Fans Forum 26th January 2017

[nobadspitfire]

Jan 27, 2017 7:33:49 GMT martync1984 said:

I don't think it's a case of People involving him, he involves himself

Were you at the meeting last night, martync1984? If not you won't know what Stewart said. If you were, you are completely misrepresenting what he did say. Some (a very small minority) supporters take him for granted, indeed when he was on social media, people were contacting him with questions about the club. Sometimes he is his own worst enemy in being too approachable & available to fans and perhaps too hands-on in his management of the club, & I for one wouldn't blame him at all for taking a step back to enable him to get more enjoyment out of his match day experience at Eastleigh. It's his club, slightly more so than ours, I would suggest, so he should be able to enjoy that privilege, not be pestered by people wanting him to sort petty problems out.

[martync1984]

I was there last night, yes, some may go directly to him with their issues but most go to kenny or just email the club, if he then chooses to get involved that's his decision.
If I've had issues I will contact kenny as that is what I've been told to do. And I have raised issues with kenny before and recieved responses from Stewart

[stewartdonald]

Martyn - When you had argument with a fan on Facebook over your child and the severity of their disabilities you copied Kenny Amor in and tried to get the club involved on a Saturday night in a personal argument. He felt he should alert me too as he wanted advice before responding - that is not me looking to involve myself is it? That is fans posting their life on Facebook and asking the club to comment on things that shouldn't involve them and also at an unreasonable hour. I wouldn't contact you on a Saturday night via social media about your job would I??? Then again I don't post about my children and the issues they have on Facebook either so I guess we are all different.

Martyn do you have any idea of my Facebook messages and who messages me without any prior message from me or who phones my home phone number or mobile without me instigating it. Are you aware when away for a weekend I had 7 messages on my phone from fans complaining about this forum without me evening having any involvement in it but wanting me to do something about it on a Saturday afternoon and Sunday.

Are you aware that fans have contacted my by twitter to see if I can stop fights between fans in the town centre on a Sunday.

Are you aware parents have contacted me concerned that their children are going to have a fight before they get on the coaches at Brentford and wanted me to stop a fight between old and new fans and I had to then subsequently phone the Police and all that that entails as they threatened to escalate this by bringing their friends down to join in and so have called me at 11 pm on a friday night directly after being passed my number. I would never give your phone number to anyone if I had it without their permission would you??

Are you aware that someone called my home phone at 4 am in the morning concerned about their welfare on the coach.

There are plenty of others that you do not have a clue about. Yes I do instigate some conversations as you know as you have been a recipient which I can do as you can but with respect you have no idea what i deal with on a day to day basis - like when I see you posting that your son is getting bullied at school and offer to come in and do a talk in the hope it will help - that is me instigating it isn't it? (for the good of your son I might add)

Do you think I have asked for these people to contact and look up my home phone number etc?? I will be going ex directory of course - some people do seek me out on things that are trivia or shouldn't involve me but waking up my family at 4 am is a little bit excessive don't you think and have I sought that out have I?

I appreciate you and a few others are unhappy with me over the stance I have taken on the Pan disability. If you wish to keep taking a pop at the club or me and having digs about the staff or me on Facebook or anywhere else then that is your right. Feel free to carry but do not expect myself or the many people who disagree with you to change their views. Most people very simply see it differently to you and a few others. If you feel that strongly that I or the club are doing things in a way you clearly feel is wrong and just like the Pan disability you can no longer back the club - pop in and we will give you and Joe a refund on your season tickets, along with the anyone else who feels this way and you can remove yourself from a club where you clearly have a lot of issues with some of the fans, the owner and staff.

Just like I have told other parents I want to focus on those people who have given us a chance and wish to remain. There is no point focusing on people who have removed themselves and given the club an ultimatum and which we won't accept as there is no common ground to move forward on - few people or institutions respond well to ultimatums btw and not generally the way to get what you want in the long term. Therefore it makes sense to only discuss the Pan disability with parents who will be affected by it moving forward and who have chosen to work within the framework we have put in and want to try and work with us in a reasonable manner. Those people who have chosen not to then I respect their decision but the club will comment no further as it is just going over old ground and will not change anything. You, as you are currently doing, can continue to dig at the club, myself and the staff but it will not change the outcome and, as it has done already, just convince more people we made the right decision. A lot of fans have obviously read yours and others post recently and last night there was an overwhelming support for the club and its stance and indeed many parents have written in to show their support for us. However whichever route we had taken some people would agree and some disagree. It is clear we will not please everyone in all the decisions we make as people come at it from different angles but for the club that is the matter closed and we will not be commenting further.

I do think though to indicate you have any idea about what I actually have to deal with when you simply don't have a clue is not going to be an argument you can win as you are just guessing.

I will comment no further and leave you to have the last word Martyn.

[fairoakfan]

Just had a quick catch up on forum, fir goodness sake leave the chairman alone! He is first class, done unbelievably for the club and doesn't deserve the petty issues that seem to be cropping up, he will very soon take a Backward step and I for one don't blame him, he puts so much effort time and money in, there are those that moan about everything and that Is just the way hey are I guess, surely we are adults!! It's like being at school! Just enjoy the journey because if u were at the meeting as I was, u will realise the journey will get even more exciting!!

[efcalan]

Jan 27, 2017 8:32:56 GMT cobbler said:

Is it possible to get a summary of the salient points from last night for those of us who were unable to attend?

Yes anyone take minutes? ☺ I had too work

[tenacres]

Minutes were taken (not by me) and will be posted later today.

[taylov]

Thank you SD for spending yesterday evening updating fans on your vision of where Eastleigh FC are heading. Exciting times ahead.

(BTW Most English-speakers in Hong Kong have adopted the term Hong Kongers. And to a lesser extent, Hong Kongese.)

[sayitabitloudermc]

It's pretty simple, if you don't like the journey, get off the bus.
Let's move on positively and get behind the team and ensure Stewart has fans to be proud of!
Thats the least we can do, surely!

[martync1984]

Now I'll take your points 1 at a time:
You say I bought kenny into a personal argument between me and a fan.
this is only partly true, I involved kenny as said fan started abusing me after I asked a simple question, said she was a volunteer, I now know she volunteers with the tssc, I involved the club as I felt (as did others) that she was giving the club a bad name.
Your next point about his school, he was getting bullied for around 2 years at his (now old) school, including being strangled, bitten and just generally attacked. Due to him being different.
The club getting involved was fantastic and I thank you for it although it made little difference as things didn't improve and we have now had to move him.
Now the stance you have taken on the pan disability:
Another parent and I pleaded with you to keep the scheme going because of how important it was to a lot of the children (joe included, he loves Eastleigh fc, it's his life, he doesn't really have anything else) so this is really hard on all of us.
I do not wish to get a refund on the season tickets, as joe loves his match days.
If you want to discuss any of these points please message me.

[bomber]

Anyone else on here just want to have a few beers, chat with their mates & watch a game of football? It's not that difficult surely?

[swb]

Me thinks that this is the price of success.

When I started to visit EFC regularly in the Wessex league it was £5 to get in, park where you like and a hot drink from the Club House Kiosk. The team got changed in an annex to the club house and a crowd of 300 was a good day’s effort. A mini bus for away travel which sometime got full.

Now look where we are. The ground and facilities are great and still growing. The entrance fee is still very competitive. Attendances around 2K. with 1,600 for an away game.

But now the club has to please far more people while also adhering to league, Health & Safety and legal regulations. This, inevitably, has led to some people being upset as things don’t go their way.

Now what the `Pan disability` issue is about I have no idea and probably don’t need to know but if only half of what SD says about being the dumping ground of peoples personal arguments seems to me as being a bit out of order. He and his team make decisions for the good of us all, club, team and supporters, and the nature of the beast says they will not always get it 100% right for everybody

[bomber]

I am old school. I 100% enjoyed reading the minutes from this meeting some people had last night & for what my opinion is worth to Stewart I think he's doing a great job in taking the club forward. Me personally, as long as I don't have my simple pleasure to stand during a game taken away & can get to the bar fairly easily then I'm happy. I speak for many supporters here. We don't ask for much.

My advice, again for what it's worth, is for Stewart to take a step back from all this 'fans' nonsense & concentrate on what you're good at. Put people in place to deal with the other stuff. Nobody goes to the CEO of a multinational company complaining that the bog in trap three near the warehouse is blocked do they. What the hell has a few lads having a tear up miles away from the ground got to do with the chairman!?

People bringing ale or playing up on the coach, ban 'em. Simple. They can only do it the once.

[taylov]

Jan 27, 2017 15:43:57 GMT swb said:

Me thinks that this is the price of success.

When I started to visit EFC regularly in the Wessex league it was £5 to get in, park where you like and a hot drink from the Club House Kiosk. The team got changed in an annex to the club house and a crowd of 300 was a good day’s effort. A mini bus for away travel which sometime got full.

Now look where we are. The ground and facilities are great and still growing. The entrance fee is still very competitive. Attendances around 2K. with 1,600 for an away game.

But now the club has to please far more people while also adhering to league, Health & Safety and legal regulations. This, inevitably, has led to some people being upset as things don’t go their way.

Now what the `Pan disability` issue is about I have no idea and probably don’t need to know but if only half of what SD says about being the dumping ground of peoples personal arguments seems to me as being a bit out of order. He and his team make decisions for the good of us all, club, team and supporters, and the nature of the beast says they will not always get it 100% right for everybody

 A lot of SD's Q and A was about where we go next - but I have great admiration for his willingness to admit his mistakes, too. Not many club chairmen/owners will have been willing to do this.

We have already taken the first and occasionally painful steps on the road to the promised land over the last 4/5 years - we can't go back now. There is only one way - onwards and upwards - and that seems to be accepted by the majority of those there last night.  Can you imagine the reaction at Woking if their owner had just stated his plans for 11,000+ gates in the Championship as the long term target?  As another who first watched in the Wessex League days when the only cover in the ground was the small wooden "stand" on the halfway line, the fact that we've been twice in the 3rd Round of the Cup and seen over 5,000 in the ground would have been just as much a fantasy.

We've already proven that "if you build it, they will come".

[patrickmc]

Jan 27, 2017 9:55:08 GMT martync1984 said:

Now I'll take your points 1 at a time:
You say I bought kenny into a personal argument between me and a fan.
this is only partly true, I involved kenny as said fan started abusing me after I asked a simple question, said she was a volunteer, I now know she volunteers with the tssc, I involved the club as I felt (as did others) that she was giving the club a bad name.
Your next point about his school, he was getting bullied for around 2 years at his (now old) school, including being strangled, bitten and just generally attacked. Due to him being different.
The club getting involved was fantastic and I thank you for it although it made little difference as things didn't improve and we have now had to move him.
Now the stance you have taken on the pan disability:
Another parent and I pleaded with you to keep the scheme going because of how important it was to a lot of the children (joe included, he loves Eastleigh fc, it's his life, he doesn't really have anything else) so this is really hard on all of us.
I do not wish to get a refund on the season tickets, as joe loves his match days.
If you want to discuss any of these points please message me.

Baffles me how/why individuals feel this is the suitable medium for their personal stuff!
BTW of course you don't want a refund, why would you when EFC fans have it so good - be grateful and just appreciate!

[Deleted]

This is my take on things. I could be wrong, but being a long time fan and having watched from afar over the past decade or so, it's obvious that we are victims of our own success. As Taylov has said. If you had told any of us who stood under that old wooden stand, or in front of the trees on the opposite side of the pitch (couldn't call it a stadium then) that in less than 20 years, we would be 1 step from the football league, playing the likes of Tranmere, Wrexham & even Aldershot week in week out, & playing in the 3rd of the Cup in front of 5,000+ people at Ten Acres we would of had you carted off in a straight jacket. But those that have been on that journey from the Wessex are just enjoying the ride.

But that success has come at a price - it has to, and there's not much the club can do about it. It seems most of the dissension has come from medium term fans against newer fans. We have had a massive boost in fans since Stewart arrived, and from when we first joined the Conf South, and it seems they are the fans that have the biggest objections to progress and change. SD has done an incredible job of increasing support. There can be very few clubs in the world who have seen the % increases in support that we have over the past 10 -15 years. With that huge increase there are going to be problems. We will have a few bad apples but it will work itself out. We had something similar in the Southern League days with the "Eastleigh Yoof" starting trouble with their Salisbury counterparts. But it got sorted and the problem went away. The big difference then was there wasn't the huge Social Media access that allows instant access to a large audience, where it is easy to start an argument, drag thing on unnecessarily or to misinterpret someones off the cuff comments.

We just need to accept that if we want to continue to grow and move onwards & upwards then changes will have to be made and not everyone is going to like every change. But just have faith that SD knows what he is doing, and he is doing it with the best intentions of the football club at heart. It's not like we have the situation that some clubs like Hull, Blackburn, Coventry etc have where they have owners who are destroying the club. We have a dedicated owner that virtually every other club in country would kill to have in charge of their team. The choice is a simple one. No one will be happy with every decision being made throughout the club. Thats the cost of progress. I recall a committee meeting that a couple of committee members almost quit because we wanted to increase the playing staff budget to 300 quid a week - TOTAL, for a squad of 15!! The fact that caused so much bad blood seems ludicrous when you look at todays budget but it brings things into perspective. Change happens & has to for the club to continue to grow.Deal with it & move forward or step aside and find something else to do on a Saturday afternoon.