The Clyde FC 2018-19 Thread

[Officer Barbrady]

16 hours ago, Bully Wee Clyde FC said:

What have you guys been smoking? A club's size cannot be defined by ancient history, or we'd be dwarfed by QP East Stirling and the likes. 

We're possibly one of the 'biggest clubs' never to have made it to the premier league, while Morton, Dumbarton, Airdrie Hamilton, Clydebank, Ayr and Raith all have. That makes us less big...ie small.  We also have a small mentality when it comes to cups too.

You look at the way ICT and Ross County have held their own in the the top division and remember we've never made it to the level in 45 years and that should be evidence enough.  We've been in, and still are in the grubber, in terms of leagues, but there are encouraging signs, but they're only signs, cos we are not out the mire yet!

We aint had more than 1500 regularly since the 70's. Maybe some reality needed?

Stopped reading at East Stirling. Seek help for that, Sir. 

 

The QP thing may stand an historical point, but it would be pure romanticism to consider it relevant in the modern, ie professional and organised, era. Besides, Hamilton took only seven years to go from D3 to the SPL. Its not unthinkable for anyone, and those bashing the discussion are in my eyes a symptom of the deep psychological problems regarding success and its management that is rife in the game and in the country at large.

[The Moonster]

2 hours ago, cfcuk said:

all the teams you mention have had money put in

I can assure you that Dumbarton have had very little in the way of investment in the last 10-15 years.  We are quite literally surviving on race nights and fundraisers right now and our owners have never invested a penny in the club since they bought it 10 years ago.

[Officer Barbrady]

44 minutes ago, The Moonster said:

I can assure you that Dumbarton have had very little in the way of investment in the last 10-15 years.  We are quite literally surviving on race nights and fundraisers right now and our owners have never invested a penny in the club since they bought it 10 years ago.

 

3 hours ago, cfcuk said:

Maybe you should ask why then ?
all the teams you mention have had money put in while over the last god knows how many years we are pissing about running the club on raffles golf days and race nights Oh and as soon as their is whiff of us now having a debt it's panic stations
Thank goodness the mentality at the top of the club has changed and guess what look at the manager / team facilities off the park and the fans have responded backing the club to the hilt, but the only way we will progress is with investment from outside whether that be a change in structure or increased commercial sponsorship and building a solid financial model not based on fans digging deeper every year that well has been gone to far too often

I personally didn't suspect Dumbarton of having investment, just canny management of a decent few gates against 2012, Hearts and Hibernian. And even at those, with max gates of around 2,000, it wouldn't have lasted long. 

 

Moonster, what structure to Dumbarton actually have at the club? Sounds a familiar tale of fans rallying round, shaking one another upside down to see what falls out etc, is there a movement for a supporters' group to get involved, or is that not a step required at the minute? 

[The Moonster]

2 minutes ago, Officer Barbrady said:

Moonster, what structure to Dumbarton actually have at the club? Sounds a familiar tale of fans rallying round, shaking one another upside down to see what falls out etc, is there a movement for a supporters' group to get involved, or is that not a step required at the minute? 

Without wanting to completely derail your thread here - we were taken over by a company called Brabco who are essentially a group of property developers. Their plan was to sell our current ground for houses (very profitable land we have down there) and move the club to a new "Community Hub" stadium a wee bit further out of town (sound familiar?). Brabco told us when they took over that they had no intention of investing or interfering with the football side of things and their main focus would be moving stadium - this has led to the current stadium being neglected for the best part of the last decade and we now have some pretty pricey repairs to carry out.  The council knocked back Brabco's stadium move (after about 8 years of planning) and Brabco are now stuck with an investment in a football club they don't want and very few options for making their money back (we have a "Golden Share" which prevents our asset i.e. stadium being sold without the future of the club being safeguarded with a new stadium plan approved, so that removes the "sell the ground and run with the money" option). Throughout all of this we've had a Trust rep on the board (who has had his hands tied for much of the preceding years) and last year after our chairman Les Hope resigned we put a new board in place which is largely filled with Trust members. This has led to a change in how we operate - no longer will we operate on director loans to fill in gaps in cash flow which is what has contributed to where we are today financially (we owe some money to former chairmen/directors and it can cripple the club). It's now essentially operating as a Community club in all but name, we raise money through fundraisers and we now have new caterers/events managers involved who will be looking to rent the function suites we have to provide non-match day income. 

In the summer we dropped divisions which sees a huge reduction in prize money, we lost 25% of our season ticket holders and we have the aforementioned repairs, some of which are now critical. To add insult to injury, Raith progressed in the Scottish Cup which has meant we don't have a home game for 4 weeks (a situation we also ended up with in October last year). That on top of still having owners who don't want to put in a penny means we are in a very difficult position right now and need money urgently to see us through. If we can punt our owners and transfer ownership to the fans we'd have a much better time of it, IMO. Working with owners like Brabco is a fucking nightmare.

[cfcuk]

I can assure you that Dumbarton have had very little in the way of investment in the last 10-15 years.  We are quite literally surviving on race nights and fundraisers right now and our owners have never invested a penny in the club since they bought it 10 years ago.

I meant Hamilton and Livingston
Well if you are now rely on a fanbased ownership in the lower leagues then I wish you luck you are going to need it in shovel fulls

Ps loved going to boghead and a few pints with my old man in the stagshead cracking away day
Fish supper and train back from Dumbarton central [emoji106]

[maxruby]

It’s all about drink with you, cfcuk! All about the drink.

[Bulstrode]

Dumbarton East was the closest station to Boghead and the Stag.

[Officer Barbrady]

3 hours ago, The Moonster said:

Without wanting to completely derail your thread here - we were taken over by a company called Brabco who are essentially a group of property developers. Their plan was to sell our current ground for houses (very profitable land we have down there) and move the club to a new "Community Hub" stadium a wee bit further out of town (sound familiar?). Brabco told us when they took over that they had no intention of investing or interfering with the football side of things and their main focus would be moving stadium - this has led to the current stadium being neglected for the best part of the last decade and we now have some pretty pricey repairs to carry out.  The council knocked back Brabco's stadium move (after about 8 years of planning) and Brabco are now stuck with an investment in a football club they don't want and very few options for making their money back (we have a "Golden Share" which prevents our asset i.e. stadium being sold without the future of the club being safeguarded with a new stadium plan approved, so that removes the "sell the ground and run with the money" option). Throughout all of this we've had a Trust rep on the board (who has had his hands tied for much of the preceding years) and last year after our chairman Les Hope resigned we put a new board in place which is largely filled with Trust members. This has led to a change in how we operate - no longer will we operate on director loans to fill in gaps in cash flow which is what has contributed to where we are today financially (we owe some money to former chairmen/directors and it can cripple the club). It's now essentially operating as a Community club in all but name, we raise money through fundraisers and we now have new caterers/events managers involved who will be looking to rent the function suites we have to provide non-match day income. 

In the summer we dropped divisions which sees a huge reduction in prize money, we lost 25% of our season ticket holders and we have the aforementioned repairs, some of which are now critical. To add insult to injury, Raith progressed in the Scottish Cup which has meant we don't have a home game for 4 weeks (a situation we also ended up with in October last year). That on top of still having owners who don't want to put in a penny means we are in a very difficult position right now and need money urgently to see us through. If we can punt our owners and transfer ownership to the fans we'd have a much better time of it, IMO. Working with owners like Brabco is a fucking nightmare.

Thanks, very comprehensive and not too dissimilar to our last decade either. 

 

The problem i see with Trusts taking the mantle is their very idealism contradicts with all basic common sense. Firstly its duty is to its members, which is a different thing entirely from the club despite its very ethos. Naturally you'll want these guys out the door, new park or not, but then you're left with a sub-committee of dozens if not hundreds, headed by a handful who might know what they're doing, and that might not be for the best either, despite any early good intentions. 

 

You say the old chair chucked it, and with him went a particular method of funding, we sure can empathise there. However, replacing that from a Trust PoV where the first matter would be 'safeguarding' the club from further debts, and future bogeymen who stand to be accused of ulterior motives from such Bolshevik organisations (potentially eventually having to sell the stadium or such like, if necessary - i di hope not) from our experience shifts from owners/chairmen throwing their children's inheritance at some glory days to much acclaim from excited fans, to simply people's time and well-meaning mother-goosery becoming the People's Champions, regardless of what happens as the club hurtles down the way due to the lack of business skills among these Trust members, or perhaps very active skills in driving the club on a 'different' path, but ultimately neither putting up nor raising a substantial amount to keep the club in its former comforts, but even then only if everyone else chips in - this unfortunately is their terribly sad reality. The original Clyde Trust was geared towards giving us "the club we want", and it was up to us to fund it, staff it, the lot. I'd strongly advise any clubs, our (mutual) size or not, to be very careful of where that road can lead to. 

Edited February 14, 2019 by Officer Barbrady

[The Moonster]

2 minutes ago, Officer Barbrady said:

Thanks, very comprehensive and not too dissimilar to our last decade either. 

 

The problem i see with Trusts taking the mantle is their very idealism contradicts with all basic common sense. Firstly its duty is to its members, which is a different thing entirely from the club despite its very ethos. Naturally you'll want these guys out the door, new park or not, but then you're left with a sub-committee of dozens if not hundreds, headed by a handful who might know what they're doing, and that might not be for the best either, despite any early good intentions. 

 

You say the old chair chucked it, and with him went a particular method of funding, we sure can empathise there. However, replacing that from a Trust PoV where the first matter would be 'safeguarding' the club from further debts, potentially having to sell the stadium or such like, from our experience shifts from owners/chairmen throwing their children's inheritance at some glory days to much acclaim from excited fans, to simply people's time and well-meaning mother-goosery becoming the People's Champions, regardless of what happens as the club hurtles down the way due to the lack of business skills among these Trust members, or perhaps very active skills in driving the club on a 'different' path, but ultimately neither putting up nor raising a substantial amount to keep the club in its comforts, is their terribly sad reality. The original Clyde Trust was geared towards giving us "the club we want", and it was up to us to fund it, staff it, the lot. I'd strongly advise any clubs, our (mutual) size or not, to be very careful of where that road can lead to. 

I would share most of those concerns if I didn't know exactly what sort of skills our current board have. It's easily the most knowledgable and passionate board we've had in my 30 years on this planet and I have every confidence in them to safe guard us, they also have the backing of our 300 or so Trust members, around 8 of which have been formed as a working group to run certain fundraisers or matchday events to take some of the burden away from board. I don't expect it to be all plain sailing, but if we can get out of our current financial hole I think we can make life a bit more comfortable in the future with the way we work.

[HughieMc]

28 minutes ago, Officer Barbrady said:

Thanks, very comprehensive and not too dissimilar to our last decade either. 

 

The problem i see with Trusts taking the mantle is their very idealism contradicts with all basic common sense. Firstly its duty is to its members, which is a different thing entirely from the club despite its very ethos. Naturally you'll want these guys out the door, new park or not, but then you're left with a sub-committee of dozens if not hundreds, headed by a handful who might know what they're doing, and that might not be for the best either, despite any early good intentions. 

 

You say the old chair chucked it, and with him went a particular method of funding, we sure can empathise there. However, replacing that from a Trust PoV where the first matter would be 'safeguarding' the club from further debts, and future bogeymen who stand to be accused of ulterior motives from such Bolshevik organisations (potentially eventually having to sell the stadium or such like, if necessary - i di hope not) from our experience shifts from owners/chairmen throwing their children's inheritance at some glory days to much acclaim from excited fans, to simply people's time and well-meaning mother-goosery becoming the People's Champions, regardless of what happens as the club hurtles down the way due to the lack of business skills among these Trust members, or perhaps very active skills in driving the club on a 'different' path, but ultimately neither putting up nor raising a substantial amount to keep the club in its former comforts, but even then only if everyone else chips in - this unfortunately is their terribly sad reality. The original Clyde Trust was geared towards giving us "the club we want", and it was up to us to fund it, staff it, the lot. I'd strongly advise any clubs, our (mutual) size or not, to be very careful of where that road can lead to. 

Careful- slagging off the trust- how very dare you- you’ll be asked for evidence

[cfcuk]

Dumbarton East was the closest station to Boghead and the Stag.

Correct , must have had a few more pints than I thought [emoji6]
Still a cracking day out

[shawfield shed boy]

Hope Ally Love gets a start on sat with or without Kris...

[Officer Barbrady]

I'd argue that after Saturday, Lamont and Boyle's two spots my be under threat. Perhaps Nicoll is equally deserving of a start as Ally is. 

[cfcuk]

Hope Ally Love gets a start on sat with or without Kris...

Agree I think he does deserve a run in the team but looks like the manager won't start him

[cfcuk]

I'd argue that after Saturday, Lamont and Boyle's two spots my be under threat. Perhaps Nicoll is equally deserving of a start as Ally is. 

I think Boyle has done very little to warrant a place in the team On nicoll , I don't know if we need him Saturday but in away games like Stirling I would have him in right from the start

[Only one David Marsh]

We've signed Scott Banks on loan from Dundee Utd 17 year old attacking midfielder 

[BroadwoodBoy]

Hope the lad does well but if we were getting anyone in it’s a striker that we needed. 

[HughieMc]

Someone has time on their hands- anyone currently laid up?

[Clyde85]

Not really what we need at all. Looks like his balls still haven't dropped yet!

[SLClyde]

Would’ve preferred a striker, but we’ll need as many options as possible for the run in. Happy enough to bring someone in.