Credit Crunch Bites

Speaking of the crunch, Salisbury City have recently pledged to the fans and local businesses they NEED to raise £100k in the next two weeks (from the Saturday just gone). They have not really given a reason why but it was annouced by the Chairman before their game against Mansfield. Players are donating their win bonuses and doing a lot of after hours work to help raise the funds. They have currently raised on £15k...maybe this might be a good thing for us as they have had a surprisingly good run so far this season.

I would much rather we did it ourselves. It wouldn't be the same if we were to win the league 'by default'. The same applies if Mansfield are docked points, for what appears to be a very minor discrepancy.

That said i didn't think Salisbury were that good, so would be extremely disappointed if we did not finish above them in the league anyway.

For once this season, I don't think the size of Saturday's gate will reflect just on the football factor.

Dave says we "we should not let ourselves be talked into a recession" yet then goes on to illustrate how he alone is bringing in only half the money for his employers that he was three months ago.

Recession IS here and we better believe it, we ALL have to batten down the hatches and rationalise our spending and mind sets.

I find myself doing a significant amount less per week and spending a not insignificant amount more on fuel for the main tool of my trade................my car. Hence, my nett income is now noticeably down at the end of the week when compared with this time last year.

Food and fuel for the home has risen astronomically, and only a fool would be unaware that things are tough. All I can do in my trade is sit out there for longer so that yesterday I worked an eleven hour day , came home knackered and went to bed within four hours of getting in without really spending much time with the kids apart from hearing Anthony read and explaining to Olivia that having three pictures of the scan of the new baby doesn't mean mummy's having triplets as she's proudly told her teacher!

Only a year ago I was going either racing or football EVERY weekend.................racing's out of the question now as it means I need to be able to have at least a hundred quid of "disposable" each time and I just haven't got that. I would love to be at Plainmoor tomorrow, but it just isn't on financially and the last thing I want or need is a near five hundred mile round trip on my day off! Car sharing used to be a cinch up here with other CGs, now hardly anyone is going so things get more expensively individually anyway. At a time when diesel/petrol is at an all time high, the chances of spreading the cost is at an all time low.

Things were like this when I began working in football over thirty years ago, and we had the three day week, the inability to use floodlights - early kick offs and the advent of Sunday soccer. Directors felt they couldn't pump anymore money into the club and that they had to look after their own businesses to a greater degree.

I know those times are here again, so it's NOT a matter of merely talking ourselves into it Dave, we are already IN it!

Stevenage won't bring more than a lady thingy full ..........they never do travel in numbers because the culture of this overspill town is always that of being an "Arsenal or Spurs" town first and a Stevenage watcher's place second. Stevenage's history and establishment is relatively short and the travelling culture "non league" is hardly ever prevalent in all but a very few clubs and most of those are the recent Football League members.

So I would estimate that given good weather, a gate of 2,200 would be all that is reasonable to expect......................and there is another home game (Oxford) on Thursday, meaning TWO home games in one pay week for many!

I appreciate where you're coming from Dave, but I'm not choosing not to spend money...................I don't ruddy have enough any more due to inflation in the cost of essentials eating away at the "disposable" I used to have.

I don't have a choice!

As ever some intelligent posts on this thread.
Confidence, whether it is in the economics of the time or in the minds of a bunch of professional footballers is a vital part of achieving success.
This forum suffers not from a lack of confidence in its set up but from the circumstances that we find ourselves in. The reality of the position for individuals as described by Merse will influence how we feel, think and act. This includes how we feel about posting on this board and whether we have the mental (or physical), energy to do so.
I have spent the best part of the last 3 weeks wrestling with how to make savings of about half a million from budgets that I am responsible for. Such work that is being repeated by many, to one degree or another, is a drain on mental stamina and because, like Merse, it necessitates working longer hours, restricts my ability to post on this fine forum.
Now, Dave makes a valid point about talking ourselves into making the position worse. We do that often enough on forums when the confidence evaporates with a poor run of form (except Merse that is of course ;D). There is a need for a degree of positivity to turn things around.
That brings me onto a related point. Our chairman has been quoted in the press recently about the financial issues that need to be faced. So in possession of this information and given that we have 2 home games coming up in 6 days, one of which is on the TV, what activity have we seen to spark any kind of interest in the club over the last few days. Take a look at the official website. You did? Not much content to stimulate or excite is there. Why not engineer something that might spark interest in fans and make them more likely to attend on Saturday. Perhaps an article/ interview by Nicky Wroe on the adjustments he has found it necessary to make since arriving from York? (Building on the Wayne Carlisle summarising comment). Maybe an article by Carlisle himself about the similarities between our position this year compared to his experience at Excretia last season. Anything in fact, that may just spark us as fans to comment on this forum and actually increase our drive to go to Plainmoor.
A young lad, who works at my place, plays locally himself. He might not have a game tomorrow but has made a decision to only take in one of the next two fixtures. There is a balance of finance and the amount it costs to “make a day out of it”. But there is no spark provided by the club. His view “not much going on this week, think I’ll just go on Thursday” represents how the club did not capture his imagination sufficiently to entice him to Plainmoor twice. In the testing economic climate of today the club has to work harder in selling itself as an attractive option and not just spout forth on the testing nature of the economics. The club Dave needs to provide a spark and that in turn will spark this board as well.

Do you think there should be warnings plastered all over the ground along the lines of;

"Watching Torquay United can seriously damage your health"