Ex Players day

A big thank you to everyone who made the Ex Players Day such a success today at Penydarren Park. It was great to see so many legends of yesteryear in the Candac mixing with the fans. Chris Holvey, Malcolm Gilligan, Micky Lenihan, Peter Jones, Wayne Jones, Ian Docherty, Ieuan Evans, Emrys Evans, Ceri Williams, Roger Mullen and of course Lyn Jones were among the many former Penydarren Park favourites at the club. It was the 10th annual event that the Trust/Club have put on for the former players, here's looking forward to next year's get-together. Great to see the mobile Museum on display once again too detailing the history of our club from 1908 to the present day.

Nice one, Harry.

Unfortunately I wouldn't call it a 'nice one'.
Former players/manager and their family members were shoved down the bottom end of the Candac when in my opinion they should have been in the 'Board room' (where the game sponsors are put).
Despite being given a voucher for one free drink at the bar (how humiliating) they didn't even get as much as a sausage roll even though invitation clearly stated refreshments provided at half time and end of game.
Sad to see ex players having to buy food from Penalty spot cafe when so much food was left over from the sponsors.
sponsorship money might be important but there was a total lack respect for the ex players/manager.

sponsorship money might be important

Probably is important - to enable the club to pay the wages of the future ex players.

However, there is clearly an opportunity for fresh blood to help the volunteers who organise and finance next years ex players day.

Great Work yesterday by Harry Swift in Organising the Ex Players day.

With regards the " Humiliating " Free Drinks Voucher just to out on record that the Club / Trust did not Pay for these Drink Vouchers , Fundraising through Sales of the Dial M For Merthyr Fanzine enabled the Ex Players to receive a drink before the game.

Yes - a big thank you to the Dial M boys for organising this event once again. All the organisation and cost (preparing and posting letters, reserving an area in the bar and providing a welcome drink) was borne by the boys.

It would not be practical to house the former players in the board room, which was reserved months ago by three of our most important sponsors (First4Rentals, Mikerry Rail and Aquarius Financial Advisors0, who have supported the club fantastically this season.

Admin wrote:Yes - a big thank you to the Dial M boys for organising this event once again. All the organisation and cost (preparing and posting letters, reserving an area in the bar and providing a welcome drink) was borne by the boys.

It would not be practical to house the former players in the board room, which was reserved months ago by three of our most important sponsors (First4Rentals, Mikerry Rail and Aquarius Financial Advisors0, who have supported the club fantastically this season.

Admin.... as you are well aware there are 13 calor league away passes given to our board of directors for away matches. It would be prudent as directors of other clubs in our league give these fees back to their clubs as part of fundraising.
It would be a nice gesture if our board of directors who uses these photo passes could donate this money back to our club so events like ex players could be funded from these donations.

I will not comment on whether our directors should or should not donate the value of free entry at away games to club finances. That is for each individual to decide.

I have no idea what other clubs do.

What I do know is that our directors already contribute much time and money to the club. If they travel on the team bus they pay towards the cost of the bus.

I'll comment, because I'm a trust member but not on the Board.

This strikes me as petty in the extreme. The time, emotion and effort our NON PAID Board put in far outweighs any slight benefit they may get for their travel and contribution.

Surely the ex players/manager/family could have shared the 'Sponsors' room' with the visiting directors.
Providing a few sandwiches, cake and cup of tea wouldn't have cost a fortunate. Didn't a number of people train for Food hygiene certificates a couple of years ago.
wouldn't it have been better for someone to get the drinks from the bar for the ex players as is done for the sponsors ?
With regards to 'reserved area' in the bar there was no sign, plus others not involved with ex players day were sat there.
It's all about respect.Without the ex players/managers there wouldn't be those trophies in the board room today.

Kathleen Hurley wrote:Surely the ex players/manager/family could have shared the 'Sponsors' room' with the visiting directors.

wouldn't it have been better for someone to get the drinks from the bar for the ex players as is done for the sponsors ?

 
Re the first point, I assume the 'Sponsors Room' is occupied by the match sponsors - whether that includes directors of the visiting club as well I don't know.  But with regard to the match sponsors - and we had three companies sponsoring on Monday as well as 'Merthyr Supporters' - surely it's up to them whether they wish to share.
 
Second point - scope for another volunteer or two?  Like everything else to do with running the club - it  needs someone to do it.
 
Regarding other points on this thread, I don't know what happens at away matches, but people may not be generally aware - although I seem to remember it was stated as policy when the Trust began running the club - but Board members pay for their admission to matches at Penydarren Park just like anyone else.  And bear in mind that some of them are quite likely to miss large parts of the game because of their duties running the club on match days.
 
While none of us is perfect I know I'd be very reluctant to criticise the efforts of Board members - or OTHER volunteers (emphasis) unless I thought I could do any better myself - and came forward to try it - or stood for election and got onto the Board myself.

In recent years the former players have been accommodated in the CANDAC. It is difficult to plan for seating because the numbers of former players who turn up is unpredictable. With the number who did turn up it would have been uncomfortable in the room adjacent to the board room, along with visiting directors and officials.

Present day sponsors are accommodated in what has been traditionally the Board room. The former sponsors room is where now visiting directors are accommodated and used as a lounge for the bar when the Candac room has been privately hired.
The ex players couldn't have been more uncomfortable in the old sponsors' than they were in a packed candac room.
I have spend many years and hours volunteering at the football club - stewarding,assisting Jeffrey with the soccalot and selling 50/50 and many others things.On Monday I even ended up helping with the 50/50 and selling match day programmes.Unfortunately due to finances and other commitments a decision had to be made as we couldn't afford to pay for 2 family members to attend matches regularly especially after sorting out the 50/50 I was lucky to see 30 mins of the game.As he is the bread winner and Merthyr Tydfil football supporter for over 40 yrs it was only fair that he got the season ticket.However that is a separate issue and topic.
Regarding the ex players day it still boils down to respect

It certainly seems as if the planned extensions to the Candac and other facilities can't come soon enough!

Merthyr Imp wrote:It certainly seems as if the planned extensions to the Candac and other facilities can't come soon enough!

Certainly! It was a little on the packed side Saturday. I won't say uncomfortably so but the fine weather meant that dozens were drinking outside so I think had it been a little cold on the the weekend it may have been a bit rammed.

As to the question of the ex-players day, and thinking ahead here. Maybe at the start of next season the lounge could be booked for ex-players day. You see this presents another unique opportunity. The day itself could attract additional sponsorship with the lucky sponsor given the unique opportunity to rub shoulders with the former stars of MTFC. Indeed I think it would be great if the club were to take a more integral role in next season's event as it represents not just a unique sponsorship opportunity but could be a massive part of our public relations and community work in that the event could attract some additional press and so on (thus it may be of interest to a sponsor) - sponsor money here being re-channeled into the event itself making it a bit bigger.

Out of interest- does anyone know if the proposed extension of the facilities include extensions to the toilets in the candac? I dunno about the ladies (not been in there honest!) but at times there is a bit of a bottleneck there in the gents at times. (thats wayyyyy off topic but sort of wondered since the extended facilities thing has come up).

.

[quote="
Out of interest- does anyone know if the proposed extension of the facilities include extensions to the toilets in the candac?  I dunno about the ladies (not been in there honest!) but at times there is a bit of a bottleneck there in the gents at times.  (thats wayyyyy off topic but sort of wondered since the extended facilities thing has come up)..[/quote]

Plans for the internal refurbishments haven't been finalised yet but I can confirm that the new build and existing areas will have additional toilet facilities including disabled.

Well Old Sod I know what you mean...I have had to use a bottle neck sometimes in the bar...I tend to either use the bloke in front jacket pocket or brave the al fresco latrine near the closed Penydarren Theatre end....good fun drawing elephants with nine legs on the algae covered wall...perhaps I will invent a new game app for the I phone..pee pee at PP...this time next year I will be a millionaire...Boz

Wow.

Where to start? We use the Candac Suite for the former players as in previous seasons when we have had the Sponsors Room available to us then they have migrated to the bar area which is better all round as its great to see them discussing days gone by with the supporters.

The Sponsors Room was unavailable anyway as it has been booked for months.

We've agreed with the club that any events we put on do not affect the club's ever tight budgets so the profits from the recent Dial M For Merthyr fanzine were used to produce drinks tokens for the players so they could have a drink upon arrival. Waiter service was out of the question as most of us have children with us these days plus if I had to get drinks for Georgie all day then I would walk miles.

Lyn Jones rang me today to thank us for the day on behalf of his group and I spoke at length with Malcolm Gilligan who enjoyed his first ever reunion at Penydarren Park.

It's never been a formal event, space has ever been kind to us since the loss of Strikers.

Perhaps we should consider a change of date for the next one as the Easter period always seems to clash with a promotion game (long may this continue of course).

Very happy to take on board the criticism, there's always room for improvement in any event. We continue to cast our net ever wider to search out former payers who remain unaware of the good work being undertaken at Penydarren Park. Maybe one day we'll get Bob Latchford back from Germany.

Well done to Harry and the Dial M boys for running the event for another year. Not many clubs at our level do this sort of thing, glad we have people who take this on year after year.

Just a further note of thanks to Mark - for initiating the placement of new name tiles on the Hall of Fame in the CANDAC and for co-ordinating the process of inducting three further names to the Hall of Fame - Moses Russell, Dai Lloyd and Andy Beattie. We are very much indebted to Mark and the Dial M crew for their ongoing efforts to celebrate the history of the club and its players and officials.