$6m man - I totally agree with what you say below that we need a proper debate about what to do when the money runs out (which is going to be very soon), but that it is clear that this isn't going to happen. To some extent i don't blame the DTB members - they are just a bunch of fans elected on the basis of a popularity/ name recognition contest and there is no reason that they would have the skills or ability to deal with a substantial business in financial problems. To me there is less excuse for the other members of the PLC board, who are supposedly there to bring business experience, but seem to have done nothing to deal with the looming crisis. The fact that there was a meeting this week to discuss a new constitution, rather than our financial crisis, really just shows the utter disfunction of the fan-owned model once you get into choppy waters.

Think that’s a good summary of where fan ownership has currently got us situated 6mdm - most of the same problems as private ownership just with no money.

My guess is my option 2 will be what most would favour because their dream can live on. My concern is we will be at the whim of somebody to do what they liked. What if this philanthropist turned out to be a looney? What if they got fed up with the club continuing to make losses, with no strategy to reduce them? What if they hiked up ticket prices and everything else? What if, what if .... I know this is how 99%of clubs are run and, on balance, why should we be any different? For every Sheffield Wednesday there is a Wrexham. For every Bury or Macclesfield there is a Man City or Newcastle. We'd just have to accept once we sell out, that is it and we are into the territory of hoping we don't get screwed over.

I fully accept I will, in all likelihood, be in the minority with my preferred option and that is fine. It would be nice if we could have an honest conversation, set out the options without any prejudicial spin or DTB / club recommendations and see what the majority of supporters want. Then we would have a basis to form a strategy and develop a plan to deliver it. For years now we just seem to muddle through until we hit a crisis but instead of using the stay of execution to ensure we never find ourselves in the shit again, we piss up the wall any good fortune we have received and end up in a worse position. I do not know whether we could or could not run our stadium if we dropped out of the league because we don't see any figures. What are the fixed and variable costs? What could we strip out or mothball if we had to, especially if crowds dropped. We have 3 temporary stands. Do they all need to be used? We still have a stadium and land to generate non-matchday income. These are rhetorical questions but it is what the board should be asking instead of just backing one horse, which is 50% + 1 or administration.

6 million dollar: you set it out really well. Maybe option 2 would not necessarily end how you say though and is my preferred option

I wasn't able to attend the SGM in person this week. I watched most of it online but missed a few chunks. What, if anything, was said about the financial situation? I caught something Angus said to the effect, I think, that last week's announcement wasn't supposed to be very dramatic, but may not have caught that correctly and didn't hear any subsequent discussion on the subject (other than the £400K provision).

Even if it was viable financially, which I doubt, I can’t see any real enthusiasm for dropping down to the Ryman League in some non league stadium (if we could find one) - it was fun doing that once but I can’t see the attraction of doing it again, this time without any real hope of getting back-so, not for me this time.

I am also less sceptical about Option 2- given that it is how basically every other club in the league is run

You don’t know that on point 2 - when owners of other clubs come to the end of their reign it doesn’t automatically mean things get worse or go bad.

$6m man- I think that you have set out the possible outcomes - though I doubt that Option 1 is viable unless we also give up the ground, as I don’t think that there is any level of football which is compatible with our income given the overheads switch the stadium. One thing that I noted from the 2025 accounts is that last year we saw a cash outflow of £1.3m from operations and, at June 30, we had cash balance of £1.3m, which gives some indication of how just close to the endgame we are now.

The solutions, as I see them, in my order of preference, are: 1. Reduce costs to be commensurate with income and find whatever level of football that results in (all we will suffer is relegation but we will not be held to ransom over ticket prices or anything else and our destiny will still be in our own hands). 2. If there is some altruistic mug or egotist out there who loves the limelight, has money to burn and will fund our losses, sell out 100% to them (when they get bored or run out of money we will be in a worse position than we are now but we can enjoy the ride before then). 3. Sell out to investors who will want to restructure the club, probably asset strip and have an exit strategy to turn a profit (very risky, likely to piss most people off and we will end up losing most of what we have now). 4. Go down the 50% + 1 route. It will kick the can down the road for a year or two, possibly enough to get through the 2027 bond repayments time bomb but it will not be long until the next crisis appears and we will be in a weaker position than now. 5. Carry on doing what we are doing, wait for administration and hope the club can be saved but with absolutely no say in who takes it over or what they choose to do with it.

I think 50% + 1 will go through too because most people are not interested enough to think through what it actually means and will just be swayed by what the DTB and club are telling them, however much it is bullshit. If, in all likelihood, we just get somebody to invest in shares like what has happened before (Nick Robertson, the lesser spotted Ananth S Nathan, and John Green's mob), once we spend the money from their investment is gone that is it and there is nothing else left to sell. What you cannot do is use cash from equity investments and, not that it will happen, a PLB3, to fund operations. That is the fast road to ruin. Capital investments should be used for capital items, not P&L.

I'm sure I brought the last copy of mission impossible in 86 DO

Robertson

I wouldn’t endorse anything Nick Robinson proposed.

Stu D - PLB3? Exactly who will be buying these? Do you have a list of names and contact details, as I have some snake oil I need to shift

There were plenty in Proboards that pointed out the move was folly. It didn't take a genius to see that coming, then the meeting afterwards pretty much that the club tail was wagging the DT dog.

The ST membership was introduced when they were building up to wanting to get 50%+1 through so either there was confidence you could get the turnout (they did, if failed on % voting yes) or they were very stupid.

6MDM - I know we haven't removed anything yet. I hear what you say but just don't think we should differentiate between East and West stands premium seats if we got to that situation. You are right that everyone would need to have a place to sit/ move to. I would say that a reasonably large proportion of West Stand seats in all blocks are concessions. It would be interesting to know how much extra revenue removing premium seats concessions would raise.

Didn’t Shergy stand on a sell ticket?

Giving DT membership away was a con trick which ensured that the magical 75% can never be reached.

And I will also add that selling the club completely is way off at the moment. I strongly believe that 50.1 will be done first and then maybe a PLB3 and other funding models before we even get close to selling out will be an option considered.

We also have to remember that nobody has stood on a sell 100% of the club manifesto for the DTB. Most of the manifestos that have been submitted have fan-ownership being a must and they will ensure it continues.

Do we need to know who these investors are before we vote for 50+1 ? Or wouid that be classed as commercially sensitive information?

And have it endorsed by the likes of Nick Robertson, John Green and maybe Craig Cope rather than just the DTB!