Forget Colu we are playing the Real Scum tomorrow

[Hong Kong Blue]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,22:23)]I'm not totally ingnorant to what your saying and in some ways I agree, but maybe I'm naive, but I belive there must be a reason they moved?

of course there was a reason

Non-football people thinking they could make a bundle of cash out of it.

They are wrong. The success of AFC Wimbledon in contrast to the hopefully continuing decline of Franchise Scum FC proves that.

 

[Thenewblue]

and here we was trying to discuss like grown ups!

 

[Xàbia Shrimper]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:22)]Thats what I mean though? Do you support Southend as a region? or Southend Utd as a team? Say they took the whole structure, players management etc and stuck as in Epping for example..would I still go or would i go see AFC Southend who I have no affiliation with? No contest SOuthend Utd would win. I live in Basildon, doe sthat mean I should turn out and support them instead of Southend?

I started supporting Southend United because they were my local professional team and, as far as I am concerned, they have always represented the town where I have lived for the vast majority of my life. Although it really doesn't apply to me now that I live in Spain, I certainly couldn't start following a "Southend United" hybrid that played in, say, Epping. It just wouldn't make sense to me. I might as well start following West Ham United.

Maybe the whole franchising concept doesn't compute to someone who already lives a good 30 mins or so away from the club? (And I don't mean that in suggesting you're wrong, just an observation!) Southend United is part of the Borough of Southend-on-Sea and must remain so ...

 

[Thenewblue]

Maybe thats true, cause the team isn't on my doorstep, moving it would make no odds. Its the club I support, the team, Not so much the location of the team.

 

[Xàbia Shrimper]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:35)]Maybe thats true, cause the team isn't on my doorstep, moving it would make no odds. Its the club I support, the team, Not so much the location of the team.

Quite possibly. I can see your point of view but it makes me shudder to think that some fans can justify modern football franchising. It's a danger to the very structure of the game in England. The future could exist of just 24 teams split between Premier$hite East, Premier$hite West, and Premier$hite Central!

 

[Thenewblue]

Quote[/b] (Xàbia Shrimper @ Mar. 17 2006,22:38)]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:35)]Maybe thats true, cause the team isn't on my doorstep, moving it would make no odds. Its the club I support, the team, Not so much the location of the team.

Quite possibly. I can see your point of view but it makes me shudder to think that some fans can justify modern football franchising. It's a danger to the very structure of the game in England. The future could exist of just 24 teams split between Premier$hite East, Premier$hite West, and Premier$hite Central!

Very true. But unlike america where it is common. Our country is pretty much fully occupied with established teams, especially London and myabe not so much Milton Keynes, from the top of my head I can;t think of anywhere else without an established team, and with such fierce competition in London maybe Wimbledon moving was a 1 off? Especially as our country is tiny comapred to the USA where they have probably 500+ miles for some people without any kind of team to support, what a catchment area!

 

[Xàbia Shrimper]

Let's hope it was a one-off!

Righto, I'm off out ...

 

[Joolz]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,21:57)]Like it or not, football clubs now ARE businesses, plc's etc. If a business underperforms..makes losses underperforms etc, then moving is a viable option. Now Wimbledon FC was losing money hand over fist, rented a ground, and had no fan base to speak of. MK had no league team as such, and so it was a business decision to re-locate, was it right football wise? undoubtley it wasn't, but business wise it was, Wimbledon FC wouldn't exist today anyway, due to debt. They did what was necessary to keep a club alive, just under a diff name, maybe it wasn't right, but it was neccessary.

I always have to take issue when someone says that 'a football club is a business'. Maybe to the chairman, shareholders etc... but not to me, never.

If I go to a particular business for a particular product (I can't think of any good examples - imagination is not my strong point), and all of a sudden that product is no good, I will take my money elsewhere. The exception for me is my football club. There have been many occassions where, had I treated SUFC like a business, I could have walked away far and square. But to me, SUFC is much more than a business could ever be - it is part of me, it partly defines me, I met a lot of my friends there, and, apart from the birth of my kids, has probably given me some of my most joyous experiences of my life so far. Hardly any business I know.

As for the fact that Wimbledon would have folded, I don't buy that neccessarily. How many professional clubs have gone out of business in the last 30 years? I would say no more than 5 at the most, so it is hardly an everyday occurrence. In this case I think it was being used as an excuse to get the club moved.

I do however think that labelling the players and fans SCUM a bit over the top mind.

 

[Thenewblue]

I know what your saying mate, but they are businesses. Like it or not! To me and you its a football team, but some teams ar eon the stock excahnge! we can't bury our heads in the sand! They need to make profit, they are businesses, their not non profit making organisations!

 

[Joolz]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,22:50)]I know what your saying mate, but they are businesses. Like it or not! To me and you its a football team, but some teams ar eon the stock excahnge! we can't bury our heads in the sand! They need to make profit, they are businesses, their not non profit making organisations!

Agreed, but businesses with a difference.

I don't mind that SUFC is run as a business - in fact I'm rather glad it is, and it appears that financially we are in better shape than we have been for a while. I'm just saying that, unlike a normal business, there are other more 'emotional' (for want of a better word) issues with a football club that should be taken into consideration. With Wimbledon I don't think they were.

 

[Thenewblue]

I think with wimbledon, they saw an oppurtunity and grabbed it with both hands and clung on, and so far , it seems to have worked, crowds are up, still nog ground though...

 

[Joolz]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:23)]I think with wimbledon, they saw an oppurtunity and grabbed it with both hands and clung on, and so far , it seems to have worked, crowds are up, still nog ground though...

Do you really think it has worked? Relegated once already and looking good for another one. Plus being one of the most universally hated clubs in the country. Are crowds up on what they were getting at Selhurst - I don't really know?

 

[Thenewblue]

Would u prefer if Southend Utd ran intself into the ground and ceased to exist or if it moved to gravesend and became Gravesend shrimpers but with the same management and players?

 

[Joolz]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:29)]Would u prefer if Southend Utd ran intself into the ground and ceased to exist or if it moved to gravesend and became Gravesend shrimpers but with the same management and players?

Good question. I honestly think the former of the two.

If you're asking the question in relation to Wimbledon, I don't think that was really on the cards, although I know they kept saying so. I think they would have survived OK - they just needed to 'cut their cloth' in line with their gates.

 

[Thenewblue]

well you can only go on 'what they say' than suspicions. and it is a dilemma! personnally, i'd rather have a team to support, from further away, than no team at all.

 

[Joolz]

Quote[/b] (Thenewblue @ Mar. 17 2006,23:38)]well you can only go on 'what they say' than suspicions. and it is a dilemma! personnally, i'd rather have a team to support, from further away, than no team at all.

Oh no, I always go on suspicions.

I think we are about as close to agreeing on this as we ever will be, and it's only a matter of time before a moderator moves this topic for being 'non SUFC related', so I think I'll sign off on this thread.

Time to concentrate on getting another three points tomorrow.

 

[Thenewblue]

I'm enjoying this debate, and i do agree, but i think with wimebledon Fc something had to give and it did!

 

[Bob Cratchitt]

You seem to be giving examples of southend moving to a very commutable distance but the distance between Wimbledon and Milton Keynes is 60 miles. This is the equivalent Southend moving into deepest Suffolk. For some people this distance would mean the end of their support as they support the club as they can get to see live football and why should they be deprived of the chance to watch the team just because some business bod wants to make more profit for themselves without any thought of the fans who got the team to where it is today before this opportunist decided to get involved.

If Winkleman and co wanted a team in MK why did they not invest in MK City like old fat bloke King did with Canvey, they where an Essex Senior team and now look at them. With the right investment MK City would have made it.

No he wanted an easy option and Wimbledon was there for the taking. The Dons saga is down not just Winkleman, and Koppel but Merton Council and Hamman who caused the ground share problem which meant Wimbledon did not make as much money as they could. Wimbledon may have not survived in the Premier$hite with the ground share but definitely the Wimbledon residents would still have had an easy communtable team to watch.

 

[Xàbia Shrimper]

Remember that there was a real chance to return to Plough Lane but that would have scuppered the lucrative (?) move to Milton Keynes. So Koppel (the club chairman!) persuaded local residents that having the football club back in Merton would be a disaster for the neighbourhood!! It's obvious what his intentions were at the time and that was not for the future of Wimbledon FC.

Imagine that there was a hidden agenda at Southend United to move the club to Ashford in Kent. There are no other big clubs in the area so the catchment would make it lucrative for the owners of Southend United. Ashford Town are a small non-descript club struggling at the bottom of the Isthmian League Division One with an average attendance of just over 200. Who cares about them; just take a look at their website here to see what a pathetic little community club they are. I bet those people down in The Weald would love to have a League Championship side in their midst!

Fossetts Farm? A smoke screen. Suddenly there's a big outcry against the move; someone's found a large Iron Age settlement that covers the whole area and, in any case, the KARERS have suddenly found over 25,000 signatories for a petition against the new ground (which, it later transpires, was encouraged by the owners of the football club). The owners of Southend United are "gobsmacked" and they cry that the decision leaves them no alternative but to move the club out of the Borough of Southend-on-Sea to keep it alive. Basildon is considered but thrown out. Castle Point apparently want nothing to do with it. Oh no, cry the owners, we going to have to look further afield. Ooh, what's this? A chance to 're-surrect' the club in Kent? We never saw that coming, say the owners. By 2009 the club has moved lock, stock and barrel to a community stadium just outside Ashford and, after a season as Southend United, they re-name themselves to the 'Ashford Blues'. Ashford Town play their last game in May 2010 against Deal Town in the Kentish Observer Kent League; barely 50 people turn up.

In 2011 it emerges that the owners of Southend United had no intention to move to Fossetts Farm and that the Ashford deal was on the table as early as 2005. As Ashford Blues struggle at the wrong end of the League Championship in front of crowds of less than 3,000, AFC Southend dominate the Essex Senior League cheered on by a regular hardcore of almost 4,000. The Isthmian League is on the point of inviting the club to join their set-up and, with the support of a local businessman, the aim is to reach the Football League within ten years.

This is mere fantasy, of course! It'll never happen to Southend United.

Or will it ...?

 

[C'mon you Blues]

only thing you're forgetting Mike is that Basildon wanted SUFC to move. Like Milton Keynes it was a new town built which lacks "heart" and history (apologies to all who live is bas but I dislike New Towns intensely - having worked in Bas for 10 years and having to visit Harlow occasionally - Milton Keynes is exactly same but more pretentios - city my arse). And one of those things that is the essence of this heart is an established football team. Winkelman cynically imported this with no effort by having a load of cash. He should have invested in MK City. They would probably be in the conference now threatening to come into the league but he couldn't wait. I blame the spineless and incompetent FA and Football League for acquiesing to this. If SUFC moved to Ashford it wouldn't be SUFC. You cannot export feelings or history. This is why I hope we stuff the bastards this afternoon (although i think it's unlikely and those who rejoiced at the swansea win will be looking at the table tonight worrying that we have to go to Swansea and need a result). Hope I'm wrong. Come on you Blues - let's stuff them