Trust News

Trust Chair Tim Hartley and Board members Tracey Marsh and David Craig met Gethin Jenkins, Julian Jenkins, Wayne Nash and Barry McAuliffe at the club on Tuesday 5 April. Members sent us their questions and here is a report of what was discussed.

We congratulated the club on being named Football League Family Club of the Year. The change in the perception of the City over the last few years has been amazing. With a whole range of activities arranged for them, families are now given a full afternoon of entertainment (playstations, magicians and meeting the players) as well as watching the ‘Greatest team in football’. In fact many families from Derby wrote to thank the club for its efforts to make them welcome, and that despite their 4 – 1 drubbing! The club says it has advertised the Football League award widely and Julian Jenkins will represent the club at the World Stadium summit at the Nou Camp in Barcelona in June to share his experience at Cardiff. Congratulations!

Restrictions for away games have been a constant issue for travelling fans with early starts, bubble matches and voucher exchanges meaning that following Cardiff can be a hassle. We wanted to know when things will improve. The club said they are making things easier for fans little by little but it all depends on behaviour at away matches. They said the rendezvous in South London before Millwall was requested by the police who will always have the final say in these things. Buses were allowed to go straight back to the heads of the valleys after the Swansea game rather than back to Cardiff this time. Also, 8 coaches at a time were allowed to go to the Liberty from the rendezvous this time which speeded things up a bit. The Trust hopes to be represented at the club’s Travel Group meetings to make sure these issues continue to be addressed.

The club is helping the Trust and the Supporters Club to welcome supporters from Chasetown to the stadium for the Middlesbrough match. Our relationship with them dates back to the FA Cup match some years ago. We will help them with parking and with tickets for the game. It’s great to see us all pull together to give our friends from Staffordshire a good day out and we hope to have a whole busload of ‘Scholars’ here in May.

Some Trust members have asked how the club can fill the empty seats on levels 3 and 4 of the Grandstand. The club said it had stopped selling one-off tickets for Level 4 to all comers as it did last season. These seats had originally been sold as premium hospitality seats and it would be unfair to those who had signed up for the whole season to allow others to cherry pick the best games. However, Premier club members are allowed to buy additional tickets for Level 4. As a footnote to this, the club is keen that season ticket holders renew their ST’s before the deadline of 18 April. So get down the Ticket Office pronto and don’t forget to give a donation to the FK Statue Appeal with your application!

We all want the club to be on a firm financial footing and are glad that our Malaysian backers seem to be sorting our finances out. However, there was no more detail on the debt situation forthcoming from the club. Gethin simply told us that work is continuing with historical creditors. But we can tell you that there will be an annual general meeting of the club, depending on the fixtures, probably in September. We as a Trust will of course be represented at the AGM.

The Trust event with Tg and Dave Jones in November was a real success and we are keen to hold regular Fans Forums with the manager and players. The club said it will arrange other nights like the Tg and the Ricky Tomlinson events next season where fans can put their questions to the manager.

An eagle eyed Trust member has noted that the match day programme lists Paul Wilkinson as Reserve Team manager and was wondering, as we don’t have a formal reserve team, what he does. Gethin told us that Wilko had been with the club since Lennie Lawrence’s time and is actually the 1^st team coach. Although we are not in a formal reserves league he also takes reserve team games when they are arranged.

We asked the club what was the cost of the half time mini-football games. The games are organised by the Community Trust for local teams. For £35 per person each player gets a coaching session, meal, match ticket and of course a chance to play on the stadium pitch. (If there were no age restriction I might get a team in there myself!) The club told us that its policy on these mini games is being reviewed.

Some members wanted to know what the club’s policy is on communication and feedback to general inquiries. Julian Jenkins told us that the club’s Customer Charter states that they aim to answer queries and complaints within 5 working days. Julian tries to answer them by telephone as soon as possible but Barrie McAuliffe said that the club is looking at a web based inquiry system so that issues can be immediately addressed to the correct person within the club. The current Customer Charter can be found at – https://www.cardiffcityfc.co.uk/page/CustomerCharter/0,,10335,00.html

There has been concern that we have been signing players who appear to be injured (and I am not naming names here.) The club assured us that a comprehensive medical examination is carried out on every player prior to their being signed on a permanent contract.  The club pointed out that when a player is signed not only is his current fitness considered but also the length that he could is being contracted for as well.

The Fred Keenor statue appeal has received a donation of £500 from Marstons brewery who own the new Sand Martin pub/restaurant on Ffordd Fred Keenor near the stadium. Many thanks to Marstons for this. The Trust is also keeping in touch with them and their Local Heroes charity scheme. We asked the club whether they had made contact with the new pub. Gethin said they had met them informally and had discussed sharing some staff parking. It’s worth noting that the Sand Martin is more of a restaurant than a pub and that they will only sell alcohol with full sit down meals on match days.

Finally, I would like to draw your attention to the Huw Thatcher Trust which the club is supporting. City fan Huw died after being injured playing for Hepworth United under 15s in Yorkshire in March. Huw had a brain haemorrhage as a result of a pre existing condition that no one knew about, or could have known about. His family want to support the Disabilities Trust charity – in particular the Brain Injury Rehabilitation Trust part of this charity. Please contribute via the Just Giving page: www.justgiving.com/nicholas-thatcher

Just a few matches to go this season and I am getting nervous. Keep the faith fellow Bluebirds and I will see you all at the Trust Annual General Meeting on Thursday 19 May at 7:30pm!

Tim Hartley

Trust Chair

A £500 donation has been made to the Fred Keenor Statue Appeal by the owners of the new Sand Martin pub and restaurant which lies just yards from where the tribute will be erected.

In a letter Derek Andrew, Managing Director of Wolverhampton-based Marston’s, said that “this gesture is from the hardy football supporters among us”.

Mr Andrew, a Wolves fan, said that Marston’s general stance on fundraising was normally to support disadvantaged individuals or groups but on “this occasion I am happy to enclose a cheque for £500 to help towards your target.”

He has also invited the appeal committee to take part in joint activities in the future with Marston’s.

David Craig, appeal project manager and a member of the board of Cardiff City Supporters’ Trust, said: “This is a great gesture from Marston’s and we’re delighted because the pub and restaurant is based just yards from where the statue of Fred Keenor will be sited.

“We’d like to see businesses and employers in South Wales, particularly those with links with Cardiff City, following the lead set by Marston’s, which is, after all, a business based in the West Midlands.

“The donation from Marston’s means we have now passed £47,500 on our way to the £85,000 needed.”

Earlier this year Cardiff City Supporters’ Trust wrote to Mr Andrew urging him to consider naming the pub, which is at the junction of  Leckwith Road and Ffordd Fred Keenor, after the Cardiff and Wales skipper, who led Cardiff City to FA Cup triumph in 1927 – the only time the trophy has been taken out of England.

The Trust  held an open meeting on Tuesday, March 29th,  to discuss ideas for the future. Most people agreed that we need to offer more benefit to members. We would all like to arrange regular Fans Forums at the club where we have a chance to ask Dave Jones and some players questions. We held a very successful question and answer session with Tg and Dave before Christmas and we will be asking the club to make players available for another event. We will also be arranging an end of season event for Trust members and are working on the details of this.

I think we need to continue to grow our membership to the Trust on a month by month basis. In a crisis I am sure everyone would want a strong Trust, however ,with the City doing well in the Championship and with some sensible financial management at the club we need to be realistic about how many new members we can regularly sign up. Having said that we will be looking to improve on our ‘offer’ to members. Some of the ideas included more member only events, a member only section to the website, an annual card and Trust badge and the like. All great ideas.

At the moment we have a core group of people running the quizzes, band nights and community projects that the Trust organises. A greater number of open meetings are planned this year in order to ensure good communication of these Trust activities and to encourage people to become more involved. There was some discussion too about holding events outside Cardiff.  The Trust has had a couple of great evenings in Maesteg and Pontypridd and we are looking to organise something with the 1927 club in London. The Trust’s emphasis when holding events will naturally be in Cardiff because that is where the majority of fans reside but we are open to all invitations from other areas to participate in and help organise events in their areas.
It was good to see new faces at the  meeting. Thanks for coming.
C’mon the City!

Tim Hartley

Chair

The appeal committee is delighted to announce that we raised £1,710.89 (subject to checking at the bank) from the bucket collection outside the Millennium Stadium before Wales v England.

This was great  considering many of the fans were not Cardiff City supporters or even regular Wales fans. We were allocated three of the stadium’s Gates – 5,6 and 7 – to collect from.

Thanks to the volunteers who made the event such a success, to those that generously chipped in cash and to the Football Association of Wales for allowing us to hold the bucket collection.

You can still help the appeal by buying one of the 8in figurines of Fred Keenor or the pin badges. You can get further details on purchasing these items by contacting fundraising@ccfctrust.org.

The efforts of everyone mean the kitty stands at over £46,000, well over half-way.