Firstly, I’d like to congratulate Neil and his team for their exciting victory over Wigan Athletic on Saturday. We worked hard, were well organized and entertained as we deservedly grabbed the three points. We’ve seen a Neil Critchley team grow and gel before and I am confident that we are again on the right track. I am excited to see how this season pans out.
I write today though because over recent weeks and months my commitment to our Club has, from some parts, been brought into question. As a reminder, I stepped in to buy Blackpool Football Club in 2019 because I wanted to secure its survival for future generations of fans. I insisted as a part of the sale process that I would only buy the full 96.2% of the Club and not the 76.2% that was originally available. I did this to ensure that the Club was free of its previous owners and so that we, as a fanbase, could unite under single ownership. To achieve this and to ensure that I, rather than any of the other three less credible bidders acquired the Club, I paid a full price for what in reality was a very distressed asset that had suffered years of chronic under-investment. Then, as now, my motives were not financial.
Since then, I have ploughed a further GBP18m of my family’s money into the Club. In this financial year alone, I expect to provide an additional GBP5m, this before any contribution to any large infrastructure projects. It’s this level of commitment that keeps Blackpool Football Club operational. It’s this investment that has given us a likely top six playing budget, and enables us to pay, for Kyle Joseph, the highest known transfer fee this year in League One. It’s this money that has helped us to bring in established pro’s like Oliver Norburn, Matthew Pennington, Richard O’Donnell and Jordan Rhodes, whilst also sign younger players such as Kyle, Tashan Oakley-Boothe, Albie Morgan and Kylian Kouassi - players who will hopefully develop into our stars of the future. It’s this that has allowed us to loan highly rated youngsters like Jensen Weir and Karamoko Dembele. I doubt that there is another owner or ownership group in League One that will make as large a financial contribution this season as the GBP5m that I will likely inject.
“But where’s the Critchley/Bowler/Yates money gone?” is the recent refrain. It’s certainly not been spent on wedding venues or woolly mammoths! These incoming transfer fee payments are staggered over time but the monies so far received have contributed to the spend on the playing squad. Player trading and reinvesting a majority of the income from player sales back into the playing squad is a vital part of our strategy and combined with my personal investment helps us to pay meaningful transfer fees, source high quality loan players and most importantly support a significantly higher wage bill than when we were last in this division. This has resulted in a transfer window and an assembled squad that the football professionals within the Club are more than happy with. I can also further assure you all that with David Downes in-situ we will use future windows as an opportunity to further improve the squad as we did every window when Neil was last with us.
When I first bought the Club I said that I ultimately wanted it to operate in a manner in which it was able to sustain itself. The owner-funded model of our community football clubs is a dangerous one. Using Saturday’s opponents Wigan as an example, they have had severe financial difficulties recently under two sets of overseas owners until finding what I hope for them will be long-term stability under their new local owner who I’m sure understands the value and importance of the Club to the town. Other local clubs such as Bury have not been so lucky as they had no benefactor step in to save them when they encountered financial difficulties. There is clearly a trade-off between sustainability and ambition and as custodian my aim is for the Club to survive and thrive over time. The amount of cash that I continue to inject into our Club clearly demonstrates though that I am funding us at the ambitious rather than the sustainable end of the spectrum. It is a shame that all of this is not better understood across the entirety of our fanbase.
I recognise that being the custodian of Blackpool Football Club is not just a financial responsibility. A lot of the big decisions roll up to me and I know that I will be judged on their outcomes. Unfortunately, outcomes cannot be guaranteed but I can say that all decisions are taken with the best interests of the football club at heart, although it is inevitable that mistakes will sometimes be made. I relish and embrace this responsibility that comes with being the owner of the Club and expect to be so for many years to come. In saying that, I only want what is best for the town and the Club. If there is anyone out there who has the means to fund the Club and believes that they are a more suitable custodian of Blackpool Football Club than I, then they should make themselves known and I will hear them out.
Finally, I hope that we can all agree that it’s time for us to put the disappointments of last season firmly behind us and to look forward. I hope that for the rest of the season we can all get behind the team and you can roar us to success as you did on Saturday. When on song, no fans top Blackpool fans and nowhere beats a packed Bloomfield Road.
On behalf of the Club, I thank you for your ongoing support.
UTMP
Simon
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