Shrimpsvoices

With our club struggling season on season to compete in the EFL, is it time for us to accept that we maybe better ploughing our trade in non league once again...even at a level below the National League

I'm coming round to the way of thinking that it might be better for the stability and long term future of our club as a big fish in a smaller pond than a little fish in a big pond trying to swim alongside the sharks and whales.

Year on year we struggle both in staving off relegation and the financial consequencies of that struggle simply to retain EFL membership when in truth we simply don't have the resources both on and off the field to be able to compete.

To rely season after season on the financial support and goodwill of a hard working Board and the financial resource of an outside body can't continue and with little sign of a new takeover on the horizon maybe it is time for us all to be realists and accept that the EFL journey should come to an end.

Would life back in non league be such a bad thing

At least we have some good memories for the scrap book of more better times in the EFL rather than the continued struggle to survive that has become the norm. Memories that other clubs can only dream of.

There will be those who will want to retain EFL membership...but at what cost...

Did I just read that or did I dream it ........... ??

Sensible post CC.The longer the ownership problem goes on the more likely it is that the club will eventually have to start from scratch.Unfortunately (or fortunately?) it's not our decision to make.

The FL novelty soon wore off. People want to see winning football first and foremost. I think if we dropped a few leagues but started to win the majority of games, our crowds would be bigger than they are now.

I would rather us carry on & see what the future holds rather than just throwing it all away. When we were at Christie Park it wasn't a problem being little Morecambe but now we have a modern stadium with facilities we then lose possibly more trade. We may not even get a sponsor for the stadium even if we went down as well.
I have stopped coming to matches; one because I can't afford it, & two because passion has gone & the negativity has set in.

If we were back playing Hyde United and Stalybridge etc, we would probably take 350 every week, and crowds at the Globe would probably stay something similar, IF we were winning?
However, there are around 7 or 8 sides in Conf North who get bigger gates than us now, and they cant get out of that league, so to say we would be a big fish is actually inaccurate.
No guarantee we would be able to attract and pay the players, not winning every week, the novelty would soon wear off and we are back to where we are now in a lower division??

It could happen, but I hope not.

Everything could change of course IF and it's a big IF there was some local financier with a passion for football (similar to the Fleetwood and Accrington owners) who was prepared to take control of our club and give it the financial stability it cries out for.

Unlike other clubs he or she wouldn't have to invest millions in a new stadium (other than improvements to the playing surface and the Omega stand). Money in revitalising the playing squad and funding a new training facility would be a priority but the basic infrastructure is already there and with new creative thinking could provide a regular income stream albeit not enough for the club to be totally self financing but certainly less of a financial cow on the current board.

How do you intend to replace the money the Club gets for being in the Football League?

[quote="Christies Child"]Everything could change of course IF and it's a big IF there was some local financier with a passion for football (similar to the Fleetwood and Accrington owners) who was prepared to take control of our club and give it the financial stability it cries out for.

Unlike other clubs he or she wouldn't have to invest millions in a new stadium (other than improvements to the playing surface and the Omega stand). Money in revitalising the playing squad and funding a new training facility would be a priority but the basic infrastructure is already there and with new creative thinking could provide a regular income stream albeit not enough for the club to be totally self financing but certainly less of a financial cow on the current board.

[/quote

I think we can all see that isn't going to happen CC. If it was it would have happened by now.

Can everyone just get a grip on themselves? So much negativity it's unbelievable! Ask any Darlington, Stockport, Hartlepool, Chester, Halifax (need I go on) fans if they would still rather be in the league and you would get a resounding 100% yes!! The Non League days were great and I loved every minute of our climb to the EFL and yes we have generally struggled since we got into the EFL, but surely having sweat blood and tears to get there you cling onto it to the bitter end. Look at Accy', this time last year they were where we are now and this season they are flying high. Anything can happen. Reading some of the posts on this forum really depresses me and you can see why we are struggling with so much negativity about. Some fans on here are best described as 'Wet Lettuce Leaves'. If all you want is winning football go and watch Man City then you might be happy. Be proud of what we have achieved and support the club through thick and thin.

Rant over.

COYS.

I love this ....it's actually the funniest post I've read for ages ....the way forward for the club is to drop down a couple of divisions ....maybe close all the stands and just have the Berlin Wall open ...jumpers for goalposts 18 lads on each side...nearest one to the goals can save it

In,come on port vale score a goal.

halfwayprawn wrote:In,come on port vale score a goal.

That goal resulted in us moving down to 3Rd from the bottom.

A win for Barnet would have been better.

I want us to stay in the Football League.

However, the austerity at the club means we’re in terminal decline. Cutting costs, particularly in commercial and marketing seems to be losing us more than we’d save with someone credible in place. The Shrimps Trust is now stronger on the commercial front and event organising than the club.

I’d like to see us go ‘shit or bust’. Cut gate prices, do some decent marketing and really go for it. If it doesn’t work then so be it. If it does, who knows, we could be another Accrington.

Christies Child wrote:

halfwayprawn wrote:In,come on port vale score a goal.

That goal resulted in us moving down to 3Rd from the bottom.

A win for Barnet would have been better.

A draw was best result IMHO

If Barnet had won the relegation spot would have been 4 points below us but its still 6.

And Port Vale are only 1 point above us as are about 3 other teams.

We need a minimum of a win , a draw and a loss from the 3 home games next week which will take us to 40 points,

Staying in all the way for me! I Don't know a couple of days with hardly any posts or arguments and then this gets started!! Someone's gone stir crazy

Had the club remained at its ancestral home then none of this would have mattered a damn, folk were happy with what they had and it seems Accrington find themselves on the cusp of joining League one with the worst ground in history and I bet they'll still be selling Hollands pies instead of prawn butties when they do.

We cannot turn back time, evolution has occurred ,albeit flawed, and it's a bigger set up without an escape hatch back to Christie park etc.

Anyone wishing to hark back to the past has the choice of Kendal, Barrow or Lancaster nearby to go and support, or alternately there's Fylde and Fleetwood for any lower league fans who are wanting a lower league experience with financial clout.

At the moment there is one priority for any real shrimps fan and that is to cheer the lads on, support the team in the relegation battle , and see what summer brings after we stay up, a buyer may sign up soon, but I suspect that it would be after we are safe rather than before.

One thing I did notice at accy last week was the atmosphere of a smaller ground, you couldn't argue the accy fans being loud and vocal.
Sometimes wonder why we built such a large stadium which even with gates of 2000 looks empty at times.
We need to all get behind the lads for the next 3 games as we need the points and to make sure we have another season in league 2.

I agree the club should drop the prices for these games like accy have and let's see how many more fans we can tempt to come and watch the matches

Phoenix Shrimp 2017 wrote:Can everyone just get a grip on themselves? So much negativity it's unbelievable! Ask any Darlington, Stockport, Hartlepool, Chester, Halifax (need I go on) fans if they would still rather be in the league and you would get a resounding 100% yes!! The Non League days were great and I loved every minute of our climb to the EFL and yes we have generally struggled since we got into the EFL, but surely having sweat blood and tears to get there you cling onto it to the bitter end. Look at Accy', this time last year they were where we are now and this season they are flying high. Anything can happen. Reading some of the posts on this forum really depresses me and you can see why we are struggling with so much negativity about. Some fans on here are best described as 'Wet Lettuce Leaves'. If all you want is winning football go and watch Man City then you might be happy. Be proud of what we have achieved and support the club through thick and thin.

Rant over.

COYS.

I don't think this was meant as an invitation to rant at those who don't agree with you, it was just asking whether people thought we'd be better off a division below or not.

Out for me. I haven't enjoyed being in League Two much at all. One caveat though was that in the Conference we had Jim Harvey's "all attack and no defence" tactics in play which always made it unpredictable and entertaining. In this division, doing that, we'd get murdered, we just haven't got the budget for players so I can see why Bentley does what he does. In the conference however, it would be fun and lead to bigger gates. It's the only way we could actually enjoy watching our football.

In for me and we wouldn’t be a big fish if we went down.

Teams who have gone down have traditionally struggled. Ask Salford City, FC United and Stockport who all have bigger budgets and crowds about getting out of the national league north.

Phoenix Shrimp 2017 wrote:Can everyone just get a grip on themselves? So much negativity it's unbelievable! Ask any Darlington, Stockport, Hartlepool, Chester, Halifax (need I go on) fans if they would still rather be in the league and you would get a resounding 100% yes!! The Non League days were great and I loved every minute of our climb to the EFL and yes we have generally struggled since we got into the EFL, but surely having sweat blood and tears to get there you cling onto it to the bitter end. Look at Accy', this time last year they were where we are now and this season they are flying high. Anything can happen. Reading some of the posts on this forum really depresses me and you can see why we are struggling with so much negativity about. Some fans on here are best described as 'Wet Lettuce Leaves'. If all you want is winning football go and watch Man City then you might be happy. Be proud of what we have achieved and support the club through thick and thin.

Rant over.

COYS.

^ This.

Absolutely THIS.

Can't believe people are saying out. I wasn't around during the Conference days (not being born etc) but to me it just seems like slightly pathetic nostalgia and a bit wet. I'm also fairly sure we'd do a York and get relegated again if we go down. We'd presumably have an even smaller budget than we do now, and I'm guessing we're all fairly sure that a lot of teams in the Conference already have a bigger budget than us? Also one super important point is that we lose the attraction to players of being an Football League club. Jim's knack of signing decent young players looking for experience/haven't made the cut at a higher level (Edwards, Barkhuizen, Whitmore) and top L2/potential L1 players who have gone off the radar due to form/injury etc (Miller, Devitt, Wildig, McGurk) will most likely be rendered useless. The clubs from the higher leagues loaning us their players usually want them to get FL experience, and if the player is released they want to keep gaining FL experience and not slip off the radar into the Conference. Same with the out of form bunch, they want to rebuild their career a bit and will happily with a pay cut at a small L2 club but I can imagine wouldn't want to slip off into non-league. Being a Football League clubs often helps us get the better players we get and without that pull factor (and probably even less money) I really think we'd be utterly screwed.

Christies Child wrote:

halfwayprawn wrote:In,come on port vale score a goal.

That goal resulted in us moving down to 3Rd from the bottom.

A win for Barnet would have been better.

As it stands, I think that Barnet, Chesterfield and Grimsby are the only 3 that may finish below us so no way did I want Barnet to win, but a draw will do.
It's in our hands particularly with 2 home games against the bottom 2.... no excuses and please, please don't wait till the other team score before we start to play....

I want us to stay up cos it took us so long to get here and there is nothing telling me that we would be anywhere near getting back.
We would still have League rules in the Conference so it wouldnt be the same anyway, we would lose most of the players we've got no doubt and we would still be no higher up that League IMO

Some people are suggesting that we would have bigger crowds if we dropped, but I'm sure elsewhere stats have been posted that show that wasn't the case previously, and given the antipathy towards The Globe in some quarters how on earth could we drop to Conference North and get better crowds than we have now? Also the budget would be smaller anyway as we would have no FL money. If we drop it will only be worse than it is now, so stay up for me. It's this type of blinkered nostalgia that led to the bloody Brexit vote!