Board/Fan Relationship

billybondsbeard

Preston
It's writing itself at the moment ;whistle

billybondsbeard

grey_til_I_dye said:

bbb

I'm indifferent to your dislike of the board; that isn't the issue for me.

I'm just pointing out that you seem happy to change your narrative as it suits, so long as the end result is that you get to paint the board in a negative light.

I disagree - its pretty constant - I do see GSB in a fairly negative light. The rest of the board I'm not much bothered with, they are employees after all.
I would dearly love to see posts from people who want to paint the 'board' in a positive light. Point by point - a real critique on all aspects of finance/Loans/recruitment etc. the accounts are out now so it should be easy.

In my opinion, its very easy to attack a persons point of view, without advancing your own for similar scrutiny.

grey_til_I_dye

I'm not attacking your point of view, though, am I?

Which bit of

I'm indifferent to your dislike of the board; that isn't the issue for me.

didn't make that clear for you?

Or was it clear, but you chose to ignore it for the sake of a cheap point?

I rather had the impression that until recently you saw the RWHF... as working class heroes, taking it to the man, and wresting back the soul of the club from the hands of unscrupulous pornographers.

Now, suddenly, they are the perfidious lapdogs of the imperialist oppressor.

As I say, any narrative, as long as it suits your aims.

MrsGrey

PrestonHammer said:

As speculation goes, that's quite impressive. I look forward to the book also. ;lol

Just don't be looking for it in the non-fiction section ;wink

billybondsbeard

grey_til_I_dye said:

I'm not attacking your point of view, though, am I?

Which bit of

I'm indifferent to your dislike of the board; that isn't the issue for me.

didn't make that clear for you?

Or was it clear, but you chose to ignore it for the sake of a cheap point?

I rather had the impression that until recently you saw the RWHF... as working class heroes, taking it to the man, and wresting back the soul of the club from the hands of unscrupulous pornographers.

Now, suddenly, they are the perfidious lapdogs of the imperialist oppressor.

As I say, any narrative, as long as it suits your aims.

That narrative was valid, as it would have been to a lot of people, until the events of Saturday night. I still support WHUsia in their aims, and there may be another protest in the future. If one cannot change their view in the event of view changing events, that would make one stupid at best.

billybondsbeard

Grey
And by the way, your last post was very patronising IMO

Where is a mod when you need one eh ?



Time for a beer - night night

grey_til_I_dye

Clearly, I didn't.

That's why there's a flag button.

Hammerwombat

Really this whole march, not march. Anti board, icf, real west ham fans, not real west ham fans. Bill gardener, united against the lies and sold our soul down the river thing is getting a bit tiresome. Just shows you that being involved with a premiership football club is not the easiest thing in the world. The board are doing their thing, mostly right, unfortunately a few howlers, but generally sort of in the right direction. And then the might of a few thousand other supporters who want it different can’t even organise a march, or the proverbial drinking session in a brewery without splitting in to different factions. Saturday we have a rather important game against Burnley. I personally believe that is more important. Mr Gardener, I wish you well. I don’t know you, never met you as far as I’m aware, but please keep supporting the club you love. You will only miss out on the highs and lows. ;scarf

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Pearces_Left_Foot said:

Just reading comments on the club finances 14.2 million of the loans to G&S were repaid and the rest are now interest free. The Boleyn was sold £40 million (a profit of £8.7 mio after mortgage etc taken off) I agree the board has underinvested in the team and the recruitment has been poor if they had got this right and we had a team that wasn't stuttering through the season I think most fans would be a lot happier.

14.2m of loans and mainly interest were paid to the owners, they’ve still left 45m left owing with deferred repayment and still getting interest but at a reduced amount of around 3%.

The Boleyn was sold for 38m and showed a profit due to what it had been valued at in the previous accounts. The club owed the banks before we moved and that was paid off along with the LLDC and the cost to make the LS look west ham.

They basically took back that money while have a zero net spend this season and therefore going back on their word that the transfer kitty would be the ticket sales when we moved just like the old days at UP.

Add to that the ticket revenue didn’t go up anywhere near like the 10-12m they projected.

Personally I would still have a problem with any/all the above even if we were winning most weeks.

Slaven_Cups_His_Beard

Regarding the March then it appears RWHFAG have put their trust in Brady keeping to her word and talks were their original aim.

The chairman of WHUISA was the one that was some made a connection to the left wing and his association years gone by with Khan. He’s since received threats (truly out of order) and has said he won’t be going back to games. There are also other rumours that certain people were “pressured” (probably the best description) into not marching once RWHFAG sat down with board members

SuzanneClaret

It’s a sad state of affairs in which no one comes well.

epsom_bubbles

What’s happened to our club. A while back, we got Moyes in (wasn’t sure of him at the time) and he gradually steadied the ship. We ‘pinged’ up the table, there was a confident air about the club. Suddenly, we are shipping goals, looking over our shoulder, praying that we maintain the 3 point buffer. Now we have marches, no marches, dissatisfaction with the board. We even have some people on here having a pop at each other. I feel I want to close my eyes for a couple of months and see what sort of club we turn out to be. Hopefully it will be as a Premiership side, looking forward to the new season and all singing from the same song sheet. I’ve been a supporter for over 50 years, and seen some worrying times. This seems to be among the worst, which is a shame after that positive vibe a few months back. I guess a convincing win on Saturday will make ne feel ‘good’ again and dispel all this march/protest stuff. Rant over

Yeoldhammer

West Ham fan TV, have put an interview up with Andy Swallow and Micky Morgan head of (RWHFAG) to explain why the march was called off.

Yeoldhammer

they also have an interview with David Gold on there

claretandbluesky

I think that interview left as many questions as answers as was conducted by a sympathetic interviewer, a bit like Theresa May being interviewed by one of her own cabinet members. The questions needed in my view were, if you were representing the members as was made clear why was the decision not to march put to the members? was there any intervention by third parties sinister or not which put pressure upon you? What explicit evidence did you have that the subsequent decision to march without you was being backed by the left side of politics? If you were against marching from the beginning how did the decision to march come about? if through canvassed members wishes and as you had previously expressed this is not about us it's about you, then why did you take the decision to march back from the members without even consultation ?

This however is just in the interests of providing answers to reasonable questions, as I will say I agree with not marching on account of providing the board a window of time to act upon promises.

I do also respect that the admin members interviewed are, and have quite rightly made the point, that this was all new to them, and so i recognise it's not right to expect foot perfect communication and PR.

SuzanneClaret

It’s looks like, to me, from the outside, a platform to air personal individual grievances. The main one being moving from Upton Park.

This can not be changed.

What is needed is a constructive plan for changing the things that can be changed.

Respectful upkeep of the memorial garden.
West Hamming the stadium and the island.
Changing the temporary seating in the BM & TB into the permanent retractable seating promised.
Concession on the second floor concourse.

ASLEFshrugged

Suze - the stadium and the island aren't West Ham's, they belong to the GLA/Mayor of London or Newham Council so they might not want them to be more West Ham-ed

Even if Mayor/Newham agreed to more West Ham-ing they'd have to be un-West Ham-ed to comply with clause under the leasing agreement that both the stadium and the island has to be "clean" for athletics

As for permanent retractable seating I'm not even sure that is possible without major engineering works that would need longer than pre-season break, we might have to move out for a whole season and you can bet your boots that the GLA will not pay for it.

SuzanneClaret

I know ;weep

But it is what was promised.

I think at the very least the owners should be pushing for it.

claretandbluesky

I agree and I think that's why an affective fans group is needed to hold to account public promises and push for action on new issues as they arise. I believe most clubs have fan representation to some degree but I feel it is likely just lip service with most and that is where this group changed things as the board really took them seriously and tried to work with them. Due to subsequent fracture and meltdown it remains to be seen if this will continue to be the case, I hope it will.

OldCastleSwift

SuzanneClaret said:

I know ;weep

But it is what was promised.

And this is one reason why some fans feel like they've been lied to.

Makes me sad to see how much of a mess this club has become.

SuzanneClaret

I still hope she didn’t lie (I know, more fool me), but I do.

I hope what KB said in those meetings she meant, but due to constraints placed by E20 she couldn’t deliver.

It’s a easier than to think that I was duped.

PrestonHammer

Surely before they had promised anything, they would have known whether or not they could deliver on those promises. It seems to me that they would say anything to get everybody on side.

SuzanneClaret

KB was made promises by the owners about the retractable seating, which she then made to us.

Turns out they couldn’t/wouldn’t do it.

It’s a big mess and no mistake.

grey_til_I_dye

Unless people are going to insist that Brady is flat lying, here is her response from the meeting:

In 2013 London Legacy Development Corporation provided us with the video that we shared with you in good faith, regarding the technical information about how the seating solution would work.

From a West Ham point of view, however, our primary focus was only in relation to the distance of the seats from the pitch and our contract (which is a matter of public record) states that clearly.

Our requirement was that the seats move as close to the pitch as possible and were as permanent as possible during the football season while still being covered by the acoustic roof. We believe this has been delivered.

We accept that as the transformation plans evolved this could have been more effectively clarified and for that we apologise.

We gave you only the information that was given to us and we did so on the basis that LLDC had provided it to us and it was correct.

We do, however believe that we delivered against our commitment of bringing the seats as close to the pitch as possible under the roof whilst maintaining sightlines.

For clarity, the retractable element would not bring seats closer to the pitch; it merely speeds up the transition between modes to aid the multi-purpose use of the Stadium.

So the retractable seating solution initially envisaged would not have made any difference to the match day experience for fans.

SuzanneClaret

It’s not, for me at least, the distance between seat and pitch, it’s the temporary nature of them.

They look and feel temporary, the ‘making good’ around them is poor. It’s makes the place feel like we are only visiting and our visit is only short term.

PrestonHammer

Definitely. Where I sat, I could see the running track and all I could think of was Mo Farah ran right underneath me, in fact I was waiting for him to pop up and say hello.

grey_til_I_dye

Suze

;ok

I'm sure there are a good few things the club could do to make things better for fans.

buffybegood

grey_til_I_dye said:

We do, however believe that we delivered against our commitment of bringing the seats as close to the pitch as possible under the roof whilst maintaining sightlines.

For clarity, the retractable element would not bring seats closer to the pitch; it merely speeds up the transition between modes to aid the multi-purpose use of the Stadium.

However, if the roof had been extended further, then the seats could have been closer; the board must have agreed the design so they have to accept responsibility for the huge distance from the seats to the pitch. If they couldn't deliver on the stands being closer (as I'm sure they promised they would be before the move), they shouldn't have accepted the deal. As for the "retractable" stands themselves, they really are a joke, and the transition time is ridiculous. They most certainly aren't retractable, they have to be dismantled and reassembled and so will always have a temporary feel and look to them.

The move, like most everything about the board, was done on the cheap because all they wanted was to get us there as they felt it would make them more money when they sell us if we're in a big, shiny stadium, even if it isn't ours (yet).

MrsGrey

buffybegood said:

As for the "retractable" stands themselves, they really are a joke, and the transition time is ridiculous. They most certainly aren't retractable, they have to be dismantled and reassembled

They aren't retractable, they're removable - which is rather the point being made? It's not the club's fault if everyone insists on referring to the seating solution by the wrong name.

buffybegood said:

As The move, like most everything about the board, was done on the cheap

Isn't it a case of the LLDC doing it on the cheap?

IronHerb

But I believe it was the club who first called it retractable seating.