When we first came to the Stoop back in 2006, if my memory serves me right, we had £299 season tickets. I think the other Stand was less expensive but not the dirt cheap £99 price.

I think anyone could go in any bar except the upstairs bars like the Captain's Club / Corporate Hospitality and there was a natural separation out of punters between the quiet carpeted bar and noisier King's Bar.

There were normally about 3 or 4 Fans Forums and the professional presenter Chris Warren was often on hand and when he was not there were also a supporting lot of high quality volunteers from within the support plus a few back office ladies who were genuinely helpful.

Where we are now is in an environment in which there is only a handful of staff, no professional presenter, almost no volunteers retained and a lot of complexity and barriers some of which cannot be enforced without a lot of resource.

I think the lack of revenue is the underlying issue with the other one being the divisive nature of the CEO who would prefer to keep the supporters behind partitions. That can't easily be fixed.

But the revenue angle would work much better to do a proper membership scheme.

As an example the club should charge £199 for the main stand and in return this should give supporters an allocated seat and a 'free hand' to go in any of the bars. Let people go to the fans forums for this price, bung them a car park pass etc. This could be policed via Gus's heavies checking a membership pin. And supporters turfing out squatters from their allocated seat!

Non-members would get nothing except an unallocated seat and King's Bar Access. I'd suggest a minimum price of £10 a game for adults. If they pay an upgrade fee, let's say £6 then they can upgrade match by match if they want to.

Otherwise it will continue to be amateur I feel. For want of resource.

Cheers
Mark

The players had a dinner on Sat evening-I'm sure presentations were made there.

I will ask the question again what happens at other clubs at the end of the season that doesn't occur in London? Thats not being deliberately obtuse just trying to benchmark the industry.

I've seen big name players leave Warrington without big presentations, more players carrying them of the field on the last day. I've never been present at an on the field fanfare like is being suggested here.

Season over, thanks, see you next year.

But there's no ticket details or confirmation of venue!

Do we need three threads on the management of the club, we have this thread, the `Ideas` thread and the `100% Negativity` thread.....they are all heading in the same direction so can we not merge them?

For what it is worth I do not give a toss about what they did to mark the end of the season and players leaving at other clubs, the management regarding OUR end of season `event`and communication as to future arrangements has been totally shambolic and the club management should be ashamed of themselves.

Anyone here remember the old Fulham CC Final night bashes at the Clarendon in Hammersmith (particularly the 1985 one when a lot of Aussies from the Northern clubs were there and Mal Meninga and Harold Henney had an ice cube fight along the bar - the staff took one look at the size of them and let them carry on!), plus the Christmas dinner at a London hotel, Supporters' Club meetings that club officials used to go to etc., etc? The club seems now to be totally disconnected from the supporters, the loss of a Supporters' Club possibly hasn't helped, although I appreciate the problems that led to its demise.

I think Gus set out to distance players from fans. Not presenting awards after the match etc

Maybe he is trying to distance the club from the fans ie you get a game of footie and go home, similar to the bigger northern clubs approach. If you want to meet players and drink wine you pay for it

Ps HKR haven't mentioned season tickets or whether they will be playing next year to there fans so we aren't alone

I have no problem with paying for anything.

Facts are those of us that bought the most expensive ST paid for 5 events that we didn't get (but did get stuff that we weren't meant to like away supporters in the "Members" bar and in the West stand!).

A quick reccie of some of the other clubs websites confirm that they do indeed have Awards nights...Wakey, Cas and Salford do anyway (thats all Ive checked).

As I said before, I'm not bothered per se about all these things, but it does throw doubts on the credibility of our club when they fail to deliver on so many fronts.

Of course, most of us realise that this club is skint and we haven't got the resources of other clubs. Well, that's fine just don't promise what we can't deliver!

The only thing I really wanted was a Season Launch do...not a grand one like the one at St Katherines Dock or even The Sports Cafe one... a cheapo one at The Stoop surely would have been within our means.

I must admit, I have long held the view that St David of Hughes should be beyond critiscism but I am beginning to wonder if he is part of the problem after all.

Certainly, I do think we would be a long way towards being a successful club (on and off the field)
if we still had the input and resources of Ian Lenegan.

Clearly money is an issue; it's the first time I can remember when the leaving players haven't been given a departing gift. Granted he hasn't played much, if at all, this season but Karl T had been with the club since 2005 and not to recognise that in some way (or god forbid, ask him a question) just seems wrong.

Personally, I have never had any great desire to speak to players post match, but would agree with Dan that if something is included in a price of a season ticket then it should be provided and then it is my choice whether I want to take up what is offered.

Maybe Karl T and the others who are leaving were recognised at the clubs end of season awards dinner on Sat night.

We are making a huge assumption that the end of the game was the end of the season for the players. I struggle to believe that the leaving players didn't get there opportunity at the dinner to say goodbye and also receive a gift

With Tony Rea having booked his flight back to Australia on Monday the club wanted to do an end of season event which included him.

David Hughes had at least two dinner Jackets in carriers so was happy to stay around till about 4 and I think Tony Rea was also set to go straight to the Lensbury.

But only a handful of players like Craig Gower seemed to be organised and I guess the majority of players dashed home to get ready before going out again.

I'd guess everything was set up at the Lensbury like Wire suggests.

I think the club does not get the benefit of the doubt but I can understand why there is this view. I've always found David a candid bloke and his big pal who has the box very open in his views but Gus a little secretive. So I think they are not bad lads. But I think others see them differently.

I guess a stage managed show would have been better and a bit of openness about all the players leaving appreciated.

I was a bit shocked that all the focus was upon Julien given Jason's four years, Karl's eight years and the local boys doing fair stints etc. But our 20 minutes was only a delay before the real event maybe.

Cheers
Rammo

All of that is true and I think that the thread header is quite accurate. TBF, it was the players themselves, Kaufusi and Bryant particularly, who made Rinaldi the centre of attraction.

The club's report on the end of season do refers only to 2012 season awards so we don't know if any of the departing players were recognised.

Oh, and The Cowgirls have simply faded away even though the club site said they'd perform at every home game. Not that I think they added much, but that's another broken promise.

Comparisons with other clubs are irrelevant, we've done this stuff better in the past, maybe because we are a "small" club.

Size and budget is no excuse for being poorly run.

I think a lot of this is down to cost cutting by the club. Every extra person employed by the club is an extra drain on DH's pocket. Too few people doing too many jobs can only have one result. Now many of the duties are blurred or even ditched. Im sure many fans on here are familiar with these signs at their own place of work and are just glad they've still got a job. As fans however we want things to be the way they were before the club were this hard up. The Powell impact on the teams form and resulting gates is far reaching. DH was believed to be losing £1.5 a year but this year it will be more and the back office is obviously feeling it.


HKR seem to be in a bit of trouble. It will be interesting to see how they respond to their finacial problems.

Much as it saddens me to hear about these unfortunate incidents i think we have to hang onto the fact that DH is still providing us with a SL team. A winning team next season may bring about improvements in these other areas.

Yes, agree the clubs resources are stretched (always have been and probably getting worse).

However, some of the things that haven't been forthcoming wouldn't have cost anything....fans forums and communication shouldn't really impact that much financially, if at all. Ditto a low-key season launch event.

It is a shame the club chose to dispense with the services of people (staff and volunteers) who cared about this club and knew how it ticked.

In spite of all that has been said, I'm sure we are all desperate for this club to flourish...maybe next year will.