Steve and Charlie gave some details about the hospitality packages available next year and a bit about the general long-term plans for the club, fed us, and had a Q&A with Nathan. Entertaining, nothing groundbreaking, but everyone came over very well.
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He was there because this is very much under his remit as it related to the income of the club and he oversees the strategic thinking of the club. With the likes of Steve Sutherland reporting in to him.
It was a good evening and it was really good to have a chat with Nathan and for him to then do a brief Q&A. Funnily enough he was just as open and transparent as you would expect him to be. Comes across very well
As did Charlie. In fairness I gave him a hard time at the beginning but he's always very erudite and honest with me and I firmly believe he is in this to succeed. He is the conduit between the money men and the senior management team. He is also not too proud to call upon the experience of previous senior staff and he said he's regularly in touch with Richard Murray, Roger Alwen, Martyn simons and Peter Varney for their opinions.
I must also say it is starting to look like this might be an exciting few years coming up. Hopefully we continue moving forwards on the pitch but there are also a lot of good things happening behind the scenes with coaching and the medical team etc. We are getting the right people in the right jobs - when was the last time we said that about Charlton??
Do you really mean that, because that statement is one that raises more questions than answers?
Charlie gathered together a group of investors.
Sold the idea of Charlton to them - "8th best academy in the country, best community trust in the country, 12th best womens team in the country, large ground in good condition, space to expand the stadium if that's the desire (more so than many clubs). All things that make us appealing and unique as well as some stats about our catchment area and potential fan base. They can see a huge amount of potential growth.
So the management structure is split to allocate specific roles and responsibilities to specific people without spreading people too thin. It's basically the opposite of what Thomas was trying to achieve which was just bottleneck.
Whether it is TOO top heavy remains to be seen. Whether there are too many chiefs and not enough indians remains to be seen.
Perhaps the upturn in form is influencing the tint of my spectacles, but I for the first time in many years (I did get sucked into Sandgaard’s ‘moment’ of enthusiasm for his first 6 months in charge) feel that we are a club on the up and focused on better times.
The most exciting of those developments was the Mountain to Valley partnership which was confirmed to give CAFC first refusal on any player graduating from the Mount Pleasant Academy based in Jamaica but drawing from all of the elite young players across the Caribbean islands. The thought of first dibs on a Leon Bailey or Dwight Yorke of the future coming to the Valley sounds like a great prospective route to boosting our academy pool.
Andy Scott has been noticeably quiet since he arrived. Was the rumour that that the investor group pulled rank on their SMT and pushed for Jones?
And then what?
Exercises no decision making of his own?
Or does he control the purse strings, as in ‘I have now overseen your strategic thinking, but have unilaterally decided we can pay for this thing, but not that thing’. None of which are his own ideas or plans.
If I am right the bloke who says he is a mere minority shareholder is actually in charge.
At the end of the day he was there last night. He spoke - and spoke well. The future could be very bright. There will inevitably be bumps in the road but we are secure so perhaps you could just enjoy it and embrace it
And btw - yes, there was a vegetarian option available last night
Maybe that is interesting to nobody else but me.
We were all interested when it was Glicksten, Hulyer, Fryer, Alwen, Murray, the Spivs, Duchatelet, Nimer, and Sandgaard but this lot are exempt from scrutiny seemingly.