Invest in a football ground anyone?

[Fosse69]

Anyone with a bit of cash to invest in a L1/2 football ground for Wimbledon AFC? Insight into costs etc.

As the Evening Standard see it

,https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/fans-fear-for-future-of-afc-wimbledon-as-club-face-11m-shortfall-to-build-new-stadium-a4296711.html

 

 

[Valiant62]

A few years back I made a very modest investment in Bury by buying a seat at Gigg Lane. Their whole demise has made me revaluate this sort of thing. Football is in a parlous state and the bigger picture with these crowdfunding type investments is that it sometimes staves off execution or a tumble down several leagues and sometimes doesn’t even do that.  Do I want to invest in a club who have anyway spent much longer of my life in a much lower league so that they can pay better wages than Vale? Not really and I say that appreciating the anxiety and potential sense of loss for fans I have nothing against. Conversley, I wouldn’t expect other fans to do the same for us. Inequalities in the wider system are to blame but I can’t keep up with the demands of micropayments to keep perhaps badly managed clubs afloat.

[Essex Vale]

Interesting issue. I think the example of Valiant 62 above, whilst similar, is also very different to the Wimbledon issue. In terms of the Valiant 62 scenario, a few years ago I put a small sum into crowd funding for Northwich Victoria. I did so because they were a long established, traditional club, and I had enjoyed seeing Vale play them in friendlies over the years. I got no acknowledgement or thanks and no follow up information. So a little like Valiant 62 I would not repeat that exercise.

However, the Wimbledon situation deserves serious consideration  Given their location, costs are inevitably going to be high.  If they can get a stadium with conferencing and other facilities it will help safeguard their future. I think the trust could, and should, open up to business investors, providing there are safeguards built in.  To do so would complete a wonderful comeback that puts a bit of romance back into football. Wimbledon are a proper football club and I would like to see them prosper.

 

Not all business investors are sharks.  Look at Port Vale. Norman Smurthwaite cannot be compared in any way shape or form with Carol and Kevin Shanahan.  The Shanahans are fabulous business investors and fans, so we should not be quick to condemn all potential business investment. If the Wimbledon trust could find people like Carol and Kevin they would be very lucky indeed.

[RailwayRowdy]

1 hour ago, Essex Vale said:

Not all business investors are sharks.  Look at Port Vale. Norman Smurthwaite cannot be compared in any way shape or form with Carol and Kevin Shanahan. 

I whole heartedly agree with your comments, but only with that wonderful thing hindsight in mind.

.Smurthwaite was paraded shoulder high around Burslem in 2013 and hailed as the saviour of our cause. And look how that turned out.

In Wimbledon’s case they have been seriously burnt with the relocation sham, so it is difficult to disagree with their fans’ more than cautious view of inviting large outside investment. 

Personally, if it was a straight choice between a smaller stadium (with the possibility of enlargement at a later date) or outside investment with unknown people with unknown intentions, I would take the former every day of the week.

One bitten, twice shy. 

 

[robf]

That's an interesting but alarming situation. I guess they need to see what they can get without endangering the club. I suspect if they could get Stadium naming rights, stand naming rights and so on they should at least have enough to cover the £1m basic build it mentions in the article. Surely even if it's a few temporary corporate facilities added for now that has to be an improvement in corporate revenue over the facilities at Kingsmeadow which basically had a supporters' bar and nothing else. 

But I can't see them getting £11m from businesses without giving those companies a significant say in how the club is run. I guess they'll have to see what they can raise and cut their cloth accordingly.