So the creatures from the Black Lagoon have finally gone back to the Dark Side, and left Nurse and the first aid team to crawl through the wreckage and administer mouth to mouth to all parts of the club that are showing any signs of life.
As with all critical situations like this, recovery will take time, and prioritising the things they have to do can be no easy task. The challenge that they have taken on can only be likened to a surgeon opening up a patient but only having a small piece of information on what is wrong. A brave move indeed, and all fans will be eternally grateful to the consortium for taking this risk; to save the club that everyone loves. The hard work and credit for relieving the club of the previous regime rests with everyone.
Gary and Phil’s web sites provided the perfect forum for fans to make their feelings known, and the perfect vehicle for taking the campaigns forward. They also enabled all the fans to be kept right up to date with all that was happening. These sites united fans, and that is something that will not be lost now that the crisis has eased a little. All the fans involved in the various campaigns and actions played a big part, but the gratitude for the survival of the club must go out to the named and un-named members of the consortium.
It was made known in the press almost immediately, that the consortium considered themselves to be custodians only, and that their aim was to seek out longer term investors who would take the club forward. That said, there was also the comforting reassurance that pending any large investment, the people involved were confident that the club could be steadied and improved. As everyone proclaimed, the club had come home, and no longer were we fearful of the daily ransacking of the bank account or playing staff. Patience now has to prevail. No new influx of players (which many people want, and club needs), no pretence that the finances are now in order, but everything under control, and planning forward.
Within a week, the rumours had started once again regarding potential investors. The web sites followed the stories, and kept the fans informed. What was wrong with that, we all wanted to know everything that happened before the buy out, why not now? Where we as fans need to change maybe, is to relax in the knowledge that we are no longer at the mercy of a Petty, a Shuttleworth or a Lewis to sell this club for their own greed and amusement, but that whoever buys this club will have to deal through the very people who saved this club only 7 days ago, and they are not about to let it revert to it’s previously dying state. Fans have longed to return to Guestbook and Message Board discussions about players and results, and now we have the chance.
We must lay our trust in the consortium members that when the club attracts an investor or a purchaser, they will have only the clubs interest at heart. Does anyone doubt that? I’d be surprised. These people have seen the damage that the wrong company can inflict on the club. The evidence is there for all to see. They may not have run a football club together before, but they are successful businessmen, and know all the warning signs, and to once again quote Bob Dylan ‘You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows’.
Sixteen games to go this season, all the adrenalin that has been pumping around the fans’ bodies for the past few months needs to be channelled into vocal support for the players now, and they need and deserve every bit of it.