Andy b

3 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Are the trust not in something as simple as a WhatsApp group together?

 

"Alright guys just spoke to big AL on the phone."

 

"Did you ask him about the letter?"

 

"Oops lol. No. My bad"

 

Surely in this day and age the trust don't need a physical meeting to know what each other is doing?

We have a what’s app groups

over the last 2 weeks it has averaged around 40 messages per day I would guess.

that a Trust Director had a brief chat with AL about rumours relating to Birketts position in the club (as advised by underdog) was mentioned in the what’s app group looking back and was missed by us both.

full time job and two kids.

my most humble apologies. I shall go and have a long hard look at my life.

4 minutes ago, lookersstandandy said:

Thanks for clarifying both. This is what I referring to;

 

 

Thanks for pointing that out.

fair point you raise then. Clearly Underdog and I were not aware. Somewhat challenging to keep track of these things around the day job!

11 minutes ago, lookersstandandy said:

 

A response and acknowledgment of receipt are different to be fair Tracy.... I'm sure I read t'other day - in response to some Tw@tter nonsense about AL considering walking - that a Trust rep confirmed they had spoken to AL on the phone, post the letter being sent?

 

If true, said Trust rep could easily have asked him if he'd received it....? They could even have asked if he'd taken the time to read it....? ....and if they were feeling particularly adventurous, what his initial reaction to it was....?

I am not aware of any trust Director speaking with the owner since the letter has been issued.

We have not received a response nor have we received an acknowledgement of receipt. We read nothing into that. We have asked for a response by 12 April, some 9 days away.

3 hours ago, underdog said:

We have a vice chair who will take the lead up to the next Trust meeting in April. So we all know who is charge now if you know what I mean and who the owner can contact if a Board meeting is called at OAFC or they want to contact the Trust in general.

 

With regards to the constitution, it does say that the Rep to the board of OAFC had to serve as a Trust Director beforehand of minimum of three years. There are four of us currently that applies to and will discuss at April meeting if anyone who is interested.

 

However, there are some new co-optees that have joined in December time that may have better skills at board level. So we may have a discussion concerning those that it may be better suited for

 

Brexit....ye gods don't get me started..hahah

The trust does not need a defined leader. It runs on a committee basis. We share the same stance on the club, the duty to our fans and the approach to our owner. That hasn’t always been the case, leader or no leader. 

At at this point in time, and in the context of our current focus, we are working effectively together. Yes, when decisive votes need to take place we need to have a chair who can make the casting vote. The vice chair takes on that role for now.

The current focus doesn’t need a cast of thousands. It needs people with the right minds and outlook. I am confident we have that.

In the wider ranks, but without formal statutory roles, are people with a broad skill set and with contacts.

appreciate that it will take time to convince people of the value of the trust but as a supporters group, I think it’s fair to say that it is in better shape now than it has been for a while, notwithstanding that some key operational posts remain unfilled

1 hour ago, mcfluff1985 said:

I don't necessarily think the trust are great but fuck me, behaving like that. What a fucking moron!

 

Should have leathered him

Don’t you. You have mentioned that. Look forward to your future contribution.

5 minutes ago, kowenicki said:

 

I was thinking more about the overall sentiment.

 

I have to say the more I read that Trust letter.....

Sometimes you have to be bold sir/madam.

3 minutes ago, jorvik_latic said:

 

Partly. It's let down by a couple of paragraphs.

 

"What the article did reveal however, is that the ground the stadium sits on isn’t owned by the club. It is in the possession of two companies Brassbank and Brassband. A quick search shows that Brassbank has two directors Daniel Gazal and Simon Blitz, who were both directors at Oldham but resigned in 2010.  If that doesn’t raise some eyebrows, it certainly should do. A search for Brassband brought up some obvious results, none of which were connected with football!." - No, the article didn't reveal that at all, it's been public knowledge for years.

 

"If what the Chairman says is true about who owns the land at Boundary Park, questions need to be asked about why those people are still in the picture. Perhaps approaching Gazal and Blitz to ask them what their intentions are will prove more enlightening that finding out whether the gas bill has been paid on time." They're still in the picture because Abdallah doesn't have enough money to buy everything. As it stands we pay rent (like many many other clubs in the land do) to the landlords. I'm more concerned about the current running of our club to be honest.

 

The author is trying to be clever but has got it wrong.

We know that there is a fan led group looking to buy the ground from the current owners and the owners are part of that process. The trust is being regularly briefed on that.

we don’t need to know anything more about the current owners and their intentions.

to that end, the article is misinformed. 

14 minutes ago, oafc1955 said:

If there is a favourable response by then I’ll be amazed and even if there is, words are cheap and he could promise the earth....its action we want!!!

 

Whatever the outcome I don’t there is sufficient time for it to effect season ticket sales for next season. For me personally, it’s going to take several weeks/months of prolonged change at the club for me to trust this guy’s ability to run this football club in a professional manner.

 

In my opinion it’s not going to happen!

 

Our owner has to be offered the opportunity to address concerns and the letter is put in those terms.

Some may believe they already know he won’t deliver. That’s their view. 

This is the start of a process.

Just now, singe said:

Precisely the two points I was going to post about. and about whether this is as Shareholders or as conduit to fans.

Nevertheless, it is right that questions are askedand answers sought.

Personally, I'd have formally emphasised at being at your disposal to assist, but appreciate that behind the scenes this may have been tried without success.
I hope that the media pick up on this,  @OAFCMIKE as well and bring pressure to bear.

Assistance is offered on more than one occasion in the letter. 

Just now, HarryBosch said:

What are The Trust, or those whose questions they’ve passed on, hoping to achieve by proving he hasn’t paid Swans or gas bills? 

 

Its all all a bit school teacherly. Is he going to

be made to sit on the naughty step if he can’t explain himself (which we know he won’t be able to)? 

 

I just want stuff like that to stop going forward. 

 

It smacks of people just wanting their pound of flesh via demanding info few, if any, businesses would/should provide. 

What a wasted opportunity to make some clear, specific & reasonable demands of him.  Demands that would be to the benefit of all concerned  

Questions may not be responded to. Our demands are set out in the main body of the letter and reflect what, in overall terms, fans want to see from the owner in running the club, as fed back on saturday. 

what are the reasonable and specific demands you would have included? 

1 minute ago, deyres42 said:

Not sure most of those demands are realistic and an itemised gas bill is unlikely to be of much interest to most.

 

Let's fast forward to be the bit where they haven't been answered.

It wouldn’t be inaccurate to say there was unanimous support for asking these specific questions, as read out by an attendee, on sat. Hence they are in.

Some may not be of interest to some individuals but they are not doing any harm in being in there.

2 minutes ago, Latics and England said:

I think it is a reasonable letter. My only concern would be that it is unclear what it is requesting to be provided to the Trust confidentially and what is being asked to be provided to then be shared with members/fans.

 

In particular, I think it may be unreasonable to ask what offer has been made for the ground. It is known that the Trust is connected to the FLG. It would be a strange decision of the owner to tell this group (as a rival bidder) what offer he has made. I would also be wary, if I was him, of disclosing next year’s budget if this was going to be shared widely. Knowing the size of the budget is something that could give competitive advantage to rival teams.

 

The Trust shouldn’t be scared of confirming that some answers will not be shared widely and we, as fans, should accept that we might have to take the Trust’s word on some things if they simply tell us that they have had an appropriate answer.

 

It is a great start though and if we got 11 answers back to those 13 questions I would be delighted.

 

Over to you Abdallah.

Setting the expectations is as important as the questions.

Hopefully we have an agreed basis on which we can judge the current and future owners by setting these out simply and clearly. That will be useful now and in the future. 

8 hours ago, wiseowl said:

yes, yes we know ...... but this line gets trotted out far too regularly. If you can't dedicate the time, don't go on the Trust board - quite simple really.

 

I've done voluntary work for years and don't bleat on every two minutes that I have a day job as well. I make it clear what time I can dedicate - and get on with it. The charity concerned manages their volunteers' time - and it runs like a well oiled machine - does somebody manage Trust volunteers' time or is it done on the back of a fag packet?

 

Momentum has certainly been lost - as an observer, it does seem to take forever for the Trust to make decisions and take decisive action. Being consensual is fine - but not all the time - someone make a decision and let's have a meaningful protest please - these are extraordinary times.

 

At the risk of sounding boring (because I`ve said it umpteen times) until it severs its umbilical chord to the club (via its much vaunted 3% shareholding) it will remain impotent.

 

Just out of interest, can someone from the Trust tell me :-

 

1) How much did the purchase of the 3% shares cost?

2) How much could they be sold for now?

 

P.S. I think I`m entitled to know as I did stand for hours with a bucket at Eastlands (City v Arsenal) and engaged with lots of City fans, to the extent that I couldn't carry my bucket because they had donated so much. Think it was around 12k in total that day - which is why I never slag City fans off - well not too much anyway 

 

None of us have enough time wiseowl.

Would you care to offer a solution to that?

In terms of shares, they were purchased at a cost of £200,000.

In terms of current value, I am not an accountant so I don’t know how share valuation works (Whether their value is recorded in the trusts accounts etc). Happy to try and get an answer for you. 

Thanks 

There are processes to be followed in getting a communication of this type

out. 

We agreed a course of action and the trust would be shot down if the letter didn’t hit the right notes or left us exposed in some way due to being rushed through.

These messages were posted on Wednesday following a meeting on the previous Saturday. Hardly a long time has passed.  Yes it needs to go ASAP but please be patient.

Just now, Andy b said:

Not quite. Final proof reading being done. Likely to go out tomorrow morning at the latest. 

Ps. Will be made available upon issue

8 hours ago, peanuts said:

may i ask the trust has the letter been forwarded to AL yet ?

Not quite. Final proof reading being done. Likely to go out tomorrow morning at the latest. 

2 hours ago, JoeP said:

 

Even so - if it's going to happen, surely it's better it happens sooner, while we're still in the league, rather than later, when we're in the Conference North when even less people give a shit? 

 

Thankfully we've probably scraped together enough points to be safe this season - we carry on like this, on and off the pitch, into next season and we'll probably be down by Christmas.  We'll be more attractive to an investor/buyer and stand more of a chance of surviving administration if we're still in the league, so I'd rather it happened now, to be honest.

 

For what it's worth, I don't actually think Administration would be a good thing in any way, but I was just contributing to the other curious predictions that people are making about events that would take us forward (e.g "Anyone but Corney" in charge, Relegation, etc..)

 

 

No one has said anyone but corney. That doesn’t mean people were happy with corney.

no one said relegation will take us forward. That doesn’t mean preventing relegation trumps everything else.

30 minutes ago, singe said:

That's precisely not what I said!

Relegation is not an objective.

if relegation comes from positive change (short term pain for long term gain) then it’s not to be feared.

Point being, avoidance of relegation doesn’t trump all other objectives. 

23 minutes ago, Kusunga_Is_God said:

Another relegation is not the answer. League Two is absolutely dreadful, I really don’t want to be here for very long.

I would agree, it is not the answer. 

5 minutes ago, singe said:

I used to be petrified of relegation, and that we would sink without trace. The fact we are technically/ mathematically (though not remotely realistically) still in contention for a playoff place is unbelievable after this shite season and shows how poorly we have been run and some really bad decsions.

I had a look at Tranmeres attendances after seeing a tweet, and was amazed that their atttendance held up during the Conf. Most likely because they were challenging. THey are almost 20% up this year again, and highest for quite a few years.

So I'd be more confident if we got relegated than in the past, but with one HUGE caveat, that exactly as you say we were moving in th right direction. Mellon has been in charge for 3 years, staility we can only crave. The squad has a core, but tey've adapted I think. But they are challenging and confident. They seem to have decent owners. That's the model

Relegation is clearly not desireable in itself. However viewing it as something to be prevented at any cost would be short sighted 

1 minute ago, mcfluff1985 said:

But the trust doesn't even seem to have the simplest answers about what has/is going on at the club.

 

Without seemingly having any facts about what's going on, just hearsay, I don't see how they can help.

 

Talk about protests is fine, but what actually do the trust know is going on at the club?

 

If AL meets and says that's all rumour, all bills are paid, will the trust be happy?

Let’s cover that when we meet.

2 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Well if AL walks, would the trust not take over?

 

I'm not criticising anyone for giving up their time for anything. Doesn't mean that organisation could run the club if needed. As you mentioned, all volunteers so imagine having to get them to do the day to day running of a football club.

 

If you want to meet for a pint one night this week, More than happy to do so. 

 

If buckshaw village isn't too far

Whether the trust could or could not run the club if AL walked is really not the point as the trust is not trying to get him to walk.

It’s current focus is on trying to get him to run the club properly. We may work out that that’s not going to happen then we move to consider alternative options (not yet defined).

Why in all that you see fit to go the great lengths to openly criticise the trust for not having the means to run the club is beyond me. Whether we can or cannot is not the issue here

1 minute ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Well if AL walks, would the trust not take over?

 

I'm not criticising anyone for giving up their time for anything. Doesn't mean that organisation could run the club if needed. As you mentioned, all volunteers so imagine having to get them to do the day to day running of a football club.

 

If you want to meet for a pint one night this week, More than happy to do so. 

 

If buckshaw village isn't too far

Easier than oldham for me. Will send you a direct messsge. 

20 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

I just want to see our club with someone in charge who can run it properly.

 

Unless the trust has stumbled across a load of cash I think we'd be far worse off.

 

Bit of a trek for a pint for me unfortunately 

For the avoidance of doubt the trust is not seeking to take over the club at the present time nor to run it as you seem to be suggesting.

unless you can do a better job or are willing to get involved in a constructive manner please don’t openly criticise those who give up their time for free. 

I have offered to meet with you in full knowledge that you would not take up that offer as you’d rather criticise from your computer.

Happy to travel to meet with you. Let me know.

thanks 

9 minutes ago, mcfluff1985 said:

Which points could you give a satisfactory answer to?

I’d genuinely like to have a chat with you. I don’t have all the answers (no one does) but let’s keep an open mind. 

available to talk at your convenience. It’s good to talk as they say. The offer is there. 

Thanks for your support.