? To coin Omari's favourite phrase... "Looooool".

Up the Warnock interview.

 

Thanks for the replies @wetherbywhaler about the training complex which is clearly something you're passionate about. I retract my 'amateur' comment with regards to the facilities and agree that they are adequate and have moved on a long way in a relatively short space of time. In lieu of our own dedicated training facilities this is probably the best we will get for the expenditure we can afford at the moment. I agree, we'd all like to have our own state of the art facility and you suggest we'd need £20m to fund it. As has been commented, that figure seems wildly exaggerated although it would cost a seven figure sum I think we'd all agree.

You argue that any money generated is better spent on the first team squad to improve the team and then use revenue that that generates in future to improve the infrastructure over time. I'd like to suggest that that is simply unsustainable. Look at our very own club for evidence. We've had since the 2012/13 season unprecedented cup success, a promotion, million plus player sales, TV money due to the prestige ties and all the associated extra ticket, merchandise and catering revenue that goes with success. In short, we were rolling in it and we progressed year on year under PP using this money for the first team as you suggest. The problem was that we plateaued and everyone knew it. Mark Lawn let slip that he and JR didn't have the finances to make us financially viable in the Championship to compete above any other level than perennial strugglers. Even with all that extra revenue that we got since 2012/13 the best we could get to was top 6 L1 with a chance of playoff success or perhaps top 2 with a really good run, a striker hitting top form, exceptional luck etc. This is why I believe the idea of investing everything in the first team isn't sustainable. Look where it's got us. It's 3 steps forward and 3 steps back. We're in no better position now than we were when relegated over a decade ago. I know we have a certain person largely to blame for the rapidness of the decline but that notwithstanding, we'd reached our peak.

Hark back to those days and remind yourself of the Archie Christie project. Much derided, at least it was an idea. PP came in and didn't like because it drew funds away from the first team. We can't forget what a ride we had under PP but what do we have to show for it other than (very good) memories? PP wanted the money then and there because he doesn't care about BCAFC beyond his stewardship. Success for him keeps him in a job. Imagine that project was properly run and funded and we'd had a few players come through to the first team or sold on for decent money. That's a blueprint. That's a plan. We don't have a plan. We muddle and fuddle our way through from one season to the next hoping to get lucky with a McBurnie, Wisdom, Cleverly transfer to reap the little merited reward. Can anyone name a team who has bankrolled future success by constantly piling money generated into the first team?

I see other clubs with a plan doing well. Brentford and Bournemouth with their moneyball approach have had success. Peterborough's gambles on non league strikers have been largely profitable. Lincoln now doing well after investing their (lucky) cup money. Fleetwood investing in youth with a facility that makes money. All teams with a plan. Then there's us living from hand to mouth year in year out. I'm grateful that Roger and the likes of @Glenn Ackroyd et al can give so much time so willingly to the club but again, it's not sustainable. The things that you've described doing Roger are real jobs that an actual employee of Bradford City should do, not an unpaid volunteer. We're Bradford City not Bradford Park Avenue.

We should have a sustainable plan for the future and the likes of The Bradford City Supporters Trust should be in that boardroom demanding that on our behalf. Rupp doesn't care what happens to BCAFC beyond his tenure but we bloody do and we want something to be proud of. Without having a Sugar Daddy to bankroll us we need a plan to grow organically. Perhaps our own dedicated training facility and the acquisition of our own ground should be part of that long term plan.

 

I’m not averse to the club running a joint facility with a school or university.
Scholarships can be used as a carrot to attract youth players etc.

But we’re just a tennant renting a couple fields with limited access to other facilities.
You drive past WG and the only clue that Bradford City’s training ground is located there is a stick on crest below the WG sign.

Anyone thinking that is par for the course for a lower league proffesional club needs to get their head out of their ass

 

Someone overruled the bloke that owned the site?

Is that really the level of intelligence I'm replying to?

 

To do a lot of this you need someone with some drive, some flair, and some money, in charge.
As steady a pair of hands Rhodes is, I can’t for the life of me see him as an inspirational character who is going to come up radical ideas and take City in a new direction. He’s been there for the majority of the last 20 years, apart from 4 or so years, it’s been more of the same.

An old HR contact of mine used to describe people as not having 20 years experience in the job, but one year twenty times over. They do the same old thing time and again. This is the Rhodes lead City in my opinion

Andy Holt is making Accrington the focus of a community, may or may not be right for City, but you need to do something different.

 

excellent post from Hoochy.