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Hereford, would we REALLY have gone out of business if we'd lost

Would we have gone out of business if we'd lost at Hereford

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Icy Gull

Back on the rollercoaster
Jul 5, 2003
72,015
These days this seems to be stated, regularly, as an inarguable fact. Is it true or is it a possible exaggeration?

DK said he had 2 million lined up to invest in the team, regardless of what happened. Not personally totally convinced about that in hindsight tbh.

Doncaster fell out of the league the following season and look how they have done since with a much smaller fanbase than we had or have.

Would Gillingham have fallen through? We had piss poor crowds there anyway, not much more than 2 k most games

Would those of you who went to Gillingham have stopped going if we'd gone non league?

Would coming back to Brighton been anymore difficult if we had been a non league team

I don't know the answers to the above but I often think about them.

In short maybe those of you more in the know could clarify why we would have gone bust if we'd fallen out of the league? Life would almost certainly have been even more difficult I accept but wages would possibly have been lower and I doubt that the crowds would have been much smaller.
 
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Simster

"the man's an arse"
Jul 7, 2003
54,110
Surrey
I tend to agree. People talk about it on here as if it was indisputable fact, which clearly it isn't.
 


Wozza

Shite Supporter
Jul 6, 2003
23,585
Online
Fair question but, at the very least, it would have been VERY tough bouncing back from non-league with no ground and relatively few supporters at Gillingham.
 


hans kraay fan club

The voice of reason.
Helpful Moderator
Mar 16, 2005
61,094
Chandlers Ford
The fact that we didn't own a ground, makes our situation different to the example of Doncaster.

On the flip side, the ground regulations for the conference in those days were much less stringent than those for league clubs, so we may have found a temporary home, a lot nearer than Gillingham - Eastbourne or maybe even Worthing?
 


Bwian

Kiss my (_!_)
Jul 14, 2003
15,898
These days this seems to be stated, regularly, as an inarguable fact. Is it true or is it a possible exaggerartion?

DK said he had 2 million lined up to invest in the team, regardless of what happened. Not personally totally convinced about that in hidsight tbh.

eDoncaster fell out of the league the following season and look how they have done since with a much smaller fanbase than we had or have.

Would Gillingham have fallen through? We had piss poor crowds there anyway, not much more than 2 k most games

Would those of you who went to Gillingham have stopped going if we'd gone non league?

Would coming back to Brighton been anymore difficult if we had been a non league team

I don't know the answers to the above but I often think about them.

In short maybe those of you more in the know could clarify why we would have gone bust if we'd fallen out of the league? Life would almost certainly have been even more difficult I accept but wages would possibly have been lower and I doubt that the crowds would have been much smaller.

They had a ground and weren't looking at a 150 mile round trip ground share which as a Conference side meant we would have dropped like a stone.
 




hans kraay fan club

The voice of reason.
Helpful Moderator
Mar 16, 2005
61,094
Chandlers Ford
They had a ground and weren't looking at a 150 mile round trip ground share which as a Conference side, we would have dropped like a stone.

As above, if we were in the Conference, I don't think we'd have needed that round trip.
 




El Sid

Well-known member
May 10, 2012
3,806
West Sussex
The fact that we didn't own a ground, makes our situation different to the example of Doncaster.

On the flip side, the ground regulations for the conference in those days were much less stringent than those for league clubs, so we may have found a temporary home, a lot nearer than Gillingham - Eastbourne or maybe even Worthing?

I always thought the dog track would have made a decent temporary home. I guess there must be a reason why it was not seriously considered.
 




Bwian

Kiss my (_!_)
Jul 14, 2003
15,898
I always thought the dog track would have made a decent temporary home. I guess there must be a reason why it was not seriously considered.

Simple-Corals didn't want us there.
 


Icy Gull

Back on the rollercoaster
Jul 5, 2003
72,015
They had a ground and weren't looking at a 150 mile round trip ground share which as a Conference side meant we would have dropped like a stone.

I'm not sure that those of us who went actually went for the quality of the football :lol: Not convinced that most wouldn't have continued to go regardless. We had gone from 30k to the real hardcore of 2k. As HKFC says though we might well have been able to playe nearer home as a non league club. We may not have done as well as Donnie but I think it shows that falling out of the league doesn't necessarily mean oblivion for a club with a potentially huge fanbase.

My point really is that I don't think the oft quoted "If we'd lost at Hereford, we wouldn't have a club" is necessarily true.
 






The Large One

Who's Next?
Jul 7, 2003
52,343
97.2FM
The fact that we didn't own a ground, makes our situation different to the example of Doncaster.

On the flip side, the ground regulations for the conference in those days were much less stringent than those for league clubs, so we may have found a temporary home, a lot nearer than Gillingham - Eastbourne or maybe even Worthing?

If we'd played that much closer to home, we'd have needed a bigger ground.

Crawley's ground was far more suitable in that sense - but the council said 'no'.
 






Man of Harveys

Well-known member
Jul 9, 2003
18,731
Brighton, UK
No question in my mind whatsoever: we would have been utterly screwed.

In hindsight, even from the perspective of playing at Withdean, it might be easy to forget just how desolate things were in about '96 and '97. Sustaining a dismal league club at Pissfield was an act of bloody-minded determination enough. But a non-league one? Forget it. Sooner or later both the money and will to live would simply have run out.

God it gives me the willies just thinking back to that era.
 



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