Have You Had Enough?

By: Bill Osborne
Date: 06/09/2002

ONCE again Grimsby Town Football Club is facing a battle in the boardroom, which is doing no more than bringing discredit to the club and the supporters are fast losing patience with the continual disagreements and power plays in the boardroom.

The media refer to us as "the likes of Grimsby" Is it any wonder? The club is facing one of the most critical periods in its history due to the loss of the ITV Digital money that has brought many clubs, including ours, to the brink of extinction.

At times like these it is imperative that everyone stands together. Surely at this time all the efforts and energies should be used to solve the many problems the club is facing. It is not the time for individual directors to be threatening to vote each other off the board and indulging in somewhat dubious practises to achieve their own ends.

Is that best business practise?

It appears to me that the directors have forgotten that their responsibility is to run the business in a professional and profitable way and not let personal differences stand in the way of that.

There are bound to be disagreements. That is human nature, but it is imperative that these disagreements do not end in a declaration of war, which can only damage the future of the club and it is surprising that our club can be involved in such activities while it is fighting for survival. There is a solution that would effectively end the political problems in the boardroom and the struggle for power, and at the same time, assist in reducing the financial pressures on the club, which is fast approaching the bank overdraft limit.

The club has 600,000 shares of which 260,000 have been issued. There remains a further 340,000 that cannot be issued without 75% of shareholders voting in favour of those shares being offered for sale. If the shareholders grant that approval, the shares could be sold and a proviso could be made that that no person could purchase more than 5,000 in the new issue.

This will allow the real stakeholders in the club, the community, fans and supporters, to gain some equity in the club thereby bringing closer links between the community and the club. It will also prevent any individual from gaining a major interest in the club thereby bringing stability into the boardroom, as the directors then, would be judged on commitment and performance rather than the number of shares they hold.

Grimsby Town Football Club is not the sort of club that can afford continual boardroom battles. It has enough problems in surviving and it is about time that common sense and unity of purpose prevailed.

It seems that the board will do nothing to alleviate the problems unless there is a call upon them to do so by other shareholders, fans and supporters.

Would you support a campaign aimed at bringing to the attention of the directors your discontent at the political struggles that could eventually bring the club down and, in addition, support a call for the release of the shares to be sold to the community?

Unless the people who matter most, the supporters, are prepared to take steps to try to change things, it will not happen. As always, the future of this club really does rest in the hands of those who support it, but we often fail to realise that.

Supporters of other clubs have managed to make changes simply because they too had "had enough" and moved to change things.

It would be good to hear your opinions on this. Would you please voice them on the Message Board

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