Welcome back Bury

[Vanni]

Oh how we missed you lads!

PS - It's not too early for this thread is it?

 

[TrinidadsNumberOne]

Can't wait for them to go into admin, shake the buckets, narrowly avoid relegation, get taken over by another moneybags with 10 times more riches than this muppet Day, spend beyond their means again, get promoted and then in the quest for another promotion, continually overspend, underperform, get relegated and end up restarting the cycle yet again.

Getting tedious now, let's hope next season they cut their cloth accordingly, spend within their means and learn to build a football club within their means from the depths of League Two like others have done in the past.

 

[Richard Cranium]

What has gone so wrong there then? I had them on my bet to get promoted this season.

 

[kieran_vale]

To be honest they were lucky last year there were 4 even bigger basket case clubs otherwise would surely have gone down then.

 

[T.A]

Can't wait for them to go into admin, shake the buckets, narrowly avoid relegation, get taken over by another moneybags with 10 times more riches than this muppet Day, spend beyond their means again, get promoted and then in the quest for another promotion, continually overspend, underperform, get relegated and end up restarting the cycle yet again.

Getting tedious now, let's hope next season they cut their cloth accordingly, spend within their means and learn to build a football club within their means from the depths of League Two like others have done in the past.

Its getting tedious for you??

 

[TrinidadsNumberOne]

Its getting tedious for you??

Nothing against the fans who don't get a say on the financial side of things at all, just when you see clubs cry poverty like yourselves, Rotherham and Bournemouth all did in League Two only to get taken over and, rather than have the cloth cut accordingly, have unprecedented levels of money invested into you, it's hard for fans of clubs who are run within their means to have sympathy when it goes tits up as it looks like doing so here.

That said, relegation to League Two for you might just be a blessing, if you can offload all those high earners off of course. No disrespect, but it's financial suicide of Day to put that much money into a club with such small gates in a location where you have two of the biggest clubs in the country to the South of you and a whole host of other clubs near to you locally. You guys are probably the most boom or bust club outside the top two leagues. I dread to think what you lot are spending on wages per year that's for sure...

 

[AdamStag]

Oh lord. Bury.

As said above, "most" of their fans are alright, some sound a little like Oldham where they remind you they were good once sometime before the war.

The clubs a joke, boom and bust. Must be a roller coaster for their fans.

 

[valefan16]

Gamble that didn’t pay off really, both seasons they’ve spent loads and signed some good players like Vaughan and Beckford etc but been a car crash, strange one as they’ve been in a mess two or three times since the turn of the millennium, recall our players donating some of their wages to help them when in trouble in the early 00s.

 

[Luke Imp]

To save UTS a bit of time typing away (from this thread over a year ago - https://www.onefootballforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/the-death-of-bury-fc.13448/)...

Have Bury ever been run properly? I mean, they were decent payers in L2 with not great crowds.

They've never been a Club who have, from the outside, looked like cutting their cloth and paying what they can afford.

We certainly have. We've played within our means from 1885-1996 and from 1999-2014. The only time we've have 'decent budgets' in our history was during our rise in the late 90's and in the last two years.. what an incredibly ignorant comment. You think we were overspending when finishing 21st in L2 in 2007?

Well, exactly, hence my comment 'from the outside'. My point was, there always seems to be something happening at Bury with finances. Maybe it's not as often as I think.

What about 2008 till whenever when you had Bishop, Lowe, Bennett, Dawson, Sodje, Cresswell, Howarth, Worrall, Ajose etc? On, what, 2.5k-3k crowds? You've had players down the years where people wondered how the hell you've afforded them.

Bishop was certainly on a good crack back in the L2 days before I can remember it being discussed by Bury fans on TFF.

So because we get 3k a week in L2 we aren't allowed decent teams? You could say that to Rochdale, Mansfield, Burton, York, Scunthorpe, Hartlepool etc etc... what a strange comment.

Sodje, Ajose etc where all loan players before they signed. Sodje played for us for years and Ajose is born in Bury and we were his first senior club. Dawson has since gone on to play for footballing giants such as Rochdale and Scunthorpe etc proving the big money thing out of the water. We built our promotion team over a few decent seasons, picking up Ryan Lowe from relegated Chester City...Worrall was from Shrewsbury town.. again, Elliot Bennett was on loan from Wolves... we moulded that team to say we overspent simply because we had a half decent team is ridicoulous. I am willing to bet you, we had a lower budget than Lincoln did for the 10 year spell we were in L2.

Bishop was probably our highest earner , but we plucked him from the conference and his goals kept us from being relegated, the rest of the squad was shoestring. Do some research before making ridiculous assumptions.

For 98% of our existence we haven't had a pot to piss in but still performed relatively well considering. Some shrewd transfers and loan signings under Alan Knill paved the way for some decent teams from 2008-11.. a massive 3 year period.

You've missed my point. I said I couldn't understand how you afforded that squad at the time, with those crowds. Not that you weren't allowed decent teams (now, that's a strange comment...).

Nor does Dawson moving to Rochdale and Scunthorpe mean that he wasn't on decent money at your place (bearing in mind that Scunthorpe at that point would have been under the ownership of Steve Wharton who wasn't short of a bob or two).

Back to my original point, though, and my point still stands. Bury *seem* to always have some sort of financial issue just round the corner. How true that is, I don't know because as I said, "from the outside"...

I've explained how we afforded the team of 2008-10. Your original statement argued that Bury have rarely lived within their means, which is bollocks. If we regularly overspent we would have gone bust 110 years ago!

 

[UTS]

Don't tempt fate lads. Be nice to stick a few past Mansfield again should we (looking inevitable) go down.

Point remains, we've fell foul of two dodgy owners in the last 20 years.. Hugh Eaves and now Stewart Day... both have/will crippled/cripple us financially but that doesn't mean we've always been spending beyond our means.

132 year history and for most of the millennium we've been knocking around in the bottom half of L2 until Alan Knill got us promoted on merit. We got relegated 2 years later and that's where Day comes in... the rest is history really.

 

[UTS]

That said, relegation to League Two for you might just be a blessing, if you can offload all those high earners off of course. No disrespect, but it's financial suicide of Day to put that much money into a club with such small gates in a location where you have two of the biggest clubs in the country to the South of you and a whole host of other clubs near to you locally. You guys are probably the most boom or bust club outside the top two leagues. I dread to think what you lot are spending on wages per year that's for sure...

None of this is new news. We are fully aware just like every other fanbase that we've got an expensive squad playing very poorly on gates of 3,500 - 4,000.

If we go down then it will get very interesting. The money used to fund these players has come about via loans against Gigg Lane...

Here is a quote from a post on Bury's messageboard:

"Information readily available in the public domain is that the club is borrowing heavily against the assets of the ground. There are currently 4 outstanding charges, the latest of which was for £1.6m taken out just a couple of months ago:

https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/00053268/charges

On top of that, there's the money loaned via Principal International through the Car Parking Scheme and Day's other companies have a number of other charges against them.

Although not a financial expert, all this strongly suggests to me that the "project" is being largely funded with borrowed money."


So the way I see it if we go down... the debts are called in and we lose our ground in an attempt to pay off our debts?

 

[UTS]

It's worth noting also, one credit of Stewart Day is he has made some decent money from the youth academy of circa £2M (900k Bedau to Villa, 500k Will Ferry to So'ton and 200k George Miller to Boro) over the last 12 months plus the 900k we got for James Vaughan in the summer. It doesn't really make a dent in the losses but we have made a fair bit of our own money too for what it's worth.

It's also strange really because in Stewart Day's first season (2013/14) he seemed fairly sensible... there was no big spending and until we appointed David Flitcroft in December we were really struggling in L2 and were bottom at Xmas. We ended up finishing 12th with players like Danny Rose, Clive Platt, Jim McNulty and players we still have now such as Danny Mayor, Craig Jones and Nathan Cameron..

You could even make an argument that we didn't spent THAT much in 2014/15 contrary to what many believed. We had momentum from the previous season and signed Nicky Adams for £100k, re-signed Ryan Lowe from relegated Tranmere.. signed Shwan Jalal who was third choice at Bournemouth and Kelvin Etuhu who I couldn't even tell you where he is now. Most of the 2014/15 promotion team had been with us the season prior and quite a few are still with us today. McNulty, Nardiello, Pablo Mills, Craig Jones, Danny Mayor, Nathan Cameron, Tom Soares and Danny Rose had all carried over from 13/14 and it was only recently Soares left the club.

However as soon as we hit L1 it just became silly and obvious we were spending beyond our means.. Leon Clarke, Chris Eagles etc in our first season, then this season basically the whole team is on decent wages from Tom Aldred at the back to Jermaine Beckford up top...

For me that 2013/14 season was one of my favourites as a Bury fan even though we finished 12th... it had everything from relegation battles to potential play off place etc we scored and conceded for fun too and had some great games such as 4-0 v Plymouth, 4-4 vs Pompey and 4-1 vs Mansfield. League Two is undoubtedly our natural level now and has been for the last 30 odd years. It's not nice being shat on by the bigger League One clubs every season be nice to be amongst our own kind and being fairly competitive hopefully while being sustainable.

 

[GTFCfish]

I can remember being in the Championship with Bury (and Stockport), can definitely see that happening again soon............

 

[valefan16]

I can remember being in the Championship with Bury (and Stockport), can definitely see that happening again soon............

Those were the days! The likes of Vale, Crewe, Grimsby, Tranmere, Walsall, Bury and Stockport gracing the second tier.

 

[Chris FGR]

I can remember being in the Championship with Bury (and Stockport), can definitely see that happening again soon............

More chance of us getting there.

Stockport surprise me every season with how they're incapable of even making the Conf North play-offs. Wtf has gone on there over the last few years?

 

[AdamStag]

Don't tempt fate lads. Be nice to stick a few past Mansfield again should we (looking inevitable) go down.

Point remains, we've fell foul of two dodgy owners in the last 20 years.. Hugh Eaves and now Stewart Day... both have/will crippled/cripple us financially but that doesn't mean we've always been spending beyond our means.

132 year history and for most of the millennium we've been knocking around in the bottom half of L2 until Alan Knill got us promoted on merit. We got relegated 2 years later and that's where Day comes in... the rest is history really.

Don't worry, we don't plan on waiting around for you boys next season, the offer of catching hypothermia in that soulless attempt at a clubhouse by the ground is enough motivation

 

[Chris FGR]

When Premier League 2 gets set up, which it will soon imo, they'll shut up shop and no teams at this level or below will ever get up there again I reckon.

 

[TrinidadsNumberOne]

More chance of us getting there.

Stockport surprise me every season with how they're incapable of even making the Conf North play-offs. Wtf has gone on there over the last few years?

Just a very badly run club, went up 10 years ago to League One, couldn't pay back a £300,000 loan on time so the debts were called in and that caused their huge decline. That said, they should never have gone down to the Conference North as they had a decent budget at that level, but the instability and constant chopping and changing of managers really did cost them big time the season they went down. Indeed, they started the next season just as badly they were flirting with relegation to the Evo Stik for half a season which really would've been fatal!

Having relegated us in 2009, I was glad to send those plastic Manc scallies down to non league in 2011, but even I feel sorry for them now they're rotting away in regional football and I do hope they come back one day.

 

[AdamStag]

Just a very badly run club, went up 10 years ago to League One, couldn't pay back a £300,000 loan on time so the debts were called in and that caused their huge decline. That said, they should never have gone down to the Conference North as they had a decent budget at that level, but the instability and constant chopping and changing of managers really did cost them big time the season they went down. Indeed, they started the next season just as badly they were flirting with relegation to the Evo Stik for half a season which really would've been fatal!

Having relegated us in 2009, I was glad to send those plastic Manc scallies down to non league in 2011, but even I feel sorry for them now they're rotting away in regional football and I do hope they come back one day.

The problem being is that we're all one dodgy owner or a few dreadful seasons away from potential disaster.

Stockport are the prime example, Bury have been a basket case, Chesterfield are struggling under their current owner, we had ours.

Ultimately, you're at the whim of the chairman/board and there's little you can do but protest, but this often comes too late after the damage has been done.

As said before, the FA need to be stronger with owners, but also with clubs - if you've been in admin in the last 10 years and do so again you get -20.

 

[Luke Imp]

More chance of us getting there.

Stockport surprise me every season with how they're incapable of even making the Conf North play-offs. Wtf has gone on there over the last few years?

Strong league with lots of money in there, though.

 

[UTS]

I've maintained for a while now that bar perhaps Coventry and Blackpool, although I imagine both have much more asset value than Bury, we are the worst ran club in the FL. The chairman Stewart Day has literally staked everything the club has on getting into the Championship including the ground.

Didn't Steve Hymas (?) do something similar with Field Mill at some point meaning Mansfield had to slowly buy it back off him??

It wouldn't be quite as galling if we actually had something to show for it either, we have a promotion I suppose but it doesn't mean much when the next 3 seasons in L1 have been a total mismanagement and embarrassment. You just have to hope as a Bury fan we manage to survive the summer, Day either learns his lesson or sells up to someone with more sense and as fans we vow not to let it happen again.

It unfortunately won't be the case though as Bury have a lot of thick fans and the town itself is pretty unspectacular, meaning people are desperate for some time in the limelight. Even now in the position we currently find ourselves in there's still a lot of Day supporters which I find remarkable given the circumstances.

 

[AdamStag]

I've maintained for a while now that bar perhaps Coventry and Blackpool, although I imagine both have much more asset value than Bury, we are the worst ran club in the FL. The chairman Stewart Day has literally staked everything the club has on getting into the Championship including the ground.

Didn't Steve Hymas (?) do something similar with Field Mill at some point meaning Mansfield had to slowly buy it back off him??

It wouldn't be quite as galling if we actually had something to show for it either, we have a promotion I suppose but it doesn't mean much when the next 3 seasons in L1 have been a total mismanagement and embarrassment. You just have to hope as a Bury fan we manage to survive the summer, Day either learns his lesson or sells up to someone with more sense and as fans we vow not to let it happen again.

It unfortunately won't be the case though as Bury have a lot of thick fans and the town itself is pretty unspectacular, meaning people are desperate for some time in the limelight. Even now in the position we currently find ourselves in there's still a lot of Day supporters which I find remarkable given the circumstances.

Haslam separated Field Mill from the club, where the club always owned the land, we then had to buy it back from him - it was an utter scandal - something that's happening (to my knowledge) at Chesterfield - rivalry aside, when things like this happen, it's bad news.

JR has one last payment to make the club will own the ground again - and also the club moving forward will be another £300k (though i think closer to £200k) or so better off.

 

[northstandexile]

Get your facts right Adam, there are still two payments left £214,000 in March 2018 and a further £214,000 in March 2019. The ground will then be owned then by the John Radford Stadium Co.Ltd and not by Mansfield Town Football Club Ltd.

 

[AdamStag]

Get your facts right Adam, there are still two payments left £214,000 in March 2018 and a further £214,000 in March 2019. The ground will then be owned then by the John Radford Stadium Co.Ltd and not by Mansfield Town Football Club Ltd.

We were told 1 by a member of the SSA. I'll contact them that someone on a website asked them to get their facts right

 

[The_Viking_Magpie]

“Never let facts get in the way of a good story”

What Haslam did to MTFC over a sustained period was an utter disgrace , bad for football but entertaining from 14 odd miles down the road.

The effects of his time in charge are incredibly still being seen in Mansfield’s home attendances now!! Surely no Stags fan thought that would be the case? How many years since haslam parted ways with the football club?

 

[northstandexile]

Hallam sold the ‘club’ in the summer of 2008, but JR is still paying him for the ground.

 

[AdamStag]

Hallam sold the ‘club’ in the summer of 2008, but JR is still paying him for the ground.

We were also under the impression (again if you know more, please add) that Haslam stipulated that the ground couldn't then be passed on to the fans for a number of years (again from member of SSA). There seems to be a lot of differing stories in relation to the ground, so sometimes it appears challenging to know exactly what the score is - much like some assuming the loan finished this season.

 

[northstandexile]

My understanding of the Hallam condition of the ground sale, was that if JR sold the ground or surrounding land that Haslam would get 50% of any profit if it happened in the 20 years from 2013.

 

[DarkSithLord]

Just a very badly run club, went up 10 years ago to League One, couldn't pay back a £300,000 loan on time so the debts were called in and that caused their huge decline. That said, they should never have gone down to the Conference North as they had a decent budget at that level, but the instability and constant chopping and changing of managers really did cost them big time the season they went down. Indeed, they started the next season just as badly they were flirting with relegation to the Evo Stik for half a season which really would've been fatal!

Having relegated us in 2009, I was glad to send those plastic Manc scallies down to non league in 2011, but even I feel sorry for them now they're rotting away in regional football and I do hope they come back one day.

Unfortunately it wont be this season.

 

[Indian Dan]

These horror stories make it imperative that our supporters Trust are successful in buying the ground from the local council and not allowing it to fall into the hands of Power or his successors. He’s already conned us over a training ground.