Shakers looking for fresh investment

10:20am Thursday 14th August 2008

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SHAKERS director Ian Harrop has paved the way for fresh blood to join the Bury board and help take the club on to the next level.

Harrop believes the Shakers are in the best possible shape to move forward, but he admits that fresh investment is needed – and he says the board are open to offers of help from anyone with serious ambitions of helping the club.

“We feel the infrastructure of the football club is the best it ever has been,” said Harrop, who is part of a four-person board that also includes Margaret Ladkin, Brian Fenton and Jeremy Rothwell (Youth).

“Investment has been made in the youth side, the home and away changing rooms, the gym and the training ground.

“Everyone is pulling together in the right direction, but what I feel we do need to improve on is that the board of directors need help. We are not a closed shop. If there are people out there who have the best interests of Bury Football Club at heart and want to get involved, all they have to do is pick up the phone.

“The football club, in theory, is always up for sale. The directors of this football club aren’t here on an ego trip – if there was someone out there who felt they could come in and, if need be, take over the club and push the club forward, none of the present directors would have any problem at all with that.

“This has always been the case, it is nothing new, but what I am trying to do is to make it a little bit more public that we feel we have got the football club on an even keel.

“Everything off the pitch is as right as you can get it, we feel that now is the time we can push the club forward where it matters – on the football field.”

There is a real air of optimism around the club, with Alan Knill instilling a real confidence and winning mentality into the team. Bury are unbeaten in eight league games at Gigg Lane and the club’s ambition was underlined when they managed to persuade striker Andy Morrell to drop two divisions and join the club from Championship side Blackpool.

“The signing of Andy Morrell shows the ambition the club has,” said Harrop. “It shows that we have a manager who can persuade players of his pedigree to come to this club.

“We said five years ago that stability was the initial aim. The financial position is that we will always struggle. I am not being negative when I say this, but we always need some more investment in the club to help move the club forward.

“We try all the time to look at things commercially, but the club isn’t naive enough to think that people will just put their hands in their pockets to watch us or sponsor games.

“The football club is always looking for investment because we are very much reliant on gate revenue. The commercial revenues, through no fault of the hard work put in by Peter Young and his staff, will probably reduce because there are companies out there that cannot afford to sponsor games.

“It’s very difficult out there, businesses are struggling, individuals are struggling to pay bills so we have to make sure that, when they come to watch us, they are entertained and they go away looking forward to the next game.

“Hopefully the fans will see we are building an entertaining team that can win.”