Football clubs are valuable social assets. Their heritage typically goes back to the late Victorian period, when football emerged as the most popular sport of the working class. They have had close association with other local enterprises, particularly breweries (McCrae, 2008), and club directors were often significant employers in the area. Towards the end of the twentieth century, however, smaller clubs were struggling to draw support, as younger generations were lured to the big names. The likes of Liverpool and Chelsea became global brands, with vast income from televised matches and sponsorship. Bury FC was wound up in 2019, and several other clubs have diced with death. As explained by John Tribe at the University of Liverpool (20 January 2023), insolvency procedures have tightened, and clubs often find themselves at the mercy of His Majesty's Revenue Collection.
When taken over in a state of financial distress, football clubs are vulnerable to the whims of rescuing investors. Yet however precariously positioned clubs may be in the league table and on the balance sheet, their loyal supporters can ensure survival against all odds.
We shall not be moved
'You make me happy when skies are grey', sang the fans of Morton FC (quite appropriately in the west of Scotland climate). But the last line of the adapted popular song, 'please don't take my Morton away',' became awfully prescient when the club was threatened with a move to the other side of Glasgow.
The Glasgow broadsheet Herald (8 May 2000) reported on 'a struggling team playing in a dilapidated stadium with, apparently, little hope for the future'. On the last day of the 1999-2000 season two thousand marched from the town centre to Cappielow Park, led by former player Allan McGraw (the highest goal-scorer in Scottish League history). and after the match a hundred staged a sit-in on the centre circle.
In their 125th year, Morton was in serious trouble, lacking money to pay players. Earlier in that season its fate was briefly entangled with the demise of another club 40 miles away. Heavily in debt, Lanarkshire club Airdrieonians had sold its Broomfield Road ground to the Safeway supermarket chain in 1994. Conveniently, Clyde FC from southern Glasgow had moved to a new stadium in Cumbernauld in the same year. This was nearer to Airdrie than to Clyde's old ground in Rutherglen, and Airdrieonians played there for four seasons before moving into their new Excelsior Stadium. However, the club failed to draw sufficient crowds to tackle its crippling debt. Amalgamation with Morton was then mooted. Airdrieonians went into liquidation in February 2000, and ceased trading on 1st May 2002 (Herald, 2 May 2002). That was not the end of the story, though.
In summer 2000 Morton chairman Hugh Scott announced that Mike Peden would be buying the club. A quantity surveyor, Peden had previously bought Darlington FC. After promising to take the County Durham club into the Premiership, instead it almost collapsed (Northern Echo, 15 October 2003). Nonetheless, Scott was impressed by Peden's plans for Morton, but supporters feared being taken out of the frying pan and into the fire. After a deluge of opposition from the local community the takeover was abandoned. Morton survived, and the club strives to return to the Premier League after nearly four decades in the lower divisions.
In recent decades many football clubs have lost their hallowed ground, typically moving to a soulless all-seater stadium on the outskirts of town, while the old patch was lucrative for housing and retail developers. Exeter City, after a major modernisation of St James Park, is now in negotiations to move to the edge of the city, as the council wants the land for its urban redevelopment plan (Devon Live, 25 September 2020). Some clubs have moved far from the town or area of their name (as with Clyde moving fifteen miles away). In 2017 Millwall directors considered moving to the Kent coast, as the ground owner Lewisham council eyed The Den for 'regeneration'. After outrage the council withdrew its plan and Millwall stayed in its former docklands home (Kent Online, 25 January 2017).
Royal marriage
Supporters of other clubs have needed to put their directors back in the box when threatening to sell out. In 1983 media mogul Robert Maxwell, then chairman of Oxford United, proposed a merger with Reading, creating 'Thames Valley Royals' (Guardian, 19 January 2024). Having gained approval from most of the Reading directors including chairman Frank Waller, Maxwell took a 19% share in the Berkshire club, and he pursued a controlling interest. Meanwhile Oxford United's directors unanimously supported Maxwell at a board meeting held on 20th April 1983. As the 1982-1983 season was ending, Maxwell announced publicly the two clubs would become one, playing alternately at each other's grounds until building of a new stadium (potentially at Didcot).
Both sets of supporters protested vigorously against the unsolicited marriage. On 23rd April, two thousand Oxford fans sat on the pitch at the Manor Ground, delaying the match by half an hour and jeering Maxwell as he watched from the grandstand. Unmoved, Maxwell claimed that both clubs were in financial dire straits and that uniting them was necessary for survival, remarking that 'nothing short of the end of the Earth will prevent this from going through' (BBC Sport, 13 June 2013). On the previous day, as Reading was about to officially announce the merger, Waller was handed a High Court injunction blocking sale of shares. Reading supporters marched from the town centre to Elm Park before the match on 30th April, and two days later Oxford and Reading played each other in a surreal atmosphere. When the High Court issued a further injunction, Maxwell retreated.
Under chairman John Madejski, in 1998 Reading moved to the impressive Madejski Stadium. Many supporters lamented the loss of their club's home for over a century (Berkshire Live, 12 March 2022), but the Taylor Report following the Hillsborough disaster decreed all-seater stadia in the upper levels, and the pleasant Elm Park would have been drastically reduced in capacity. In 2006 Reading rose to the Premiership, where it played for several seasons. Oxford United, meanwhile, has had fewer ups than downs on the pitch – but its loyal supporters have settled in their own new ground.
West of Stirlingshire
Some clubs have been through worse trauma than Oxford and Reading. Back in the Sixties, a Scottish League club was decanted forty miles away in an absurd venture that lasted less time than the United Arab Republic (the short-lived union of Syria and Egypt from 1958 to 1961). The story began in 1957 when the Glasgow car salesmen Jack and Charles Steedman acquired a 51% share in East Stirlingshire (Herald, 10 November 2004). Playing in the shadow of Falkirk FC, East Stirlingshire was small in every way – its ground, playing staff, support and ambition. The club had only one signed player and its Firs Park ground was rented from British Railways on a year-to-year lease. Attendances dropped below two hundred, as East Stirling finished bottom of the Scottish League.
Determined to build the club to compete at the top level, the Steedmans signed players from the thriving junior leagues (a status denoting level rather than players' age), and In 1962-63 East Stirling gained promotion to the First Division. Crowds reached an average of three thousand, but this was not enough to pay full-time players' wages. After relegation the whole squad was put up for sale.
The Steedmans decided to move the club to more fertile pastures. In March 1964 they met the directors of Clydebank Juniors, who were enticed by a deal that would elevate their club to the senior level while remaining at Kilbowie Park. On 9th April the Clydebank club's annual general meeting voted 21 to 7 in favour. A week later the Steedmans held a press conference in Glasgow to announce the merger between East Stirlingshire and Clydebank Juniors.
The news shocked the East Stirling supporters' club, the second-largest shareholder, which was committed to blocking the move from Falkirk. The Steedmans cancelled an extraordinary general meeting on 24th April, and in May they confirmed that the merger was ratified by solicitors for both sides. The team would be known as 'ES Clydebank'. Work began on dismantling the enclosure at Firs Park to transport it to Clydebank. In desperation East Stirlingshire Supporters Club sent letters to all Scottish League clubs seeking help, but merely four replied, while the football authorities stated that they had no reason to intervene.
The Clydebank public welcomed the new club, with six thousand watching the opening game. Eight of the team had played in East Stirlingshire's last game, while the entire Clydebank Juniors team had been released. After a bright start to the season, in the new year of 1965 ES Clydebank lost the derby with Dumbarton, while the Steedmans were facing defeat in court. An East Stirling shareholder James Middlemass had contended that the Steedmans' transfer of shares outside the company breached the club constitution, and the judge agreed to an enquiry. The court case was convened in March 1965 to allow a judgment in time for arrangements for the following season.
At a Court of Session on 7th May 1965 Lord Hunter ruled that the transfer of shares resulting in the move of East Stirlingshire to Clydebank was invalid and should be nullified. He concluded that the move to Clydebank was for the brothers' interests rather than the benefit of East Stirlingshire, and the threat of bankruptcy was exaggerated for a club that had always lived on a shoestring. Six days later at an extraordinary general meeting it was agreed that East Stirlingshire would return to Firs Park and revert to black and white stripes. Charles Steedman was deposed as chairman and Jack Steedman as secretary. The new chairman would be James Middlemass.
The Steedmans joined the board of financially healthy Clydebank. However, having vacated its place in the junior league, and then lost its membership of the Second Division, Clydebank had no football to play. The club applied for membership of the Scottish League in its own right, but failed to gain the required support of two thirds of Scottish clubs. Instead, Clydebank joined the professional clubs' reserve league, where it played for one season before being accepted into the Scottish League for the 1966/67 season.
Passion is not readily quantified, and the small band of denizens of Firs Park got their club back. Twenty years later Jack Steedman remarked that 'we knew at the time that it was wrong of us to deprive the handful of people immersed in the club of the right to watch the team on Saturday.' (Beyond the Last Man, 27 February 2018)
The Steedmans left a dark stain on Clydebank too. The club gained a place alongside Rangers and Celtic in the new Premier League in 1975, but after relegation attendances declined. In 1996 the Steedmans sold Kilbowie, necessitating ground-sharing first with Dumbarton and then Morton, while hopes of a new ground in Clydebank were dashed. When Airdrieonians went bust in 2002, a consortium bought Clydebank and moved it to the Lanarkshire town, renamed as 'Airdrie United' (When Saturday Comes, September 2002). A group of Clydebank supporters founded a new club, returning to the junior league.
Plough Lane odyssey
The most infamous relocation was that of Wimbledon FC to Milton Keynes, sixty miles away. Wimbledon had made remarkably rapid progress from a Southern League club to gain promotion to the top division of the Football League in 1986, and winning the FA Cup in 1988. However, its Plough Lane ground was too tight for the visit of clubs like Arsenal and Manchester United. While the club sought a new stadium in south London, it spent several seasons playing at Crystal Palace and Charlton. A supporters' boycott emptied the club's coffers, and inevitably Wimbledon was relegated.
A key figure in the saga was Lebanese club chairman Sam Hammam, who went from hero to villain. Hammam went as far as exploring a move to Dublin. He then focused on Milton Keynes, where the local development corporation had for years been seeking a deal to bring a Football League club to the sprawling new town. In 2002, after a year of deliberations, a Football Association tribunal agreed that Wimbledon could transfer its operations. Wimbledon was sold to Pete Winkleman's Inter MK Group, and the club was renamed using the nicknamed shortening of the former club. Winkleman's consortium declared (Guardian, 21 January 2004): -
'We feel the name 'Milton Keynes Dons FC' will represent the past, present and future and place the club at the heart of its new community. '
As it moved to its new home at the National Hockey Stadium in September 2003, the club went into administration and sold most of its players. However, MK Dons progressed on and off the pitch, particularly after moving to a new stadium of 28000 capacity. Wherever MK Dons played, the players and supporters had a hostile reaction from opposing fans (to some extent, fearful of what might happen to their own club).
The controversial move of Wimbledon to Milton Keynes was criticised as franchising, a common practice in the USA, whereby successful sports teams are bought and moved from city to city. Sociologist John Williams at University of Leicester (3 August 2018) explained: -
'Baseball and NFL clubs sometimes relocate in the middle of the night to avoid any unnecessary unpleasantness. Australian Rules clubs have also upped sticks for a better deal elsewhere. But for professional football in England, the MK Dons episode was something of a modern first – and it was not well liked. The respected national football magazine When Saturday Comes still refuses to include the Dons in its pre-season predictions – and fans at rival clubs have little time for the Milton Keynes faithful. This audacious – or atrocious – move, depending on your predilections, gets to the very heart of the debate about the relationship between sport, local communities and place. Nearly all football clubs in England and Wales are still named after the places they were formed. History matters.'
In the summer of 2002, supporters formed a breakaway club, AFC Wimbledon, which joined the Combined Counties League, at the ninth level of the football pyramid. Playing its first match at Sandhurst Town on 17th August 2002, AFC Wimbledon drew incongruously large crowds to basic, tree-lined grounds in the Home Counties. Playing home games at Kingstonian FC, the club steadily hacked through the undergrowth of the lower leagues and in 2011 gained promotion back to the Football League (since the 1990s a separate structure of Premier League and three divisions of the Championship). In 2016 the reformed Wimbledon reached the third level where it crossed swords with its nemesis MK Dons. Perhaps in poetic justice, Wimbledon was promoted and MK Dons relegated, and in 2020 the former club returned to Plough Lane, at a new 9125-seat stadium (BBC Sport, 2 November 2020).
Conclusion
Most football club chairmen and directors work in the best interests of the team and its supporters, in a highly competitive environment. Some new owners, however, have other ideas. With radical plane to move or rebrand, they conflate change with progress, often more motivated by financial gain than continuing the club's heritage.
Assem Allam, an Egyptian businessman who rescued Hull City from financial ruin in 2010, demanded that the club be renamed 'Hull Tigers'. He probably did not expect supporters of a club with the same nickname to oppose him so bitterly, but like Maxwell he doubled down, threatening to withdraw his money from the club unless he got his way (Daily Mail, 3 October 2014). Allam's rationale was that 'Hull Tigers' would attract more support and investment from abroad, but the football authorities barred the name change.
Similarly, Cardiff City, with its nickname of 'Bluebirds', was set for a colour rebranding by Malaysian owners Tan Sri Vincent Tan and Dato Chan Tien Ghee, who had stepped in to a club saddled with debt (Daily Mirror, 9 October 2013). The team strip and club badge were changed from blue to red, supposedly to appeal to football audiences in the Far East. Cardiff City fans were horrified, refusing to purchase redesigned scarves and replica shirts, and soon the Bluebirds were back in their rightful blue.
In such cases, supporters are confronted with a choice of accepting change or having no club at all. Indeed, traditional fans may be regarded as an encumbrance by ambitious new owners. Never a football fanatic, Robert Maxwell saw Oxford United as a business investment, and his proposed merger with Reading showed the inability of a global tycoon to understand the local rivalries that make football so meaningful. John Tribe (20 January 2023) suggested that clubs should seek partnership with the local authority rather than risking their future with businessmen who lack any connection to the area. However, as experienced by Millwall supporters, councils may not prioritise the football club when there are housing targets to fulfil. Tribe's other suggestion may be more durable: a community collective running the club as a not-for-profit entity. Football proves that people power still counts.
References
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BBC Sport (2 November 2020): AFC Wimbledon finish Plough Lane odyssey 18 years after formation. AFC Wimbledon finish Plough Lane odyssey 18 years after formation - BBC Sport
Berkshire Live (12 March 2022): Reading FC fans left in tears over Elm Park farewell. Reading FC fans left in tears over Elm Park farewell - Berkshire Live (getreading.co.uk)
Beyond the Last Man (27 February 2018): The merger that shook Scottish football – the ES Clydebank story. The Merger That Shook Scottish Football – The ES Clydebank Story – Beyond The Last Man
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