Director's blog: OA's Q&A

What a few weeks it has been. After two seasons of Covid disruption at last we are seeing some regular football, live at the stadium, with enthusiastic fans creating a great atmosphere.

The men’s first team are doing us proud right now, second in the table as I write this and on an unbeaten (well you know what I mean…) run of 12 matches.

I must congratulate Hak and his staff for turning the season around after our form collapsed in October. It seems a simple demand on the players has paid off: work harder! We can see the effect of this in our performances. Opponents are given far less time on the ball and pushed to make mistakes; when we attack we have more players available making runs, getting into good positions; when we lose the ball players are working their socks off to get back in position and defend.

When we the fans see our team playing with such effort and commitment it makes us even keener to shout our support. It’s win-win and long may it continue.

If I could just add one important additional reason for our recent success: my absence from the matches. I have been stuck in France as the Covid restrictions tightened in November and this appears to have had a miraculous effect on results. Finally, I’ll have to admit that Tim Murrell and you others are right, I am a bad omen…don’t worry I’m not returning to Kent for a few weeks yet!

Despite being away for so long there have been a few questions flying around and so I thought I’d give you my answers to some of them.

Is this the best team we’ve had at the Gallagher since coming home?

I think it’s too early to say. We’re on a great run and the team is playing some exciting football but let’s judge them after a full season. Hopefully in May we’ll be celebrating something special. It would take an exceptional season-long, effort however to match Jay’s promotion squad of 2016. The squad which sat near the top of the National League table towards the end of 2017 was decent too. Players such as Pigott, Lewis, Loza and Hines were outstanding and we beat teams like Dagenham, Woking, Eastleigh, Sutton and Macclesfield all away from home…and Cheltenham!

What’s going on with all these contract extensions then?

Terry, Bill and I feel we have an exceptionally talented and hard-working management team and playing squad this season. Given there is a reasonable chance of promotion we felt it was timely to secure the services of our manager and the spine of next season’s team early.

We are delighted with where we have got to with this but of course other players still have the opportunity to prove themselves too. There is abundant talent throughout this squad.

We are of course aware that extending contracts like this at our level of football is not without risks. In other situations I have seen the award of a long contract cause players to stop trying so hard or go off the boil. Others are unlucky with injury. In the case of this season’s squad we have a very honest, hard-working group so I have no worries on that score.  

How are the club’s finances doing?

Through Covid Terry, Bill and the team worked very hard to batten down the hatches and avail ourselves of all the public financial assistance going. You, the supporters, have been generous in donating season ticket moneys and in many cases working as volunteers around the club to help us where possible.

So, despite being shafted by the National League in the October 2020 funding distribution (more on this later), we have managed to turn in another profitable year. We will be publishing the figures in a few weeks time. This is the ninth year in a row we have made a trading (EBITDA) profit and I will be asking Kieran Maguire, the guru of football finance, if he knows any other club with such a record.

It may not be as sexy a football record such as winning the league nine times in a row, but I’m mighty proud of the achievement nonetheless. Our profitable business model underpins the club and makes it safe and sustainable in an era of bankruptcies and financial over-stretching.

Are there any plans to expand the stadium?

In past years stadium expansion was obligatory in order to meet grading requirements (the reason behind the Genco Stand) and was paid for by the profits we made together with grants made available by the Football Foundation. The situation now is slightly different. We don’t have to expand the stadium for ground grading purposes now, regardless of whether we get promoted this season or not.

However this season has seen the occasional return of a horrible phenomenon – crowd disturbances. We are trying to address this by improving our security operation and by restricting access to unaccompanied, non-member youths. Nonetheless we have to admit that the way we are able to accommodate away fans is not ideal. Placing home and away fans in the same stand is always provocative to a certain section of support. It’s not just at the Gallagher. We have seen this at Eastleigh, at Dagenham and at other stadia. It’s never ideal.

Some fans have asked why we can’t put away fans in the town end. Well the stadium was designed to have away fans entering through the north turnstiles, they can be segregated more easily, turnstile capacities have been calculated with this in mind, extra seats can be made available in the main stand. Furthermore the town end has the greater facilities for home supporters, the Spitfire Lounge, the food outlets, the Club Shop, the meeting area in front of the turnstiles. There simply is no other way of segregating supporters safely in line with capacity, entrance and exit requirements.

In the master plan for the stadium, once built out to its 6,000 maximum capacity, the town end becomes the home supporters’ end and the Genco Stand becomes the away supporters’ stand, with a segregation line where appropriate. We may have to add turnstiles and exits at the north end at some stage. However we have limited funds for expansion at present. This might change if we are promoted.

In the National League we become eligible again for substantial grant support, although Football Foundation grants are always capped at maximum 50% of total building costs… As a result we are starting to look again at the feasibility of replacing the town end terracing with a larger terrace, maybe a slightly smaller version of the Genco Stand. This would have to be done within a tight budget, without restricting future development of the West side stand and with a design capable of having additional facilities (changing rooms, seats, bars, etc) bolted onto it in the future.

It will be a fascinating feasibility study. If we were to find a way of designing and funding this it would resolve our Genco Stand issues instantly. The town end would revert to its previous use as the home supporters’ end. It’s a long shot but watch this space.

Are we still contesting the National League’s disastrous governance during the Covid period?

Where do I start? Firstly, let there be no doubt as to what happened. The National League board proved to be incompetent throughout the crisis, from March 2020 onwards. There were errors of judgement and errors of mismanagement, there was arrogance and failure to admit to mistakes and apologise for them. Clear-headed directors would have resigned but the ones we had were simply unable to grasp the seriousness of the crisis and the extent of their statutory responsibilities as directors, which are to represent all clubs fairly and not to feather their own clubs’ nests.

The chairman, Brian Barwick, who finally resigned months after we and other clubs called for his head, kept blindly bleating ‘we are a well-respected league’ during every public utterance, as though he was conducting the orchestra on the Titanic.

Jack Pearce, who was the architect of the flawed distribution of October 2020, has refused to admit to or apologise for all the errors of judgement. Let’s not forget it was Pearce who saw fit to recommend a distribution which went against government guidelines to reimburse lost gate receipts. His distribution proposal rewarded seven out of eight National League board members’ clubs with £500,000 more than they should have received. He acted as though he knew better than government. To add insult to injury the directors of those clubs, whose pockets bulged after adopting the Pearce distribution plan, then had the gall to appoint him Barwick’s replacement as League Chairman. Even Stalin would have blushed.

It’s really no excuse to say ‘well it was Covid so what else could we do’. The then Chairman Barwick should have had the humility back in March 2020 to establish Covid crisis committees to assist the league. Some of his board colleagues, who subsequently resigned, had proposed this. He could have drafted in additional support. He could have seen what was going to happen and himself resigned, admitting he had no appetite for the challenges ahead. He and his board simply weren’t up to the task on their own. They behaved as though they were some village committee organising a knees-up, not a company board responsible for governing some 68 clubs, clubs with combined turnovers of £50 million, clubs with 2,000 paid staff and hundreds of thousands of fans. It’s very serious stuff.

Over the past months we have been working hard with other angry clubs and our legal advisers to hold the guilty parties to account for what went on in these recent dark days. This has proved complex and expensive. We have not given up though.

In the meantime we have been made aware of a project to produce a film documentary telling the truth about the National League governance during this period. We are looking forward to working with the producers and writers to create a powerful documentary, whose exposure of the truth will have a real impact.

Have you finished now?

Yes, give me a cold compress. Goodness, I haven’t even mentioned 3G pitches yet…

Er…Any news on 3G pitches?

Yes. Tracey Crouch’s recent review into football governance, hopefully to be adopted by government in the Spring, says League 2 should allow 3G pitches for a grace period of three years, which is as good as unconditionally allowing them. Moreover there are now clubs in League 2, e.g. Sutton, Harrogate and Leyton Orient, who have shown they are in favour of 3G pitches. I remain confident that we will be able to use our 3G pitch in League 2 if ever we knock on the EFL door.

Anything else?

Yes. Apologies for being long-winded. That’s what not being able to attend matches and talk to you in person does for me. So let me end by wishing you all a great end-of-season spent following the Stones.

Yours in sport

Oliver Ash

A return to some sort of normality

We are all desperate to return to some sort of normality after some of the most stressful and anxious times we will ever experience.

Whilst to some football is just a sport, to many people it is much more than just a game. For millions of football supporters attending a game and supporting their team will be a massive step towards the new normal.

Maidstone United is, and will always be, a club deeply committed to the community it represents and the closure of the Gallagher has meant that thousands of people have not been able to gather to watch or play the game that they love.

We are working hard to get all elements of the business operating, as the club is suffering from the complete shutdown of all our income streams.

The most high profile of all our activities is of course the first team which drives the whole business model.

If the first team is doing well we find recruiting academy students is more successful, we find our player development squad numbers increase and, of course, we get bigger crowds through the gates.

On the flip side if we don’t get things right on the pitch, then financially and emotionally life can be dire.

Our three seasons in the National League were a struggle and I also felt last season was a great disappointment.

Despite the difficulties of the last four seasons, we have always made sure that the business is profitable and viable.

We will continue to take a sensible approach to how we run the club and are prudent about the money we spend.

One of the first decisions we have made is regarding the playing budget for the 20/21 season because our retention and recruitment will not progress unless we have a financial framework to work with.

We have contacted players we feel could be right for the team, initially to establish their thoughts about whether they would prefer to train three mornings or two evenings a week.

Our findings were clear in that the majority of the players we spoke to wanted to train three mornings.

There was no evidence that this would force the playing budget upwards but it was evident that the players we wanted were ambitious and wanted to make football their main source of income.

For Maidstone United to continue this training regime is a major statement of our intention to get back to the National League. Whilst our three seasons were difficult, we learned a lot and will not make the same mistakes.

The playing budget will be less than last season but because of the uncertainty around crowd numbers and start dates, we will try to be flexible and keep some funds in reserve.

In addition to the five contracted players, we are in advanced negotiations with a further four of last season’s squad.

We are keen to avoid signing the journeyman players who drift from club to club without really committing to Maidstone United, so our campaign will concentrate on more local players.

There are a substantial number of players that are of interest to us but making sure we make good signings has never been more important.

We know from telephone calls to hundreds of our supporters how vital the football club is to many people so we will ensure that we will be ready for the new season, whenever it starts. Thank you for your continued support.

Terry

A defining decade for the Stones

So it is Happy New Year time once again. On behalf of the directors I would like to wish you all a very happy, healthy and successful 2020 whether you are with family, friends, at work or doing what you most enjoy, watching the Stones of course.

We have just ended an amazing decade in the life of the club. Back in January 2010 we were coming to the end of our tether and by August the Maidstone United train had hit the buffers.

Ten years on and we have a fantastic stadium in a great location near the town centre and we have enjoyed progress on and off the field for most of the decade. It really has been an extraordinary ride.

Thank you to all the fans. Those from yesteryear and then the wilderness years, and also all those who have joined the party at the Gallagher Stadium and supported the club on its recent journey.

Thank you to our business partners, in particular Gallagher Group, Britelite, Gullands, Shepherd Neame, Compare and Recycle, Rockingham Reins, Genco, Churchill Security, Manchett Facilities, Henry Reeves and Co, Simon Miller and Haynes who have stayed with us and supported us faithfully over the decade and thus enabled us to play at National League level.

Thank you to all the volunteers who have stood by us and with us and worked tirelessly to raise the profile and prosperity of the club. Thank you to our staff, who give everything for the cause and have done throughout the dramas of ten long years. Thank you all.

We have come a long way but there is still a long way to go. The challenge is to remain patient, be proud of the sustainable business model and community club we have and enjoy the football played at National South and National League level.

Accept that it will not always be the beautiful game. Understand how tough it is to survive financially when we are unable and unwilling to throw money we don’t have at the playing budget, while other clubs at this level and above spend hundreds of thousands of pounds which they don’t earn.

It’s frustrating trying to compete with these clubs but that’s just how it is right now. Maybe it is for the best. However, we do appreciate that because of these limitations not every aspect of how we run the club will please all of you all the time. All we can do is ask for patience and understanding. Everybody at the club is a supporter and we are always trying to do our best.

As you know we recently announced a plan to try and find new investment to enable us to grow sustainably, faster. Our strategic plan, the success of which will depend on this new investment, is to develop the stadium to enable us to increase our recurring commercial and football revenues.

We also want to keep developing the community side of the club including the women, disability and the youth football sections and ensure all this remains a valuable asset to the local area.

It’s a heck of a challenge for us to remain sustainable and to achieve a promotion to the EFL within the next decade. However, I believe that it is absolutely feasible and that this coming decade can be every bit as exciting for Maidstone United as the last one has been.

We have had plenty to cheer over the past ten years. I won’t bore you by discussing every memorable match in detail because like me you’ve probably watched most of the games fifty times already.

So instead, before I go, I’d like to name my team of the decade and invite you to comment and challenge my selections on social media.

I haven’t gone for any players from the last 12 months because it’s a bit too soon for this season and last season is generally best forgotten. However, I really hope by the end of this season some of our current players will have progressed from ‘favourites’ to ‘legends’.

Goalkeeper: Lee Worgan. Lee was outstanding for us over several years and played in two of our amazing three promotions in four years. He was a real club man and got involved in coaching and soccer schools. Became an official Stones legend for one particular penalty save and subsequent celebration.

Right Back: Jamie Coyle. OK, so I’m playing Jamie slightly out of position here but we’re overloaded with centre-back legends and Jamie was versatile enough to play right back. He was a strong defender and a stalwart for us for a couple of seasons. He was a leader too on the field and is now developing a good coaching career off it. In the runner-up position were other good players and characters like Seth Twumasi, Callum Driver and Richard Davies, who looked so promising before injury did for him.

Centre-Back: Steve Watt. Watty is a shoo-in for a centre back spot. Such a strong header of the ball, excellent reader of the game and a forceful communicator, who set a fine example with his commitment. A core part of our successful run. A club legend.

Centre-Back: Sonny Miles. It is to Sonny’s credit that he beats Lokko, De Havilland, Okuonghae, Finney, Parry, not to mention Elokobi, to this position. Very effective, always gave his heart for the club and played with total commitment. One of those who made you feel his heart was made of amber.

Left-Back: Tom Mills. Tom came up through the ranks and played for us for years and years, a good, solid defender, improved season on season and always reliable. Some spectacular goals were the icing on the cake. He beats Joe Anderson and the adaptable Bobby-Joe Taylor to the spot.

Right-Midfield/Wing: Zavon Hines. Zavon was only with us for a three-month period in 2017 but what a time that was. He was one of the best players ever to appear for the Stones and when he wanted to perform he was unstoppable. Some sublime moments of skill and great goals (Eastleigh away anybody?). He outdoes stiff competition from the dependable Matt Bodkin with Vas Karagiannis also close to featuring.

Centre-Midfield: Stuart Lewis. It’s a tough position to pick with so many good and popular players competing. Stuart wore his heart on his sleeve as well as the captain’s armband. Always showing a good example with his tireless running box to box. His signing in early 2017 saw a massive turnaround in our fortunes and we ended the NL campaign strongly.

Centre-Midfield: James Rogers. A credit to him for seeing off competition from other memorable club midfielders such as Danny Lye, Reece Prestedge, Micky Phillips, Jack Paxman, Jai Reason and Joe Healy, not to mention Jay Saunders. James was an old-fashioned ball-winner for the Stones and he commanded the midfield for a couple of terrific seasons. A real Stones legend.

Left-Midfield/Wing: Alex Flisher. What a player he was for the Stones. Skilful and with a huge heart he was the sort of player you would travel far and wide to see. A real eye for goal and a fabulous left foot. Good enough to keep Blair Turgott and Jamar Loza out of the side, both of whom were excellent for the club.

Striker: Joe Pigott. His performances lifted us in 2017, we were not the same side without him. Perhaps the best signing of that period. A strong, skilful striker, he could score out of nothing, as those of us who witnessed his stunning opener against Dagenham in February 2017 would affirm. Now doing well a few levels above. Good luck to him. One of our own.

Striker: Frannie Collin. A Stones legend goal-poacher, who will always be remembered for his winner against Stevenage, fortunately before VAR was invented. Was a key part of our climb from the depths of the pyramid and fans took him to their hearts, like they did to most of these players. Close runners-up were Jay May and Shaun Welford, two talented strikers who played their hearts out for us, and also Ian Draycott.

Manager: Jay Saunders. Well, who else? Seven memorable seasons as gaffer. Many of these players were his recruits, he certainly knew how to get them to play for us.

Head of Football: Bill Williams. Still the wisest footballing mind in the office. An invaluable source of support, advice and encouragement for Terry and me over the past ten years.

Well, that was fun to do, not easy to make team selections, brings back many good memories. I would certainly love to see that team in its prime out on the field again.

All that remains is for me to wish you a Happy New Year and a Happy New Decade and Come on you Stones!

Oliver Ash

Questions, comments and fake news

Replies to questions, comments and fake news about Maidstone United, finances, player wages, 3G pitches and how professional football leagues could be restructured in England.

For those of you who missed my informal Q & A down at the club recently (only people called Morgan ever seem to turn up to those…) here are some blunt replies to comments, questions, allegations and fake news items heard and read recently. 

(This was written just before John Still took over as Maidstone Manager.…)

« Maidstone Utd have no ambition »

Yes we do, we want to be a successful, sustainable, stable and family-friendly club. We know we’ve made some questionable decisions this season : apologies but we’re only human and we always seek to do our best in the long-term interests of the club. We’re ambitious for the club to rise as high as it can in the football pyramid while respecting the above goals. After three difficult years in National League we now realise it will take longer than we thought to get into the EFL but so be it. With our financial structure – and unwillingness and inability to subsidise the club – that’s where we are for the moment.

« What financial structure ? »

We’ve invested in a £5 million stadium fit for National League but not EFL League 2 (another £1-2 million would be needed). No other club except Fylde in National League has had to build and finance a stadium from scratch in the last 8 years. The business model means there is little spare cash to finance the business except that which is generated from the business itself. In good seasons we have managed to get promotions while earning enough revenue to keep building the stadium so we would comply with League rules. This means we have no cash reserves built up. It is all in the metal and concrete. In difficult seasons like this one, where we have extra costs from changing the playing squad and management and crowds have dropped significantly, the cash flow is under great pressure. It is a vicious circle. People don’t always realise that there is constant capital expenditure and maintenance needed to keep the show on the road. This season for example we have had to replace the floodlights and restructure the pylons at a cost of some £40K. Last season we installed toilets under the Genco Stand (£60K if I remember correctly). In another season or two we will probably have to replace the pitch. We understand that (particularly the more recent) fans might deem the current situation of struggling in NL for three seasons too awful to bear but every supporter who gives up on us reduces our revenues and impacts the budget. You need to know that.

« Are Maidstone able to survive in the National League or are we a ‘yo-yo’ team now ? »

Right now the NL is so tough to survive in financially that we will struggle to break out unless we find a new source of funds. We are always open to consider new investors or partners who could have better financing and a sensible strategy going forward. However as we are at present, if we manage to recruit more wisely, we should be able to enjoy stable years in NL and/or play-off years in NLS. We hope fans will buy into this reality as something to savour not to abandon. In due course we will find a way of moving on upwards but it will take time. It may be the same sort of ‘yo-yo’ situation as we experience with Brive rugby club at present; we just have to make the best of it.

« Does the club have an £800 per week wage cap ? »

No.

«  Are you lying ? »

Er…no. We set playing budgets where we believe we can afford them as part of the overall forecast for turnover and expenditure in the business. We have never set any individual player salary caps although we judge on a case by case basis if we think we should make a special effort or pay a fee for a particular player. I think it would be indiscrete to individual players to give more detail on this.

« You seem to play your cards close to your chests… »

What ? Please tell me you’re joking. I challenge you to find me any other club where the owners are so open with information about the club, regularly do Q & A sessions, publish blogs about the club, submit their accounts promptly, sometimes with additional comments and press releases and provide information whenever reasonably requested (without breaching confidentialities) on every aspect of the club.

« What moneys do you and Terry take out of the club ? »

None. No interest, no salaries, no expenses. We hope to recover some or all of our investment as and when we divest in due course but even then a principal goal will be to leave the club in good hands, otherwise all that has been built up will have been in vain.

«  We had everything and we threw it away… »

No we didn’t, cheer the fuck up.

« Why do we have so many loan players ? »

Sometimes you don’t want contract commitments to players. This season ironically we planned to put more players on contract and in the end this has slightly back-fired on us. Several players have gone out on loan during the season but only on reduced wages, so this is costing us significant amounts of money and impacting the current playing budget…

« Why don’t we recruit a new centre forward ? »

We’ve been trying. We can’t afford to pay top striker’s wages right now, particularly if this means we have to relocate the player and put him up in a hotel or flat. We can’t really afford this sort of arrangement at the moment, we have to be more selective. But yes, we are looking for an affordable big centre forward who knows where the goal is…

« Money from sale of Turgott will finance next season’s NLS squad. »

Sorry ? This is about as truthful and accurate as a Donald Trump tweet. Please stop.

« Did we ever buy that piece of land from the Council ? »

Well we finally exchanged contracts on it a few weeks ago after a ridiculous amount of time and effort. We are waiting for final clearance from The Millenium Commission (don’t ask…) before we can complete.The purchase is highly significant in the medium term as it will enable the West Stand development to take place when it can be financed.

« Why did you replace the first 3G pitch after only 4 years ? »

It was wearing out quicker than we planned because of the high usage. It had to meet demanding standards of the leagues (FIFA 2*) in terms of ball roll, bounce, shock absorption, etc, while at the same time being used extensively (50+ hours a week). It failed its test in 2016. We then had a panic to replace it as economically and fast as possible in Summer 2016, which disrupted our Summer and pre-season useage. This time around we hope to get 5 or 6 years out of it but we have to be ready to finance another one as from the end of next season just in case…this might cost around £100K…

« Let’s face it 3G is never going to be allowed in EFL is it ? Let’s go back to grass »

Not so fast please. Never say never. It’s not going to be easy but as I still believe in the massive benefits of 3G to smaller pro clubs I still believe it will be accepted sooner or later in EFL. One alternative proposal we are making at present to EFL is that League 2 should accept a grace period of three years to allow NL 3G clubs a reasonable time to replace their pitch. So if a club were relegated after one or two seasons they would have been able to keep their 3G pitch and maintain their community structures. Also clubs might just install a better natural pitch after a season or two of planning and with the benefit of having enjoyed generous EFL funding for a couple of seasons. This would ultimately benefit all League 2 clubs.

Going back to grass is simply not an option for us at present. The 3G pitch does bring in significant revenues and it gets people coming down to the club and becoming involved. It’s part of our DNA. Replacing it next time will not be cheap but it won’t be ridiculous either (see above). In 2016 we invested in a new engineered sub-structure which should last 20 years. This means only the actual carpet needs relaying.

Don’t think natural pitches come cheap either. High cost and high maintenance. For a top hybrid pitch we’d need not far short of £1 million to install one and you can’t play more than roughly 10 hours a week on it depending on the weather so it won’t allow any significant community use. 3G, hybrid and natural pitch technology is all changing fast so we have to try and keep our eye on the ball here and be creative and reactive.

« Why is the National League such an impossible one to survive in ?

The fact is that the five professional divisions in English football are administered by three separate leagues, The Premier League, The Football League (EFL) and the National League. These are not administered in a uniform, structured way. Rules are different between the leagues and there are rich and poor divisions. When you go from NLS to NL you find the average playing budget for the NL is £500,000 higher (yes you read that correctly, perhaps I should spell it out like they used to do on the teleprinter when Raith Rovers beat East Fife 10-0…) than in the South division below ; you cannot by law drink alcohol while watching a match, which probably costs us £80K in lost revenues ; the travel and accommodation costs are far higher as the league is truly national ; to compete you may have to convert to full-time employment contracts and add various layers of playing and non-playing staff to your operation. If after all this your club is still standing well I’ve got more bad news for you, you may also have to fund considerable additional stewarding services to segregate matches. That all adds up to a hit of about £800.000.

All this is in addition to any one-off costs of extending stadia to comply with strict rules on capacity, seating, dressing rooms, floodlighting, etc. After absorbing all these costs you might find you cannot increase your playing budget very much so you then find yourself battling relegation at the bottom of the table, resulting in crowds dwindling and reduction of ancillary revenues, cup income, etc. So the National League could be said to be the graveyard of the pyramid. This explains why clubs are so desperate to get out of it and spend obscene amounts of money in owner subsidies to do so. Forest Green Rovers were rumoured to be subsidising at £2 million a season while in NL and Ebbsfleet the same amount until recently. My guess is that today many NL clubs are still choosing/having to inject £500K-£1 million per season into their clubs. Leyton Orient new owners are rumoured to have already ‘invested’ £10 million since taking over in June 2017 as they try and make the leap into the promised land of the Football League (EFL). The bottom line is that annual handouts to clubs from the EFL from commercial and TV surpluses total around £1 million today for League 2 clubs while they are less than £100,000 for National League clubs.

There is of course a parallel with clubs in The Championship busting a gut to try and reach the Premier League, As an example take AFC Bournemouth in Season 16-17 in the Premier League. Their reported turnover was £139 million. Of this amount £124 million came from Premier League TV and commercial rights.* That’s 90% of turnover. Staggering. By comparison the money is considerably lower in the Championship. In 2015-16 season club turnovers were between £10 – 40 million and total losses in the division were over £200 million. ** Some clubs will risk everything to try and get to The Premier League. It is a similar story (albeit on a far smaller scale) with the gulf between the National League and EFL League 2.

« What can be done to change this imperfection in the league structures ? »

Now that’s a really good question. The answer is lots but football administration changes very slowly in England so don’t wait up for it to happen.

40 years ago the Conference was created and populated with the top semi-pro clubs. Today the National League is predominantly populated with fully professional clubs in their diverse forms. When you look at some of the clubs playing in The National League today (or who have recently been in it) you could be forgiven for thinking this was a brother division to League 2. Here are twenty of them – Chesterfield, Tranmere, Leyton Orient, Hartlepool, York, Torquay, Wrexham, Chester, Stockport, Southport, Aldershot, Dagenham, Barrow, Macclesfield, Barnet, Luton, Halifax, Cambridge, Lincoln, Grimsby…

One argument I find appealing is that this division should now be incorporated into the EFL as League 3. There could be renegotiation with the TV companies and other EFL sponsors for extra rights and fees, as EFL would have extra matches to screen and more product to sell. There would need to be a negotiation with The FA for additional financial support for the new division, integration of the division into the EFL rules, reorganisation of EFL competitions, etc. However all this should lead to extra revenues being generated to provide League 3 clubs with a financial support of, say, £300-400K per season, which would be a decent, gradual step-up between NL and League 2 and which would be welcomed by all National League clubs and especially those clubs pressing to join EFL at present and risking a fortune to do so.

The question of increasing promotion places up into League 2, the ‘3 up 3 down’ campaign upon which the National League focusses so much attention today, would be resolved in one fell swoop : there would even be four up and four down as in the rest of EFL. Relegation from League 3 would be as it is at present in National League.

National League clubs playing on 3G pitches would also have their difficulties resolved by being members of EFL League 3 and being entitled to 3 years in which to remove their pitch in the event of promotion to League 2.

Clubs in League 3 would be less likely to risk everything for promotion because the financial gap between League 2 and League 3 would be smaller than the current gulf between NL and League 2.

In terms of administration EFL would need additional resources to run an extra division but after the restructuring period these would not be significant and higher costs would effectively be compensated by economies as the National League would effectively disappear. The administration of NLS and NLN, now the highest non-league divisions, could be handed to one of the three leagues currently running Steps 3 and 4 of the national game. In due course sponsorship and rights sales would enable these two top non-league divisions to create new revenues, identities and prestige.

Wouldn’t it make sense for the professional National League clubs of today to be incorporated into the EFL ? Wouldn’t it make sense for non-league football to be regional with semi-pro clubs at its pinnacle ?

« Are Maidstone going to be relegated this season ? »

We still have a chance to survive but it will take a minor miracle. We’ll be doing everything we reasonably can on and off the field. If we do go down it will be a blow of course but we’ll recover, go again and bounce back stronger and better prepared next time 

Oliver Ash

So another exciting season starts...

You still have to pinch yourself to remember that this time six years ago we were starting another season in Ashford with no concrete plan as to how the club could survive let alone go forward. Only in my wildest dreams did something akin to the Gallagher Stadium appear on the horizon looking like Old Trafford, but then again I'm not sure I want to go into too much detail about my wildest dreams... 

Now we are actually starting a season in Division 5 of the professional game. Pinch, pinch. Fixtures against York and Wrexham and Tranmere are now the norm not the exception. Pinch, pinch. We only have one FA Cup match to win before we can get to Round 1. Pinch, pinch...

Terry, Bill and I rarely make formal targets for the season, just as we rarely have formal Board meetings. Of course we discuss the football just like you do and there is usually a meeting of minds, after all if we didn't have a similar outlook on matters football and business we would have fallen out long ago. 

For me an admirable target for this season would be top half. Such a result would be fantastic. If you had come up to me at Homelands and said in six years time would I accept 12th in the Conference and a 4000 capacity new stadium in town with a top quality new 3G pitch I'd have torn your arm off before eating it. Well, maybe not eating it...but I may well have accepted your offer.

This close season has been frantic. We have had to commission and lay a new pitch. We have had to prepare plans for our new stand. We have had to prepare for a new division with new rules and constraints, travel on a national scale, new players to recruit and existing ones to manage, etc.

It's been a massive effort by Bill, Terry, Jay and all the club staff, who have been flat out trying to get all this in order. It is a major challenge getting everything done within the strict time limits imposed by the FA and raising vast amounts of money (close to £1,000,000 this close season) but as ever we will do our best. As long as it makes good business sense. So far that is still the case although in an ideal world we might perhaps have 'chosen' to wait another year before promotion because of all the capital project requirements which come in its wake.

Our financial results for the past season will be published soon and they are looking as encouraging as in previous seasons. Four successive seasons of increasing turnover and steady profit margins is not to be sneered at. It underpins increased capital spending on the stadium at a difficult time and encourages Terry and me to invest further as we will unfortunately still have to. The main thing is we are investing in infrastructure which will give the club a first-class home for the foreseeable future and not in a quick hit on players. 

We asked the supporters to contribute through our Stand up for the Stones project and so far the response has been terrific. Many thanks to all of you who have given and thanks in advance to those who are still to give. Every contribution makes a difference, not just with this specific fund-raising but throughout the season, with tickets, merchandising, beer, in fact everything the club tries to sell. It all goes towards club funds and allows the club to operate successfully at this level. It's very simple really: every penny you spend in and around the club helps your club! So please make that extra effort for Maidstone United, go the extra yard if you can.

I'm not sure that supporters realise how much pressure is placed on clubs by The FA and Leagues with their endless rules and regulations, not always useful or fair, but which pile on stress and pressure. When Sport England threaten to cut FA funding if their structures aren't reformed and professionalised I cannot help but agree with the sentiment. The FA and Leagues should exist to help all their clubs, not just some of them, reduce their stress and remove the needless obstacles in their way and not just to expand the blazer buttons and egos of some of the officials.

Terry always accuses me of spending my every waking moment on the sunny terrace of some mythical Parisian café-bar. This is a quite scandalous accusation, the very thought of which is disturbing my Pina Colada by the pool here on vacation...from where I wish the Stones, Jay and all our new squad, all of our wonderful supporters, the very best of luck for the exciting season ahead.

Yours, Oliver Ash