The real concern ....

[CP Gull]

Having made the OP last night, I am more encouraged by the positive spin placed on our financial situation by Simon Baker in the HE today. He talks in terms of breakking even this year (y.e 30.6.2011) and while that is a huge improvement on the massive losses incurred over the last two years it should also be borne in mind that we have benefited considerably this year with extra income generated from our run to the Play Off Final, reaching the Fourth Round of the FaCup (for only the fourth time in our history) and player sales which include up to c £125k for Elliot Benyon - so it does beg the question how we might have fared if we had had a year sat in mid table and gone out of the FA Cup at the first round stage!!!

He (Baker) goes on to say that they will be aiming to attain break even (or better) over the next year or two - which suggests to me at least - that they feel they have spent what they needed to do to get the infrastructure right and now want to try and operate on an even keel - which is fair enough, although you would hope (as a fan at least) that we don't try and achieve this by curtailing any ambition to improve our league standing and hopefully achieving promotion.

[basil75]

But then again, attendances were brought down by the winter weather and we have more local games next year - I will be extremely disappointed if our average attendance isn't a fair bit higher next year (assuming we don't have another ridiculously extreme winter - although that would be unlucky and unlikely). Plus we don't know the effect of an unexpected baron December had - cash flow may have been an issue as we had no income at all that month - I wouldn't be too surprised if we had to resort to costly means to get the cash we needed that month.

Doubt we earnt much from the play off final in reality - we only got 25% of earnings after costs were accounted for. Low attendance + high cost venue = not much in the pot.

It's very difficult to turn round a large loss to break even in one year. The extent of the loss last year surprised the board, suggesting that they had been rather careless with money, which in turn suggests that we hadn't been running he financial side of the club very efficiently and wasting money needlessly (not a surprise given how the admin side is run). But, it can take a while to find these issues and sometimes even longer to correct them - particularly if tied into contracts - so a 600k improvement in one year is very good and encouraging if true.

[YellowMurphy]

This year coming should hopefully be a good financial one with the likes of Bristol, Plymouth, and Swindon making for at least 3 potential sell-out's. There should also be a brief period when the fairweather's come to try the grandstand, see what it's like, also, when you take into account player sales into this coming year (if they're handled right!) I think we can realistically break even within 2 years. We would have to keep up our cup run's though and general excitement, as CP says, without the cup run's, we would be in dire straight's. Let's just hope we get at least 3/4 sellout games this season, and can achieve an average crowd of about 3,000, that should leave us in a healthy situation. The main areas we need strengthening off the pitch is marketing and actually getting more fan's, I think a lot could be done about that. I feel the website has improved since the days of endless nothingness. However when people moan about 'hotmail addresses', it is just nit-picking. A lot to look forward to, but still a bit that could be improved. Looking forward to the season, none-the-less!

[MuzDog]

Agree with the three posts above.

The weather has had a big part to play on last season's downturn in attendances. We have averaged over 2,900 on Saturdays in both of the last two seasons - the big difference is we only get around 1,800 through the turnstiles on Tuesday evenings and there were six midweek games this season as opposed to three the year before.

Improving Tuesday attendances (any suggestions?), a bit of luck with the weather plus the three big "derbies" and the inevitable bounce from having the new grandstand should help us get the right side of 3,000 next season - provided we have a modicum of success on the pitch!

[hector]

Agree with the three posts above.

The weather has had a big part to play on last season's downturn in attendances. We have averaged over 2,900 on Saturdays in both of the last two seasons - the big difference is we only get around 1,800 through the turnstiles on Tuesday evenings and there were six midweek games this season as opposed to three the year before.

Improving Tuesday attendances (any suggestions?), a bit of luck with the weather plus the three big "derbies" and the inevitable bounce from having the new grandstand should help us get the right side of 3,000 next season - provided we have a modicum of success on the pitch!

This is the key...if we have a crap season then crowds will drop below 2000, whoever the manager is.