Ramblers in the red
Groundsman Ned Donovan fixing the nets at St Coleman's Park before a match earlier in the season
SANDWICHES, electricity bills, cable subscription, water fees. They are all nominal expenses for every household but they could be threatening to bring down an Eircom League football club.
From a €40 bill for the purchase of trophies from a local company, to €24,000 for accountancy fees and €76,152.98 of tax debts, these are the eye-opening figures which give some indication of the trouble and uncertainty in the league at the moment.
Cobh Ramblers are by no means the only club in deep financial crisis at the moment; in fact these figures are likely to be minimal in comparison to some of the debts accrued by many Premier league clubs.
Cork City, who officially applied for examinership yesterday, have debts of roughly €1.3m, while Bohemians last year racked up creditors to the tune of up to €1.9m.
Fundraising
Sligo Rovers are in an increasingly precarious situation and need almost €100,000 by the end of this month or they will fold, while Galway have opened fresh appeals for help from fans in fundraising.
This, sadly, is the reality of life as a business in the Eircom League and the ones hit hardest may soon be the clubs at the bottom of the pile such as Cobh Ramblers.
The Irish Independent has gained access to a number of copied documents from creditors of Cobh requesting the debts that are owed to them.
From the outset it must be stressed that these documents date back to roughly two months ago and some of these debts may have been paid up in the intervening weeks.
In those weeks, Cobh hosted Sunderland in a friendly which is believed to have produced over €100,000 of funds.
However, that money was projected to go towards maintaining the club's day-to-day budgets for the remainder of the season.
And just last week, all members and players of Cobh Ramblers were urged to donate €2,000 to the club personally. While no players have taken up the offer, instead opting yesterday for a 30pc wage cut, an unspecified number of club members have so far agreed.
When contacted, Cobh chairman Barry Walsh strongly rejected the creditor figures but later admitted that the club are now in roughly €150,000 of debt.
A senior figure still working within the club who did not wish to be named, however, stated his belief that "there may be one or two slight discrepancies but other than that, this list was correct.
"A number of them have been paid off in the last few weeks," he continued, before adding that a few more creditors could also be added to the list since its conception.
Many of the copied letters to the club which we have received scream the word OVERDUE, with two particular documents indicating that the written request in question is the third one which has been sent to the club.
The most alarming of the documents have been sent by the Bank of Ireland. The first informs Cobh Ramblers that their account is overdrawn, the second notifies that a stop has been placed on the issuing of further chequebooks to their account.
The third, however, puts into perspective just how desperate the situation at St Colman's Park really is.
It reads: "We regret to advise you that, because of the continued unsatisfactory operation of your account, the Bank has decided to enforce its termination entitlements in respect of your overdraft facility.
"With effect from a date 21 days from the date of this letter, the Bank will terminate the overdraft facility on your account. Further, the Bank is no longer prepared to offer you banking facilities.
"Please clear the outstanding balance and close your account within 21 days from the date of this letter."
Walsh has claimed that, on the contrary, Bank of Ireland is still doing business with them.
Cobh Ramblers Football Club, in the past year, has been something of a soap opera which is slowly morphing into a reality show of car-crash proportions.
In the past 12 months, three treasurers have stepped down. Audits of the club's finances are carried just once a year but in between, it is a myriad of voluntary subcommittees and club members who try to keep the books in order.
During the course of the investigation by the Irish Independent, many current and former club directors and members have been contacted and none were willing to go on the record, with one in particular mentioning that they feared their family would be ridiculed.
It is a tight-knit club with modest roots in the Munster Senior League and the overriding feeling was that any dissenting voices within the club or regarding the club are quashed quite swiftly by the current regime.
Many of the contacted parties praised the current chairman's attempts to develop St Colman's Park which, in time, could bring Cobh Ramblers to a new level.
But whether it is a level Cobh Ramblers can sustain is currently a subject for massive debate, which is likely to occupy the picturesque coastal town for some time to come.
- Neil Ahern
