Now I'm no expert on AGM's but I'm told they are usually mundane and uninteresting affairs, apparently this is a conception somebody forgot to tell our board and shareholders.
We all know who are the chief culprits in this blantant ignorance of the unspoken rules but to be fair they did at least provide us and other local press plenty of meat; what with allegations regarding a former coach, the board over ruling a shareholders vote and plenty of verbal conflicts between the board and several shareholders, and all this as a tornado hit the town!
I knew I was in for an eventful evening barely five minutes out of the front door, having driven only a few hundred yards down the road I was held up in traffic following a car crash, I'd been cursing the motor beforehand for doing its hardest not to start, but now it seemed a blessing in disguise.
Arriving at the AGM the first person I bumped into was none other than Des Comerford, who had spotted my reporting gear (Well, notebook and pen) - the cynical person would suggest he was trying to butter up valuable press - but I'll carry on believing that he was only interested as a fellow concerned shareholder, and after all I was only there thanks to his mate Mr Van-Dijk's kindness through the back pages of the SET.
Before the meeting kicked off a list of questions were circulated amongst shareholders, which following the meeting plan would be answered by the board.
The questions referred to a former coach at the club, who it transpired had been officially police cautioned for indecent assault on 11 yr old boys.
The questions alledged that although the club did not know of his caution when they appointed him they allowed him to continue at the club for two years, with the board apparently justifying his position at the club by restricting him to working with over sixteen's and to always be under supervision of another adult, with Mr Wilson acting as his supervisor.
And it gets better folks, on a residential visit to Scotland he was allowed to share a dorm with boys without any other adult supervision, apparently because of the rules of the camp (Obviously not designed for indecent children assaulters).
At the AGM Mr Comerford claimed that the issue was the real reason for the feud between the club and himself saying: "People have been handed information that somebody was employed by this club who indecently assaulted 11-year-old boys.
"That's why I stood up as a director to have that man removed from this club, absolutely true, and three months later you took the first chance you had to get me out of that door."
United's Chief Executive Don Rowing replied: "You have already had hours and hours of our time over this, this is nothing to do with the AGM.
"If you want to talk about this we'll do it after the AGM.
"You are bringing up a particular subject, that is your view and it happened to be my view at the time, we have spent hours talking about this."
So despite the claims being potentially highly damaging to the club they have not been countered and nothing has been confirmed or denied by the club.
We must emphasise that these are only ALLEGATIONS, however you do worry that someone who is known by the police to have committed indecent assault on young boys is allowed to work with the youth teams at a professional football club.
Changing the subject here slightly and moving onto accounts, and the matter of a £70k legal bill.
Members of the board had previously said that legal costs from the spate of handbags that ended up in the High Court would not be met by the club, but low and behold hidden in amongst the accounts was £70k allotted to legal expenses.
Surely some mistake there? Nope, and despite earlier claims that petty arguments wouldn't cost the club financially the board were now quite happy to let lawyers plunder £70k out of the club, who it has to be said, whilst secure, are not in the best of financial situations.
And onto the routine matter of voting for acceptance of the accounts, each shareholder gets one vote and the board were duly defeated by the shareholders, angry that the club were being forced to foot the bill for the directors decision to pursue a court case.
A vote of 39 to 21 backed a proposal by Mr Comerford that the accounts not be accepted, an embarrassing defeat for the board yes. But no fear as they simply changed the type of vote, with each shareholder getting one vote per share owned, and no surprises for guessing how that vote went.
So the club foot the bill, after steamrolling through their will,but question marks have been raised over the running of the club, how could somebody cautioned by police for indecent assault on ELEVEN-YEAR-OLD boys be allowed to work at the club for a full two years. How could he be allowed to work with boys under 16? Unsupervised in a dorm with under sixtenn year olds? Why should the clubs funds pay for the board/Mr Comerford's petty squabbles?
There was actually more scratching of claws at the meeting, over such issues as...
Catering: Why don't we take more money, the people criticising had obviously never tried serving 3,000 people in 15 minutes (As a member of the catering staff I can confirm you can only serve a certain amount of people in such a short time).
Boardroom Facilities: Who cares about the state of the toilets for the three and a half thousand ordinary fans as long as there is a stairlift to the executive boxes?
Take-over Bids: £1Million? Or £500K? Or even £250K? I don't know, no-one else at the meeting seemed to either.
We all know who are the chief culprits in this blantant ignorance of the unspoken rules but to be fair they did at least provide us and other local press plenty of meat; what with allegations regarding a former coach, the board over ruling a shareholders vote and plenty of verbal conflicts between the board and several shareholders, and all this as a tornado hit the town!
I knew I was in for an eventful evening barely five minutes out of the front door, having driven only a few hundred yards down the road I was held up in traffic following a car crash, I'd been cursing the motor beforehand for doing its hardest not to start, but now it seemed a blessing in disguise.
Arriving at the AGM the first person I bumped into was none other than Des Comerford, who had spotted my reporting gear (Well, notebook and pen) - the cynical person would suggest he was trying to butter up valuable press - but I'll carry on believing that he was only interested as a fellow concerned shareholder, and after all I was only there thanks to his mate Mr Van-Dijk's kindness through the back pages of the SET.
Before the meeting kicked off a list of questions were circulated amongst shareholders, which following the meeting plan would be answered by the board.
The questions referred to a former coach at the club, who it transpired had been officially police cautioned for indecent assault on 11 yr old boys.
The questions alledged that although the club did not know of his caution when they appointed him they allowed him to continue at the club for two years, with the board apparently justifying his position at the club by restricting him to working with over sixteen's and to always be under supervision of another adult, with Mr Wilson acting as his supervisor.
And it gets better folks, on a residential visit to Scotland he was allowed to share a dorm with boys without any other adult supervision, apparently because of the rules of the camp (Obviously not designed for indecent children assaulters).
At the AGM Mr Comerford claimed that the issue was the real reason for the feud between the club and himself saying: "People have been handed information that somebody was employed by this club who indecently assaulted 11-year-old boys.
"That's why I stood up as a director to have that man removed from this club, absolutely true, and three months later you took the first chance you had to get me out of that door."
United's Chief Executive Don Rowing replied: "You have already had hours and hours of our time over this, this is nothing to do with the AGM.
"If you want to talk about this we'll do it after the AGM.
"You are bringing up a particular subject, that is your view and it happened to be my view at the time, we have spent hours talking about this."
So despite the claims being potentially highly damaging to the club they have not been countered and nothing has been confirmed or denied by the club.
We must emphasise that these are only ALLEGATIONS, however you do worry that someone who is known by the police to have committed indecent assault on young boys is allowed to work with the youth teams at a professional football club.
Changing the subject here slightly and moving onto accounts, and the matter of a £70k legal bill.
Members of the board had previously said that legal costs from the spate of handbags that ended up in the High Court would not be met by the club, but low and behold hidden in amongst the accounts was £70k allotted to legal expenses.
Surely some mistake there? Nope, and despite earlier claims that petty arguments wouldn't cost the club financially the board were now quite happy to let lawyers plunder £70k out of the club, who it has to be said, whilst secure, are not in the best of financial situations.
And onto the routine matter of voting for acceptance of the accounts, each shareholder gets one vote and the board were duly defeated by the shareholders, angry that the club were being forced to foot the bill for the directors decision to pursue a court case.
A vote of 39 to 21 backed a proposal by Mr Comerford that the accounts not be accepted, an embarrassing defeat for the board yes. But no fear as they simply changed the type of vote, with each shareholder getting one vote per share owned, and no surprises for guessing how that vote went.
So the club foot the bill, after steamrolling through their will,but question marks have been raised over the running of the club, how could somebody cautioned by police for indecent assault on ELEVEN-YEAR-OLD boys be allowed to work at the club for a full two years. How could he be allowed to work with boys under 16? Unsupervised in a dorm with under sixtenn year olds? Why should the clubs funds pay for the board/Mr Comerford's petty squabbles?
There was actually more scratching of claws at the meeting, over such issues as...
Catering: Why don't we take more money, the people criticising had obviously never tried serving 3,000 people in 15 minutes (As a member of the catering staff I can confirm you can only serve a certain amount of people in such a short time).
Boardroom Facilities: Who cares about the state of the toilets for the three and a half thousand ordinary fans as long as there is a stairlift to the executive boxes?
Take-over Bids: £1Million? Or £500K? Or even £250K? I don't know, no-one else at the meeting seemed to either.