Posted by RB
on 23/5/2009, 11:52:02, in reply to "Re: Tonight's Meeting"
86.14.216.116
Just trying to keep an objective balanced view, Jay. The enjoyment of the game for many spectators (home, away, and neural) was often spoilt by the unnecessarily vulgar abuse from the terrace behind the goal. So, a large proportion of the readers of that comment will react with a wry chuckle. What was perfectly obvious was that the abuse actually made things harder for the team, as the more abuse they got the more the match officials quite clearly gave decisions of opinion to the opposition to get their own back, including not giving a few good shouts for late penalties - and that was an opinion widely held down the stand side. Passion is one thing, unnecessary abuse is another. And by the way, I am from the school that match officials have to earn their respect - and am not averse to letting them know what I think about their technical performance if it is unnacceptably poor - which has been the case for most of the refs last season - but I stop short of the personal vitriol heard from behind the goal. But as you say, that is not the point in focus at the moment. The crux of the matter is that those that run the Club have no concept that the key stakeholders are the fans and community at large, with whom they do not communicate at all except by letting information slip verbally to start rumours. Every other club has a news page (even clubs at much lower level) on which the facts would have been announced in full. And when Keith does participate in the forum (which is just as unprofessional as the Club not communicating formally) he makes things worse because he can only hint at the full facts, and the impression created is that the fans are being unreasonable to be unhappy. At the end of the day, I think the only effective action is going to be voting with your wallets and staying away. But unless from within the fan base alternative club officials step forward, you could be in for a long haul. Do I reaaly care? No, would be a harsh answer, because as someone whose life has been dominated by football since that wonderful summer of 1966, it is sad to see any club in turmoil, becuase it is football people like myself me that suffer - and in the case of ATFC I include all the good young players in Mid Beds who want to, and are capable of, playing at Level 4, but whoe are now likely to be denied the opportunity to do so for what should be the best club in the area. I know some of them, whilst not actualy fans, have aspired to play for ATFC whilst still junior players in Mid Beds. A few of those were in last season's squad, but were not able to show their best because of the shocking example of performance and attitude that was provided by some of the senior players. Matt simply could not expose those young players to the rigours of Level 4 because they would not get the support on the pitch from the senior players that they needed to develop into the players that the Club needs this season - all that is now academic because it is likely that there will be 16 completely new faces on the team sheet next season. So much for the Chairman's words about a stable club......... Good luck ATFC fans - but remember to behave responsibly and respectfully as representatives of your community! :-)
Message Thread:
« Back to thread