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The TUFC Board consists of no less than 14 Directors. This is a large Board.

My question concerns the way in which the Board allocate the various Budgets within the club.

I regularly read of yet another appoinment of a coach for the Youth System.What really worries me is that the Board,most of whom I suspect do not understand finance,are setting a Playing Budget which is inadequate and results in the Manager being unable to recruit players of real quality.

It is simply no good if we overspend on the Youth System and then loose our Football League status again because we neglected the most important Budget ie the Playing Budget.

I sincerely hope the Board who deserve a lot of credit for improving Plainmoor have got their sums right. We have to be competitve to survive.A lot has gone wrong this season with injuries to key players but this is why you need cover in all positions particularly key positions like centre back.

I am not a Shareholder so I never see the Annual Accounts but does anyone have a clue whether the Playing Budget is realistic?

One thing is for sure. If we are relegated,heaven forbid, the Youth System will be unaffordable.

Finally I am proud of the Youth set up but am concerned as to whether the Board have got the balance right.

It all depends, the clubs development centres are self funding, the kids pay £30 per month training fees, also depends what the coachs are for, many who are involved with either the development centres or the main acadmey (8-16) are not permanent members of staff and are paid just for what hours coaching they do.

Have spoken to some of our youth staff many times, some I know. Been told they are funded partly by grants and sponsorship and partly by the club, whether that is fully the case or what % each amounts to I don't know. However I do not think for one minute the youth set is funded by the club to the point it would efffect the first team budget.

I've had a look, and it does seem to be a relatively large Board (although it's 12 members, rather than 14). However, we have a very flat management structure, so it's hardly as though we have reams and reams of Vice-Chairmen or middle-managers to contend with.

You don't regularly read of anything of the sort, unless you re-read the same piece of news time and again. We have seven members of the coaching staff, one one of those isn't really a coach at all, he's the performance analyst who happens to chip in with the nippers when he can.

Do you honestly think that we're pumping these mystery millions that everyone is so sure we have squirreled away into the poxy youth team? We, as a club, have basically bugger all. We are paying off a shit load of off field investments in order to establish the club as a proper professional outfit and not one with half a ground and no training pitch. I know a lot of you don't want me to be right and a lot of you would argue the sky was green if I told you it was blue but you really need to take my word for this: Torquay United is broke. Brassic. Penniless. Poor. Financially ruined. Out of dosh. Without recourse to funds.

Knilly has at his disposal a budget which is in the five smallest in the division. That's not because the youth team go everywhere by helicopter and feast on caviar and foie gras, but because we, as a business, generate barely enough money to keep the wolf from the door at the best of times. Deano Edwards (with a little help from those who are so minded) is working his balls off to get money into the club. The big screen is helping, as are the other initiatives which he is presently championing. I've seen first hand his ability to generate ideas out of almost nothing. He's a master of the art and we owe him a lot. In conjunction with the Candyman, those two are basically keeping the club afloat as we head through the season. Losing key players left, right and centre is hurting us more off the pitch than it is on it and Knilly is pulling off some unbelievable deals to secure players that a club with our available funds (i.e. zero pounds, zero pence) has absolutely no right to be getting hold of.
We are hampered presently too by the wage cap imposed upon us in order to attempt to restrain Manchester City from simply buying the Premier League title every year. Quite who thought that was a good idea, I don't know, but he wants bloody shooting. Bristol Rovers are in the same boat, but they deserve everything they get for offering Championship wages in L2 (allegedly, I don't actually know this to be true).

Further to your assertion that the Board are a bunch of dingbats who can't boast so much as a maths GCE between them, do you honestly believe they are stupid enough to not have employed an accountancy firm to do the books and explain to them all, in very short sentences, how much money they have to spend?
Additionally, on our Board, we have the MD of a successful and profitable flooring business, A solicitor who is at Partner level and specialises in business and commercial law. Another man who is currently on the Board of 5 profitable companies. One man who is MD of his own successful hardware store and others that I can't be arsed to look up. Our Board are perfectly conversant in matters financial.

So no, you needn't worry that the Board are pissing our budget up the wall by funding the youth team in preference to the first XI. Ok?

Matt.

I have no worries about the financial management skills of our board.

But their manager selection skills (although there was not a manager selection process this time, other than, 'that bloke we promised could have his job back, well the fans don't want him, they want this other serial failure instead who likes wingers instead of defenders...let's take the easy option) appear to be lacking since Colin Lee left.

hector wrote:I have no worries about the financial management skills of our board.

But their manager selection skills (although there was not a manager selection process this time, other than, 'that bloke we promised could have his job back, well the fans don't want him, they want this other serial failure instead who likes wingers instead of defenders...let's take the easy option) appear to be lacking since Colin Lee left.

Yeah because if he was still here we would be seeing superstars like Mo Camara performing, are you really that thick?

hector wrote:I have no worries about the financial management skills of our board.

But their manager selection skills (although there was not a manager selection process this time, other than, 'that bloke we promised could have his job back, well the fans don't want him, they want this other serial failure instead who likes wingers instead of defenders...let's take the easy option) appear to be lacking since Colin Lee left.

Bang on !

Southampton Gull wrote:
Yeah because if he was still here we would be seeing superstars like Mo Camara performing, are you really that thick?

Given the rest of the post, I'd say yes.

Matt.

Matt there are 14 Directors. They are;

Thea Bristow
Simon Baker
Bill Phillips
Alex Rowe
Andrew Candy
Alan Bristow
Cris Boyce
Mark Boyce
Tony Carter
Eric Coote
Ian Hayman
James o'Dwyer
Brian Palk
James Perry

I have made the assumption that the OS is up to date and correct. You may no differently.

The fact that we have one of the smallest budgets in League 2 makes it even more important that financial control is spot on.

You appear to have a very short memory.Has the Colin Lee saga escaped your memory? Do you not remember how the Board got stitched up?

Just because a firm of Accountants is doing the books means nothing. You are so naive. The last few years have shown over and over again the utter incompetance of some of the big firms of Accountants.

Tell me how does the "wage gap" affect TUFC?

I was a Company Secretary for many years and I can tell you from experience for every intelligent switched Director there are 5 duffers.

So no in answer to your question I am not convinced that our Board have the right business acumen to run A League Club which is why

so many Clubs get themselves into serious financial trouble.

No doubt I can expect a scathing reply but I remain unconvinced that our Board has enough quality to really make a difference. I nontheless applaud many of the improvements at Plainmoor in the last few years.

Bill Phillips

I have full confidence in the Board for the simple reason they are giving up their time and money to support the club they love - not for what they can get out of it for themselves. Anyone who takes on the role of a director of a club like Torquay must be mad or a committed fan, or maybe both. We had the second lowest gate on Saturday and week after week, our gates are amongst the lowest three or four. It stands to reason that if the money is not coming through the turnstiles on a Saturday, something has to give. I was going to mention that the only team with a lower gate on Saturday were Morecambe who were 3 - 0 down against Chesterfield and went on to win 4 - 3, but I won't.

Out of interest, does anyone know where the proceeds from the 50/50 draws go ?

Can't reply properly now, but wage CAP is what is killing us more than anything right now (we suspect).

SOME firms of accountants are shit, ours may well not be.

SOME directors of SOME companies are useless old duffers, nothing says ours are.

The Colin Lee saga was a lesson for the previous Board (featuring, admittedly, a number of present members) which the new Board will doubtless have heeded.

12 came from a reliable website, but that is based on the most recent set of filed accounts, so could well have been updated before the recent reshuffle.

Not scathing, you're right to be worried, you just need to be open to persuasion to the contrary. The Board are fine. They're not world beaters (or whatever the equivalent is), but they'll certainly never let us live beyond our means. That is infinitely preferable to doing what every other club in the League does and pissing away money after money chasing the highly improbable dream, only to see it all come crashing down around their ears a matter of months later and all for the boast of having had 'top-flight' football for a year or two.

Matt.

For accuracy, I am not a director.

Southampton Gull wrote:

Yeah because if he was still here we would be seeing superstars like Mo Camara performing, are you really that thick?

Oh yeah, because, of course, just look at how much better the team is doing since! Are you really that thick?

£500k in transfer fees, another play-off campaign, new stand................ we really have gone backwards since he left.

You actually are that thick aren't you?

Southampton Gull wrote:£500k in transfer fees, another play-off campaign, new stand................ we really have gone backwards since he left.

You actually are that thick aren't you?

Completely agree, one or two of the comments on here are quite unbelievable. It's all a bit Monty Python, what have the Romans ever done for us?