April 2023 Advisory Board Meeting minutes

The goals for the 2023/24 season was way out of the club and the owner's depths. I will break it down for you.

Promotion to League One

Whilst it is every club's intention to get promoted, the lack of funding both on and off the pitch held the club back from ever achieving this. The off the field EFL charges and arguments in the board room along with the Transfer Embargo which meant that the club were unable to pay any money for player's contributed to the worst ever league position and points total in the 4th tier of English football in modern times.

Cup Runs in all competitions

I really do not to explain what happened here. Out of the FA Cup in round 1, out of the Carabao Cup in round 1 and finished bottom of the group in the Papa Johns/Bristol Street Motors Trophy. The club did have some success with the U18's in reaching the Quarter Final of the FA Youth Cup for the first time since the 1960's (great achievement) and the Swindon Town Women's team winning the Wiltshire Cup

Break-Even running costs

We know that Clem has had to put a minimum of £1m into the club since May 31st 2023, this shows that for a 3rd successive season, the club is running at a loss compared to it's turnover. 

Stadium Plans

These are yet to be produced and presented to the Joint Venture or the supporters.  This is still correct as of May 2024.

New Fanzone offering

This is yet to be approved by the council and no work has been started as of May 2024 either.

Clear All Legacy debt

This is yet to be completed, there is still outstanding covid loans, Centreplate still haven't received any settlement regarding the £312k winding up order that was dismissed in court in December 2022 , DPDS legal fees have not been cleared from August 2022, the £60k is still unpaid to M4 Car sales for the area where the FITC offices used to be that was allegedly agreed with Lee Power and the Mercedes that was allegedly leased to the club when under Lee Power's ownership.

Entertaining Football

The season started with entertaining football and a 9 game unbeaten run, then after defeat to Notts County away, it all went downhill. If being 7-0 down to Aldershot in the 58th minute of the 1st round of the FA Cup is entertaining football, then supporters would definitely agree.

This is probably the easiest to pick the bones out of.

April 2023 - £6m Turnover £6.5m Expenditure

We know from the accounts (published March 2024) and the "Fair Game" report (published April 2024) that the Turnover was £6.9m and that the Expenditure was £8.2m. The club during a fans forum in January 2024 stated that they didn't know where they had spent £8.2m

I don't need to go through the delivery of the men's team being promoted to the 3rd tier in 2024 or to the Championship in 2025. 1 hasn't happened and the other can't happen.

There are just a couple of things that I would like to point out from the above graphic. 

1. During the 2021/22 season, we had £500k of income from the Manchester City FA Cup game and high ST and Matchday revenues since Clem took over. How can a club be losing so much money?

2. There is a note that the books are being balanced daily and that the turnover is around £6m and that the expenditure is closer to £6.75m. This contradicts the information on the same presentation above.