Anonymous, As I understand it Weymouth were bankrolled by Martyn Harrison, who I am led to believe sold one of his holiday centres to do it, with a view to them becoming self financing in the longer term. This has not happened and their average gates have been dropping consistently this season from a high of 3500+ in September to just over 2,400 in December. Martyn's aim remains the same but the club obviously has not achieved the level of self financing that he expected and the cloth is being cut accordingly before the club goes t*ts up - sound financial management in my view.

This situation does not and, as far as I know, has never has applied at Welling and it reinforces the lessons people should have learned from Hornchurch, Crawley et al that bankrolling a club may be effective in the short term but it is doomed to failure unless there is a radical shake up of the administration and commercial sides. Just spending megabucks on players doesn't necessarily of itself bring results (though to be fair Weymouth are doing well), does not of itself bring in the crowds and doesn't automatically bring sponsors on board.

Even at the peak of his criticism I don't think JgFc has ever said commit everything and go for it s**t or bust. He has said that additional revenue from Cup competitions, sales etc should result in some investment in the team and that the commercial arm of the club needs to far more professional and proactive. We have no bankrolling and it is thus a totally different scenario to Weymouth but the investment and marketing arguments are the same.

-- Edited by bruno at 16:21, 2007-01-11