"Where we are now"

by

Exeforever

(written the day before Pete Drewett's departure)

It is obvious from some of the postings on this board (The Tribe) that there are a number of people who have a very partial knowledge of the club’s recent (say last 20 years) history. It is very arguable that what happened in the amateur era is not relevant to what is happening today and I am therefore not going back any further than the mid 90s. Whilst debate about where we are is a valid and valuable tool it is only so if there is an element of context to it. I therefore offer the following in a spirit of contribution to that debate, one that I believe needs to take place. It is one person’s recollection of events, I do not wish to suggest that it is “gospel truth”, it is my opinion of what happened and anyone who wishes to contradict or add to it should do so:

Exeter Rugby Club owns Sandy Park and is in turn owned by the Members. Some years ago the then members voted to cap the membership at 750 because there were rumours circulating in the press that a group of South Africans were looking for an English ND1 club to purchase in order to relocate it to London, rename it London Tribe, populate it with SA players of Springbok quality and gatecrash the Prem destroying the “donor” club in the process. The rationale was that the SA ex-pat community in London was large enough to provide a viable supporter base which was likely to grow as Afrikaner whites emigrated from SA to avoid the new political reality at home.

Tony Rowe became the dominant figure in the club as a result of the clout that SW Telecoms’ sponsorship gave him. The firm also employed a number of then current and past players. Once we were ensconced in ND1 after a first season in which we only avoided relegation due to a league reorganisation which took place during the season (plus ça change), it became apparent that the increasing demands of Health and Safety and the deteriorating state of the County Ground demanded radical action. We had seen the “Worcester model” develop and it was obvious that that was the future: a non-match day steady income stream and first class modular facilities which could be developed to meet the needs of the Premiership. Even before we left the County Ground I seem to recall that the board had stated in both the Programme and at Members’ fora that it was their intention to ensure that we had Premiership Rugby at Exeter within 5 years. This was first said about 7 or 8 years ago so those who believe that we are in a 3 year plan now either did not know, or have forgotten, their history.

The board put the proposal to move to Sandy Park to a members’ meeting attended by 150 or so of the available members including Ian Bremner and the players. Despite the obliteration of the name of Bremner from the subsequent records he was largely responsible for the drive towards the “Chiefs” brand and absolutely set on the move to SP. The members voted something like 140 in favour and 2 or 3 against the move, on the understanding that it would be completed without plunging the club into debt. The original plans also provided for over 200 car parking spaces at SP. The members also, either at this point or shortly afterwards, entrusted the Board with the business management of the club (including the right to set the beer prices!!!) and appointed a group of trustees who were old (in the longstanding, not chronological sense) club men to keep a watching brief on the Board.

To achieve the new Stadium the board were given £14million minus whatever debt the club then had, (I don’t recall the members being informed that there was any significant debt at that point and indeed I do not think that there was). To those who claim that SP is some sort of tribute to the board’s farsightedness I am inclined to reply that anyone given that amount of money should be able to employ the necessary experts to ensure that the product is delivered in an acceptable and timely state, Construction is not rocket science.

We now enter an area where the facts become murky. SP was delivered on time but there was controversy over the groundworks, the contractor and the solicitors. It was rumoured that the ground was contaminated from the excavations associated with the creation of the Motorway Junction and the figure of £3million was bandied about as the cost of cleaning the ground, this has never been confirmed nor, however have I ever seen or heard it denied. I believe that this led to an attempt to recover the costs from the contractor and the solicitors. To the best of my knowledge the outcome of this action is either not yet known or has never been made public, whether for reasons of a gagging clause or whatever I do not know. The topic used to be raised regularly at members’ fora, usually directly after the beer price (!), but was unanswered on the grounds that it was sub judice .

It may be totally unrelated to the above but it was then made clear to members that there had had to be some retrenchment in the development of SP which suggested that either costs had escalated or that we had gone over budget for the reasons suggested above or for some other reason.

The board responded quickly and efficiently however to issues raised about facilities at SP increasing the provision of WCs and providing the covered terracing on the East side but the failure to persuade the Council to adhere to the original parking proposals resulted in there being less parking within 5 minutes walk of the ground than there was at the County Ground; and for a club that will need to expand its supporter base in order to attract adequate crowds to sustain Premiership membership this is still a ticking bomb. The cost of both food and beer is high by comparison with some other clubs and this has been a constant cause of criticism both from members and from visiting supporters. Personally I go to SP to watch Rugby and to a pub to drink beer but the link between alcohol and the sport seems indissoluble.

For a number of years the club outperformed its budget on the field; third place finishes in 00/01, 01/02 and 02/03 being particularly commendable followed by seconds in 04/05, 07/08 and possibly this year. However we have never made the vital breakthrough to the next level.

Four trips to Twickenham have resulted in four defeats. The first and last losses to Rotherham and Northampton respectively were to be expected, the defeats by Orrell and Pirates were much more disturbing since we were strong favourites to win both games.

Likewise the crucial League matches have resulted not just in defeat but in humiliation. Bristol away 68-15; Quins away 70-5 are not the performances of a team who are Premiership-in-waiting quality, more recently the defeat by Newbury, draw against Esher and the massacre at Moseley indicate that this trend has continued.

Part of the rationale for recruiting Pete Drewett was that as England u-21 manager he would bring a string of quality young England players with him (according to a Board Member I spoke with at the time). This really did not happen, Matt Cornwell has had a thoroughly forgettable season at 12 and many of the better recruits have been Irish!

Throughout the years however we have had some surprise packages come, and, far too rapidly, go: Vaili and Rasmussen and Malone immediately spring to mind. Josh if he is indeed off to Quins and Lewis Stevenson and others of the current vintage.

Overall then we are where we are firstly due to the foresight of the members in the 30s who bought the County Ground and thus provided us with a valuable capital asset when many other clubs were playing on council or privately owned pitches.

We have a stadium which is the envy of many Premier, let alone ND1, sides but the timing and decision to build this were forced on us by external circumstances and the artificially high price of housing land not created by some visionary seer.

We didn’t go bankrupting ourselves by selling the County Ground at the beginning of professionalism and throwing the money away on a couple of seasons of players’ wages. The board will claim credit for this but the members could have demanded that we did so had they wished. It happens that the board and the members were as one on this issue and believed that we should progress as our means allowed us to.

Nevertheless:

Under 2 different professional Directors of Rugby we have never won any silverware. Our last meaningful prize (discounting the Fair Play Trophy and Devon Cup) was the Division Three Championship and promotion in 1997 which was accomplished by an amateur side under a coach who had a full time school teaching job.

We have now had 3 chances to seize the initiative for promotion and blown it quite spectacularly on each occasion.

Over the last few seasons we have been getting closer, we were 50 points adrift in 05/06, 22 points adrift in 06/07, 27 points adrift last year due to Northampton’s enormous advantage of having 5 or 6 times our playing budget and we are currently 4 points adrift of Leeds this year yet the board has now sacked the architect of this progress.

I leave you to make up your own minds about what conclusions, if any, can be drawn from the above and also about which version of Exeter Rugby Club you wish to support and, indeed, how you wish to support it.

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