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[distancetraveller]

Given Alty's present position in the league... who will be the most worried fans at present?

Alty fans who owe nobody a bean and have the potential to kick start there season starting this Saturday.

or 

Being a Crawley fan who have seen there club spend over half a million quid on players with average gates of no more than ours. and a supposedly weekly wage bill of 70 grand in there attempt to gain promotion to FL2 by next April ?

I know which team I would prefer

How about you folks of the forum?

[taxi Phil]

If there was the merest suggestion of us going down Crawley's route, I'd burn my season ticket and watch Trafford !

[robins1978]

After the pathetic display they put on against us (even tho they won the game) I would not want to be a Crawley fan. END OF..

[Ballers]

The thing is that any new investment or new direction appears to be painted in a lot of peoples minds as straight in the sh*t or bust category.

Surely there's a middle road between an obvious disaster and us struggling to prosper but unable to attract or accomodate new investment?

In my opinion Ray, the comparison is a nonsense mate, in the sense that it's misleading.

[fuertes]

The thing is that any new investment or new direction appears to be painted in a lot of peoples minds as straight in the sh*t or bust category.

Surely there's a middle road between an obvious disaster and us struggling to prosper but unable to attract or accomodate new investment?

In my opinion Ray, the comparison is a nonsense mate, in the sense that it's misleading.

What would we want an investor to do though? Even if it's on a small and sensible scale, an 'investor' giving us money would still constitute Altrincham FC spending money it doesn't generate through natural income streams. That's not sustainable, and I don't think it's in the spirit of the game either. Let's face it, even in situations where the plug isn't about to be pulled, it's not an admirable way to run a club. Is there a single person following our club who respect Chelsea or Manchester City? They're both complete joke clubs. I want our club to grow naturally through its own achievements. If that means we find it tough for a while, then hey ho, I can deal with that.

[Mick]

The thing is that any new investment or new direction appears to be painted in a lot of peoples minds as straight in the sh*t or bust category.

Surely there's a middle road between an obvious disaster and us struggling to prosper but unable to attract or accomodate new investment?

In my opinion Ray, the comparison is a nonsense mate, in the sense that it's misleading.

What would we want an investor to do though? Even if it's on a small and sensible scale, an 'investor' giving us money would still constitute Altrincham FC spending money it doesn't generate through natural income streams. That's not sustainable, and I don't think it's in the spirit of the game either. Let's face it, even in situations where the plug isn't about to be pulled, it's not an admirable way to run a club. Is there a single person following our club who respect Chelsea or Manchester City? They're both complete joke clubs. I want our club to grow naturally through its own achievements. If that means we find it tough for a while, then hey ho, I can deal with that.

Fuertes.......I fully understand your point, but I would like to pick up on a few things

You say that an investor would just be giving us money that we are not generating through our own revenue streams and that it is not sustainable.
I agree, but wouldn't it be nice if someone out there was happy to chuck in £75k a year so that we could be better able to compete. Once they get fed up, then we reduce next seasons budget by £75k and see how we fair (being careful we don't have players tied up on big wages).

This league is getting more competitive each season as the L2 clubs come down , ambitious clubs get promoted (either with decent crowds like Wimbledon / Newport, or with sugar daddies like Fleetwood), and other clubs spend beyond their means running full-time teams playing in front of 600 people.
Hence what is becoming unsustainable in my eyes is having the ability to compete with teams in this division with an inferior playing budget to most of the other clubs. This is especially valid for those clubs whose budgets are actually linked to genuine income i.e that from the paying customer through the turnstiles.
I hate to say it, but if the current trend in this division continues then our attendances from a financial point should and will only sustain a BSN side.

We all want Alty to 'grow', but how can this be done. Crowds need to improve and I can only see a marginal improvement happening even if we were competing in the top ten. Most of the town are not up for it. Sad but true.

[fuertes]

Fuertes.......I fully understand your point, but I would like to pick up on a few things

You say that an investor would just be giving us money that we are not generating through our own revenue streams and that it is not sustainable.
I agree, but wouldn't it be nice if someone out there was happy to chuck in £75k a year so that we could be better able to compete. Once they get fed up, then we reduce next seasons budget by £75k and see how we fair (being careful we don't have players tied up on big wages).

This league is getting more competitive each season as the L2 clubs come down , ambitious clubs get promoted (either with decent crowds like Wimbledon / Newport, or with sugar daddies like Fleetwood), and other clubs spend beyond their means running full-time teams playing in front of 600 people.
Hence what is becoming unsustainable in my eyes is having the ability to compete with teams in this division with an inferior playing budget to most of the other clubs. This is especially valid for those clubs whose budgets are actually linked to genuine income i.e that from the paying customer through the turnstiles.
I hate to say it, but if the current trend in this division continues then our attendances from a financial point should and will only sustain a BSN side.

We all want Alty to 'grow', but how can this be done. Crowds need to improve and I can only see a marginal improvement happening even if we were competing in the top ten. Most of the town are not up for it. Sad but true.

I genuinely don't think it would be nice. Where's the sense of achievement in having a good season because some bloke is giving a big hand-out? Also, I'm not sure it's as simple as "right, Mr. X isn't contributing this year, so let's knock over a grand per week off the wage bill". We could probably just about do it, but only through a rather demoralising close season where we get rid of top earners and replace them with journeymen. I wouldn't like to operate in that way.

I agree, it's probably more competitive this year than ever before. However - and I know this is hard to take because I want us to succeed as much as anyone - perhaps we just have to accept that teams joining this league such as Newport rightly spend more than us because they get the crowds and generate the cash. I don't see other clubs' spending patterns as justification for our club looking for handouts. I know it's frustrating looking at Crawley, Fleetwood, Gateshead and Forest Green, but I never want us to follow their lead, even if it did mean winning most weeks.

There's always that possibility of the big Cup draw or the run to the Trophy final. Think how sweet our success would be if we got the £500,000 for the run to FACR3 and invested it carefully a la Burton Albion. That'd mean far more to me than surging up the league after an investor ploughed moey in.

[Mick]

Fuertes
I don't disagree with any of the above..............bring on the big FA Cup run. After failing to deal with Luton, Millwall and Mansfield and Rushden of late, it has been a long time coming

[taxi Phil]

We must finance ourselves via a Cup run (or two.....or three !). I may be alone in this, but I'd rather drop to Evo-Stik level than follow the pattern of clubs like Crawley or Fleetwood !

Football hierarchy should be achieved on merit, not because a club can outspend another club. Unfortunately, we are never going to get much bigger gates than we have at present unless we capture the imagination of the notoriously fickle local public. Kids today are force fed Premier League football, and we've got two giants on our doorstep who they'd rather watch on telly than come down to Moss Lane.

That's why the oxygen of publicity that a Cup run would bring is important to this club - without it, the next generation of fans will not come through in any significant numbers !

[markecky]

Here is another angle on it...if I could get an investor I'd channel every penny of the money into making more more money.  I would invest it all in marketing and promotion.

We have 4000+ spaces on the ground to fill every week.

Its alright saying that the town don't back but I feel a lot of the time the town have no idea what we do.  Its not a criticism but if we had money to produce and deliver thousands of leaflets or tickets, to advertise in the town, run promotions etc then money would make money.

[Ballers]

In fairness, what do we do to genuinely attract fans from the town in our outlook? All we hear is how we run a tight ship and it's hard to compete against full time teams and we could get midtable etc. How does that attract people? Really. We should be looking to say we're pushing on in the top half, get behind us in a play off push etc. I realise to an extent that's difficult and you can't make daft promises and perhaps now the team has taken a slight step backwards but my point is. Sometimes we sound too much like martyrs and people won't come to watch a club or team that is probably as happy to be in regional football as long as things don't rock the boat. The question is that by trying to be ambitious and attracting new people you bring increased expectation and with this the pressure to deliver so do we have the nerve to deal with this or is it easier to go back into our shell and then wonder why people don't come?

[ManagementGuru]

If I were to invest, in addition to following the marketing route above, I would look at spending money on infrastructure.  Not only would this improve Moss Lane in a way that would last for many years (look how well the terracing of the Chequers end has stood up since 1978) but could potentially reduce running and maintenance costs in the future thus freeing up more money for players.

[taxi Phil]

We're back to the Investor v Benefactor argument. If anybody were to consider investing in Alty, I honestly believe they would want to consider relocation. You can spend all the money in the World on the ground, but frankly there's no way it can be expanded in any direction. So nobody would INVEST unless they could sell Moss Lane and install us in a new purpose-built all seater stadium out of town.

What we need is a BENEFACTOR. I'm still buying my weekly Euromillions ticket - if we all do the same.........

Going out to work now, or I won't take enough money to buy my lunch !

[distancetraveller]

The thing is that any new investment or new direction appears to be painted in a lot of peoples minds as straight in the sh*t or bust category.

Surely there's a middle road between an obvious disaster and us struggling to prosper but unable to attract or accomodate new investment?

In my opinion Ray, the comparison is a nonsense mate, in the sense that it's misleading.

I was using Alty and Crawley as a direct comparison rather than comparing us against other clubs that have the money to spend season on season

[Ballers]

It's muddying the waters all this Phil. If I had money to spare wouldn't consider myself a benefactor. I wouldn't sign a legal written agreement for say £50k pa over 3 years and say do what you wish with it. I'd want a say in how the club uses it or how the club was run.