Cod Almighty | Diary
The sounds of one board member clapping
1 September 2020
The season comes ever nearer with the club announcing that Saturday's League Cup game against Morecambe will be available on iFollow for £10.
Having previously issued a detailed statement on the availability of season tickets, the club has today issued the terms and conditions on which they will be sold. Two things drew Casual Diary's attention.
The first one is that any attempt to pass your season pass to a family member or friend if you can't attend will result in your pass being withdrawn, and cancelled with no refund. Why? As I've mentioned before, I'm not currently a season ticket holder but when I was, in the unlikely event I wasn't able to attend a game, I would pass it on to a deserving cause. I did so in the full knowledge that if my chosen recipient behaved like a prick I ran the risk of having my ticket withdrawn. Why has the club chosen now, when our capacity won't meet demand, to stop you from passing your ticket on and allowing a fellow fan the rare opportunity of viewing Town in the flesh?
I can understand barring selling on for profit, but in times when a significant number of people's finances will be at best strained, why stop season ticket holders from making their money back on games they can't attend? As the option to pay to view home and away games exists for £10 you'd think they'd not put extra barriers in the way of those still prepared to stump £350 upfront now.
The second pointless condition is anyone sharing any aspect of the game via social media platforms will have their pass withdrawn. One of the staples of 21st century football is the so-called "limbs" clips where someone shares a free kick or penalty and the subsequent celebrations. With social distancing, they will not be a thing, but does it really matter if someone shares 45 seconds of a game with their 500-odd followers? The clips could even remind people who have got out of the habit what they are missing.
The unsease that has manifested on social media about Town's limited transfer activity, fed perhaps by manager Ian Holloway's statement that he is seven played short of a competitive squad, will have been calmed by the arrival of Danny Rose and the expected signings of Sean Scannell and Danny Preston. Preston is a young left back from Nottingham Forest. Scannell is an established ex-second flight winger who impressed in the trial games.
There has also been discussion online about how, while fans are praised for putting money into the club through crowdfunding, share purchases and donating season ticket refunds, there is little evidence of investment from the board itself. From the last accounts filed, none of the directors except John Fenty have significant investment in the club. Michael Chapman and Stephen Marley in particular continue to retain a seat on the board despite having no obvious value and having invested very small amounts. £500 for Chapman's 18-year seat at the table seems a little under valued.
Since Operation Promotion, supporters have put in more than a third of a million pounds, but board members - excluding Holloway, Fleming and the supporters' representatives - have taken out twice as much. The 2019 accounts show directors loans have been reduced from £1.8m in 2018 to £1.55m in 2019. It is a reasonable guess that all this was repaid to the major shareholder, Fenty.
Fenty gave as one of his reasons for rejecting an offer to buy the club that he was unsure the prospective buyers could fully fund a downturn in the club's fortunes. It is impossible to imagine a greater downturn than we have seen in the last six months, so isn't it reasonable to ask the board to step up to the plate? Otherwise the praise for our efforts from chairman Phil Day, like the ministers who clapped NHS workers even as they failed to supply them the protective equipment they needed, rings a little hollow.
UTM