Interesting article - thanks. It all seems a bit daft at the minute. My biggest fear around the whole project is that if there continues to be such in-fighting, I think the fairweather local fan (such as myself - I live a couple of miles away but have been to a couple of games since the re-emergence) will stop turning up, the crowds will dwindle off, and the ‘famous old club’ will fold again.
They need to find a way to make it work, stop all the social media nonsense, and crack on with getting the local fan base engaged and watching a relatively successful team.
Sounds easy, I know it isn’t, and I hope they don’t waste this chance.
Well, as a BFC fan approaching 60 years, i'm 72, I found this article very interesting.
I was a rat and followed AFC from the beginning and a fantastic few years it was, not like the "loyals" who were full of division and hatred of anything AFC.
Whilst the benefactors and the 1885 cohort worked miracles to save gigg, theres no doubt in my mind that the clincher was BoJo and Gove along with Daly, trying to harvest local votes by throwing a large chunk on money at it.
However, now we have a democratically board, voted for by members, hopefully both the sides can get together and resolve their differences.
I'm just happy watching football in front of an enthusiastic crowd and watched by lots of families.
Non league footy is a good watch, and if you want, you can have a beer watching, unheard of under EFL rules.
It was good to read Jack’s article and I welcomed a much needed summary of the complex situation surrounding the new Bury FC
I’m not necessarily a football fan but I do care about the town of Bury and it was fantastic to see football back in Gigg Lane thanks to the hard work and determination from the different groups Jack mentioned (plus all the volunteers)
Much of the article was fair and considered but there are some important factual inaccuracies :
Surely it was some of the “Supporters”… and not the “Shakers“ who resisted the second merger vote? This important inaccuracy needs clarifying with a neutral source
Another inaccuracy is in respect of Mr Young who has been seen several times at Gigg Lane
“one insider told me at the game on Tuesday. “He doesn’t live local, and it was always this: ‘oh, he’s not a Bury fan, he’s never been to Gigg Lane.’”
Finally, members from both societies recently voted in a new board - it was a democratic vote. At the end of the day supporters should respect that and now try to move on. Hopefully the new board can start bridging the gap between opposing factions
This is early days. Let’s give it a chance. Success on the pitch will go a long way towards unifying the fans
If I want articles about dissent and divided communities I can read a tabloid.The nice thing about the Mill is that it offers a more uplifting take on Geater Manchester folk despite their daily struggles.The less written about football the better.
What a dismal, distorted report from Gigg Lane! It was patently unfair to lead with the anonymos quote, “What a mess.” It’s nearly always baffling when a reporter opens his story with a quotation. That’s why you don’t often see that trick performed in national media. Who is this weird person talking about a net covered with a pane of glass? It’s a tricky metaphor. We have to work it out like a puxxle. Jack also puzzled me by suggesting that there is something wrong when 2,720 people gather on a cold, moonless night in a stadium with a capacity of over 11,000. Does Jack realise that in the very low tiers of English league football a gate of 2,720 at a night match in October is amazing. In Bury’s last season up in the fourth tier of English football, in 2018-2019, a season when they won promotion, the gate at a night match in October was 3,072. to see Bury draw 1–1 with Newport County. Amid Jack’s 2,300 words about the moans, groans and office politics of the Bury revival, no space could be found to tell us the really big news. So let me state it here. On that cold, moonless night, Bury were, and still are, top of their league.
Point of order on the Bury FC article. The football board is not newly established. It has been around with the same members since AFC started back in 2019. It has always run the football side of things. There is also a well-established stadium board, populated by Supporters and Benefactors.
That was the nub of the problem. The interim board was 50-50 from each side. For practical reasons (because consensus could not be reached), the football board remained dominated by AFC, the stadium board by Supporters/ Benefactors. That should change now following the democratic elections.
… and in defence of Phil Young, he attends most matches, in the South Stand, along with the bulk of supporters, not with the privileged few in the Main Stand.
There’s a lot more to tell here. I would have contributed to the article but only saw the request last night!
Another article about Monty Pythonesque "Splitists".The Mill is, it seems,keen on turning real life into Coronation Street episodes.Even Bury has more important things to fret about than this. In fact football is obsessed about more in this region than anything else which is disappointing and depressing in equal measures.
Strangely articles about everyone getting along tend not to be that interesting.
Even the most ardent football fan (like me a Sunderland season ticket holder in exile in Bury) knows that, ultimately, it’s unimportant but ... of all the unimportant things in life football is the most important.
Interesting article - thanks. It all seems a bit daft at the minute. My biggest fear around the whole project is that if there continues to be such in-fighting, I think the fairweather local fan (such as myself - I live a couple of miles away but have been to a couple of games since the re-emergence) will stop turning up, the crowds will dwindle off, and the ‘famous old club’ will fold again.
They need to find a way to make it work, stop all the social media nonsense, and crack on with getting the local fan base engaged and watching a relatively successful team.
Sounds easy, I know it isn’t, and I hope they don’t waste this chance.
Well, as a BFC fan approaching 60 years, i'm 72, I found this article very interesting.
I was a rat and followed AFC from the beginning and a fantastic few years it was, not like the "loyals" who were full of division and hatred of anything AFC.
Whilst the benefactors and the 1885 cohort worked miracles to save gigg, theres no doubt in my mind that the clincher was BoJo and Gove along with Daly, trying to harvest local votes by throwing a large chunk on money at it.
However, now we have a democratically board, voted for by members, hopefully both the sides can get together and resolve their differences.
I'm just happy watching football in front of an enthusiastic crowd and watched by lots of families.
Non league footy is a good watch, and if you want, you can have a beer watching, unheard of under EFL rules.
It was good to read Jack’s article and I welcomed a much needed summary of the complex situation surrounding the new Bury FC
I’m not necessarily a football fan but I do care about the town of Bury and it was fantastic to see football back in Gigg Lane thanks to the hard work and determination from the different groups Jack mentioned (plus all the volunteers)
Much of the article was fair and considered but there are some important factual inaccuracies :
Surely it was some of the “Supporters”… and not the “Shakers“ who resisted the second merger vote? This important inaccuracy needs clarifying with a neutral source
Another inaccuracy is in respect of Mr Young who has been seen several times at Gigg Lane
“one insider told me at the game on Tuesday. “He doesn’t live local, and it was always this: ‘oh, he’s not a Bury fan, he’s never been to Gigg Lane.’”
Finally, members from both societies recently voted in a new board - it was a democratic vote. At the end of the day supporters should respect that and now try to move on. Hopefully the new board can start bridging the gap between opposing factions
This is early days. Let’s give it a chance. Success on the pitch will go a long way towards unifying the fans
If I want articles about dissent and divided communities I can read a tabloid.The nice thing about the Mill is that it offers a more uplifting take on Geater Manchester folk despite their daily struggles.The less written about football the better.
What a dismal, distorted report from Gigg Lane! It was patently unfair to lead with the anonymos quote, “What a mess.” It’s nearly always baffling when a reporter opens his story with a quotation. That’s why you don’t often see that trick performed in national media. Who is this weird person talking about a net covered with a pane of glass? It’s a tricky metaphor. We have to work it out like a puxxle. Jack also puzzled me by suggesting that there is something wrong when 2,720 people gather on a cold, moonless night in a stadium with a capacity of over 11,000. Does Jack realise that in the very low tiers of English league football a gate of 2,720 at a night match in October is amazing. In Bury’s last season up in the fourth tier of English football, in 2018-2019, a season when they won promotion, the gate at a night match in October was 3,072. to see Bury draw 1–1 with Newport County. Amid Jack’s 2,300 words about the moans, groans and office politics of the Bury revival, no space could be found to tell us the really big news. So let me state it here. On that cold, moonless night, Bury were, and still are, top of their league.
Point of order on the Bury FC article. The football board is not newly established. It has been around with the same members since AFC started back in 2019. It has always run the football side of things. There is also a well-established stadium board, populated by Supporters and Benefactors.
That was the nub of the problem. The interim board was 50-50 from each side. For practical reasons (because consensus could not be reached), the football board remained dominated by AFC, the stadium board by Supporters/ Benefactors. That should change now following the democratic elections.
… and in defence of Phil Young, he attends most matches, in the South Stand, along with the bulk of supporters, not with the privileged few in the Main Stand.
There’s a lot more to tell here. I would have contributed to the article but only saw the request last night!
Another article about Monty Pythonesque "Splitists".The Mill is, it seems,keen on turning real life into Coronation Street episodes.Even Bury has more important things to fret about than this. In fact football is obsessed about more in this region than anything else which is disappointing and depressing in equal measures.
Strangely articles about everyone getting along tend not to be that interesting.
Even the most ardent football fan (like me a Sunderland season ticket holder in exile in Bury) knows that, ultimately, it’s unimportant but ... of all the unimportant things in life football is the most important.
‘Even Bury’ What does that mean ?