A poignant night with the Cian Neary tributes. As I said in a recent post I think you'll really see the club make in roads in the community over the next few months.
As for the performance, another non showing in a second half. Flat as a pancake. Team seems to have lost its grit from early in the season. Worrying
I think you might be correct - costs have gone up, but income has at best stood still.Originally Posted by De Town
I suppose if you asked us in money terms how far are we off having a team consistently competitive in the first div, its probably about 100k a year. So where would you get that is the question. Improved gates would give you some of that, maybe an extra 20 or 25k, but hard to see where the rest comes in.
Probably need to have at least one other non football source of income.
We gave a good account of ourselves in first half, but the gap in quality in the second half was vast and once first went in was just a question of how many.
To be fair I wasnt expecting anything from last night, be a bit more hopeful for the Wexford game.
Agree, in terms of being a LOI club anyway. It's such a great facility out there but there just isn't the population to make money out of it. The club would be dead 20 years ago without JH and a few others but it's not sustainable to keep relying on individuals covering the shortfall year after year after year. To be fair the club have, from what I can tell, run a tight ship for a long time now with wages always being paid, no huge debts being run up, but every year gets more expensive.
Went up to Saratoga, where my horse naturally won.
If relegation happened I'd like to see a shift to more of a local angle. Start having the squad predominantly Longford, Roscommon, Leitrim, Cavan, Monaghan etc players. And have the odd few from outside. Because I just can't see how the Dublin reliance would be sustainable in the 3rd tier. Plus those lads would have options presumably for the teams in Kildare, Meath, other Dublin clubs etc. Why would they come to Longford at that point, and wages would be reduced in 3rd tier most likely.
Would that win a few more people over to go to games, hard to know.
Mind you I think we should be giving our lads more of a shout this season already. If this is going to be a quiet season like it's turning out to be, at least give the likes of Manny and Flood Norton more a chance to make an impact and show that the academy can produce players at LOI/3rd tier level. If those lads end up leaving cuz they're not getting enough game time I'd be sick. Because I'm beginning to think if we're going to get clapped most weeks using these Dublin lads, what have you to lose from giving academy lads a look in. Always thought Callun Warfield should have got more of a look in before he moved on for example
In the past that was a local or not local debate, but it is more nuanced now as we have our own underage pathway. Looking at other clubs they do try and get some of their younger lads, 16/17 years olds into squads - Goodness from Longford was a sub for Rovers in Europe and I think in some league games this season, aged 17, Finn Harps have a few of their younger boys playing too.
One other issue for us is the competition for the best young talent both male and female, where the highest rated young players from our league are signing for other clubs.
To continue this debate why are we paying a FT wage to a certain club official? Thats not sustainable. That wasnt done in our glory years. If we were generating the crowds then yes I would 100 % support this. It defies logic to say the least. At least if that practice stopped then they could make a dent in having to pay for the damage down to the ground resultin from storm Ewoyn.
Last edited by Martinho II; 28/04/2025 at 1:10 PM.
Gary Cronin is he the right man to manage Longford Town?
No way you could run the club without staff anymore. I'd say every other club has a few paid non playing staff.
The club plays 7 games and I would guess 20 plus training sessions a week, think of all thats involved with that, let alone all the offield stuff that has to be done.
Do you think that lad getting paid is being paid 100,000? Every club has minimum 3/4 full time staff for off the pitch stuff. We’re lucky we even have one!
I heard at the weekend that he's no longer in that role. I have no idea how true that is though, nor do I know whether he was or wasn't doing a good job to be honest.
Went up to Saratoga, where my horse naturally won.
You so realize that in our glory days we essentially had 1 team to run? There are now 5 or 6 men's underage teams and two girls underage teams. You do also realise a third of the clubs in the first division have just fallen foul of not doing their paperwork correctly around transfers, I've no doubt had we not had an individual who was fully trained and competent in the practice of ITC and player registration that we would have also ended up with a likely points deduction.
Ive said for a few years now that I'd be willing to accept a few years of finishing at the bottom if it meant the club was going to focus on building stronger structures off the pitch. More full time or at least paid staff is the only way to achieve that.
Do you think that chap was on €100,000?
Furthermore to the current discussion, did anyone else see the figures coming out of Sligo's AGM last night? Their budget for this year is 2.4 million. We haven't a prayer
I'd love a promotion run as much as the next person but I just know if it did happen we'd get just absolutely stomped. There's no competing with those resources. And the solidarity money all going to the premier clubs doesn't help. I know the premier clubs aren't rich as such but for lack of a better word, "the rich get richer" in this case.
I'd be curious to see one of the other part time clubs go up and just see how they fare. UCD were the last ones up there but I don't count them (sorry but not sorry). I'd like to see a Wexford or Bray mixed in with those full time teams to see how bad it gets. It could be even worse than our 2021 or UCD's 2023
With the way things are going the team coming down is always going to walk the division barring any financial meltdown. Agree that any of the part time teams going up via play offs would be whipping boys. It's a problem for the league. They're probably hoping it gets addressed by the "investors" pumping money into the smaller teams but how sustainable is that?
Went up to Saratoga, where my horse naturally won.
Fully agree with that. I think our sad reality is going to be once the third tier comes up that us managing stay in the first division will be viewed as a successful season. If we go down there's absolutely no guarantee we come back. There would be clubs in the LSL paying out bigger wages than us for some players
Total crapshoot. Athlone look like they're about to get their new overlords in, so jury is out on them. Cobh had and lost their new owners.
I wouldn't know how attractive Longford Town would be to external investors. I also have concerns about our current sponsors, does their lack of presence on the jerseys this year indicate they're pulling out? Pure speculation mind
Have to agree with you on this. Theres nothing attractive in Longford any more. The clubs location out of town doenst help things at all imo.
Gary Cronin is he the right man to manage Longford Town?
Disagree, unlimited space to develop the ground, if the car park was tarmacked (i know that would cost a bomb) it could be rented out for any amount of uses. The sad reality is Longford is one of the poorest town's in Ireland and the population means we are never going to compete unless some fella comes in and decides he has unlimited funds to burn.
BetweenTheStripes.net - Home of Between the Stripes LOI podcast.
If the town of Longford had ever really boomed it could have been a very smart move to get all that land in terms of developing income streams. Unfortunately it never really did and the location does feel a little remote for non football amenities to be developed. Still a great site for football activities if there was unlimited funds for developing pitches, lighting etc. And the club deserve enormous credit for what they have managed to do with basically no government funding over the years.
Went up to Saratoga, where my horse naturally won.
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