Altrincham FC director, Bill Waterson, penned the following "From the Boardroom" article for Saturday's Robins' Review, which encapsulates the Club's off-field ambition over the next twelve months...
"Today we welcome the board, players, officials and supporters of Hednesford to the J Davidson Stadium for the final game of the long but immensely satisfying Evo-Stik Northern Premier League season. In doing so we welcome back James Lawrie to Moss Lane, who gave us so many incredible memories in his time at Moss Lane.
So here we are, Champions of the Northern Premier League. We topped the table from early October with the most wins, fewest defeats, most goals scored (two more needed for a league century), fewest conceded, best supported team home and away. This is an incredible achievement and one which should not be undervalued. I hope to say more on this after the game, if appropriate.
Already the club are planning for next season. Our intent on the field is to selectively strengthen the squad so that we can mount a challenge in our first season back in the National League North. And this clearly defines our off-field priorities. We need to raise enough revenue to provide Phil Parkinson with a higher playing budget than this year.
Given we intentionally ran at a deficit this season, this means that the revenue we need to raise is significantly higher than the rise in the playing budget itself.We need to expand our commercial functions to give us every opportunity to achieve this. The board are meeting next week for a commercial planning day where we will put into effect our plans in this area. This includes our admission and season ticket pricing strategy and let me thank you for your input to this process. We only raise around 30% of our revenue from admission prices, and we have no plans to change that, except perhaps downwards over time.
In addition, we have plans to improve our infrastructure and therefore we will also be looking at ways of funding such activities. Thank you all for your contributions that allowed us to purchase the pitch covers, and in that context, we have also laid out our plans to improve the pitch drainage. We will also be looking at improvements to the media gantry and therefore to the Popular Side.
We announced the arrival of a new website and work continues building the platform. I would like to express our wholehearted thanks on behalf of the club, and on behalf of the fans to John Laidlar for his magnificent contribution over many years. The content of the website is so complete that it puts many others to shame. We do not intend to lose this content as we move to a new platform, instead we are opening ourselves to new commercial opportunities as we drive new revenue streams from Digital.
Finally, we lost another dear friend and extraordinary fan this week with the passing of Jacqui Forster, who lost her long battle with cancer. She has been a major actor in football across League and non-League clubs for many years and was our Honorary Head of Inclusivity and Diversity. It is amazing how much Jacqui and Jordan Tyms were able to achieve this season given Jacqui’s declining health. She will be missed.
Thank you for your magnificent support this season, and I look forward to seeing you all in a couple of months.
Enjoy the game, Bill Waterson".
You can see from this article that the club is looking to fund a squad capable of mounting a challenge next season. This will have been discussed with Phil and I am sure like us that is his ambition to push for promotion. From there and in future planning the full time/part time debate will continue.
I for one am looking forward to next season.