Speaking to a Board member at the weekend, I get the impression there is a reluctant agreement that the club has lost the town and indeed the fans. We have failed to bring the town and community to the party. Criminally.
The impact of seven years of failed ‘game changers’ at the expense of engaging with the fans, community and town is pretty much now acknowledged.
You know when Scrooge was taken by a ghost with to the house of Bob Cratchett and Tiny Tim on Christmas Eve and he glared in the window at the loving family, the glow of the fire, of happiness, camaraderie the sort of thing that makes a unit work.
Here’s an idea. Why don’t the Board go down to the Dripping Pan on quiz night, peer in through the glass, and they’ll see the same thing. A packed lively happy bunch of people having a great time.
Nick and the people who put this on just couldn’t make it an better which is why it packs out. Challenging questions, fun, banter, competition etc. David, Duncan and the lovely tall lad behind the bar. It is everything we should be doing in a nutshell. Welcome to community.
It’s not like the joyless match days with the reluctant bar staff it is enormous fun.
We do nothing else like this.
I have argued our club, because of who we are, should excel at this sort of community stuff. This is how you build community clubs. Not national media coverage blah blah blah, but er….engaging the community.
The quiz is an example of how our club can and does work. Let’s drop the game changers and get back to basics.
I really hope the new Board members don’t get sucked into the culture of inertia and business gobbledegook but start working out how we can build and expand on quiz night and the principle that if the club love the fans and get them involved more, the fans will reciprocate. That is after all a PROVEN chemistry
The Rights of Fans. 