I was thinking to myself that it would be fantastic to own my own soccer team. I was wondering if anyone had any information on the Blue Square Bet Football Conference. I found a news story about Salisbury City FC being sold for 1 pound, but I'm guessing that's probably kind of rare. Does anyone have any information on the business side of things in that league?
Clubs at that level still bring in a decent amount of support, Oxford and Luton this season pulled in gates of over 10,000 on a few occasions, although the gap between the professional clubs at the top and the part time clubs at the bottom is growing. Salisbury were sold for a quid because they were in financial difficulties. They've also been chucked out of the Conference and will play at level 7 next season.
That certainly explains Salisbury. So is it unheard of for teams like this to be bought and sold at somewhat more normal prices? Or do they tend to be the sorts of clubs that are owned by locals and rarely change hands along the lines of a team like the Green Bay Packers?
...and pretty disgracefully too. Paid their bills in full and get relegated two division. Contrast with Portsmouth - 9 point deduction that made no difference to their league position, and virtually a clean slate to start the following season. One rule for the rich...
Appendix E is just something for those in the Conference. So not just the rich, as plenty of other clubs below Salisbury haven't had the penalty they have.
http://youtu.be/EoseMIQHnE8 This club has the fan base and passion to succeed, they just need investment.
Surprised how quiet it is in here maybe because their is little coverage in the US? Anyway York City won the Play-off final to get promoted into League Two. Really enjoyed Setanta/Premier Sports coverage this year. Always been a fun league to watch for me.
In the USA the League Championship, League One, and League Two playoffs were televised but not the Conference playoffs. I'm no expert, but I would expect Conference teams to have very few fans outside of England.
Setanta has been showing it in Australia since the channel launched I think their was a year or two without coverage when Setanta UK collapsed but since Setanta relaunched in the UK under the name Premier Sports and they resigned the league they started showing it back into Australia. I don't know how many League Two matches are shown here each year but its probably only 2 or 3 regular session games plus the Play-offs we certainly get better coverage of the Blue Square Premier than League Two.
first pro game I ever saw was Lincoln City versus Doncaster Rovers, ( early 70s) lived near Lincoln at the time, i owe a lot to Lincoln City and hope they can get back in the league
After tonight, I would say we have very few fans in England either ......... I was part of a crowd(?) of just 686 to witness Southport 2 - Gateshead 1 ........ however it was cracking entertainment, and the 319 fans who were there on Saturday (we got 1005 attendance), but not tonight, missed a great game, and a superb battling perfomance from the Sandgrounders.