Did we shaft St. Francis?

[Gaz@richer]

Talking to a good mate of mine (and longtime Pat`s Fan) in the pub on Saturday night about the merger, he reckons we acted in very bad faith. From what the players, management etc of St. Francis have been saying this deal was done behind everybody`s back. Sure, primarily it`s the responsibility of the Saint Francis board to have acted in their Club`s best interests (which I`ve no doubt they have NOT done) but his point was that from the point of view of eL unity nobody should have entertained such a selfish group who were so blatantly ignoring the wishes of their own people. He reckons our opportunism will rebound on us - if somebody bigger than us moved into our area and threatened take over talk who`d take our concerns seriously? It`s sort of Kilcoyne territory again here. Why didn`t they just go back to Leinster senior? What the hell was in it for them? You do have to ask. I have to admit that until Saturday night I never seriously looked at the deal from their perspective, all the scaremongering in the media had me primarily concerned with how it would affect us. (It seems a good deal for us in my opinion). I`d be interested to hear other`s opinion on this - are we the benefactors of the rape of a Football Club?

Gaz

[pete]

Theres no disputing St Francis didn't offer much to the eL & as you said yourself why didn't they go back to the LSL. By all accounts they were a handy junior club?

Its kinda difficult to guess what the St Francis Board got out of this :confused:

BTW don't EVER assume the Board of an Irish club would act in the best interest of their players & supporters! :(

[EddieL]

Well,from what I've been reading & hearing I reckon the St Francis people who went for the merger were the ones who acted in bad faith,they never told their manager,players and,I believe,the fans what was going on.They behaved in a very undemocratic manner and it seems to me that they did'nt want the others to know because they feared stubborn resistance to their schemes.

[Pauro 76]

I'd be very ****ed off if i was a St. Francis fan. And forget all this sure we're both Dublin 8 **** as said by Pat Dolan. Will it say Pats incorporating Francis on their shirts next season, cos sure as hell it wont be on their shirts in a few years time. If my club ever fell on bad times, id much rather being independent and being in a **** league rather than being part of some giant so-called merger. :mad:

[Pauro 76]

And sorry bout the swearing stuff there too chief. That post of mine looks like an Eminem rant!!

[Ash]

I read somewhere that John Hyland himself was only informed
of the merger after the deal had been done and dusted.
He was, understandably, very p!ssed off about it all and said he'd have preferred for the club to go back to being a junior side than loose thier identity ... which lets face it thay have.

Even with the crest on the pats shirt sleeve and the new "incorporating St. Francis" title ...
as The Fast Show would say .... "its all ******"

At the end of the day Pats will always be Pats and St. Francis is dead!

[wws]

i hate to be a big party pooper here but francis are no more and my reaction would have to be "so what?"


too many people are willing to allow basically going nowhere setups into the top flight of irish football and simply expect them to pick up he ball and run with it

the biggest fear i had was that the merger would mean an entry for Tralee or Newbridge into League Football........wake up people!!!!

there are no sleeping giants of Irish football biding their times in non league simply waiting on the invite from merrion sq for the privilege of playing Dublin City or Kilkenny. they do NOT have hidden fanbases of thousands of people who simply cant wait to go to a soccer match if ony our "tralee/newbridge/pike rovers" were playin in that high falutin league of ireland. Wake the fcuk up!!!


Francis are gone but all that was positive about the club.....the facilities the pitches, the backroom set up and possibly the youths are being retained for National League use.......ie their death will make the NL stronger as it weeds out yet another no fan team taht will never add anything to the NL yet it amalagamates two obvious supporter catchment areas for an NL club with ambitions beyond division one




so long Francis i wont shed a tear.......there are 5/6 other clubs that i wish joined you

[pete]

Can't disagree with you there but St Francis would probably still have been better off dropping back to the LSL?

[Dodge]

There is potential there for a team in an untapped area but it needs proper business people in it and not the people in charge of junior/intermediate sides.

Unfortunately, a franchise type thing might work and would see 3-4 big junior sides combine to create one 'super' club. If all the big (in relative terms' in Tipperary joined and moved into a new stadium, the chances are they would get great crowds at the start. It's then up to the team to keep that goodwill

Of course this is just a pipe dream as no-one will commit that sort of money and most people in football are very territorial about their club.

John

...I realise this last statement might seema bit rich froma fellah who was panicking last week at the thought of losing our name but I'm also involved in intermediate football (as a committee man) and if I thought my club would be part of something much bigger I don't think the name would bother me

[EddieL]

....but I think you're missing the point here.OK,Francis are no great loss to you,or to me for that matter,but it makes no difference whether they had 10 or 100 fans,it was THEIR club and THEIR identity and suddenly it is all gone without so much as a consultation,which to me is very undemocratic and unfair.I agree that,sadly,it did'nt work out for them in the eircom league and they should have gone back into the LSL (where they were very successful,and could perhaps re-group)but were they given the opportunity to do so? And if not,why not? As far as I am concerned,the manager,players and fans are the victims of a conspiracy here and my sympathies lie with them.