East Fife chairman Jim Stevenson has issued a rallying call to fans to prevent the club slipping into serious financial difficulty and potentially stop them from dropping out of the senior leagues altogether.
Addressing fans earlier this week, Stevenson insisted that a takeover bid by him and fellow directors Dave Marshall, John Barclay and John Donaldson would stabilise the club, but he suggested that finances at the club were “not good”.
Dwindling crowds at Bayview have been partially to blame for that scenario and Stevenson is keen to avoid the Fifers spiralling further in the wrong direction.
“We haven’t signed off the accounts for this year yet, but what the accounts will say is that the debt is a lot less than it was before,” he revealed.
“It is still ongoing debt because the money coming through the gate isn’t enough. On Saturday, we brought in the massive amount of just £1,700 through the gate.
“Remember that we have 230 season ticket holders. You get a gate of 440, and that includes comps and stuff, and 69 people went through the £13 gate.
“So £1,700 to try and pay our bills and expenses is not enough. What we’ve got is manageable debt right now, but the debt gets worse because if there’s no money coming in, the players still have to be paid.
“That’s the point we’re trying to make. Your football debt is with you, regardless of who signed the players or what.
“You need to pay players to get them in and the manager makes the decision, and we’re doing our best.
“But Rangers, Hearts and Dunfermline asked people to help and they got thousands, millions thrown at them. East Fife ask and you get told to go and jump off a bridge somewhere.
“The fans don’t own Rangers and Hearts, and other clubs, but they go and help. Here, it’s difficult.
“Do you think Rangers would be Rangers if there was only 500 turning up? No.
“You need fans and people to put money into the club to have a better team, and if there was 2,000 turning up every week we’d probably be in the Championship and challenging. But there’s not.
“We used to have an average of 720 for donkey’s years, but now the average is around 550 and it’s going down.
“And you’ve got to remember that this year, every club in League Two has a problem because there’s a play-off at the bottom.
“If you look at the clubs who could be involved, Spartans for example who just beat Clyde in the cup, it’s not going to be easy.
“That bottom club could easily end up in the Lowland League or wherever.
“You’ve got to invest to make sure you are not in the bottom. We’re not making a really good job at the moment, but hopefully there are signs the team can do better.”
Stevenson hopes the purchase of a 52% from the club’s current majority shareholders will steady the ship, stressing that the current owners will no longer have input at the club.
“We will take responsibility for all the shares and they will be transferred into our names,” he continued.
“There will be no interference whatsoever because we will be the major shareholders. They will have no say and no input, and we will have responsibility for managing debt.
“To dispel the myth, we can manage that quite easily ourselves, but we’d obviously like the community to be involved and everybody helping.
“The whole thing is to set this club up so there are no difficulties, and we decided we would take the pain so the club can gain.”
Stevenson also said he could envisage a time where the club is fully owned by the supporters as the whole of the 52% could be purchased by supporters.
“The opportunity is there,” he stressed.
For his part, Marshall said a meeting earlier this week with the East Fife Supporters Society (EFSS), who had previously wanted to work with the directors on a joint bid for immediate fan ownership, had proved productive.
And he admitted that the next few weeks and months could well be about winning hearts and minds.
“Hopefully we have convinced people that we are genuinely wanting assistance from every group at the club,” he added. “We know that unless we all work together we’re struggling a bit.
“We’re hoping, the four of us, to possibly tie things up in five or six years that’s the hope. It depends on how much backing we get.”
Barclay echoed those sentiments and stressed that the directors had made their bid to takeover the club in good faith.
“Having been a supporter since I was a bairn and getting involved in the club has been absolutely wonderful,” he said.
“Obviously we all have the club at heart. There’s no ulterior motives, there’s no financial gain. It’s just giving our time to try and move this club forward.
“Obviously we’ve been getting held back because we’re not in a position to say: ‘This is going to happen’ and we’re being guided by people who are not here.
“So to take it into our hands and get the fans involved would be a big plus for this club in moving it forward.”