Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Wed Jun 02, 2021 9:36 pm  

Reading through this, it looks like most of the old guard who have supported the club through thin and thinner are just about done. I know, I'm one of them.

David Hughes took over in what? 2001? There's a part of me that wished we'd have been put out of our misery then.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Wed Jun 02, 2021 9:42 pm  

Deadcowboys1 wrote:

I guess I wouldn't mind so much if Hughes,<snip> came out & explained the great plan they are working to.

I wouldn't believe a word that came out of his mouth. It's got to the stage now where ANYONE and not just mouthy gits like me, that dares to call into any activity or lack there of at the club is banned or has access limited on social media.

Long time fans with a track record of defending him and the club, whilst spending thousands in support are now shunned because he's given another unqualified idiot the keys

He employed (and continues to) Gimps, who will do his bidding whilst coming up with every excuse under the sun for the lack of interest. The Name, The Ground, The lack of a Tube Station......but the cold hard reality is that David Hughes is a fan with cash who spat his dummy out so hard in 2013 because of a hammering by Wigan that we nearly folded. That's not the action of a smart business man. Since we were saved in 2005/6, the club has had one CEO of any note. Paul Brown. Since then, we've had a bunch of amateurs running the club. The RFL have tried, with giving access to Marketing specialists and bribing the bloke at the Hive to let us in, but the buck stops firmly with the bloke who has flushed £30,000,000 down the drain because he refused to ever listen to anyone who might have known better.

Wimbledon have a 4 million (IIRC) debt to service and David Hughes paying them £200,000 a year in rent over 10 years will help with that, but if they're budgeting for anything north of 300 on game day for the Broncos they may have to look at other revenue streams.

280 fans, which will include Wags etc....Pub soccer gets bigger gates

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Wed Jun 02, 2021 9:43 pm  

Yea, we are pretty much done tbh. I really hate what seems to have happened, and I put no blame on wimbledon at all, I think they have been sold a lemon, and they must be wondering why the long time london fans are so opposed to the move. Its the fact we are moving, not where we are moving to, and the fact of the significant price increase with the weakest squad we have ever had.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 6:42 am  

Benny Profane wrote:

Reading through this, it looks like most of the old guard who have supported the club through thin and thinner are just about done. I know, I'm one of them.

Sad to keep reading this thread, but glad you say most! & not EVERYONE! I was at the first game and ever since, travelling 225 miles each way by car for home games.

I still Hope that we will come through all this, that the move to Wimbledon will turn out Positive! In our travels we had that many lows, playing in an athletic stadium one for me!

Without one person financing Our Club for many years, we would not be here today, I can't see any queue of investors? wanting to take over.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 8:02 am  

Unless they have a master plan up their sleeve you would think given where the club is today, pulling out of Wimbledon would be the sensible thing to do.

It makes you wonder if a new benefactor doesn't come forward fairly quickly then the club is going to be run down to closure.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 8:45 am  

wire-quin wrote:

Unless they have a master plan up their sleeve you would think given where the club is today, pulling out of Wimbledon would be the sensible thing to do.

It makes you wonder if a new benefactor doesn't come forward fairly quickly then the club is going to be run down to closure.

I would not be surprised if Wimbledon pull out and take the decision away from London... If they have been told we will rock up with 2K fans and be in SL in the next 2 years where attendances will be >2K, and from that made projections on match day revenue, now they are seeing we will have

1) 20% of the projected fans (and then by extension 20% of the gate takings, beer and food takings etc),
2) we won't even be making the playoffs let alone promotion as no money to get in quality players over than the acadamy boys,

does it make sense for them to have us as Tenants. I can't believe rent alone will cover what the Dons need to pay off there loan, they need a cut of the takings, and 300 fans that cut will be very small.

To answer Jaybs, we would come back when the product on offer matches the cost of attending. Right now it does not. And this is coming from somebody who has had 3 ST for 20 years, has bought 3 home and 3 away tops pretty much every year, and paid for parking when available... SO I have put more than my money in over the years.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 9:31 am  

Wimbledon I feel do need the money! so wishing for that being a reason we may not move, could e a pipe dream! I have got to know many at Wimbledon, and they are keen on us working with them.

I said yesterday there seems no one even thinking about taking over the club, The RFL will not save it, it will be the end for me with rugby league if we collapse, I will still watch it on TV, if any TV company us then even showing it live.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 10:22 am  

jaybs wrote:

Wimbledon I feel do need the money! so wishing for that being a reason we may not move, could e a pipe dream! I have got to know many at Wimbledon, and they are keen on us working with them.

I also hear this from several sources, but then why are no Dons fans coming to our current games to see what we are bringing.. There is no football on right now, so nothing to do at weekends.

If the Dons fans are so interested in RL and us, and are potentially going to significantly increase our gates, then I'd be expecting some of them to be showing up right now. But they are not, as an attendance of 280 tells us, that the 'new fans' who would be replacing the old ST holders, are not showing up.

I'll be amazed if Dons fans come to more than 2 games, and once football season starts again, then if we see 100 of them regularly I'll be shocked.

This is not a dig at Dons fans, I'm a RL fan not wendyball, and if it was the otherway and Wimbledon came to trailfinders and we was the landlords, I would not go to any Football games, basically as Football bores me. So I don't see many Dons fans attending (even if they get in free with there Dons ST's)

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 10:32 am  

If I was a Dons fan, reading this forum would not impress me.

Re: SUNDAYS GAME : Thu Jun 03, 2021 3:21 pm  

crashmon wrote:

I also hear this from several sources, but then why are no Dons fans coming to our current games to see what we are bringing.. There is no football on right now, so nothing to do at weekends.

If the Dons fans are so interested in RL and us, and are potentially going to significantly increase our gates, then I'd be expecting some of them to be showing up right now. But they are not, as an attendance of 280 tells us, that the 'new fans' who would be replacing the old ST holders, are not showing up.

I'll be amazed if Dons fans come to more than 2 games, and once football season starts again, then if we see 100 of them regularly I'll be shocked.

This is not a dig at Dons fans, I'm a RL fan not wendyball, and if it was the otherway and Wimbledon came to trailfinders and we was the landlords, I would not go to any Football games, basically as Football bores me. So I don't see many Dons fans attending (even if they get in free with there Dons ST's)

Not sure its reasonable for a curious AFC fans to drag themselves to Ealing to watch us, maybe if we were playing in EFL's newest member Sutton Utd's ground or if we were playing on Tooting Bec Common it might be. Everything from August onwards might depend on how well we do & how well AFC do. Not sure AFC's support will hold up if they struggle. You see far, far more Chelsea shirts on a Saturday in Wimbledon than AFC ones.