| My proposed essay to Mr Milne 10:09 - Mar 22 with 5454 views | ASAx |
I have not bothered to spell check / check punctuation yet and am happy to receive any feedback on things that should be added or removed.
I will revise it and send it later today. Sorry for going down the whole 'super fan' route but I am merely trying to point out that people that would follow the club blindly in almost any circumstance are actually choosing to draw a line now. I know ex-players involved with the club and people who work in prominent positions and they are all unhappy with the direction of the decisions being made behind the scenes.
I appreciate it probably won't even get read, but we can only try and make our feelings known to the club in the hope that they consider them. I don't expect any response, if I do get one I expect it to completely miss the point on everything we are concerned about but at least I've said my bit in the hope that along with similar views it may one day help in some small way.
*** UPDATE ***
Sent to Ian Milne for his attention only at 11:38 - 22/03/17
Dear Mr Milne,
I write to you as a long-standing supporter and former employee of Ipswich Town Football Club who has taken the decision not to renew my season ticket.
I am aware that you have received a great deal of correspondence from my fellow supporters over the last few days and appreciate that with your inevitable commitments you will be unable to personally respond to everybody in a timely fashion. However, I am sure it has now come to your attention that the current stock reply being sent by your staff is only serving to further reduce the faith supporters have in the club. My hope is that you have, in recognition of this reaction, committed to personally dealing with such communication directly and I hope to receive a reply from you in due course.
Let me begin by apologising for the length of this communication. I sincerely wish there was much less to say but unfortunately there are numerous points which I feel I must address. It is evident that some clubs believe they have fans and others feel that they have customers. Regardless of how we are viewed by Mr Evans, yourself and the rest of the ITFC board, it surely remains in the interest of all parties to work together and share the combined resources, ideas and experiences to ensure the club has every chance of being in the healthiest position possible.
As things currently stand I shall not be returning to Portman Road next season as a season ticket holder, having watched the club home and away for 35 years, since the age of 3. I will not be renewing my oldest sons season ticket. I will not be purchasing a season ticket for my youngest son as I had previously intended to prior to pricing announcement last week. My father, who was also employed previously by Ipswich Town for many years, and who has followed the club religiously home and away for 55 years, missing 6 home games from almost 1500 in that time, has also told me that he will not be back. He will miss as many home games in the first two months of next season as he's missed between now and when we were champions of England in 1961. Â
My ticket has increased by 1.5%. I have absolutely no problem with the suggested cost across the season, despite the high cost of watching ITFC compared to other Championship teams. My sons U11 ticket has risen dramatically. In all honesty, I believe £50 per season to still be excellent value and have no issue paying this sum. My father, who is over 60 but not yet 65, has seen his ticket risen steeply as well, and while I am sure he is not being particularly pleased by this, I can assure you he would ordinarily have returned for his 56th season nonetheless. In isolation, pricing is not the issue here.
My own personal feelings, clearly echoed by other ITFC supporting family members, supporters I sit with at Portman Road and those whose views are given on the TWTD website, are that the club is now being run on an absolute shoestring, comparatively speaking, with very little experience or understanding of footballing matters and with little or no real regard for the supporters or customers of the club.
For what it is worth I believe that fans and customers are very different animals and that those who attend Portman Road are both. I have expectations, as a customer, on things like an unrestricted view of the field of play, a reasonable level of service and quality when purchasing food and drink, reasonable toilet facilities and the appropriate disabled facilities and provisions in line with legislation.
However, as a fan I have no right to any expectation. I have no right to be entertained, no right to see Town win or play free flowing attacking football, no right to a say in who the manager is or the team selection or whether young players are given their chance. I have no right to demand a transfer budget or that Mr Evans continues to invest as heavily as he did in the first half of his ownership.
The problem is though that regular fans like me must weigh up whether we can commit our hard-earned money or what little spare time we have to follow the club. For me personally a great deal of this comes down to the hope that we can be successful and the enjoyment that such success would give me in view of my love for this club of ours.
Up until a year or two ago I could not feasibly have ever entertained the idea that my dad may choose to do something other than go to Portman Road on a Saturday. This was simply unthinkable. In 1961, as a 6-year-old boy, he went to his first game. He’s been there every season since, watched us away at 70 other football league stadiums and seen us in European competition in many different countries. He even started working for ITFC in the late 80’s where he remained for around 15 years.
I was taken to my first game at 2 years old and started going to every game the following year. I have completed seasons that I cannot even recall and travelled home and away and in Europe to watch my beloved team. When my own son was old enough I took him along and he absolutely loves going to football and like me and my father before me, proudly boasts of being an Ipswich fan when his own school mates support Liverpool, Manchester United or Chelsea.
In the last four years it has become quite apparent that Mr Evans is no longer prepared to put in significant amounts of his own money. The financial situation in the Premier League and now the Championship is farcical I fully understand that. However, our prospect of success is diminishing with every passing season and the move to the sustainable business model that is admirable in many other walks of life has the remotest chance of success in professional football in the second tier.
I feel that the club is heading towards League One, if not this season, but the next and all the expectations and hopes I have as a fan are slowly being stripped from the club. With the losses we are likely to make next again next season, and assuming that the owner again retains his recent policy of attempting to cover his costs, we face the prospect of either reducing the playing budget further and in all likeliness the quality of players in the squad, selling the last of the players we have likely to command a sizeable transfer fee, or as I fear may be the case, a combination of both.
By my own appraisal, only the magnificent Bartosz Bialkowski and Adam Webster would command fees in excess of a million pounds. We have a manager in Mick McCarthy, who has completely lost the support of the fans. He did a superb job over the early part of his tenure but the quality of football has never been good. I greatly admired the team spirit and togetherness of the 2014/15 season but this has long since gone. The last 18 months has seen the results completely disappear, the feeling around the club evaporate and has been replaced instead with toxic negativity because of the direction our club is heading in on and off the pitch.
I fully respect that Mr Evans has achieved a significant amount of success prior to his ownership of the club. I appreciate that you are both no doubt very intelligent men, which is even more concerning to supporters as to what the real agenda is here. We continually hear that Mr Evans remains as committed as ever to success. It stands to reason that Mr Evans either wants to continue as owner of this club and make it as successful as possible or has either lost interest or cannot continue to finance a Championship club, in which case he would be looking to sell the club. In any scenario, decreasing attendances, supporter unrest, negative publicity and a toxic atmosphere is disastrous for the current owner and severely off-putting to a prospective one.
Fortunately for you we are very much a fan base who primarily moan and tut. The excellent online community that is TWTD allows a lot of ITFC to get their disenchantment off their chests and as such it has not transpired into protests, demonstrations or boycotting of matches as would have been the case a long time ago at other clubs. Across social media you will find fans that want McCarthy to stay, some who want him to go, some who think Mr Evans needs to invest £20m a season and some who feel that with the right manager success can be ours for minimal investment.
It's very rarely that two fans will agree on everything. But when 97% of supporters claim they do not feel valued by Ipswich Town, when thousands of people who have already paid for season tickets are not going through the turnstiles this season and when thousands more are outraged and disgusted by what appears to be a completely terrible season ticket campaign at what point does the club start to realise that it needs to listen?
Due to my lengthy involvement with the club I have friends who are stewards, friends who work on the turnstiles, friends who are involved in match day operations and one or two friends quite high up within ITFC and they themselves have shared their concerns over the last few years that absolutely every part of their job is being stripped back to the bare minimum. With the sale of our top striker for several million pounds and the belated replacement with a non-league player for several thousand, it appears the playing budget is now going the same way.
I know fans who can barely afford to go to football, are barely in the kind of health well enough to travel short distances, yet make huge sacrifices to spend 10 hours travelling to and from Preston on a rainy Tuesday night in December when the team is playing terribly and we have little chance of getting a result. I know a disabled fan whose has limited movement whose entire life has revolved around Ipswich Town, who has equally had enough.
When these types of people have expressed to me that they won’t be back next season and are no longer prepared to make a short journey to Portman Road once a fortnight to support the club they have loved unconditionally for decades then we have the most serious of problems. Because if these people have had enough, people like my dad, people like myself, then you have to question how the club can possibly allow this situation to deteriorate and expect to recover. People who would never have imagined walking away from the club are leaving in disgust at how they are being treated.
People like myself, who as a 10 year old boy sat in the freezing cold on New Years Day, watching the mighty Ipswich Town get trounced 5-0 by Port Vale, a team I'd barely heard of. Guess what. That same 10 year old was squished between two sizeable adults in the back of a Ford Capri merely 5 days later because he wanted to make the almighty trip to Leeds in the FA Cup where we were surely going to get turned over again. We won 1-0. That's what we football supporters do. It defies logic and allows our unwavering loyalty to be taken for granted. But we've had enough.
If Mr Evans wishes to sell the club and is actively looking for a buyer, then I fully understand everything that is happening and why it is being allowed to continue. However, if he remains as committed and as passionate as ever and is in it for the long term then I would urge you as someone who deeply loves the club to please engage with the supporters, please reach out to us and help us to help you make this club of ours great again.
You will find that once you lose these supporters they may never be back. The fans, customers, staff and owner have a shared interest in making the club positive, successful and profitable. In my opinion, the only way you can now expect any kind of upward recovery from the position we find ourselves in, without an unlikely level of investment sadly required in the modern-day Championship or League One as it still could be, is to accept the part the club is still making mistakes and reach out to us.
We are not a huge club followed by millions of overseas fans with little to no idea of what goes on at Ipswich Town. With little to shout about and with the difficulty in recruiting younger fans recognised by the club, we are still largely made up of loyal, long term supporters, many who understand football and some who even understand business and the football world specifically.
Amazingly, for me anyway, this isn't about ticket prices increasing, the poor quality of football we've suffered or the inability to clarify the future of a manager even the most grateful of ITFC fans has now had enough of. It's about the fact that the majority of fans are united in feeling almost every decision ITFC makes is completely wrong and the inevitable feeling of knowing where this is all going to end.
Please let us all work together before we all lose out spectacularly.
Many thanks for the significant time you have invested in hearing my thoughts and in anticipation of your response.
[Post edited 22 Mar 2017 11:57]
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| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 12:40 - Mar 30 with 325 views | ASAx |
| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 12:29 - Mar 30 by SW6Tractor |
Great letter. Nicely highlighted how different we are as a club to many others (something they would do well to appreciate) - particularly how measured the fan response to this season & renewal process has been.
Forgetting the season ticket renewal, given that both your father and yourself worked for ITFC, this is an appalling response from the club. |
My old man worked there for years and still knows a good proportion of the staff down there (particularly those involved in match day operations) even having not worked down there for 15 years or so. He knows quite a few former players very well from his time working there.
Between us we do hear a lot of what goes on at the club from people who work there, some in prominent positions and while we don't ordinarily speak about what specific people have told us in confidence, the stuff that goes on there is even worse than anyone would imagine based on what I have heard.
It is utterly depressing that everything rests with one person whom none of us have any confidence in whatsoever over what is now a very long tenure. | | | |
| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 12:41 - Mar 30 with 325 views | Tractorboy24 |
| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 11:44 - Mar 30 by ASAx |
Even though I don't expect any kind of helpful reply, if any, I have responded nonetheless to Edwina because I wanted them to know how completely useless and evasive their response was. Purely because I'd be interested if Edwina has been given the freedom to offer any kind of positive news and if so what it might be - probably to tell me U23's have a snazzy new deal!
Good morning Edwina,
Many thanks for your response, which is appreciated. Unfortunately I consider that the response is completely unsatisfactory and does not answer any of the issues or concerns I have raised.
I appreciate that you are very much the messenger here and so any comments I may make are not directed at your personally. I appreciate you are no doubt doing you very best in dealing with an overwhelming level of criticism aimed at the MD and Owner and that you are effectively fighting fires on their behalf under the guidelines they have laid down. I do not envy your position at all.
However, I would seek clarification as to two points you have raised please. Firstly, your comments about having 'direct access to Football Club' via the supporters club and secondly, the inference that going down such a route would somehow make my opinion heard.
On the first point, what is an email to Mr Milne's personal email account if not direct access to the club? To me this simply seems to be suggesting that anybody trying to engage in any form of communication with him is wasting their time as he won't actually read them or reply himself and so the only way of doing so is to engage with him face to face. In which case who gets to decide what email content is relevant to Mr Milne? By definition, I presume all of the concerns and issues I have raised have not reached him personally and so what would be the point in raising such issues with him in person if somebody has already deemed them not worthy of his time?
Secondly, I have attended these forums. Any question that is asked is going to be brief, to the point and raised without the ability to show any level of detailed understanding of the problem in question, which is surely where a lengthy email is of benefit in explaining not only the issue, how and why you feel the club have made a wrong decision and providing your own qualification into why you may be in a position to give some form of educated opinion on this, rather than a completely unqualified and unreasonable view. I had assumed that it was much better to come across as a thoughtful, reasoned and concerned supporter rather than a potential idiot trying to look clever to an audience by being controversial. I've also seen many a person raise a very polite, well-thought but difficult to answer question, only to be given a totally meaningless and irrelevant response before the clubs representative moves on to the next question.
I am disappointed that the many points I raised have been diluted into a 'overriding theme' of simply feeling the club should work with supporters. I am not suggesting that it does not already do so, but there seems to be a massive conflict of interest with the relationship of the supporters club and the football club, who rather than working together, seem to be more in bed with each other and it leads me to believe the club is being told what it wants to hear rather than what it needs to hear for the sake of maintaining this relationship. Would a supporters club that constantly complained and asked difficult questions of the owner be welcomed in the same manner? I sincerely doubt this.
Given that the current business model seems to be to simply accept that supporters of 35 years, 45 years and 55 years are now giving up their season tickets in their thousands seemingly, with no intention of doing anything to retain them, no word from the owner or MD on who will be in charge next season, no word from the owner or MD on whether we are likely to have any kind of budget to give realistic prospects of a promotion challenge, is there anything else you can add that may give us fans, desperate for the club to succeed, any glimmer of hope?
Thank you for your time. |
I've also been in dialogue with the club via email regarding the rise in season ticket prices, I won't bore you with my emails because a lot will have been covered.
However, I'd like to leave this line which was in their last email to see how people interpret it.
'We are also in discussions with other clubs regarding contra agreements over pricing. These are at an early stage. Details will follow in due course.'
Is the club looking to create their own anti 20s plenty movement with other clubs, moaning to clubs like Huddersfield for causing us to compare their prices? |  | | |
| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 12:47 - Mar 30 with 307 views | ASAx |
| My proposed essay to Mr Milne on 12:41 - Mar 30 by Tractorboy24 |
I've also been in dialogue with the club via email regarding the rise in season ticket prices, I won't bore you with my emails because a lot will have been covered.
However, I'd like to leave this line which was in their last email to see how people interpret it.
'We are also in discussions with other clubs regarding contra agreements over pricing. These are at an early stage. Details will follow in due course.'
Is the club looking to create their own anti 20s plenty movement with other clubs, moaning to clubs like Huddersfield for causing us to compare their prices? |
Dear Mr Hoyle,
What on earth are you doing?
£199 for a season ticket? You do know these mugs will pay twice that right?
You've caused us a right headache. You're higher in the league and playing some lovely stuff and charging less. How can we justify that?
We suggest you increase your prices immediately. If you half the price you won't double the attendance so milk these loyal fools for every penny. We've worked it out. It's the way forward.
The feel good factor can't be cashed in at Thomas Cook like it's the last few dollars from your trip to New York. Act like a proper football club and charge a fortune will you.
Yours,
ITFC [Post edited 30 Mar 2017 12:56]
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