Supporters Notes - Enfield Town

Unfortunately, due to personal circumstances, Margate Supporters Club were unable to submit an article in time for tomorrow's Match Day Magazine. Instead, we share the thoughts of Francis Empson on our website.

Good afternoon welcome back at Hartsdown Park where we entertain north London rivals Enfield Town in the Bostik Premier League.

We must have football people in charge of the club, goes the cry from certain quarters week in, week out. But what is a Football person? Are we talking about an ex player, ex coach or someone who is an ardent fan who eats, breathes and lives Margate Football Club.

There have bee many an example in all levels of football of clubs being run by individuals who claim, rightly and wrong to have the clubs colours flowing through their veins and still whatever they do others will call for them to go. Newcastle are the prime case in point with Mike Ashby being constantly slated as not being worthy of his position. Maybe if Chelsea and Manchester City had not been so successful over the last few years the supporters would be turning on their owners more often. Maidstone in the 1980s and 1990s were under the control of Jim Thompson who was regularly coming under attack at matches and local papers (social media thankfully did not have Facebook and Twitter keyboard warriors then)

Margate Football Club had calls for the board to be sacked over the years many times especially with the name change to Thanet Utd in the early 1980s sadly what the more vocal attackers fail to realise that we might have a football club BUT we also have a business that has to be run on a sensible manner it wants to continue to exist. How many times have you seen non league clubs go to the wall or have to merge to continue and even some professional league clubs have hit major financial dramas?

I am sure our current owners and board members want to see Margate FC flourish and succeed however they must ensure we have a club that survives first. Having been involved in the running of the club before and during the Thanet Utd days I feel I can speak for a strong position that you have to live within your means and cut your cloth accordingly. Relying on a rich benefactor to continually put his or her hand in their pocket to bank roll the club is a very dangerous position.

Supporters Club Christmas Dinner: News coming soon. Watch the noticeboards, Facebook and website for further details.

Don’t forget to visit the Supporters Club hut by the turnstiles for your 50/50 tickets, membership forms, details about away trips and any other information concerning the Supporters Club. Membership of the Supporters Club this year has been frozen again at £7 for adults and £5 for concessions and a special £1 membership for under 16s.

There will also be a notice board by the hut giving information about forthcoming fixture for the First, Under 23s, Ladies and Walking Football teams as well as anything else that keeps the fans informed.

Remember the Supporters Club is the voice of the fans when dealing with the club and will raise any matter through a meeting with the clubs General Manager and report back to you as soon as possible.

In this column we will also be looking back on the record books to see what happened 40, 20 and 10 years ago.

16th October 1978 Two games in two days in the Southern League Premier Division but Margate ended up empty handed after first travelling to Cheltenham Town (now established in the Football League) and then having a home game to Gravesend and Northfleet (now trading under a geographical name not related to their area) We have now played 6 games in the Southern League Premier Division. In front of 725 fans and goals from Vic Pain and John Williams at Cheltenham were not enough as we lost 2 - 3. At home watched by 535 George Putman’s goal was scant reward as our Kent neighbours hit 3. In the League it is now three wins, one draw and two defeats scoring 10 and conceding 10 leaving us with 7 points. It was to be the start of things going wrong on the pitch which I am sure soon of our current fans would be calling for heads to roll.

17th October 1998 Three games in a week and despite having what many would consider a very good start to the season the home gates were surprisingly very low. We began the week with a Saturday home goalless draw with Witney Town in front of only 268 fans followed by a 1 – 1 draw also at home against Erith and Belvedere with Tony Dixon netting for us. For the second game only 260 turned up. The following Saturday we travelled away to Cirencester Town where Phil Collins and Paul Sykes scored for a 2 – 0 win. The home attendances were low but only 90 saw the away win. We have now played 12 games winning 7, drawing 4 and losing just the one. The Gate has now scored 22 and conceded 10 resulting in 25 points. With that success where were the fans?

18th October 2008 Finally we had some success in the league with James Gregory scoring the only goal of the game away to Dartford in front of 1379 fans. Somehow I don’t think it was the lure of a visit from Margate that helped boost the numbers but more a local council providing a new stadium. We in Thanet were still waiting and waiting and waiting for any help from ours. The euphoria was sadly short lived as the following week we had a home FA Trophy fixture in the 1st Qualifying Round against Hendon and watched by 362 Margate lost by the odd goal. The result left us having played 12 games with three win, three draws and six defeats, scoring eleven goals but conceding eighteen.

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