A year ago today.....

We just beat a Scunny 2-0 away and everything was great.....we were on the up!
Who could imagine a year later.........

It’s only football but it hurts.....

we've had a shocker of a footballing year  UTM

We have had 20 years in the Championship.  Now for many many years we cannot get into the top half of Div 2.

Quoted from TownSNAFU5

We have had 20 years in the Championship.  Now for many many years we cannot get into the top half of Div 2.

Unfortunately this is our level now. I wish we were bigger, but we need to be honest with ourselves and say that we were batting well above in the old 1st Division. But football isn't the same anymore, life isn't the same and we just don't attract enough fans and players to be a big club anymore. Unfortunately we are a yoyo club, without any good directorship, we have just been bouncing around the top of non league and bottom of League 2 for the last 15 years. We never used the promotion as a push to make the club better and we all know why that was.

But we are never going to be a Championship team any more, we will be lucky to ever be a League 1 club. That is down to the fact that we rarely get above 4/5k through the gates week in week out, so don't have the revenue to support it. Hate to say it, but look at Lincoln, very similar, if not worse than us for last 20/30 years. Bouncing around League 2 and non league playing hoof ball. Then get promoted and the buzz is there, double their attendances and double their income. Look at them now, and yes I am envious as that could have been us.

But we have new leadership coming in to the club, with new ideas and new ways to push the club forward. Will they work? Who knows, but its well worth the try as the last lot have made a right hash of it. I will be honest here and say, all I want to watch is a successful Town team winning games, something we haven't had for the last 5 years. If that means we get relegated and start again, then so be it. It may take years, it may take longer than last time, it may not. But we had some great away days and games in non league, we can't say we didn't enjoy ourselves, most of the time. UTM.

Quoted from LouthMariner

Unfortunately this is our level now. I wish we were bigger, but we need to be honest with ourselves and say that we were batting well above in the old 1st Division. But football isn't the same anymore, life isn't the same and we just don't attract enough fans and players to be a big club anymore. Unfortunately we are a yoyo club, without any good directorship, we have just been bouncing around the top of non league and bottom of League 2 for the last 15 years. We never used the promotion as a push to make the club better and we all know why that was.

But we are never going to be a Championship team any more, we will be lucky to ever be a League 1 club. That is down to the fact that we rarely get above 4/5k through the gates week in week out, so don't have the revenue to support it. Hate to say it, but look at Lincoln, very similar, if not worse than us for last 20/30 years. Bouncing around League 2 and non league playing hoof ball. Then get promoted and the buzz is there, double their attendances and double their income. Look at them now, and yes I am envious as that could have been us.

But we have new leadership coming in to the club, with new ideas and new ways to push the club forward. Will they work? Who knows, but its well worth the try as the last lot have made a right hash of it. I will be honest here and say, all I want to watch is a successful Town team winning games, something we haven't had for the last 5 years. If that means we get relegated and start again, then so be it. It may take years, it may take longer than last time, it may not. But we had some great away days and games in non league, we can't say we didn't enjoy ourselves, most of the time. UTM.

I find that a little defeatist. There is absolutely way we should be where we are right now, facing relegation into non-league for a second time.

There were about 20 clubs who averaged lower gates than us last season, and that’s with a team struggling in League Two. If we were to find ourselves doing reasonably well in League One, playing decent football, there’s probably a good 30 clubs who’d be pulling in lower gates than us.

You have to remember that much of the last 20 years have been an absolutely dire spectacle for Town fans, and gates will reflect this. But with a fair wind, and a new stadium, I don’t think it’s inconceivable that we could be hitting five figure gates on a regular basis which is sufficient to give you a crack at getting into the Championship, even if staying there would always be difficult for a club like Town.

Where we are right now is a million miles away from that of course, but that’s not due to a lack of fan base, we’re not Macclesfield, it’s due to years and years of negligent ownership.

I would urge Town fans to stay positive regardless of the situation at the minute. This club has been very, very sick for some time now, but we are about to enter remission. Of course, being sick for such a long time means that we will be weak for a little while to come, but will soon be free of disease and able to gradually rebuild our strength.

Do not write off GTFC. We will return. Stronger. Better. Bigger.

Quoted from LouthMariner

Unfortunately this is our level now. I wish we were bigger, but we need to be honest with ourselves and say that we were batting well above in the old 1st Division. But football isn't the same anymore, life isn't the same and we just don't attract enough fans and players to be a big club anymore. Unfortunately we are a yoyo club, without any good directorship, we have just been bouncing around the top of non league and bottom of League 2 for the last 15 years. We never used the promotion as a push to make the club better and we all know why that was.

But we are never going to be a Championship team any more, we will be lucky to ever be a League 1 club. That is down to the fact that we rarely get above 4/5k through the gates week in week out, so don't have the revenue to support it. Hate to say it, but look at Lincoln, very similar, if not worse than us for last 20/30 years. Bouncing around League 2 and non league playing hoof ball. Then get promoted and the buzz is there, double their attendances and double their income. Look at them now, and yes I am envious as that could have been us.

But we have new leadership coming in to the club, with new ideas and new ways to push the club forward. Will they work? Who knows, but its well worth the try as the last lot have made a right hash of it. I will be honest here and say, all I want to watch is a successful Town team winning games, something we haven't had for the last 5 years. If that means we get relegated and start again, then so be it. It may take years, it may take longer than last time, it may not. But we had some great away days and games in non league, we can't say we didn't enjoy ourselves, most of the time. UTM.

Looking at what you’ve written here and Pooja’s response I think you’re both right in a lot of ways.

I think in reality we absolutely should be where we are after years of chronic underinvestment, blinkered leadership and I use the word “leadership “ loosely and a season where the other members of the Board let the “football” again a word used loosely director run riot unchecked ..... oh and add to that no pre season. We where always going to struggle and get sucked into the current position.

I also think that realistically when Day said the ambition was to get into the Championship within 5 years we should have realised that he knew f**k all about the realities of the modern game. We just don’t have the sustainable ability to generate the income required to pay Championship level wages.  

All that said like many of the supporters the potential new owners seem to recognise that mid to long term there is potential for better and on the back of that better.

This won’t be a popular statement but there is no reason that why we can’t emulate the success Lincoln have had in terms of attracting the right quality in the board room, sensible investment and improved local engagement. It may not leave us in the L1 promotion places in 5 years but it will set us up properly, something that we’ve not had the benefit of this century.

All being well the takeover will complete not only to get rid of the current cabal but also to bring in some leadership who truly appear in the first instance to “get it” and get what GTFC means to us all.

In terms of aspiration or ambition it appears now that we’ll need to take a stage by stage approach which will be get back to the EFL, then get out of L2 and then build for even better, it can be done and a number of clubs have done this in recent history.

We are where we are now because the leadership of the club has been so wrong for so long it’s effected the points the team have got this season. The writing has been on the wall since we came back into the EFL, regardless of who the manager has been the current Board are 100% accountable for this.

Once the cancer that has held us back for nearly 2 decades has been removed we all should have faith we’ll come back a better club which usually leads to bigger things happening on the pitch.

People on here often use the phrase “once great club”. During my 45 years or so going to BP I’m not sure we’ve always truly been a “great club” but until a certain former fish merchant and his cronies get involved we where certainly a “good club” and I’m 100% sure we will be again.

UTM!!  

The fact we had one of our board members publicly saying that the goal was to be in the championship in 5 years explains clearly why we’re going down to NL again.

A new board with fresh ideas a new ground and a team that wins more than we lose then 12000 home gates would be the the norm in the championship.

Just got to get there and hold our own.

Grimsby is in a unique position football wise. N. E. Lincs has a population approaching 150,000 people with no major clubs or rivals within a 60 mile radius to compete with. That compares us with Ipswich for example, who have 13,000 season ticket holders. The potential is there, but we have stagnated since the fifties and just plodded along. With the new regime of forward thinking people perhaps we can start to redress the imbalance of this stagnation, after all, Lincoln have managed it, so why can't we?

Quoted from Poojah

But with a fair wind, and a new stadium, I don’t think it’s inconceivable that we could be hitting five figure gates on a regular basis which is sufficient to give you a crack at getting into the Championship, even if staying there would always be difficult for a club like Town.

In our last season in the Championship our average attendance was 5,884. The last season we had an average attendance above 10k was in 1980/81. We've not broken 7k since 90/91.