Cod Almighty | Diary

Do you really need to ask what is wrong with the Oystons?

27 February 2017

Trentside Diary writes: Oh dear. Getyourfactsright (AKA John Fenty) has ventured onto the Fishy defending some of the more odious football owners currently in the UK, namely the Oystons at Blackpool and the Allams at Hull.

Its a comment which suggests our non-chairman sees himself in the role of Reg in The Life of Brian: "And what have they (the Romans) ever given us in return?
The aqueduct. Oh yeah, yeah they gave us that. Yeah. That's true. And the sanitation! All right, I'll grant you that the aqueduct and the sanitation are two things that the Romans have done... And the roads... well, yes, obviously the roads..." Fenty asks: "Precisely what has the Oyston's supposed to have done??? would i love to see an list other than be apart of the above." [sic]

You do have to wonder that he just can't stop himself. Or maybe he was just so dazzled when he entertained the Blackpool directors on new year's eve that he has to defend their honour. Does he not have access to the internet in Fenty Towers? Is he unable to process too much information? A quick internet search for chairman Karl Oyston, or his father and majority shareholder Owen, brings back a litany of their arrogance and contempt for the club and fans. While you should take everything on Wikipedia with a degree of scepticism, the Oystons are quick to sue and these comments are carefully referenced.

The image is by Padge480, available under this licence

There are too many things to list here, but one unforgiveable action is the family redirecting funds out of the club. Fans claim that they have not provided funding for the club's infrastructure, despite sums from their heady years in the higher leagues, yet cash has been distributed around the family and family-owned companies.

And so back to our non-chairman and custodian of our club. He has lent/given our club money and steered us to financial viability – we are told – via a slide down and out of the Football League and back, just. Is it just me who thinks he does himself no favours when he comments because he exposes limited thinking? Yes, he's a football chairman (in all but name) and I'm not. But he seems totally incapable of walking in the shoes of an everyday football fan.

A lack of critical thought, and very little apparent self-awareness, concerns me at a time when we could be starting on an irreversible path. No, it more than concerns me. This is the non-chairman who claims he voted for the Check-a-Fiasco trophy because the papers were circulated just before the meeting and he hadn't had the chance to read them properly. This is a non-chairman who is leading us into financial deals on a new stadium which we are told will be the saviour of our club but many fear could be a financial encumbrance which could hog-tie us for many years to come, if not send us on a road to bankruptcy.

We're grateful to the Mariners Trust and the commendable efforts they are currently making in engaging and representing fans. But will they have influence and – more importantly – access to independent advice before these decisions will be taken? Town fans deserve proper input.

We are a resilient bunch. The thoughts before Saturday were "It may be away but it's Morecambe. We need something from this to start show a bit of consistency", and it wasn't too impressive. Now we'll be there on Tuesday thinking "Right, we need to pick ourselves up".

So back to Blackpool. Getyourfactsright's intervention comes in a thread about the Blackpool Supporters Trust's request that we support their boycott of the club. Most of us who planned to go won't boycott the match in April, because it's our awayday, but I'm sure very few of us who have read what has been happening there will be buying anything at the ground other than their ticket. Maybe we need a theme to show our solidarity with Blackpool fans? Any ideas?

And our non-chairman? Well, at least he hasn't been photographed next to a billboard of "Fenty's cash cow" and we know he isn't taking money out of the club. If we can give him that, why can't he give us a proper say on the running of our club?

UTM