Open Mike night

[Ancient Mariner]

Are you Shaun in disguise? A paying member from literally the day the club sold memberships that has travelled interstate and overseas (independent of any club tour) to watch them play is so fed up with the way things are run they're prepared to boycott until the owner moves on... and all you can muster is a good bye?

If I was anyone even remotely connected with the club I'd be investigating why each and every lapsed member has done so and then passing that on to whoever can do something about it. Dismissing our entirely valid concerns with "hurr durr you're not a real fan jog on" is the opposite of what you should be doing.

"Good-bye" was posted in frustration with all the posts of those threatening not to renew.

I too have been a member since the start (#147) and also share your frustration and anger about the way things have gone.

Threatening not to renew or calling for a boycott on renewals, I strongly believe is not the way to go about achieving change. In fact I believe it will be counter productive and has the distinct possibility of seeing the club extinct.

People coming to games and renewing memberships happen in waves, and can become movements. You and others here have an impact on those reading this forum (there are more out there than post) and can lead to others saying "shit they're not renewing why should I?"

If members resigning in protest becomes effective, it will make the club less attractive to any possible buyer than it is already and thus be counter productive. A buyer will look at what the club has going for it in terms of future development. At the moment we are the smallest club, with the smallest catchment and close to the smallest attendance. That is why the Chinese bought the Jets, they could see potential.

The only way the club will be sold at the moment is to someone who wants the licence to set up in what is seen as a greater potential area. Anyone of the many bids who miss out on the next two licences and miss out on picking up Wellington's licence will grab ours and move us. The FFA (if they are still in control) would love it. They see the future of the game in big population areas.

I love your passion and would truly hate to see you (and FFC) go but equally I really hate to see anyone advocating withholding renewals. Foe someone who is equally passionate about the club as you it just does my nut in.

On MC I do not agree with some of what he is doing, but it is his money and he is losing $1m a year to keep us afloat.

What I wish I had the quickness on the night to think to ask him is. "If he is prepared to lose $1m a season on a shit team wouldn't it be better to pony up an extra $5k and make us more competitive, build crowds and therefore make us more attractive to a buyer? Especially as all football clubs are for sale."

I think part of the trouble written words come over stronger than spoken. Maybe I can shout a beer sometime and discuss effective ways to get the members feelings across and showing frustration without damaging the thing we all want to save. I think the forum questions the other night were a clear indication to MC as to how the fans are thinking.

 

[Insertnamehere]

Let's not be naive here, football clubs are not money making ventures. Virtually every club going loses money. The money is only made back in capital growth on the licence fee in leagues like ours. It's not an altruistic loss of money.
MC wants the capital growth without maintaining the property. A successful clubs licence fee is worth butt loads more than a basket case.
I still reckon we start a mariners marquee fund, if we want to do something about MCs lack of investment.

 

[Gratis]

On the ownership. I'm going to be very simple about my views on this.

We have a club. It's been a very thin line several times since the A-League started as to whether we got to keep it.
If not for Mike C being willing to lose $1m per year out of his own pocket - we would not have a club. Thank you, Mike. Thank you thank you thank you. That's no small amount of money to lose. I can cope with him not being willing to lose more than $1m/year if it means we get a club. It seems, currently, these are the only 2 options: accept a mid-salary cap range or fold. All in all I'm happy with the former.

Clearly, things haven't worked out so well over the past 5 years. But year after year I've not seen Mike or Shaun sit on their hands. Not once. They continually reinvent, improvise and innovate new ideas and solutions. Have they all been successful? Unfortunately, for the most part, they haven't, and for many reasons. But they keep trying and retrying and never get complacent. Barometer: memberships are the highest they've ever been.

The first few years austerity measures could be blamed for results. But if we're 100% honest - since Moss took over until right now - our biggest on-field problem has been inadequate coaching. We had a squad this year that could take down Sydney. With a quality coach we could have done much better.

So - for our spend this season and next we probably should be a mid-league team. The fact we're not is on the coach, not the owner, the club or the spend.
I feel this is (probably) addressed now with Mulvey and a mid-league finish is actually on the cards now. Better if we punch above our weight.

Thank you, Mike, for our club. Thank you Shaun, Dan and team for the quality of CCM off field. And Mulvey - I'll thank you in advance for a competitive team that will fight to final whistle every time.

 

[Luca Brasi]

MC is a property developer, the COE provides assets way beyond any 'loses' attributable to the football club.

 

[nebakke]

MC is a property developer, the COE provides assets way beyond any 'loses' attributable to the football club.

I mean - it's not like he got that and the club for free, and by all accounts he's probably into it at least 5 million over the last 4 years at this point.
I now property values are good and COE increasing but that really means that he needs more than 6 mill back from CoE on top of what he's already sunk into it, not withstanding any extra investment he's put into the build. I reckon he's still got a bit to to there.

 

[Pirate Pete]

MC is a property developer, the COE provides assets way beyond any 'loses' attributable to the football club.

Apart from the COE what other properties has he developed?

 

[priorpeter]

MC said there has been “no legitimate interest to buy the club” since he took over. I think the Ledman Group may have something to say about that...

 

[Wombat]

The COE is worth more than 6 million.

If not I'll try and borrow the money and give Pikey the 4 million he has invested thus far.

First thing on the agenda is a "club" with serious gaming facility!!!

 

[Manny_ccm]

MC said there has been “no legitimate interest to buy the club” since he took over. I think the Ledman Group may have something to say about that...

Not sure who to believe as I'm not in the know but perhaps Lawrie and Erin may be in on what happened?

 

[Forum Phoenix]

On one hand I thought it was good that question was asked unfiltered. On the other hand I think it shows why they need to be filtered. After the third round of - why don't you put more money in, why don't you just sell the club or f**k off (along with various insults) - even though those questions had been answered, it got a bit embarrassing, and makes us all look like f**king idiots. Just my thoughts on that part.

I think the support on this post shows how accurate this is and reflects on how a large number of us feel also. I hope Shaun gets to read and note it.

 

[Forum Phoenix]

It might be worth noting that Mulvey mentioned to us that he turned down an offer in Thailand that was 3 times more than what he will earn with us. The guy must really want the challenge.

Despie the lower dollars, still a better pathway to bigger leagues and greater potential success I think.

 

[Forum Phoenix]

Fair point and I also get the feeling he isn't given a very accurate picture, probably shielded from all that goes on here. I think it was pre-game when we did retro round last season, he looked shocked at some of the things being said to him. Maybe that needed to be done but not sure how much good it will do in the end? If it was me I probably would have gone f**k this, if you want me to sell up there is a stack of expansion bids that will happily buy the licence... and take it to South Sydney, Tassie, Brisbane, Wherever.

He seems like he genuinely wants the club to do well and puts a lot of money in. Some of the stuff he gets called is over the top and pretty unfair. I was talking to some people that don't follow the A-League at all and don't know anything about the club, they were shocked when I said we have a guy putting in a million dollars out of his pocket into the club every year and he gets called all sorts of names - because he won't spend more!

There are some issues that keep festering - it's like a little rumour gets started and there is nobody to shoot it down so all of a sudden it's fact and the pitch forks are out - and I realise I just described the internet there... but maybe we need more regular communication from Mike? Maybe he needs to address some of the shit that goes on every now and then, but having said that - when he answers a question and then gets shot down because he didn't say what people wanted to hear, and it gets asked over and over... plus a few "you Pikey c**t"s... what are you meant to do then?

Personally I'm not sure money is *the only* answer. Even if we were spending the cap and a bit there is no guarantee the quality would be there. I think we tried to spend more wisely this season, have a decent quality (comparatively) striker - and that failed. That's been acknowledged and things been put in place to prevent that happening again. I can't believe all the player hiring came down to the say-so of one person anyway! Any other professional club will have a team of people working on this shit. We also shouldn't have done as badly as we did with the players that we had. That would come down to inflexible coaching, and "man management" I guess, and we've also addressed that one (potentially).

I'm just not sure what people are expecting here. There doesn't seem to be a line up of billionaires waiting to buy the club with a home ground in GOSFORD and chuck a few million every year into it. Constantly ripping into the guy that is propping up the club doesn't seem fair to me. Pissing off and ripping up your membership doesn't seem very helpful either. If we only wanted to support a club with deep pockets we would all throw our membership cards over the fence in a little tantrum and go support Melbourne City.

Great post. Only thing I'd differ on is I do believe Okon, from all I have heard, would have expected to have total control over his recruitment. TBF to him, on the back of his career, why would he look at our football department and think anyone would know better. But personally, he has proved himself a poor judge of attacking players and their quality. Outside of Adsrubal and how he set us up, playing Kubi as a striker was a shocking example.

 

[Forum Phoenix]

Not sure who to believe as I'm not in the know but perhaps Lawrie and Erin may be in on what happened?

I thought it read pretty clear?

Mike said no serious buyers/offers and a "brief coffee" after someone has already met with the FFA specifically about buying the Jets is a long way from turning into a serious buyer/offer for CCM. A serious buyer has to equate to a fair or better offer for anyone in business.

 

[adz]

I can imagine that conversation.

- What are the FFA taking for the Scum?
- They are trying to offload the club quickly so will take a packet of twisties and 3 used stamps...
- We can't match that. I guess we should finish our coffees though.

 

[Ancient Mariner]

Fair point and I also get the feeling he isn't given a very accurate picture, probably shielded from all that goes on here. I think it was pre-game when we did retro round last season, he looked shocked at some of the things being said to him. Maybe that needed to be done but not sure how much good it will do in the end? If it was me I probably would have gone f**k this, if you want me to sell up there is a stack of expansion bids that will happily buy the licence... and take it to South Sydney, Tassie, Brisbane, Wherever.

He seems like he genuinely wants the club to do well and puts a lot of money in. Some of the stuff he gets called is over the top and pretty unfair. I was talking to some people that don't follow the A-League at all and don't know anything about the club, they were shocked when I said we have a guy putting in a million dollars out of his pocket into the club every year and he gets called all sorts of names - because he won't spend more!

There are some issues that keep festering - it's like a little rumour gets started and there is nobody to shoot it down so all of a sudden it's fact and the pitch forks are out - and I realise I just described the internet there... but maybe we need more regular communication from Mike? Maybe he needs to address some of the shit that goes on every now and then, but having said that - when he answers a question and then gets shot down because he didn't say what people wanted to hear, and it gets asked over and over... plus a few "you Pikey c**t"s... what are you meant to do then?

Personally I'm not sure money is *the only* answer. Even if we were spending the cap and a bit there is no guarantee the quality would be there. I think we tried to spend more wisely this season, have a decent quality (comparatively) striker - and that failed. That's been acknowledged and things been put in place to prevent that happening again. I can't believe all the player hiring came down to the say-so of one person anyway! Any other professional club will have a team of people working on this shit. We also shouldn't have done as badly as we did with the players that we had. That would come down to inflexible coaching, and "man management" I guess, and we've also addressed that one (potentially).

I'm just not sure what people are expecting here. There doesn't seem to be a line up of billionaires waiting to buy the club with a home ground in GOSFORD and chuck a few million every year into it. Constantly ripping into the guy that is propping up the club doesn't seem fair to me. Pissing off and ripping up your membership doesn't seem very helpful either. If we only wanted to support a club with deep pockets we would all throw our membership cards over the fence in a little tantrum and go support Melbourne City.

Probably the clearest statement summing up our present discussions. Logical, in a sea of uninformed lashing out and well presented.

Time to add a 10% bonus to your moderator salary.

 

[Wombat]

The question was asked about Monty.
MM said at the moment there is no assistant or other staff. Although he has people in mind.
He was aware of Monty and did say when he coached Roar it was always a pain in the ass
playing us with Hutch & Monty in midfield.

My contact from Yoof said that all the Yoof players like and respect Monty alot and that he would make an excellent assitant manager.

 

[Ozhammer]

My contact from Yoof said that all the Yoof players like and respect Monty alot and that he would make an excellent assitant manager.

I reckon if MM has the sense to take Monty as his assistant, we would pretty much have the dream coaching team. MM to provide the nous and guile and Monty to provide the steel and standard setting.

 

[FFC Mariner]

Ben Cahn >>>>> Monty

Head coach in waiting

 

[adz]

Ben Cahn >>>>> Monty

Head coach in waiting

I hope there's no hard feelings with Ben and he will be back in some way

 

[Ozhammer]

I hope there's no hard feelings with Ben and he will be back in some way

The club shafted him royally, so I wouldn’t be holding my breath.....