The Fans Forum: A summary

Monday evening saw Graham Westley and Phil Wallace host a fans forum in the Broadhall Suite to a section of Boro regulars. Various topics were discussed ranging from the new signings to the turnstiles in the East Terrace. One message came from it all though. Stevenage FC is a progressive club and is one that is always moving forward. Here are a few notes from what was said for those that couldn’t make it.

• Graham Westley confirmed the departures of Andy Drury, Mitchell Cole, Eddie Odhiambo and Mark Albrighton. He stated that he wanted to keep both Drury and Cole, but that it wasn’t possible for a few reasons financially. Drury was offered a much better deal at Luton, whilst Cole rejected a new, performance related deal to sign for Oxford. As for Odhiambo and Albrighton, they were allowed to leave to find regular football elsewhere.

• Phil Wallace confirmed that moves for players with football league experience are in the pipeline and more news can be expected from the 30th June when their contracts run out. Gw hinted that they are looking at the attacking options.

• GW commented on the new signings, stating that he was excited about the potential of Peter Winn and has been looking at him for the last year or so.

• Luke Foster is someone he wanted in January and is a leader. He mentioned that he felt Oxford’s results took a turn for the worse when he left to join Mansfield. He’s been signed to add competition to Jon Ashton and Mark Roberts.

• Darius Charles gives the boss more options and will keep Laird on his toes.

• Robbie Sinclair is another tricky player that he has had his eye on for a while.

• Westley gave PW a lot of credit for managing to keep Bostwick at the club. Wallace did not entertain any offers from the likes of Charlton for Bostwick and in the end managed to convince the midfielder to sign a new deal, at the expense of the Broadhall Suite carpet apparently.

• Wallace confirmed that there are still sell on clauses for any future transfers of Steve Morison and George Boyd. He said that Peterborough had tried to buy the clause from the club, but any offers had been refused.

• Regarding Peter Vincenti being offered a new deal, GW replied that he felt PV offered the club a different option and would be used more as an impact player. He said he would regret it if he allowed him to leave.

• A question was asked about the official site, to which PW confirmed that the premiumtv people will be taking over the running of the site. He expects this to be done in about 2 months.

• This led to questions over the kit/sponsor. It doesn’t look good for Vandanel as they seem to have gone bust. Megaman opted to not extend their deal with the club, so at the moment the club has no kit or sponsor with pre-season training just under 2 weeks away.

• Pre-Season training starts on the 27th June.

• Wallace confirmed that there are plans to build a new stand at the North end of the ground. Artist’s impressions will be displayed to the council and the hope is that they will help fund part of the stand as well as the football foundation grant which will cover about 50% of the cost.

• He said he wanted the Broadhall Way end to make a statement like Milton Keynes and Chesterfield etc.

• Wallace mentioned that he believes Stevenage is the biggest brand in the town. Not sure about that one myself.

• GW mentioned that he believes there will not be a massive jump from BSP to League 2 in terms of quality, but the teams will be more consistent.

• Westley finished off with a speech about how he intended to attack the league and try and “win the next game”. I got the feeling that the club are not looking at just making sure they are safe, but are looking at doing a Doncaster or Exeter and getting up again.

Overall, it was a good meeting, but not a lot came out that we didn’t already know. I expected Odhiambo and Albrighton to leave and that was confirmed this evening. It was also nice to know that the club is doing a lot of work off the pitch to make sure it comes across as professional. I think it’s something that has let the club down in recent years, but PW knows that this needs addressing and is acting on it.

All eyes are on Wednesday morning now as that is the day we will find out who we face in the Carling Cup first round. We are unseeded, so could face the likes of Bristol City, Ipswich, Crystal Palace, Norwich and Charlton in the first round proper. It should be good.