| taken from york city fanzine 'ginner's left foot' FACT of the Matter by Jobi1, with Greg Stone Recently, life for City fans has become more affirming than a bucket of anti-wrinkle cream. With John Advert set to include fans� trust members on his new board, things have never been so interesting. But the trust is not a new idea� Rewind to �99. Some no-mark from Wycombe scrambles the ball into the Lincoln net with a few minutes of the season left to send City back to whence they came. The new season started, and it soon became apparent that things were, if anything, getting worse. The fans had finally had enough. And thus, like a crunching Nigel Pepper two-footer, was FACT born� From the relative obscurity of local politics stepped Coun. Greg Stone. Someone needed to take responsibility for starting the fans� fightback, and here was the man. Greg not only proposed, but arranged the now infamous red card protest for the league game against Peterborough. Armed with a boxful of red cards, Greg convened the activists in the Burton Stone, amongst their number GLF�s Will Thornton and your correspondent. D(C)-Day was a great success, with even the Posh fans pitching in. Half-time was a fifteen minute abuse-a-thon as the cards were waved and the chairman was informed of exactly what everyone thought of his stewardship. The immediate aftermath was as comic as it was tragic. If dummy spitting were an Olympic Sport, DC admirably demonstrated his gold medal credentials. After threatening to sue for libel over the leaflet's claim that he is an "asset-stripper" (some mistake surely?) he issued the group with a bill for �41.12 for cleaning up costs following the protest. It was as if he were trying to conclusively prove the group�s newly chosen name, Fans Against Craig�s Tyranny, wasn�t just a clever acronym. Public relations between club and fans deteriorated through the last part of the year; the invoice row rumbled on, with threats of a ban from BC and a possible small claims court summons from Mr Craig. FACT scored another hit with the response to bucket collections at several City games. The cost of the invoice was covered more than twice over, with even the legendary Harry Gration pledging 10p. Unfortunately the club refused to lighten the mood for Christmas, rejecting the group�s offer to present DC with the money on the Crescent pitch at half-time. In December 99, things started to hot up. First a FACT boycott, drawing attention to DC�s refusal to sign the Kick Racism Out Of Football charter, saw only 1005 attend the Auto Windscreens clash with Hull � the second lowest gate in the club's history. FACT then infiltrated that bastion of mind-control, the matchday programme, with Will Thornton's "In the Net" column containing a cryptic message � the first letters of each sentence forming the plea "CRAIG OUT NOW". Media coverage of the FACT campaign hit the national news. But if things were to be changed, it was no use being a clandestine little gang. A public meeting was held to gauge support before a game with Southend � over 100 people attended. In a typically stirring speech, Greg, flanked by Will and your correspondent, tentatively suggested that we thought about actually trying to take a stake in DC�s playground. When your correspondent spotted an ad for a conference on supporter involvement in football clubs, the group knew where the future lay. Armed only with sharp togs, cigars, and a love of �their� club, Greg and your correspondent bowled into the first ever Supporters� Direct conference in London. After surviving the brain-numbing speech from Trevor �My old club West Ham� Brooking, they came away full of ideas and optimism. Fed up of the rift between fans who want change, and fans who felt that they were a disruptive element, FACT announced a change in name to Fans Assisting City Together and looked at ways to encourage fan participation in the running of the club. A FACT business plan was prepared which first �officially� floated the idea of a supporters trust. Craig rejected the plan as "a half-baked sixth-form essay" but later offered the fans a seat on the board in the most non-participatory way possible, if the official Supporters Club membership reached 1500. This empty gesture was met mostly with disappointed resignation by FACT-ites. At this stage, had FACT discovered a cure to all known disease, Craig would probably have rejected it out of hand. Faced with Craig�s abuse, and the general public�s indifference, FACT retreated to get behind the team in a fight against relegation. And so it was around Christmas 2001 that the (tight, Scottish) shit hit the fan(s). With Supporters� Direct firmly established as general doers of good/slayers of evil in football, and supporter involvement very much top of the pops nation-wide, City fans were able to race to become the quickest ever formed fans� trust. John Advert has welcomed them with open wallet, oops, I mean arms. The future is exciting, and here�s to it. But let us not forget the work of G-Man and his 24 hour party people. We tried, and yes, we failed; maybe we were just ahead of our time. Whatever, I wouldn�t have changed any of it. And now I�m proud to be a life member of the York City Supporters� Trust. Who cares what might have been? We�re there now and that�s all that counts. |