The Ownership of Torquay United.

[dawlishmatt]

I find it hard to understand that apparently at yesterdays match a small number of supporters were calling for Clarke Osbourne's head. Just what exactly do this minority of supporters want? In 1990 Mike Bateson took ownership of TUFC and initially saw the club promoted to the old third division after the famous play off final win at Wembley over Blackpool. Because Bateson did not strengthen the squad, we were relegated the following season.
During the next 12 years, Torquay came close to being relegated out of the football league on 3 occasions. On one of these occasions Torquay actually finished bottom of the league but were not relegated because the national league champions Stevenage were deemed not to have a ground up to football league standards.
Torquay did manage promotion a second time under Bateson in 2004 but again we only lasted one season in the higher league before being relegated because Bateson refused to spend money to strengthen the squad.
After the Chris Roberts fiasco, the club were eventually sold to Lottery winners Paul and Thea Bristow in the summer of 2007. After the tragic death of Mr Bristow in June 2010, Mrs Bristow began to splash the cash and enjoyed several years of success under Colin Lee and manager Paul Buckle. Sadly this was not to last as the clubs success on the pitch was costing the owner millions. After spending over 4 million quid, Mrs Bristow eventually walked away giving ownership of the club to Gaming International.
It's been 6 years now since Clarke Osbourne took over ownership of the club and he has already pumped nearly 5 million quid into the club.
What the hell do you Clarke Osbourne haters want ? In 16 years Torquay united owners have spent the best part of 10 million quid and just look at the end result. We are in the bottom 4 of the National league for goodness sake.
Following the recent annual shareholders meeting, Osbourne committed his future to the club but said that to be able to be a sustainable club. Torquay United must move from Plainmoor to a multi purpose stadium. I believe that if Torquay United are to have a long term future we must ALL get behind the owner.

[MellowYellow]

CO pumped in money - you mean loaned. Investment other than loans is £1k and that is the net book value. Although I am not critical of this as there is no reason why CO should not seek a return of investment and I hope he gets it but obviously not to the detriment of the club. Whilst he has done himself no favours to win over the fans I do not believe he personally deserves this negative response for our current form. I cant really believe Im saying this but he has done well by the club so far and you have to ask yourself would we still have been in existence had he not stepped up to the plate six years ago - whatever his motives may be.

[Admiral]

We are owned by asset strippers. Anyone who thinks they’re loaning that money for the love of the club is deluded. It’ll all end in tears eventually, and by then we’ll probably be stadiumless too. Look at their track record! This has always been the case, not just reflected by recent results.

[culmstockgull]

From day one of Osborne's ownership there has been a small but very noisy element that have sought to undermine his ownership of the club, certainly from one person I know well it was because he was connected with another group that wished to purchase the club but like the previous regime had about £1.75 between them and less knowledge of the logistics of running a club than I do.
Even at our level, the club needs more than 100K a week to pay wages and running costs , if you do not have a home game for a fortnight where is that money coming from, certainly not a bank, we have nothing to borrow against.
Osborne has been accused of many things based on historical business dealings but what has he done toTorquay other than invest anything from 5 to 7 million pounds of his own money and without any shadow of a doubt kept us in business as a football club.
Admiral will have you believe he is an asset striipper but in the case of Torquay he convientently forgets we have nothing to asset strip , no ground to sell, certainly no assets in the squad or back room staff, might get a few bob in scrap from our very dodgy floodlights but thats it.
I agree with Osborne that as a stand alone Torquay United is worthless, no one would buy it, no chance of a return on his investment, it is not sustainable, very few clubs are without someone to pay the bills, we need to move to an environment where the off field activities pay for the match day ones and that cannot be achieved at Plainmoor. The alternative is a southern league team at best.

[Dave]

From day one of Osborne's ownership there has been a small but very noisy element that have sought to undermine his ownership of the club, certainly from one person I know well it was because he was connected with another group that wished to purchase the club but like the previous regime had about £1.75 between them and less knowledge of the logistics of running a club than I do.
Even at our level, the club needs more than 100K a week to pay wages and running costs , if you do not have a home game for a fortnight where is that money coming from, certainly not a bank, we have nothing to borrow against.
Osborne has been accused of many things based on historical business dealings but what has he done toTorquay other than invest anything from 5 to 7 million pounds of his own money and without any shadow of a doubt kept us in business as a football club.
Admiral will have you believe he is an asset striipper but in the case of Torquay he convientently forgets we have nothing to asset strip , no ground to sell, certainly no assets in the squad or back room staff, might get a few bob in scrap from our very dodgy floodlights but thats it.
I agree with Osborne that as a stand alone Torquay United is worthless, no one would buy it, no chance of a return on his investment, it is not sustainable, very few clubs are without someone to pay the bills, we need to move to an environment where the off field activities pay for the match day ones and that cannot be achieved at Plainmoor. The alternative is a southern league team at best.

Very good post, and pretty much said everything I was about to say.

[Chrisjb66]

Bloody good, Culmstockgull!

[Dave]

To follow on from the above post, before any of you think about joining the 20 or so fans chanting 'Osbourne and Edwards get out of our club' please engage some brain cells.

If CO cut his losses and walked away who else? do TUST have that kind of money, doubt it, who's going to come up with the kind of money required to run our club, this is why back in 2014 I, along with many others were shouting for everything to be done to ensure the club kept its EFL status, the difference in income generated between the EFL and NL is massive, I believe, although could be wrong it's about £2 million a season, so that's not just a drop in income of £2 million from our relegation, that's £2million + £2 million + £2 million, season on season etc, all those at the time who just shrugged their collective shoulders, whilst holding up their 'We'll be back' scarves, demonstrated a nuclear level of stupidity, those who are once again shrugging their shoulders, are in the same category.

I believe, although could be wrong, CO is a businessman that ended up with the ownership of our club by default, a football club he never wanted, we all know G.I have never built a stadium, we know their track record, however, as said above what assets do TUFC own?
1) they do NOT own the ground
2)they do NOT own the training ground

And I believe there is no scenario whereby they ever will own either.

Assets I believe the club does own.
1) player registrations
2) Kit/training equipment
3) Administration equipment (computers/telephones etc)
4) Stock in club shop, B+L, Gulls Nest, No10's

There may be something I've missed, but if you get my drift, it's the sum total of not very much to strip.

The only way CO can get his money back is by doing something he's never done before, and actually build a new stadium, however the problems I see in that, and they are many.

1) The stadium itself, will likely to be a flat packed blot together brought from wish.
2) The new stadium will be owned by CO not TUFC.
3) At what level will the rent paid by TUFC be set at.
4) How much, if any of the profits from 'other' events be ploughed back into TUFC
5) Any rentable space that came with any potential new ground, would also be owned by CO, not the football club.

Things may not be going well with our current ownership, and not any single one of us should trust our current ownership, but without them there is no football club, without them it ends in tears anyway. There will always be a TUFC, a TUST owned say AFC Torquay, would have to start again most likely, from what level? and we it ever recover like other clubs have before it? Not sure there's enough passion in this area.

[Admiral]

Fair enough, there are some good posts here. Yes, without them we’d go bust, but my concern is (in my opinion) WHEN they acquire the freehold. Times are tough, the council are struggling to pay their own bills and if things continue to worsen on the pitch there is a lot less value in keeping hold of a stadium that only attracts 1400 fans a game.

Unfortunately we were desperately unlucky on that day in 2020, and with promotion CO could have stabilised and even sold the club. A new stadium is not necessary, and I don’t want to see Torquay end up in a Coventry/Darlington situation with extortionate rent. Only if the rent was capped, or the stadium was part owned by the council would I back it.

People are frustrated, we’re all Torquay supporters who want the best for the long-term vision of the club. CO needs to show some compassion to the supporters, the ‘statement’ the other day was a joke. I get he’s a businessman, but a more transparent vision shared with the supporters would be welcome.

[Chelston TUFC]

I think the original plan was for Plainmoor to be given to Spires College as their sports centre, Quinta playing fields to be developed for housing and the new stadium to be built at the Willows. The area that was earmarked to become the stadium is now becoming a solar farm so this plan is up in the air. Agree with the majority of the themes in the posts. To run TUFC sustainably without any kind of benefactor needs stripping back all the costs and more of the operations to be run by volunteers as opposed to employees. Its hard to see us being a full time club if TUFC are to operate as a non-loss making business. I do think the council and the town as a whole are missing a bit of a trick. TUFC getting a mention each week as the football results are announced does keep Torquay front of mind for visitors and when we were in the NFL and League One specifically the additional visitors enjoying a weekend in Torquay brought additional income to the bay out of summer. There's lots of wider benefits to the town of a TUFC in the league. I'd also add that there do need to be some questions around the under 18's and the youth set up.....how many players have been brought through as first team players? If the plan was to develop local players and recreate what ECFC have done this doesnt appear to be making much progress with what could/should have been providing a stream of local players into the team/squad.

[culmstockgull]

forevertufc, almost nailed it , you forgot two lawnmovers, five forks and a dodgy sprinkler system, again with everything mentioned 50K top wack. The tust and its smaller annoying cousin set up just to annoy the tust have on a good day 50k in the bank or three days running costs, it has been suggested that they would raise money through a share or debenture type fund raiser, it will only ever be a one off and may keep us afloat for half a season if lucky, but no continuity plans after that. I do not give a flying fig if the new stadium is flat packed from Ikea, its the team and stability that counts, while others may disagree for me the direction of the club went badly down hill when Thea was mugged out of 3 million plus for Bristows, a far cheaper flat packed or second hand alternative should have been obtained and the difference spent on players which would have kept us in the league, There is no point in having a super ground when you rarely fill a third of it and it stands idle 6 and half days a week.

[Taelee73]

Yes, the plan it seems was for Spires to give their sea view fields up for housing.
New stadium is supposed to be multi purpose, why people keep banging on saying it'll never be more than a quarter full. That's what Osborne is saying, attracting uses for the stadium as well as football to bring more money in.
Does he mean it, will a new stadium attract other uses, will it even get built? Who knows.
I though 2,200 was a decent attendance on Saturday certainly we may get 1,800 tomorrow but down to 1,400 is hopefully not going to happen any time soon.

[Admiral]

How often are multi-purpose stadiums used for other purposes? The Gulls Nest is often hired out, do they mean office space? A 4G pitch would get better use than any suites etc.

Would a new stadium generate more income through other channels, and would this be higher than the difference in rent that we currently pay at Plainmoor? May as well turn Plainmoor into a solar farm over the summer closed season.