Trust Attend Coca-Cola Fans Forum
Situated in the Marston Suite we were introduced to our guest panel, Mark Saggers, the presenter of Radio 5 Live Sport on Five, Director of the Football League, Stuart Regan, and Managers from Leeds United, Preston North End and our host Club Neil Warnock of Sheffield United. Phil Brown was also due to attend but had an emergency meeting with the Board of Derby County Football Club, as we later found out this would be the last meeting between these two.
The first topic on the agenda was the Transfer Window a straw poll was almost unanimous in wanting to scrap the Window, in fact only one brave person admitted to wanting to keep the window. The banter between Billy Davis and Kevin Blackwell provided much of the entertainment for the evening, as the Leeds manager admitted he no longer had a scouting policy instead he just went to Preston for new players!
The scandal regarding agents arose next. The three managers stated that there were good and bad agents in the game, and it was annoying when papers speculated about transfers and bungs, if people had hard facts then names should be bought out into the open. No-one from the fans thought that the Premier Leagues enquiry would bring any changes to the way agents acted.
Neil Warnock moved the conversation onto the next England Manager; the entire panel agreed that with the English talent available to the FA the next manager should be English. This led to a heated debate between the fans and the managers, another straw poll was taken and a large majority of people in the room want an English manager to replace Sven, but agreed that Sven had done a good job.
After a break for the News the Fans Forum began again this time the conversation was on capping the number of foreign players in a squad and the Academy. With the Sky Blues current Save Our Academy Appeal we listened in earnest to the opinions of the managers, all of whom stated Academy were the future of football and the way the Club’s could generate income. Leeds United have recently had two fifteen years old sign for Chelsea and this is now going before a tribunal so more details could not be given. All Mangers thought that the system needed to change to protect the youngsters, Neil Warnock said that some of his younger players had been loaned to lower league clubs to help improve them by playing in front of larger crowds and experiencing a match-day atmosphere.
Stuart Regan introduced the ticket prices and asked the Forum if people thought they were getting value for money. The average price for two adults and two children is £53.00 this compares to £58.00 for the same people to go to the Ricoh Arena. It was agreed that more needed to be done to encourage children to attend games. Fans thought that there should be standard promotions for children at both home and away games, one Preston fan stated that it was free for under 7’s to attend Deepdale but at Bramall Lane the price was £16.50 for Away fans. Stuart Regan told the fans that the Football League could not cap ticket prices as this is illegal but Football Clubs can charged Home fans a promotional price without lowering the price for Away fans four times a season and this was in the Football League Regulations.
The meeting closed by telling fans that the Football League would be having an awards ceremony on 5th March 2006 at London Hilton, Park Lane and there would be an award for the Football Club who had done the most for their Community.