As I mentioned in my post yesterday, the resolution to amend the rules of the club was passed at the AGM. The full story would be that the motion was passed with votes of; 645 for, 90 against with about 4,200 abstentions. (!)
The following presentations were made:
The batting award for last season went to Darren Maddy and
The allrounder award went to Tim Ambrose (not present).
Dougie Brown was given a warm round of applause in recognition of the service he has given the club, and looked slightly uncomfortable with all the attention.
I picked up on the following points;
By looking through the club annual report and deducting the "shop overheads" and the "shop cost of sales" from the "shop sales" you get a total for 2006 of£38,483. For 2007 that figure is £4,853. This seems shockingly low to me, and shows a 35% drop in sales, whilst in the same time costs rose by 14%. However you mess with the figures however, a sub-£5000 retail (gross) profit, that has such a level of footfall past (and through) its doors is a shocking performance. I expect the club would say this is due to a change in stock, refits, etc, but I would therefore expect to see a much improved performance this year.
I will deal with the stadium, ground plans and international staging agreements in a later post, along with the attached increase in borrowing powers in the new rules, as this all seems to fit together into one overall issue.
Neil Houghton (Chairman) mentioned one interesting point about the appointment of Giles. He admitted in his speech that they wanted to appoint a successor to Greatbatch as soon as possible and preferably before the players went on their winter break. This contrasts quite sharply with Povey's statements at the time that the club would take their time to find the right candidate.
The Treasurer, SG Mills, made an entertaining speech, given that he was presenting the accounts. Apart from some bizarre comment about wanting to play playstation with a U-15 girls team award winner called Laura Croft, which he opened with to general confusion. He said the club are aiming for a £500k operating profit this year and confirmed that last year there was a significant increase in expenses due to the new offices installed and the increase in marketing and PR (+24%), which he explained as investments in the future.
He went onto to make a couple of entertaining statements, that he was at pains to point out were his own and not the clubs. He predicted that within the next 3-5 years a county club would go into administration and predicted that it would be one of the ones pouring money into improving the ground chasing the international cricket bounty. He did emphasise his own ambition but also financial prudence and said it would not be Warwickshire. He also said that the media and not the ECB runs English cricket!
Chris Tickle then took the podium to explain some of the rule changes and was at pains to point out that most of the changes were to add a practical and flexible approach to the management and day-to-day running of the club. He did also mention one thing that struck me, but was hidden away somewhat, and that was the potential for the club to operate through other structures, such as subsidiaries and joint ventures. This got me thinking about whether they plan to involve a joint venture in the building of the new stadium.
While the votes were counted Ashley Giles gave a speech on the upcoming season that was quote-a-rific. He appeared relaxed and was his usual candid self, but there did seem to be a bit of nervousness about him. He began in typical Giles fashion; "I'm not perfect, I make mistakes and I'm sure I'll make some this summer."
He went onto say, "the team had been slack in some areas over the past 2 years and in some basic disciplines". "Hard work is key..I want this to be the fittest team in the country..and have already seen a big change in attitude and fitness". He stated his belief that hard work and success will bring enjoyment back into the team and the supporters.
On the season's targets he said; "we want to get back to where we belong, we are aiming to get back into the top flight this year..I can't promise this will happen but it is the aim". He finished by assuring members that his England selectors job is subordinate to his role at Edgbaston and will not get in the way.
Colin Povey then finished up the speeches for the evening in his usual style. He has the ability to not be especially boring but talks in such a way that you find yourself drifting off while talk of "value streams" and "partnerships" washes over you. I have to confess I was writing down notes, but fighting the urge to join the member next to me in having a quiet nap while he talked.
As I said I will wrap up his speech on the ground plans and the related bits the rest of the panel talked about in another post.
There was just time for some questions, including one insightful guy, who spoke for 5 minutes, where his only question, which he pointed out he felt he had asked at the members forum in November and hadn't been answered then (shock!) - 'when Dale Steyn was with us he took a lot of wickets, when he left we didn't take a lot of wickets. Did Colin Povey think that when Dale Steyn left we stopped taking wickets and were not as good?' Now I might not have got all the nuances in this Machiavellian logic train, so apologies from my clumsy treatment of such an insight. I don't like Povey but he could have beat this man to death with a microphone and claimed the hand of Darwin.
Thursday, 28 February 2008
Full AGM Report
Wednesday, 27 February 2008
AGM report
I'm a bit knackered to put in a full post on this at the moment. But the main news is that the amended constitution was passed by 647 votes to 90, meaning the club can now borrow up to £20m.
I've got a full report brewing, with quotes, reports on the plan for developing the ground, as well as some juicy conspiracy theories based on some things that were said, and some interesting (well relatively) points that I have found from digging around in the annual accounts statement and some other bits and bobs.
At the moment however I seem to have lost the ability to spell, and it is only the wonderful firefox browser I've got with inbuilt dictionary that has made this post legible. (which to be fair is true for most of my posts; but delevolping? what on earth is that?)
More on this story tomorrow. Or the next day.....
Tuesday, 26 February 2008
AGM
I've been pondering what my position should be in regards to the AGM and specifically the special resolution to amend the club constitution which will be put to the vote at it. Its a tough choice and I think George Dobell in the Post has summed it up pretty well as a hobson's choice.
The clause in question in the "new rules" is 3.2.2. If I am reading it right it gives the club the ability to take out up to £20m of debt at an interest rate of no more that base rate +3% for unsecured debt (or such greater sum or rate as the committee shall determine from time to time). I believe (but I am no legal expert) that the committee would have to amend the rules again, if they want to go above the £20m limit, and that that particular note about "or such greater sum.." only gives them the power to easily do so.
The clause in itself is neither unusual or anything particularly untoward, the only issue that arises is whether the membership trusts the current administration with these extra powers. I think for the sake of the future of the club as one of the premier international grounds on the county circuit the membership will have to vote for this amendment. I don't necessarily believe the scare stories that Edgbaston is currently in danger of losing international cricket altogether, however I do feel the ground needs improvement and the increase in borrowing power is probably vital to achieve this.
Given the way that voting works on this amendment, in that a 2/3 majority is needed to carry the motion, (with abstentions not counting towards the total number of votes) means the only realistic way the motion will not be carried is by an organised campaign against it. I have not heard of such a campaign and I don't believe that any last minute rallying call at the meeting itself could succeed; most people will have made their minds up before attending.
In a way the timing of the AGM could not have been better for the management. The events of last season and the ill will they generated among the members has been partially swept away by the optimism of a new coaching team. We have also not seen how this new set-up will deliver, so members are still in a sort of extended honeymoon period. The new season is also just around the corner and people are probably believing anything is possible. I would venture a guess that the overall "morale" among members is probably higher than it has been for 6-9 months. And this is good news for the chance of the motion passing.
The concern must remain however that the current leadership team at Edgbaston has not really delivered demonstrable success in anything it has tried to achieve so far, and the thought of £20m of debt is something none of the members will feel especially comfortable about. The voting decision remains one where there is no comfortable path for the members, faced with either slow decline or a gamble on the financial prudence of Mr Povey and his team, neither of which is especially appealing. Perhaps I am cautious having spoken to a friend who visited Elland Road at the weekend and reported on a crumbling stadium where they cannot afford to turn on the electronic scoreboard. I think however we have to make a leap of faith.
The Raggybear will either be voting "yes" or abstaining. I will not be voting against this motion as I do not believe that my vote would then be in the best interests of the club.
I am hopeful of attending the meeting in person, although I have a meeting in London, so will be in the unusual position of wearing a suit. I hope people don't mistake me for a member of the executive club.