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Post by Rio Doherty on Feb 22, 2024 13:37:44 GMT
Torquay United Owner Clarke Osborne has today stood down as Chairman, and has withdrawn all funding. An Administrator is going to be appointed to run the club until they can find a new Owner, so very desperate times for Torquay. They’re currently millions in debt, languishing in 11th-place in the National League South after their relegation last season, there’s very little communication between the club and supporters (who are planning on doing a protest this Saturday), while Manager Gary Johnson is past his sell-by date and has lost the fans. Hope they can get things sorted, as they’re a similar-sized club to us and I’ve always enjoyed my trips down to Plainmoor. Just another case of an out-of-touch Owner running away, with the diehard loyal fans having to pick up the tab. A fair few of their fans have been discussing the possibility of a Phoenix club recently, so I’m sure we could offer them advice if needed.
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Post by Si on Feb 22, 2024 14:02:39 GMT
Always enjoyed the trips to Plainmoor, and are a club similar to ourselves that in terms of history and fanbase should be a league or two higher up the footballing ladder. Whilst we all understand the limitations of being fan owned, it's things like this that remind me how lucky we are. Any privately owned club at our levels are at the mercy of whoever owns them, and these days I don't think there are that many prospective owners with the wealth and integrity needed to take the reigns, especially if there are large amounts of debt to be cleared. Rochdale are another that seem like they could be in the shit. Unless you are a Premier League club, the majority of football clubs are a loss making venture and will rarely attract well meaning owners unless it's a cash rich supporter. Only have to look at the growing amount of traditional league clubs that are going fan owned to see that this clearly should be the blueprint for how to effectively operate within your means in the lower levels whilst safeguarding your club from the perils of being private owned. The way it's going, there will be more proper traditional clubs below National League level, whilst that level will continue to be saturated by recently relegated League 2 teams who find it hard to get back out of it, and cockney vanity projects in front of 600 fans.
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Post by Churton Blue on Feb 22, 2024 14:08:24 GMT
Torquay United Owner Clarke Osborne has today stood down as Chairman, and has withdrawn all funding. An administrator is going to be appointed to run the club until they can find a new Owner, so very desperate times for Torquay. They’re currently millions in debt, languishing in 11th-place in the National League South after their relegation last season, there’s very little communication between the club and supporters (who were planning on doing a protest this Saturday), while Manager Gary Johnson is past his sell-by date and has lost the fans. Hope they can get things sorted, as they’re a similar-sized club to us and I’ve always enjoyed my trips down to Plainmoor. Just another case of an out-of-touch Owner running away, with the diehard loyal fans having to pick up the tab. A fair few of their fans have been discussing the possibility of a Phoenix club recently, so I’m sure we could offer them advice if needed. Clarke Osborne was a Director of a company that acquired the old ground of Bristol Rovers, Eastville. The club were evicted and Osborne made a sizeable profit from the sale of the stadium for development. He then bought Torquay Unitd and put a lot of effort into persuading the local council into selling him Plainmoor. You can make a good guess as to what would have happened next. The Council have not played ball so it looks like Osbourne has given up. As Torbay Council own the ground a phoenix club maybe possible but they may just sell it for housing if Torquay go bust. Grim times to be a Torquay fan especially as they looked nailed on to return to the League a few years ago. However, Osborne was loading debt on to the club and losing over a million a season in the process. The gamble failed and they have been heading for bankruptcy ever since. |
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Post by Lon on Feb 22, 2024 19:16:16 GMT
Their manager Gary Johnson has left now. Abandoned the sinking ship
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Post by Churton Blue on Feb 22, 2024 21:31:52 GMT
The BBC take on matters. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/68372224Highly unlikely Osborne ever funded the club in the way the BBC states. A Thai named PHATHANACHAROEN resigned as a Director of the Torquay Utd parent company in December 2023. The BBC fail to mention that Osborne got paid a 160k bonus for selling Eastville to IKEA and leaving Bristol Rovers homeless. He also had a substantial shareholding in the company he worked for and benefitted from the profit his company made that year. Eastville was sold for 19 million. |
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Post by southernblue on Feb 27, 2024 21:48:35 GMT
Weymouth are donating Torquay £5.00 for every away ticket for Saturday's game against them. Capacity of 1,800 for away fans. If I wasn't working away from Dorset this Saturday, I'd have been tempted to join the Gulls in the away end.
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Post by SuperNickyWroe on Mar 4, 2024 10:31:35 GMT
The BBC take on matters. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/68372224Highly unlikely Osborne ever funded the club in the way the BBC states. A Thai named PHATHANACHAROEN resigned as a Director of the Torquay Utd parent company in December 2023. The BBC fail to mention that Osborne got paid a 160k bonus for selling Eastville to IKEA and leaving Bristol Rovers homeless. He also had a substantial shareholding in the company he worked for and benefitted from the profit his company made that year. Eastville was sold for 19 million. Hi all, Thanks for your support.  The Thai director you have mentioned is in fact Osborne's wife. He also turned over Reading and Swindon Speedway the same way as Brizzie Rovers. The man is not to be trusted. There was/is no way that Torbay Council would have sold the freehold of Plainmoor to Osborne. If he had actually built a stadium in the first place, he may have got somewhere. Instead, he has gambled £5m on trying to get the freehold. |
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Post by Rio Doherty on Mar 13, 2024 16:13:47 GMT
The Gulls have been deducted ten points, which puts them in 17th - three points above the National League South relegation zone.
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