Pic: Don Walker
BENEFACTORS and Non-League football. For every happy ending, there seem to be five clubs caught in the eye of a storm. Sometimes the trail of destruction left when a rich man tires of his latest play thing is like trying to dustpan and brush-up the after effects of a hurricane.
Occasionally an outsider comes in with dreams of the Football League and beyond and it works. Fleetwood Town fans will tell you Andy Pilley is like a second father to them after taking the club from the North West Counties League into League One.
But what happens when a money man gets bored, when they call time on their ten-year master plan after a mere matter of months of cheque writing?
We asked Margate, a club not so much picking up the pieces but walking through the scattered glass that has been left behind.
Businessman Bob Laslett scarpered at the first sign of a mid-table season. Without the commitment to a project when the results aren’t right like say Dale Vince at Forest Green or Stewart Donald at Eastleigh, the likeable global consultancy tycoon threw in the towel inside two years.
Worst of all? He promised to drip feed the National League South club money over future seasons to ensure they kept in existence. Today we reveal that he went back on his word.
Saturday’s 2-0 home defeat to Poole Town was the Gate’s eight straight loss. Marooned, they look certain to return to the Ryman League where Laslett’s notes first found them.
Manager Nikki Bull’s budget has been cut 80 per cent from last season. The money he now has to spend on players’ wages weekly – and getting them to the Kent coast – is a figure that most clubs in Step 4 of the Non-League game would struggle to work with.
Healthy future
“We’re not the first club to have a benefactor walk out on them, and we won’t be the last,” says loyal Bull, 35. “Some clubs haven’t survived, but we have and the last six months or so has been about making sure that happens. I think what has shocked us all is how quickly things deteriorated.
“Bob left quite suddenly, and to be honest it’s disappointing that none of the money to keep the club going over the next few years that he promised has arrived. It’s all very unfortunate.”
Margate are now operating on next to no money and they have a manager who has to travel over two hours just to get to the ground. In true Non-League spirit, he refuses to buckle.
“I’m not a quitter,” stressed the former Aldershot Town keeper. “I never have been. But it’s important for people to realise the state of play. The fans do, and they are 100 per cent behind us all.
“I actually see a healthy future for the club. We now don’t owe anyone a penny, but we aren’t going to get into debt trying to stay in this league.
“The people here have been through enough. We’ve had the boom, but we aren’t about to go bust.”
