Right now, the club is owned by people who may or may not be billionaires. Most, if not all BFC fans are not billionaires. But seeing as our ownership seems determined not to put a penny of their own money in, what difference does it actually make whether they're billionaires or not? Would a group of fans running the club be a viable alternative? The main issues I see are as follows: The "billionaires" choose not to put money in, but in theory could do if the situation became critical. It is more than likely that if the club was owned by a fans' group, loaning the club money if needed just wouldn't be an option, bearing in mind the vast sums needed to run professional football clubs these days. Time-wise, there are unlikely to be many of us on here who have the luxury of being able to give up our day jobs in order to spend 50-60+ hours a week running a football club. Unfortunately, this especially applies to those fans who would have the relevant skills to do so, bearing in mind they are most likely to be professional people of working age, who have families, mortgages etc. However, on the other hand, things can't go on as they are. I have pretty much zero interest in attending matches right now. I'll be in Sheffield on Saturday, but won't be anywhere near Hillsborough as I'd rather spend the time catching up with friends I haven't seen for a while. I might make it to the Charlton game, if only because it fits so exactly into my movements that day, that not attending would be logistically inconvenient. I'm sure there are many, many others who feel like this. This is the person who on several occasions in the past flew to the England for two days to attend BFC matches while living abroad, then flew back. The disconnect between the fans and the club is absolutely devastating right now. Patrick Cryne was not perfect, but at least under his stewardship we had the feeling of a locally owned club doing things the right way. A club sticking two fingers up to corporate greed and facelessness, while still producing some magical moments on the field. The current incarnation Barnsley Football Club as an entity has absolutely nothing in common with my values. I want to support a club whose ethos matches mine. Sustainability, a connection with the fans, real support and interaction with local small businesses, a hub of the community for everyone to get behind and be proud of, even if things aren't going well on the field. If a fan-owned model is the way to bring that back then I'm all for it, even if it would mean us playing at this level or below. I fully understand that as BFC is a relatively big club, and indeed a multi-million pound business in an extremely cutthroat world, the size of the undertaking would be phenomenal. But if there's even a sliver of a possibility we could do it, then it has to be looked into, as the alternative is more disillusionment, stagnation, and the slow, painful death of the club. Enough is enough.
I'd be content with fan owned and never getting above this level. Trouble is you'd be continually be accused of 'never putting your hand in your pocket' 'lacking ambition' etc. We can't win - you either have a sugar daddy who ploughs millions in like everyone else, lose millions like others, or run a tight ship and be doomed to mediocrity.
I thought that anyone taking over after administration had to prove funds to keep the club running for a certain period? Could be tricky, especially in the current economic climate. Genuine question about administration - would it be easier for a fan group to take over before or afterwards?
Chief Executive Officer: Young Nudger Finance Director: Orsenkaht (leads strategy of heavy investment of all inbound transfer funds into the 3:45 at Doncaster) Marketing role changes to 'Head of Ministry of Information' and led by: Alan Blah Social Media: Stephen Dawson Head of Youth Development: Tommy Tyke
SD in charge of social media would be brilliant. All communication coming out of BFC would either be coded messages using different songs, or extremely ill-judged sexual innuendo. That would already be a giant leap towards reconnecting me, and I'm sure many others, with the club.
Just have a look at what Hearts have achieved under fan ownership. It can work and if the club did fall in to admin this would be the way of bringing the club back to the community. Remember that fan owned is not fan run.
Wrexham said you can only go so far with it, hence there's none in the upper pyramid. End of the day the club needs millions of investment to sustain a top two tier team, with the current board we aren't going to get it.
I think it is something that should be seriously considered. It can’t go on as we are. As a community based club we need to be locked into our community and it’s values. As of now we are now miles away from that. The only way back I can see is a fan ownership model. I’d like to see us lead the way with the German 51-49 model so we had some financial support behind us. We could show the way for other small clubs.
Great idea. But how do we go about making it a reality? I have enough trouble organising three people into deciding what they want for breakfast or dinner every evening. I wouldn't fancy our chances of being able to direct a couple of hundred or more eager but generally clueless Barnsley fans into running a football club in any sort of coherent manner!
