First of all, thank you once again for the fantastic support at last weekend’s game. I’m sorry the result was not what we all wanted, but it was good to see so many people safely enjoying themselves on the terraces. Following the game, many of you will have seen that the match received large national coverage, including the Daily Mirror, Daily Express, and the Tuesday edition of the Non-League Paper, all showing good publicity for the club.
This week I wanted to give you a little insight into what is going on in the Boardroom, other than constantly making sure we are operating in a COVID-secure environment. I am keen to expand and strengthen the Board and we are currently speaking to two new potential members, one of whom I had a three-hour long conversation with this week. I am very excited about what these people could bring to the club.
As previously stated, as well as surviving the current turmoil, we are still very much focussed on the future and taking the club forward. The work towards moving to a new ground continues. The heads of agreement are currently back and forth with the solicitors, a time-consuming, but vital, part of the process. However, in the meantime we are continuing to look at ways we can improve the supporter experience at our home games at The Meadow. This might surprise you, but one of the avenues we are exploring is a 3.9m by 900cm full colour electronic scoreboard – and before anyone else cracks the joke, yes, I know, we don’t really need a scoreboard to help us to keep counts of the goals at home games at the moment!
Jokes aside, the board will enable us to display teams, substitutions and goal scorers, but the discussion we are having with potential investors in this project is the additional sponsorship opportunities it will create with great visibility in full colour for everyone in the ground to see. We are currently talking to four local companies of which two have already agreed to help with the finance of the board, which will be in the region of £6,000 + VAT. If you, your business, or anyone you know, might be interested in being a part of this exciting development, please contact me directly at chairman@cheshamunited.co.uk.
The new tiered system of Local COVID alerts continues to make it a day-to-day challenge to prepare to host matches. As the national paper coverage this week demonstrated, we are very lucky to be even able to still be playing football in front of crowds, but with that comes a huge responsibility. The Board and I continue to be proud of the way we manage procedures with our stewards and bar staff doing an incredible job to make it happen. Remember so many of these people are volunteers giving up their own time to make the delivery of these games possible – we should all be very grateful to them, I know I am.
This week we have invested in more barriers for the clubhouse to help with the queuing and a big thank you to everyone for your patience and respect for each other by practicing social-distancing. Thank you, also, to the Under 11s for doing a superb job as ball boys, it is fantastic to see the youth section becoming a part of the matchday activity.
On the field it was another frustrating week. I know the management are working hard on improving the side and getting us back to scoring goals. One thing that has become apparent this season is that teams are going to come and ‘park the bus’ in front of us at The Meadow and in a way it shows the respect they have for us as title contenders, but it is something we will need to work hard at every game to breakdown. Some of our long-term injuries are starting to return and it was great to see Jake and Kyle getting some game time in their return to full match fitness. I have every confidence we will start scoring goals and continue to compete at the top end of the table with the squad we have.
As always, thank you for your support, crowds have been tremendous this season and there is a real buzz around the place with more volunteers stepping forward to help out. There is always more that needs doing so if you do have time to spare, or a skill to offer, please don’t be a stranger.
Peter Brown
