The first draft of this statement was very different.
Covid-19
All clubs in the Championship have faced similar problems in regard to Covid. It's the responsibility of our owner to ensure wages are paid. We have no external debt largely because when we have sold players for large fees we do not reinvest large sums of money back into the squad.
Football
On the field performances have been largely poor for 18+ months, yet the club were happy with the abject performances; regularly telling supporters that they had a too high level of expectation and not enough patience. We left the sacking of Alex Neil for as long as possible, as we firmly believed he was the best man to grind out a championship existence.
Some people suggested that the squad was not good enough to compete, and our results since proved categorically we should have sacked Alex Neil much sooner i.e. immediately after the capitulation against Rovers at home.
Our poor squad strengthening in recent years has largely been because we have no real strategy or awareness of what players would aid the managers style of play. But we want to base all future optimism on the last eight games of the season as that makes zero sense and suits our short term philosophy.
We will continue to allow players to enter the last 12 months of their contracts. We won't offer them proper wages to secure our best players. It is likely more players will fancy a change of scenery due to this lack of ambition.
We have made the switch to a "head coach" rather than a manager as again it suits our entire philosophy. We require staff to nod in agreement and be happy to have a job. We signed up new recruitment analyst James Beet but we wish to make it crystal clear it will not alter our recruitment policy. We don't personally believe in modern ideas at PNE.
Euxton Training Ground
We fooled fans into supporting plans for a new training ground but at least we purchased Euxton. We think it was prudent to wait as long as possible to join other clubs in the 21st century. It's also saved cash on renting somewhere for our youths to play.
Academy
We operate what is known as a Category 3 Academy which demonstrates our complete lack of respect of understanding for youth football. Rather than fund a proper academy that could help enhance the clubs future for decades to come, we prefer to send our ragtag collection of youths on trips to non league outfits before releasing them. In doing so we are able to sign up the likes of Nugent and Harrop on 500k per year contracts who offer a similar inability to play first team football. Organising a Cat 2 academy would take ambition and hard work. We do not have time for all that nonsense at PNE.
Sponsorship
We have happily took money from betting companies for years because it's the easiest approach and we have zero interest in the fact betting is a huge problem in the UK and do not worry about promoting gambling addiction or any concerns our fans might have.
Recently all football clubs were made aware betting companies would likely to be soon banned from being shirt sponsors. So, sadly we will need an announce a non betting sponsor soon. The reduced revenue we create will come out of our transfer budget.
European Super League
When the misguided European Super League was announced a few weeks ago all facets of football stood against it. Not just PNE. Some of the club's involved hadn't won anything in 60 years... much like us.
49 different clubs have played in the premier League including most of our north west neighbours. But rather than concern ourselves with why North End haven't achieved that, we just want to make you aware that on one specific statistic (that we will not explain) PNE are the second most successful club promoted to the championship in the last six years. (Please ignore barnsleys play off finish)
The phrase "sooner rather than later" does not fit our philosophy at all but it sounds good. We just hope some of you are alive to see it.
Return Of Fans And Season Tickets
The absence of fans allowed us to offer a standard of football that was often unwatchable at times. We've held off putting season tickets on sale because its unlikely to have seen a successful take up from fans.
The main objective of this long winded statement today was to prepare fans to be ready to fork out £400+ next season. There wil be no grand scheme to see deepdale full to capacity anytime soon.
You can expect some token offer for certain young age groups but most of you will be paying top dollar at Deepdale. When the announcement is made please don't moan, as we have no interest in hearing your views.
The last 18 months has reinforced the idea the idea that fans are the heartbeat of football. Whilst we appreciate the sentiment we know there is only one fan that matters. And he resides on the Isle of Man