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Newport & Wrexham article

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Newport & Wrexham article Empty Newport & Wrexham article

Post  Dial M For Merthyr Zine Wed May 01, 2013 3:02 pm

Twohundredpercent blogsite article on Newport and Wrexham, includes a brief mention of Merthyr Town;

Both Wrexham and Newport County went into their play-off semi-final second leg matches in the Blue Square Bet Premier this season with leads that could perhaps be best described as “precarious.” Newport County entertained Grimsby Town at Rodney Parade with a one goal lead from their first leg trip to Blundell Park, but a first half goal from Christian Jolley was enough to settle most nerves and they held on with some comfort to book a trip to Wembley for a second successive season after losing in the FA Trophy final there to York City last season. If anything, Wrexham’s position going into their second leg match at Kidderminster Harriers was even more suspect. Protecting a two-one lead from the first leg at The Racecourse Ground, they might have been expected to man the defensive barricades in order to cling onto that lead, but instead a crowd of just over 6,200 people saw them win by three goals to one on the day, and by five goals to two on aggregate.

It is worth pausing a moment to consider the agonies suffered by their opponents this season. For Grimsby Town, this season has been a case of “no near, yet so far,” twice. Beaten in the final of the FA Trophy by Wrexham last month, they have now missed out on a second trip there as a result of losing to Newport County and have to regroup for the start of next season. For Kidderminster Harriers, the sense of disappointment may just be even greater. The club had a disastrous start to this season, failing to win any of its first ten league matches, before losing just four more league matches all season and missing out on automatic promotion at the end of the regular season to Mansfield Town. As has happened so many times before, however, perhaps the physical efforts of straining to the very last and the psychological effects of daring to believe before having the title snatched away at the last proved to be too great to overcome.

Perhaps, though, it is appropriate that Wrexham and Newport County should be playing off at Wembley at the end of a season that has surely been one of the most extraordinary in the entire history of Welsh football. With Cardiff City having been promoted to the Premier League and Swansea City having consolidated their Premier League place as well as having lifted the League Cup, the accession of either Newport or Wrexham to the Football League will complete an unprecedentedly successful season for the game in Wales, and there may be further success to follow if Merthyr Town can win in the play-offs for Division One South & West of the Southern League over the next couple of weeks or so, having finished in third place in the table in their first season in that division.

Easy – and convenient – though it may be to casually lump all Welsh clubs in as one homogeneous bloc, however, it is worth remembering that these clubs have, more regularly in the past, been rivals rather than anything else. All have their own stories to tell, and the stories of Newport County and Wrexham are those of clubs revived, in one case from the brink of death and in the other after the death of the club had already been reported. In the case of Newport County, it was the mismanagement of one man, Jerry Sharman, that was the biggest single contributor to the demise of a club that had become one of the first victims of the introduction of automatic promotion and relegation between the fourth division of the Football League and the Football Conference. Two successive relegations in 1987 and 1988 saw the club plummet from the Football League after a stay of sixty-eight years – albeit one that was interrupted by one year back in non-league football, in the 1931/32 season – and folded in February 1989 with debts of £330,000.

The club reformed a year later as Newport AFC and joined the Hellenic League, with a dispute with the Football Association of Wales preventing the club from playing in its home town until 1994, when it won its legal claim to be able to continue to play in the English league system and moved into the Newport Stadium. There was, however, no AFC Wimbledon-esque race up through the divisions for the club, which changed its name to Newport County in 1999. The club spent fourteen years in the Southern League before being placed into the Conference South upon its introduction in 2004, but it was promoted again in 2009 with a record one hundred and three points. After a reasonable first season, however, the club struggled in its second season despite its FA Trophy run, and finished in nineteenth place in the Blue Square Bet Premier table, avoiding relegation by just six points and two places. Last summer, the club left the Newport Stadium to move to Rodney Parade, and it has been about the top end of this year’s Blue Square Bet Premier table, finishing the season in third place in the table, behind Mansfield Town and Kidderminster Harriers.

The supporters of Wrexham Football Club never quite lost their club, but it was close at times, before the Wrexham Supporters Trust took ownership of the club in October 2011. There had been concerns over whether the Trust could keep up the levels that the team had, against all odds, it has to be said, achieving during the previous season, but managed a Third Round replay in the FA Cup against Brighton and lost in the semi-finals of the Blue Square Bet Premier play-offs to Luton Town. This season has seen a continuation of that success, with a win in the final of the FA Trophy last month at Wembley – the club’s first to that particular venue – coming on top of another place in the play-offs in the Blue Square Bet Premier play-offs, where this time they held their own over two legs against Kidderminster Harriers. A return to the Football League would be an extraordinary end to less than two years of ownership by the Wrexham Supporters Trust.

These are, then, two clubs that have been to the brink and back and it is, perhaps, a salutary lesson for the supporters all clubs at this time of year to remember that returning to form can be a matter of patience after years in the doldrums. Football in Wales has had an extraordinary year at club level, with the successes of Cardiff City and Swansea City to be added to what Wrexham and Newport County have managed over the last nine months. And by the end of Sunday afternoon, Wales will have a third club back amongst the top ninety-two of the English league system, regardless of the result. Considering everything that has happened across Welsh football over the course of this season, it is entirely appropriate that it should be two clubs from that part of the world that should be ending the season at this of all venues.

Dial M For Merthyr Zine

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Post  SwanseaJack(SgorioFruit) Sun May 05, 2013 6:14 am

Im just arrived at wembley stadium now.


Come on newport
SwanseaJack(SgorioFruit)
SwanseaJack(SgorioFruit)

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Location : Abertawe, Cymru

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Post  Dial M For Merthyr Zine Fri Jan 31, 2014 4:35 pm

THE PRICE OF PROMOTION
From www.footballeconomy.com

Newport County lost GBP350,000 chasing the dream of re-joining the Football
League but the club expects to see a big boost to revenue streams during
this financial year. This week's annual general meeting revealed
considerable detail about the finances of a League 2, formerly Conference,
club.

The annual report stated that the priority for the business was to achieve
promotion, an achievement that led to an operating loss (before exceptional
items) of GBP606,032. However, that loss was offset in a gain of GBP263,626
resulting from restricting the 'historic' debt (largely money owed to former
directors) by converting it into shares and cash.

Turnover went up for the Exiles to GBP1,227,623 after topping GBP1 million
for the first time in 2012 and, interestingly, the Exiles list just GBP750
as their expense for incoming transfers. That's because chairman Les
Scadding paid for their two most significant deals, those for Christian
Jolley and Conor Washington, as part of an interest-free loan and with no
deadline on repayment, totalling GBP395,959.

Turnover for this year should be up again, notwithstanding the cost of
playing at Rodney Parade being GBP51,000 in rent compared to GBP17,000 at
Spytty Park. Revenues were up for the Exiles virtually across the board,
with gate receipts increased from GBP330,904 to GBP555,677.

Programme sales were up around 33% and 'other income' rose from GBP114,740
to GBP185,413. The Exiles boosted their commercial revenue from GBP76,361 to
GBP115,137 and the Bisley Business Club added an additional GBP21,176.

Newport's trip to Wembley for the Conference play-off Final wasn't as
lucrative as their FA Trophy Final a year previously, netting the club just
GBP69,932 compared to GBP150,999 in 2012, with television and prize revenue
also falling significantly, from GBP167,330 to GBP29,000.

The club also announced a total of GBP110,000 received for player transfers.
The Exiles are also now dealing with a seven-figure wage budget for the
first time. Playing wages increased in 2013 to GBP949,964 from GBP648,188
and staff wages also rose, from GBP83,535 to GBP226,177, inclusive of new
staff off-the-field and new contracts from manager Justin Edinburgh and
assistant Jimmy Dack.

Dial M For Merthyr Zine

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Post  Tim Drummond Sun Feb 02, 2014 6:16 pm

Conor Washington has been sold to Peterborough United for an initial reported £150,000.







Tim Drummond

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Post  ncfc Tue Feb 04, 2014 3:16 am

£150,000 initially with add-on's for x amount of games played. Supposedly the deal will eventually work out at £500,000 if he plays enough games for them.

I don't think any of us were expecting anything different to come out of the AGM to be honest. Any of our fans who aren't blind/stupid will admit we've been bankrolled for the last 12-18 months; I'm surprised the losses weren't bigger to be honest.

ncfc

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Post  ncfc Sun Feb 09, 2014 2:40 am

PS. Seems weird how they mention Wrexham's attendance in the article as if to demonstrate their size, yet the semi-final gate at Newport was about 500 more at almost 7,000. Lol.

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