Help save Rushden & Diamonds FC

[stokeriño]

Fans of the Blue Square Premier League side Rushden & Diamonds are trying to raise £250,000 in the next 2 weeks to prevent the club from going bankrupt. Here is a little article about it: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/r/rushden_and_diamonds/9482639.stm

Please help their cause by buying a pixel on their fund-raising website: http://www.saverdfc.com/blog/buy-a-pixel/

A pixel costs £5 and payment is made through Paypal. You can upload any picture you want to fill the pixel(s) - it will ask for a URL to link via the pixel, but you can just put the EWB address or even Google or anything.

(Paypal hates the cookie settings on my work PC, but when I get home I shall be putting a Chelsea logo in the middle of the lion!)

Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

[stokeriño]

Alternatively, donate any sum you like (even £1) at http://tiny.cc/1zjv1.

[jrhodes]

Nice idea.

I've just donated a fiver.

[METALMAN]

I've always thought that players and clubs who have more money than they know what to do with should do their bit to help other clubs in trouble. Greedy sods.

[Crybaby Bunting]

I hate to be a dickhead but...

How many other clubs in that league could actually run up a debt of £250,000 and still exist?

Sure it'd be wonderful if the good-giving nature of the public stopped this club from folding, but what has this club got that any other club in the division hasn't got other than a name that we sorta recognise?

Would you be willing to donate if the £250,000 was to save Barrow, Wrexham or Kettering Town?

I mean come on guys, if you have some sort of connection to Rushden and Diamonds then it makes sense, because it's the fans themself that are keeping the club in business. But to a neutral? that's just asking for trouble.

[Guest skipschool]

They're working on a big match I hear, I've got friends in the area and some are friends with players

The problem with the huge debt for such a low league club is, Max Griggs spent BIG when he was there to try and make them a football league club and they regularly fell short (I think they spent two seasons in League two maybe) and it just mounted, the fact the club is "owned by the fans" doesn't help - And unlike many low league clubs they've not had much produce to sell on, their ground is spectacular for what it is, I saw quite alot of England under 18's matches when I was a bit younger there.

I'll donate.

[Gazz]

I've always thought that players and clubs who have more money than they know what to do with should do their bit to help other clubs in trouble. Greedy sods.

That's not exactly going to encourage fiscal responsibility is it?

[stokeriño]

I hate to be a dickhead but...

How many other clubs in that league could actually run up a debt of £250,000 and still exist?

Sure it'd be wonderful if the good-giving nature of the public stopped this club from folding, but what has this club got that any other club in the division hasn't got other than a name that we sorta recognise?

Would you be willing to donate if the £250,000 was to save Barrow, Wrexham or Kettering Town?

I mean come on guys, if you have some sort of connection to Rushden and Diamonds then it makes sense, because it's the fans themself that are keeping the club in business. But to a neutral? that's just asking for trouble.

Since you asked, I used to live in Milton Keynes before the MK Dons existed, and on the basis of looking for a semi-local club to semi-support (although I kind of had to go 40 miles out to find any), I picked Rushden & Diamonds (because fuck Luton and Northampton). Hence I have some sort of connection, however vague.

After all, no one is forcing you to donate anything.

[METALMAN]

I've always thought that players and clubs who have more money than they know what to do with should do their bit to help other clubs in trouble. Greedy sods.

That's not exactly going to encourage fiscal responsibility is it?

It might. Maybe if Chelsea (or whoever) were required to contribute some money to this fund they might think twice about paying Frank Lampard (or whoever) £150,000 a week (or whatever).

[Colly]

I've always thought that players and clubs who have more money than they know what to do with should do their bit to help other clubs in trouble. Greedy sods.

That's not exactly going to encourage fiscal responsibility is it?

It might. Maybe if Chelsea (or whoever) were required to contribute some money to this fund they might think twice about paying Frank Lampard (or whoever) £150,000 a week (or whatever).

But why should Chelsea (or whoever) be required to contribute some money to Rushden (or whoever) because they decided to pay Diego McPele (or whoever) £1000 a week (or whatever sum is stupidly excessive for a Blue Square Premier team) too much money?

Unless they'd also donate the same amount to the other teams in the league it just gives Rushden an incentive to spend more money than they earn and get bailed out if they fail to gain promotion.

Edited May 26, 2011 by Colly

[METALMAN]

they should do it because they're told to

[Colly]

By who?

[Lineker]

*whom

^_^

[Colly]

By whom?

[METALMAN]

I wouldn't mind doing it.

[MDK]

Didn't they have loadsa money about ten years ago? What happened?

[stokeriño]

Didn't they have loadsa money about ten years ago? What happened?

Would these be memories of old CM games?

Although previously owned by Max Griggs (of Doc Martens' shoes), he sold the club to a supporters' trust in 2005 for the sum of £1. This was after sales had declined in Doc Martens to such an extent that they ceased production in the UK in 2003 and moved it all to China and Thailand.

[MDK]

My memory may be skewed by old CM games, possibly >_>

[lanky316]

It's a smaller scale warning to the likes of Chelsea and Man City. Griggs worked wonders for Irthlingborough Diamonds ( ) and built a nice club almost from the ground up. They were badly managed in the Conference which halted their rise a little.

I wonder what would've happened had they continued their rise. Doc Martens would still have been hit but maybe Griggs would've kept his interest and not withdrawn if they were fighting to get in to the Champion/premiership.

[gunnar hendershow]

I'm not sure about donating but this is a good example of the challenges of clubs all over. You obviously have to spend in order to move up and thus increase your profits. But if things go wrong (poor manager, injuries) the money spent becomes a burden and sends the whole club into debt. I would not see anything wrong with revenue sharing from the top of the EPL trickling down to all clubs in the Football League. Some players make as much in a week as entire clubs spend in a year, there's got to be something done to at least financially protect these clubs I think.

But I'm coming from an American point of view and our biggest sports league has thrived off of revenue sharing and a standard salary cap. The format is a little different, less teams and outside of New York, Maryland, and Florida there aren't teams really sharing the same region. But I'd like to know, if you're so inclined, why a system where at least profits are distributed in at least a pyramid manner from top-to-bottom would or wouldn't work in England?