Andy b

Thumb pressed firmly down, I assure you. We’ve met and our presence has been felt. That will remain the case. That’s the start but it’s only that. The owner knows our stance and expectations. We will monitor his next steps against those expectations and follow up. There is still no substance or detail behind his aspirations and so we will keep a watching brief on that. We are really not in a position to make wild demands however. Its a process folks. You won’t get the earth shattering news many want overnight. I hesitate to say be patient but the trust is not the principal owner of the club, is not the decision maker and is not in control of the resources needed to make the changes everyone wants to see.

Hull, Swansea, Rotherham, Brighton, Doncaster, Bournemouth may not be where there are now had they not nearly gone to the wall. It resulted in a root and branch restructure of those clubs with Local Authorities stepping in to support in some cases. necessity is the mother of invention and sometimes you need a full blown crisis for change to happen. please don’t read that as a suggestion than relegation is a good thing. It’s not. It can be the catalyst though. as I say, I take the view that some good might come out of all this in the long run. it also might not. as such I don’t believe relegation is always an unequivocally bad thing. Doesn’t mean you wish for it.

We are in the eye of a storm and it’s not great. I tend to take a pragmatic stance and would like to think that some good might come out of this situation in the long term, as is often the case. Naive? Maybe, but we have to try and build from where we are. It wouldn’t take much to get us out of league 2, and how good would that feel? Getting that winning feeling back and fans would return. Not sure how I would cope.

One can only conclude that in hindsight.

Stand by my position chaps/ladies. What the trust wants from the club is the six expectations set out in our letter issued in March. Achieve that and we will be content that the club is being well run. That is the focus, not league positioning. It’s not the trust’s job to set ambitions for the club and success on the pitch. It’s the trust’s job to do what it can to ensure the club is run properly and viably, with fans listened to and to create the conditions whereby the club can feasibly achieve something. If the trust were able to effect positive change in that regard, it would be doing its job very well and the club would be far better set up for sucess. That’s my focus. League position is a symptom of where the club is at. The trust doesn’t have specific ambitions to change that league position but to change the conditions which have created it. My personal perspective on football as a fan is that want to see my team compete and be in with a chance. Many teams get releagated and it galvanises them. Do I want relegation? No. Do I fear it? Not really. However, very clearly if we dropped from league two to the conference that would indicate some major issues within the club. To that end, the trust (and me) are trying to take steps to make sure that that doesn’t happen (ie a focus on a well run club). Its the off field stuff rather than the on field stuff which is our focus and rest assured i am on the same page as you all there. No one is advocating relegation to the conference. I agree that would be a step too far. There was a case for relegation to league two being no bad thing in the grand scheme of things though. It won’t kill the club.

We can compete and have a better chance of success on the pitch in this division. That’s a fact. I like to see wins. Don’t really care what division we are in right now. I am sure I will in the future but after the last 25 years I just want to see some sort of success on the pitch. Whether that’s league 1 or conference doesn’t bother me at this moment in time. Maybe that’s the difference in our respective outlooks.

Yes it is. 6 trust directors in attendance. I can’t make it. The meet is obviously a follow up to recent exchanges. Trust board meet on 13th and will be inviting fans in for first hour to raise issues, questions, concerns, feedback etc and generally have a chat with the Trust about ongoing issues. Details to be confirmed in the next day or so. Thanks

But we have a damn sight better chance of getting out of league 2 than we had of getting out of league 1. Shortern the odds and it’s more likely to happen my friend. Doesn’t guarantee it but it’s a hell of a lot more likely. We can compete. In any case being ingrained in this division is no worse than being ingrained in league one as far as I can see. Not that I think that will happen. We are at the right level for the size of this club. Am afraid that after about 2006, we were well and truely out of our depth in league one in all senses.

Good work that. There are many that were content that we were not getting relegated from league one and were adament that yo yo ing was no better than the constant shit of 16th. I couldn’t disagree more. Even this season we were in it until the last two weeks. When was the last time that happened? Get the club into a stable place off the pitch and we will get out of this league and we won’t look negatively on our relegation in the grand scheme. It might go tits up but that won’t be because of our relegation to league two. SC fooled so many in to thinking that he was doing a good job in keeping us in league one and that league two was to be feared. Utter bull shit I would rather have had bury, tranmere and Rochdale’s hand over the last 20 years. With Luton, tranmere and Leyton O back up there are few ‘well at least we aren’t...’ teams left

For the benefit of others, wiseowl and I met about two weeks ago and I have urged him to get involved in the trust, drive the changes he wishes to see and put his energies and ideas to good use. The trust is a group of people. Those people and the trust’s approach can change if you want it to. You need to get involved though. Shouting from the sidelines won’t really cut it. i haven’t yet heard back. i won’t be logging off over the summer nor will the rest of the trust board. We have work to do.

Lost 18th game as well at Bristol rovers.

Won first four I think. Ended with 1 all draw at home to Charlton I think

The Trust will continue on its current path. We have a louder voice if we are backed but have legal rights which we will draw on if the majority remain silent and do not engage. For what it’s worth I believe we do have the general backing of fans and can credibly speak for fans. The general course of action we are pursuing is supported by most imo even if there is disagreement on some points of detail. Most see that there are major problems at our club. A few wins numb the pain and help people forget that for a while. It’s a short term hit.

This brings the trust certain rights yes, including the right to have a seat on the Board. It doesn’t mean he has to meet fans, though EFL regs require the club to hold 3 fan forums per year. Clearly not satisfied this year.

A properly managed and coordinated meeting, yes. A mob with pitch forks, no.

That may be acceptable in normal circumstances but as he appears to be the only person with any authority and strategic influence within the club, we have a bit of a problem don’t we. How does ‘the club’ engage with fans and build a relationship if it’s not through the owner. There is no one else. Therein lies the problem.

We are starting with a trust meet and will take it from there. That would be a start!

Thanks. The issue of what his future long term plan is is given attention in our letter- see the six expectations. The very specific questions are supplementary to these. We have a right to ask these additional questions but i assure you we are very much driven by a focus on the big picture points, which is I think what you want to see. As stated in the letter, we will all judge the owner against the six ‘strategic’ expectations we set out and our engagements with the owner will be structured around those expectations. A big part of this is what his long term plan is. You will see that this issue comes up again in our brief to fans following receipt of the response where we express our disapointment that the owner is not opening up about his long term vision. We will be picking this up with AL if and when he agrees to meet

Depends what your expectations are I suppose. we have done better than I expected generally. doesnt mean I am happy

I agree. It’s been a relatively successful season on the pitch (relative being the key word).

Around the 300 mark. Not close to where we need to be but a significant increase on where we were at the beginning of the season. Our short term aim is for four figures.

Honest point, what do you think the Trust’s question should be and what do you want to see from it?

This defines where the club is at the moment I am afraid

Isn’t this a great illustration of the mess we would appear to be? A brand new stand with decent function facilities at our ‘own ground’ yet we hold our awards ceremony in a different location and not even in a venue which will support oldham businesses/people. Don’t blame anyone as such and clearly the reasons are not straightforward but it’s just a ridiculous situation to be in.

Not a bad idea. Have been thinking along similar lines actually. Will take this back to others we also need to work out how the access the silent majority via match day visibility.