SUGAR DADDIES-A BITTER PILL TO SWALLOW

In the Telegraph today, Jim White, as usual, comes up with a very nice story about the fickleness of football when he tells us that Billericay Town FC is up for sale. I won't go into huge amounts of details but will include the "link"-it is a good read.


I was unfortunate enough to be involved with a similar "sugar daddy syndrome" as teenager playing for my local "non-league" club, Horsham Town. There were a number of coincidences with Jim's article. (hope you can read this-if not, use technology!)

My school sited in Horsham, was Collyer's Grammar School (now Richard Collyer's College). It was funded in 1532 by a wealthy local businessman, Richard Collyer, who was a member of the Mercers' Company, merchants who traded in London. The Mercers'  Company are still trustees of the school.

I played for Horsham FC's Youth team and we had a pretty good cohort, a few likely lads joined the adult teams. This period spanned my time between sixth form and university.

With the club looking fairly comfortable in the old Athenian League, it came as a surprise to me that one night at training we were told that a local businessman was to invest in the club. We were excited and sure enough, suddenly we had new kit, we actually had an overnight stay in a hotel on the Friday before a match at Harwich and Parkstone (we lost) and various other extras made the Hornets a busy club.
Some time later that season, when Horsham had not gained promotion, we were told that the investor had pulled out and the club was in debt. Reason? said investor had laid on all sorts of activities in the club house, stag nights, comedy evenings, you know that sort of stuff that puts money over the bar. The investor paid our "semi-pros" and bought extras with that money, but failed to pay the brewery and other vital bills! Result, Hornets "bankrupt" and it took years to recover.

The club had to start again and eventually gained some financial "balance", especially with a windfall of two FA Cup ties (2nd Rd Proper) against Swansea City, drawing the first match and losing 2-6 in the first FA Cup match to be played at the new Liberty Stadium. One way and another this didn't "save" the club, whose committee chose to raise money from the excellent location that was Queen Street, by selling it.
https://stadium.horsham-fc.co.uk/our-story/
They sold off their historic ground (first used in1904) in 2008, entering into ground sharing with various Sussex neighbours, which doesn't earn a great income. Horsham Town FC ticks over but who knows what might have happened if a slightly different path had been chosen all that time ago! The club had two previous FA Cup windfalls; in 1947/8, First Round proper away at Tommy Lawton's Notts County losing 1-9 and in 1966/67 at home to Don Roger's Swindon Town losing 0-3 in front of over 7,000. My geography teacher, Brian Hardcastle, a Yorkshireman from the West Riding, was in the Horsham squad.
Prior to the Swindon game, Horsham beat Hastings United 2-1 at Queen Street, with Bobby Smith (yes ex-Spurs) failing to inspire the seaside town!

So the story is...... beware of "sugar daddies", they may carry a bitter pill.