Brockhall STC - planning permission application ?

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

16 minutes ago, Blue blood said:

Ok so these tweets are rather puzzling. Most of all is how have we fans like this? 

It's rather odd isn't it.

Are these the same people who verbally attacked the protesters when it was clear as day that wrong was being done to the Club they support?.Do they mistakenly see any questioning of the Club as an attack on its infrastructure...why?

Are these same people like that in life in general,do they believe everything they are told,are they afraid to question what they maybe see as higher authority?

How can any Rovers fan not want to know the real score on this evolving story.Strange society we are living in these days.

[AllRoverAsia]

2 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

It’s definite sarcasm... but it’s a scarily accurate parody of the reaction a lot of our fans will voice.

The same ones who would have been the first to say that without Vs we would have no Cat 1

[RevidgeBlue]

5 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

It’s definite sarcasm... but it’s a scarily accurate parody of the reaction a lot of our fans will voice.

Thanks.

Apologies it went straight over my head!

[J*B]

15 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

To address a couple of those points Joe...

This message board is fairly unique in that it’s members have gone out of their way to set up an account and come here specifically to discuss Rovers. Some of the accounts on Twitter/Facebook who pass comments on Rovers related things won’t be as interested. Reacting in passing, etc.

There’s also an age thing. Again, this isn’t a dig, but a number of the fans on Social media mightn’t understand what we mean by Jack Walkers legacy. They’ve only known Venky’s and don’t share the cynicism that many of us have developed.

Also, voicing a “negative” opinion on Twitter  (I don’t do Facebook, but imagine it’s worse) gets you piled on pretty quickly... so maybe people who frequent this board have similar experiences to the one you have had here when they air their views on social media.

I’ll acknowledge I’m one of the most critical and sceptical of our fans towards the owners and the board, and my initial reaction to this news breaking was negative. I’ve spent the last couple of days digging, reading up, and admittedly speculating, and I’ve seen nothing to alter my initial reaction. So I don’t think my pessimism, or the pessimism of the people commenting on this thread is blind. A lot of the optimism I’m seeing though, I think it is.

To kind of summarise, I read a tweet today saying “The club literally only exists because of Venky’s”. This person needs to put down their phone, pick up a book, and read about John Lewis and Arthur Constantine (this one is absolutely a dig).

It's also a huge misconception that the users of this site don't represent the 'general fan' - one thats usually peddled by people that either: 1) don't enjoy the forum (which is fine) or 2) have previously been banned from the forum and now have an agenda.

The forum usually receives - on a normal day, 700 individual hits from across the globe. Of which, usually, around 200 post, but the majority of the 700 are members with an 'active' account to post if they see fit. Each of those 700 people usually spend between 10-12 minutes browsing the forum each session, which is massive, a normal website gets between 30 seconds and 2 minutes. The people hitting over 2 minutes tend to come back two or three times a day for similar periods of time. 

There isn't another Rovers fan platform out there which has anything like those numbers. Imagine a twitter thread which has 200 people replying or a facebook post with that volume of interactivity. 

Anyways, thats enough justifying BRFCS.com. Which, for the record, is the longest going platform for Rovers fans, of which everyone is allowed an opinion, so long as they don't personally abuse other people. ;)

[EgyptianPete]

9 minutes ago, AllRoverAsia said:

The same ones who would have been the first to say that without Vs we would have no Cat 1

Condisending isnt in it

[arbitro]

14 minutes ago, Stuart said:

Where/who would the U23s play? Without Cat 1 status, we cannot continue in PL2 so it would be a reserve league format. Meanwhile any prospects would be picked off by bigger clubs for peanuts.

The fact that this has come out so surreptitiously shows just how little the club care about fans in all this - especially for something supposedly so positive.

We’ve heard from the Rovers Trust, do we have any thoughts from any Fans Forum representatives?

Still nobody is talking about Mowbray any more. 🤔

I stand to be corrected but some of the clubs who have given up Academy status only play friendlies. Huddersfield downgraded their Academy for financial reasons and this could well be us in the near future. I have a recollection of the Academy costing £3m each season but that was a figure from a few years ago.

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/sport/football/news/huddersfield-town-set-overhaul-academy-13629038

[Dan]

40 minutes ago, Blue blood said:

Ok so these tweets are rather puzzling. Most of all is how have we fans like this? 

So I can't see any fans wanting to support Rovers sine the Loons rocked up. With broad coverage of the big 6 available, the toxic environment at Ewood under Kean, 6-7 years of steadily worse performances and a general circus - why would anyone start supporting Rovers? 

On the flip side I cannot see how any fan from prior to the takeover could be happy with what had happened over the last 10 years. If you have seen Hughes or Souness's team, let alone the Premiership winning one, and Williams running of the show, why would you be happy with how things have gone? Why would you think these plans are acceptable? 

We've also lost half our supporter base in that time. So where on earth have these supporters of operation destroy Rovers come from? 

https://mobile.twitter.com/callumatkins1/status/1358864939436437511

 

Wasn’t Venky’s fault. We’re all glory hunters. 🙄

[Dreams of 1995]

22 minutes ago, Miller11 said:

To address a couple of those points Joe...

This message board is fairly unique in that it’s members have gone out of their way to set up an account and come here specifically to discuss Rovers. Some of the accounts on Twitter/Facebook who pass comments on Rovers related things won’t be as interested. Reacting in passing, etc.

There’s also an age thing. Again, this isn’t a dig, but a number of the fans on Social media mightn’t understand what we mean by Jack Walkers legacy. They’ve only known Venky’s and don’t share the cynicism that many of us have developed.

Also, voicing a “negative” opinion on Twitter  (I don’t do Facebook, but imagine it’s worse) gets you piled on pretty quickly... so maybe people who frequent this board have similar experiences to the one you have had here when they air their views on social media.

I’ll acknowledge I’m one of the most critical and sceptical of our fans towards the owners and the board, and my initial reaction to this news breaking was negative. I’ve spent the last couple of days digging, reading up, and admittedly speculating, and I’ve seen nothing to alter my initial reaction. So I don’t think my pessimism, or the pessimism of the people commenting on this thread is blind. A lot of the optimism I’m seeing though, I think it is.

To kind of summarise, I read a tweet today saying “The club literally only exists because of Venky’s”. This person needs to put down their phone, pick up a book, and read about John Lewis and Arthur Constantine (this one is absolutely a dig).

Has his post been deleted? 
Put much better than I would Miller, and quite honestly the fact he still isn’t understanding what is meant by legacy of Jack Walker - despite excellent posts by Matty and Revidge also - suggests to me he never will. 

Having never met Jack, and only remembering the later years of his ownership, I think I can still firmly say that he wouldn’t have sold Brockhall to downgrade and risk our category A academy for a short term financial gain. “Cut throat” business man or not (are you purposely trying to get a reaction Joe?)

The idea that the majority agree with this is wrong. A majority of our fans don’t post on social media I would guess and even that isn’t unanimous in supporting this. There will always be some contrarian figures who want to be seen to be reasonable, against the grain, “able to see all sides” but the reality of the matter is that there’s not a positive take on this if you bother to look at the plans in depth. 
 

I am yet to be answered (three times I’ve asked him now) what’s to be positive about this training ground? There’s nothing proposed we haven’t already got and, in actual fact, we are losing more than we are gaining. So whilst it is not disrespectful to Jack to “see the positives in a training ground” it is blatantly disingenuous to be claiming there are positives when the proposals show for certain this is a downgrade.

 

[Mercer]

You think of the £20million+ (fees and wages), IMO, spunked up the wall on Brereton and Gallagher in context of the 'destruction' of the club's crown jewel.

IMO, this is all down to Mowbray's idiocy and abysmal management - we are further away from the PL as ever.

I would happily sell a player every year to keep Brockhall in its entirety intact.  Start with Armstrong.

[Bigdoggsteel]

I just find it strange that we seem to do so well with the under 23s consistently, but so few players make the breakthrough. You would think with us up with the big clubs at that level this season, we would have more young lads knocking on the door of the first team. 

[Richard Oakley]

Leicester City's training ground was 185 acre redevelopment of a former golf course and cost £100m. I don't think the STC and JTC combined are 185 acres and we've certainly not got a spare £100m, but building something like that would be respecting Jack's Legacy and build one for themselves.

I was looking for information on Venkys share price and came across a hint to potential investors (8 weaknesses) that Venkys are inefficient in the use of Capital. Translation for everyday plebs like me = Venkys waste money. Fans of this club don't need to be high flying investors to know that.

Since all money raised would go straight to India, we'd be dependent on Venkys releasing funds. If Venkys are in cut-and-run mode that's not going to happen.

@MercerThat'll be Nyambe

@BigdoggsteelUnder another manager it probably would

[Mattyblue]

38 minutes ago, RevidgeBlue said:

Usually agree with all your posts. Is this sarcasm?

We've seen no benefit whatsoever from the policy of loaning players in thus far and Elliott's enthusiasm for playing here seemed to tail off around Christmas when presumably he might have been eligible for another move or a return to Annfield.

He's been rubbish since.

You missed the apostrophes, I take it?

I’m going to take a perverted type of pleasure in watching the mental gymnastics the FB brigade go through to justify the ever onward downsize over the next few years...

[Hasta]

10 minutes ago, Bigdoggsteel said:

I just find it strange that we seem to do so well with the under 23s consistently, but so few players make the breakthrough. You would think with us up with the big clubs at that level this season, we would have more young lads knocking on the door of the first team. 

I'm not sure they are given proper chances. Despite our deficiencies in defence for several seasons Wharton kept going out on loan. He only got game time due to a severe crisis and you would have to say looked at least as good as, if not better, than the Brandthwaite and the City lad.

Plus if we played him and developed him we could see for a profit, which was supposed to be our model. Now its discard the status of the academy and flog the land.

[Herbie6590]

1 hour ago, RevidgeBlue said:

With respect, you are talking absolute rubbish on this point and imo being extremely disrespectful to Jack Walker. I hope my post doesn't send you scurrying off to the moderators to complain as I would prefer not to suffer a ban and I'm not surprised you riled many people with your comments yesterday.

No-one expects the facilities left by Jack to remain untouched for 100 years or more in his honour or memory.

No-one expects the Jack Walker "Legacy" to mean that future owners should be hamstrung or restricted in their running of the Club.

The Jack Walker "Legacy" is a notional standard to aspire to which if met would be for the protection of the Club not it's detriment.

When Brockhall was built, the limited value of Ewood Park as a site meant the main danger was always a subsequent owner flogging the the training complex. That's precisely why the covenant protecting the use of the land was introduced.

No-one but no-one would be complaining if this was a genuine upgrading of the training facilities. But it's not, it's a substantial downsizing of the complex in an attempt to generate a short term cash injection which will be to the long term detriment of the footballing facilities at the Club. And once this asset is gone it's gone those facilities can never be replaced.

That is why people are up in arms about the Jack Walker "Legacy" about which you are so dismissive not being respected. This scheme is for the short term gain of either the current owners (which admittedly would be their prerogative were it not for the legal covenant) or the Club employees who appear to have been involved in some sort of similar scheme at Coventry, or both.

It certainly isn't imo in the long term interests of the football club. Ultimately that's the litmus test for deciding whether something respects the Jack Walker legacy or not.

It's not about making silly statements like you can't touch buildings for hundreds of ideas as it might dishonour Jack. The idea though is that if you do touch them you make them better! If you replace it with something not as good then that obviously is an insult to his memory and what he did for the Club.

Nailed it.

[roverandout]

15 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

You missed the apostrophes, I take it?

I’m going to take a perverted type of pleasure in watching the mental gymnastics the FB brigade go through to justify the ever onward downsize over the next few years...

Is that quote something someone said on Facebook?

[Mattyblue]

1 minute ago, roverandout said:

Is that quote something someone said on Facebook?

No, I’m just pre-empting what I’ll see when the Cat 1 status is removed...

[Mercer]

18 minutes ago, Richard Oakley said:

 

@MercerThat'll be Nyambe

 

Think only Armstrong sale will bring in significant funds.  Needs to be viewed in context of scale of annual loss (averaging some £20m over 10 years). 

[Richard Oakley]

1 minute ago, Mercer said:

Think only Armstrong sale will bring in significant funds.  Needs to be viewed in context of scale of annual loss (averaging some £20m over 10 years). 

Armstrong's not in the £20m bracket, yet and Newcastle are rumoured to be getting 40% of any sell-on and we wouldn't see the sum in just one year, either. Most I think we'd get for him upfront this year would be £10m, which could only be £6m to us less anything owed to the player and his agent. That wouldn't be as significant as I'd like.

[Mercer]

Just now, Richard Oakley said:

Armstrong's not in the £20m bracket, yet and Newcastle are rumoured to be getting 40% of any sell-on and we wouldn't see the sum in just one year, either. Most I think we'd get for him upfront this year would be £10m, which could only be £6m to us less anything owed to the player and his agent. That wouldn't be as significant as I'd like.

There's no one else going to bring in anything of significance.

For all Mowbray's hype about squad value, I think the cupboard is almost bare.

[bluebruce]

1 hour ago, SIMON GARNERS 194 said:

It's rather odd isn't it.

Are these the same people who verbally attacked the protesters when it was clear as day that wrong was being done to the Club they support?.Do they mistakenly see any questioning of the Club as an attack on its infrastructure...why?

Are these same people like that in life in general,do they believe everything they are told,are they afraid to question what they maybe see as higher authority?

How can any Rovers fan not want to know the real score on this evolving story.Strange society we are living in these days.

Basically, yes.

[den]

2 hours ago, RevidgeBlue said:

With respect, you are talking absolute rubbish on this point and imo being extremely disrespectful to Jack Walker. I hope my post doesn't send you scurrying off to the moderators to complain as I would prefer not to suffer a ban and I'm not surprised you riled many people with your comments yesterday.

No-one expects the facilities left by Jack to remain untouched for 100 years or more in his honour or memory.

No-one expects the Jack Walker "Legacy" to mean that future owners should be hamstrung or restricted in their running of the Club.

The Jack Walker "Legacy" is a notional standard to aspire to which if met would be for the protection of the Club not it's detriment.

When Brockhall was built, the limited value of Ewood Park as a site meant the main danger was always a subsequent owner flogging the the training complex. That's precisely why the covenant protecting the use of the land was introduced.

No-one but no-one would be complaining if this was a genuine upgrading of the training facilities. But it's not, it's a substantial downsizing of the complex in an attempt to generate a short term cash injection which will be to the long term detriment of the footballing facilities at the Club. And once this asset is gone it's gone those facilities can never be replaced.

That is why people are up in arms about the Jack Walker "Legacy" about which you are so dismissive not being respected. This scheme is for the short term gain of either the current owners (which admittedly would be their prerogative were it not for the legal covenant) or the Club employees who appear to have been involved in some sort of similar scheme at Coventry, or both.

It certainly isn't imo in the long term interests of the football club. Ultimately that's the litmus test for deciding whether something respects the Jack Walker legacy or not.

It's not about making silly statements like you can't touch buildings for hundreds of ideas as it might dishonour Jack. The idea though is that if you do touch them you make them better! If you replace it with something not as good then that obviously is an insult to his memory and what he did for the Club.

Well done Rev. Excellent.👍

[Parsonblue]

1 hour ago, arbitro said:

I stand to be corrected but some of the clubs who have given up Academy status only play friendlies. Huddersfield downgraded their Academy for financial reasons and this could well be us in the near future. I have a recollection of the Academy costing £3m each season but that was a figure from a few years ago.

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/sport/football/news/huddersfield-town-set-overhaul-academy-13629038

That's the model that Brentford follow with their 'Brentford B' setup.  However, I had a quick look at how they operate pre-Covid and their 'B' team was involved in friendly matches right across Europe.  Here they played friendlies against a mixture of League and Non-League clubs and some of the larger Scottish clubs.  However, they were visiting Europe two or three times a month to play friendly fixtures.  Somehow, I can't see Rovers wanting to go to that expense.

Brentford also look at players released from other London academies and pick up foreign players because of their excellent scouting operation.  Something we haven't got.

With the way we picked up Dolan and Nolan from academy football and have borrowed three Premier League academy lads I do wonder if something is afoot with regard to the academy.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Parsonblue

[Richard Oakley]

42 minutes ago, Mercer said:

There's no one else going to bring in anything of significance.

For all Mowbray's hype about squad value, I think the cupboard is almost bare.

Playing 4 loanees and Bennett, Mowbray's treating our Academy as gone already. Then you're looking at value from 6 starters.

[chaddyrovers]

Its good that the local councillor in the Brockhall area sounds against the Rovers plan of building homes on the STC and building a new training complex at the Academy site. 

I would have thought the club would have hold interviews with local and national media(if they are interested) in this new project today. You would have thought they wouldn't wait to show off the digital plans of the new Training complex. 

The new Leicester training ground is state of the art and We should be looking to build a similar sort state of the art facilities. Not asking for 21 training pitches but we shouldn't be downsizing our training facilities if we are still aiming for the Premier League.  

[booth]

Quote

Jack Walker was a businessman, a cut throat one at that, who wasn’t scared to make tough decisions. In this financial climate, IF he was the owner of our side in our position now (Lord knows we wouldn’t have got here in the first place with him at the helm) I really don’t think it’s outside of the realm of possibility that he would also look at cost cutting methods such as this. Whilst always willing to pump in funds and support the club, I very much get the impression that JW was a pretty clever businessman who wasn’t afraid of making difficult decisions.

Reply to JoeH (wouldn't let me directly quote), Jack Walker wouldn't have Mowbray as manager and Waggott as CEO. Arguably both failures in their previous positions. His motto was "think big".

Edited February 22, 2021 by booth