Soc (1 Viewer)

I believe Jan was the driving force. Now he wants to set up another "supporters group" to rival SOC.

I think they were planning to go to sisu ha but sisu moved,to be honest i think those that sorted got the sisu out thing going were happy with that they wanted to upset sisu like sisu upset the fans,then Jan took over and tried to suck up to sisu,that pissed the original few off and to be honest that's where it went wrong,you can't work with sisu but Jan thought he could represent the fans as the fans rep on the board,

Jan seems reasonably able & presents well on camera, as far as what the people left are doing, well the lack of coherent strategy, meetings & dwindling activity says it all.

The SOC campaign is now nothing to do with Jan as he resigned due to the overwhelming (and in my opinion, wrong) feeling that opening any kind of dialogue with the club meant that the group were pandering to the demands of SISU and diluting the power of the campaign. However, the moment Jan left the group fell apart.

SOC organised the 'Back the Boys' event away at Reading. They put on cheap coaches for as many fans who were interested and the day was full of positive support for the team. However, within the portfolio of protest action against SISU I still struggle to see what the aim of the event was. Yes it was a brilliantly well organised day out which showed the players we were (and are) still behind them, but the event did nothing to progress the direct aims of the group to remove SISU. In fact, the Back the Boys event could even be deemed as a distraction for Gary, as his time and resources were focused on organising this. This created a period of silence for SOC who have still failed to clarify their aims and objectives since Jan (and others) have left SOC.

Communication and dialogue between SOC and the fans seems to be at an all time low. Gary seems to be the only person who is prepared to admit to being part of the group. This has led him to carry a heavy burden on his shoulders, and whilst we can all appreciate the hard work he has put in and the passion he has for the club, he has at times, possibly due to stress, come across as an aggressive individual. I am sure he is not and I personally have tried to reconcile with him on a number of occasions in order to re-open communication channels but he has never reciprocated.

Gary and the SOC group have failed to answer a series of direct questions about their policy and direction. When Jan was part of the group he would always enter into dialogue, whether himself and I agreed or not was not an issue as I felt he was committed to creating understanding. In fact, as an outspoken skeptic of the group at first, i came to understand the original SOC group and had begun to back it.

Jan would also post minutes from the SOC meetings to allow those who were not in attendance to keep up-to-date with its progress. Gary has often taken it as an offensive request to do the same, with any public statements often being poorly written and contradicting. For example, the SOC website claims the Hoffman bid to be credible, but Gary has admitted to not having any proof of any form that the Hoffman bid is credible.

The SOC group in its present format have also discussed a public demonstration at the Olympics. A move which I believe will embarrass the fans (not the club/SISU) during a world-wide event which is meant to be focused on peace and togetherness rather than politics.

SOC are also planning on going to London to rally the cause of their group to the Football League and the press. The aim of this action is to force these bodies to investigate what SOC (and all of us fans) see as poor management by SISU. However, with no reasonable speculation about SISU doing anything illegal, I can't see this being as productive as SOC may hope.

SOC started as an action group for the majority in the hope of including all fans to unify under a common cause. SOC is now seemingly managed by one individual and is intent of remaining the outspoken minority. I urge you all to keep up-to-date with the new proposed Trust, which Jan is part of, as it is not created to rival SOC, but to make us fans feel part of the club again as valued stakeholders.

Did anything ever happen with SOC?


All the best

Not a lot SOC or anyone else can do, they have virtually no power other than to be a pain in the butt to SISU. Takeover talks are supposedly going on and there is no avenue to get to Joy Seppalla or Dermot Coleman other than Tim Fisher who i am not convinced just where he stands, sometimes he comes across as a hardline SISU man other times i wonder if he is a Hoffman man now just waiting to be given the full-time c.e.o job once sisu have sold up and gone. At the end of the day you don't have to be part of any official or unofficial group to stage protests. A couple of determined individuals can cause alsorts of problems if they want to.

The problem with Jan as i saw it was he got too far ahead of things, arranging meetings with the slippery Tim Fisher before soc had really got going. No problem at all with his intentions, just a little too early IMO.

EleanorRigby said:

The problem with Jan as i saw it was he got too far ahead of things, arranging meetings with the slippery Tim Fisher before soc had really got going. No problem at all with his intentions, just a little too early IMO.

Click to expand...

I disagree. Jan approached Tim Fisher after the (failed) boycott at the time when the press coverage and supporter empathy was at its highest. Jan was right to leverage this to the group's advantage.

But yes, you are right about the SOC group not having their ducks in order. The message from the group was inconsistent (work with SISU vs SISU out). This was a major factor to the demise of the group.

I am confident lessons have been learnt and the Trust will provide the fans with an entity they can feel they belong to. A group which has the fan's interests at heart. SOC in its current format in particular does not offer this.

PorkyCovvy said:

The SOC group in its present format have also discussed a public demonstration at the Olympics. A move which I believe will embarrass the fans (not the club/SISU) during a world-wide event which is meant to be focused on peace and togetherness rather than politics.



.

Click to expand...

What an absolutely appalling idea!! I for one would be disgusted for anyone to embarass my club with this!!

Olympic protest is a seriously poor idea.

However don't go taking what porky says on face value, he is well known (or a poster with the same name & style, so I presume same person) on the GMK website for trying to undermine the original SOC as it was with Jan in charge.
I find him very tiresome & never posts anything constructive. I shall as ever make up my own mind based on facts, I hope you do too.

Jack Griffin said:

Olympic protest is a seriously poor idea. <br />
<br />
However don't go taking what porky says on face value, he is well known (or a poster with the same name &amp; style, so I presume same person) on the GMK website for trying to undermine the original SOC as it was with Jan in charge. <br />
I find him very tiresome &amp; never posts anything constructive. I shall as ever make up my own mind based on facts, I hope you do too.

Click to expand...

<br />
<br />

Jack, i am a regular poster on GMK. I don't respect anyone who doesn't make up their own mind based on the facts and their own experience, so, by all means, take my post like any other, but what I have presented is an accurate analysis of the demise of SOC. I can prove my claims that Gary has said he has no foundation to believe the Hoffman bid is 'credible' and that the idea of protesting at the Olympics was discussed.

With regards to my alleged discrediting of Jan, I would say that is a harsh comment. Yes, it got a tad heated at one stage but I never lost respect for Jan as he proved, even when we had differences, to be open to change and discussion. I merely ask questions. Something i have done with Gary's version of SOC; except he takes offense to anyone questioning his manifesto.

I'd be more than happy to exchange more of my thoughts with you or anyone on SOC. I believe any group, or Trust, who claims to represent the fans, whether it be the majority or the minority, is accountable first and foremost to the fans.

PorkyCovvy said:

I believe any group, or Trust, who claims to represent the fans, whether it be the majority or the minority, is accountable first and foremost to the fans.

Click to expand...

I have no idea of the history between you all as I only use this place and don't read GMK, but the part I have quoted above has to absolutely be the basis for any group that wants to gather our support, regardless of any other motives which individuals may or may or manot perceive the group to have.

There porky goes again, I said his posts undermined the SOC & he expands that in his own words to say I said he showed disrespect to Jan, I never said anything of the sort!
Putting words into other posters mouths is typical of him, he did something similar to me before. See why I warn you about him.
Anyway, listen to him if you want, I won't be wasting my time reading his topics, I've avoided them on GMK for some time, I don't care what his adgenda is.

Jack Griffin said:

There porky goes again, I said his posts undermined the SOC & he expands that in his own words to say I said he showed disrespect to Jan, I never said anything of the sort!
Putting words into other posters mouths is typical of him, he did something similar to me before. See why I warn you about him.
Anyway, listen to him if you want, I won't be wasting my time reading his topics, I've avoided them on GMK for some time, I don't care what his adgenda is.

Click to expand...

It seems this is just a simple misunderstanding then. Can you please explain how I undermined Jan then? If you provide a sufficient definition then it will allow me a fair response.

CJparker said:

What's happening with SOC? Seems to have gone very quiet in the last few weeks.

I think one reason it hasn't taken off, could be that the group's strategy was not sufficiently clear.

Never mind the debate about whether it's a general group or specifically ant-SISU, it did well to organise protests and meetings but it was never clear how that would practically translate into engineering the changes it wanted to see.

It's all very well blaming the "apathy" of Coventry fans for not getting involved in the group, but without a clear strategy of how the time/effort involved will result in changes then you can't blame people for staying away.

Click to expand...

the SOC group missed a trick after the Saints protest.

Plenty of ppl turned up for the meeting after that protest but then Jan and Andy B wanted to start looking at meeting with Sisu and Joy Seppala to try to "work with them" which did not seem right after protesting against them the week before! This led to Jason resigning as he did not agree with the way the group was now heading and then only 3 people turned up for the following meeting which was proof in the pudding that the fans that had turned up to previous meetings didnt like the way the group was now heading so that was the night when it was decided that SOC would continue to focus its efforts on protesting against sisu.


Jan and Andy then resigned from the group stating they would not form a new group which has since happend and i think Gary is about at the end of his tether now as he has put loads of work in to the Back the boys day etc and has had shed loads of abuse for doing that off so called "fans" like porky covvy etc mainly off gmk which has kind of killed his emthusiasm.

Were still planning a sisu visit tho and looking like a few of us may well be venturing down there on friday if anyone fancies a day out in london??

SOC will also be looking at running another back the boys day to an away game later in the season and are currently trying to sort out prices for coach travel.

The main problem is the "cant be arsed" attitude of our fans, we have too many that just cant be botherd to do anything about it even thought the majority now reralise what a lying bunch of parasites our owners actually are.

brinner said:

the SOC group missed a trick after the Saints protest.

Plenty of ppl turned up for the meeting after that protest but then Jan and Andy B wanted to start looking at meeting with Sisu and Joy Seppala to try to "work with them" which did not seem right after protesting against them the week before! This led to Jason resigning as he did not agree with the way the group was now heading and then only 3 people turned up for the following meeting which was proof in the pudding that the fans that had turned up to previous meetings didnt like the way the group was now heading so that was the night when it was decided that SOC would continue to focus its efforts on protesting against sisu.


Jan and Andy then resigned from the group stating they would not form a new group which has since happend and i think Gary is about at the end of his tether now as he has put loads of work in to the Back the boys day etc and has had shed loads of abuse for doing that off so called "fans" like porky covvy etc mainly off gmk which has kind of killed his emthusiasm.

Were still planning a sisu visit tho and looking like a few of us may well be venturing down there on friday if anyone fancies a day out in london??

SOC will also be looking at running another back the boys day to an away game later in the season and are currently trying to sort out prices for coach travel.

The main problem is the "cant be arsed" attitude of our fans, we have too many that just cant be botherd to do anything about it even thought the majority now reralise what a lying bunch of parasites our owners actually are.

Click to expand...

I agree brinner most fans can't be bothered to goto the games because of sisu and i would say 95% want sisu gone the other 5% want to build a bridge between them and the fans at least wait until the new consortium come in and you can start fresh and take there plans and ideas forward,working with sisu is a total waste of time,fisher is a liar and a puppet for sisu,and at this stage what dyu aim to achieve come on Jan wot dyu aim to achieve between now and the end of sisus reign

brinner said:

the SOC group missed a trick after the Saints protest.

Plenty of ppl turned up for the meeting after that protest but then Jan and Andy B wanted to start looking at meeting with Sisu and Joy Seppala to try to "work with them" which did not seem right after protesting against them the week before! This led to Jason resigning as he did not agree with the way the group was now heading and then only 3 people turned up for the following meeting which was proof in the pudding that the fans that had turned up to previous meetings didnt like the way the group was now heading so that was the night when it was decided that SOC would continue to focus its efforts on protesting against sisu.


Jan and Andy then resigned from the group stating they would not form a new group which has since happend and i think Gary is about at the end of his tether now as he has put loads of work in to the Back the boys day etc and has had shed loads of abuse for doing that off so called "fans" like porky covvy etc mainly off gmk which has kind of killed his emthusiasm.

Were still planning a sisu visit tho and looking like a few of us may well be venturing down there on friday if anyone fancies a day out in london??

SOC will also be looking at running another back the boys day to an away game later in the season and are currently trying to sort out prices for coach travel.

The main problem is the "cant be arsed" attitude of our fans, we have too many that just cant be botherd to do anything about it even thought the majority now reralise what a lying bunch of parasites our owners actually are.

Click to expand...

Brinner, I fail to see how asking simple questions consitutes as 'abuse'. In fact, Gary flew off the handle on GMK and delivered a tirade of abuse to anyone he percieved as opposing his views. The existing SOC group seems to isolate itself from the fans as there are some serious questions which need to be answered.

Has the SOC group become an arm of Travel De Courcey? The seemingly anti-SISU group appear to be very handy in offering reduced price travel to games but I fail to see how this action is going to achieve your aim of getting 'SISU OUT'?

Just out of interest, how many people turned up to your last meeting?

Rubbish. The majority of fans are ambivalent to the issue. They attend games and are mature enough to know that ownership issues are outside their sphere of influence.

My rubbish comment was to the child from canleys response by the way,

Ok Mr duffy can u explain why we've lost 6000 to 7000 fans since sisu took over the proof is there and I think we were 8000 less for the Leeds game this season than last year,next season we will be below 10000 if we go down and like i said fans can't be bothered wasting there hard earned cash anymore,

canleykid said:

Ok Mr duffy can u explain why we've lost 6000 to 7000 fans since sisu took over the proof is there and I think we were 8000 less for the Leeds game this season than last year,next season we will be below 10000 if we go down and like i said fans can't be bothered wasting there hard earned cash anymore,

Click to expand...

The Leeds game at home last season had us in the Play Off mix; this season we are relegation fodder. Not exactly a fair comparison.

There was a growth in fans when we moved to the Ricoh, since then attendances have been falling anyway. I am not a SISU supporter but I can't see how any other ownership structure could have maintained a team good enough to claw back the fickle fans.

PorkyCovvy said:

Brinner, I fail to see how asking simple questions consitutes as 'abuse'. In fact, Gary flew off the handle on GMK and delivered a tirade of abuse to anyone he percieved as opposing his views. The existing SOC group seems to isolate itself from the fans as there are some serious questions which need to be answered.

Has the SOC group become an arm of Travel De Courcey? The seemingly anti-SISU group appear to be very handy in offering reduced price travel to games but I fail to see how this action is going to achieve your aim of getting 'SISU OUT'?

Just out of interest, how many people turned up to your last meeting?

Click to expand...

there is a meeting thursday night at half 7 at Hen lane.

Pop up and we can have a chat.

brinner said:

there is a meeting thursday night at half 7 at Hen lane.

Pop up and we can have a chat.

Click to expand...

This is typical of the new SOC regime. Simple questions to which you cannot answer.

1) How does another Back the Boys remove SISU?
2) How many people attended your last meeting?

There are so many more questions but we'll start with these.

canleykid said:

Ok Mr duffy can u explain why we've lost 6000 to 7000 fans since sisu took over the proof is there and I think we were 8000 less for the Leeds game this season than last year,next season we will be below 10000 if we go down and like i said fans can't be bothered wasting there hard earned cash anymore,

Click to expand...

this is correct.

Sisu had their chance, we averaged 20000 for the 1st 10 games of their reign and were now down to 13500 average.

So in 4 years the gradual decay of the squad and lack of investment in the team has seen almost 7000 fans disappear from the average attendance and it will get worse while they remain.

PorkyCovvy said:

This is typical of the new SOC regime. Simple questions to which you cannot answer.

1) How does another Back the Boys remove SISU?
2) How many people attended your last meeting?

There are so many more questions but we'll start with these.

Click to expand...

pop up thursday and we can divulge.

you seem really intrested in the group so you may aswell, you never know you might even end up coming on the next back the boys day!!

well pigs might fly.

PorkyCovvy said:

The Leeds game at home last season had us in the Play Off mix; this season we are relegation fodder. Not exactly a fair comparison.

There was a growth in fans when we moved to the Ricoh, since then attendances have been falling anyway. I am not a SISU supporter but I can't see how any other ownership structure could have maintained a team good enough to claw back the fickle fans.

Click to expand...

To porkycovvy,yes crowds started to dwindle as did our ambition when we were letting all the good players go cheaply,I go home and away every game and i have to question myself why,even the likes of raff are starting to face up to the facts that were on a hiding to nothing,what the club shouldve done to keep the crowds up was do kids for a quid or two adults and two kids twenty five pound but they have only just started it now they should've marketed a while ago because when people stop going to football they very rarely come back.

brinner said:

pop up thursday and we can divulge.

you seem really intrested in the group so you may aswell, you never know you might even end up coming on the next back the boys day!!

well pigs might fly.

Click to expand...

Simple questions for simple people! Why do you choose not to answer any questions about your campaign?

PorkyCovvy said:

Simple questions for simple people! Why do you choose not to answer any questions about your campaign?

Click to expand...

if you are reallly that intrested we will see you thursday.

canleykid said:

To porkycovvy,yes crowds started to dwindle as did our ambition when we were letting all the good players go cheaply,I go home and away every game and i have to question myself why,even the likes of raff are starting to face up to the facts that were on a hiding to nothing,what the club shouldve done to keep the crowds up was do kids for a quid or two adults and two kids twenty five pound but they have only just started it now they should've marketed a while ago because when people stop going to football they very rarely come back.

Click to expand...

Brinner says our crowds were 20,000 on average for the first 10 games when SISU joined. Do you not think these crowds were a result of the hype from a takeover?

And Canley, you make a good point about the offers; yes they should have been offered earlier, but SOC actually opposed CCFC offering the reduced prices against Barnsley.

Under SISU we did show ambition, we had our best squad since the first year in Division One and we still didn't get the crowds. And if you think ambition is the Portsmouth model i'd rather SISU wern't ambitious.

brinner said:

if you are reallly that intrested we will see you thursday.

Click to expand...

You are here, right now. Yet you don't contain the grey matter to reply to even one of the questions? Do you not see how pathetic that makes your campaign look? You do not engage in any public dialogue, don't relase any statement and just deliver a closed shop policy. Why should someone go to your meetings when you are seeminly so hostile? Gary has shown himself to be aggressive as well. You are coming across like a right bunch of thugs.

PorkyCovvy said:

Brinner says our crowds were 20,000 on average for the first 10 games when SISU joined. Do you not think these crowds were a result of the hype from a takeover?.

Click to expand...

That is incorrect.

Infact the 1st crowd under Sisus reign was 1212 less than the previous game before they took over!!

PorkyCovvy said:

You are here, right now. Yet you don't contain the grey matter to reply to even one of the questions? Do you not see how pathetic that makes your campaign look? You do not engage in any public dialogue, don't relase any statement and just deliver a closed shop policy. Why should someone go to your meetings when you are seeminly so hostile? Gary has shown himself to be aggressive as well. You are coming across like a right bunch of thugs.

Click to expand...

im not on the SOC board old lad.

To porkycovvy,was is it ur actually asking is there a specific question you want answering because the attendances have dropped since sisu arrived it may be a coincidence but to last four years is a statement from the fans to sisu that there shit and to piss off,one question to you do you go to games

brinner said:

im not on the SOC board old lad.

Click to expand...

OK, so can you speculate to the answers of the questions? As a SOC supporter surely you have some insight?

What do you think the benefit of another Back The Boys day will have in removing SISU?

How many people turned up to the last meeting? Were you there?

Well at least he is doing something about it. Yes it may not work but sniping at every comment is hardly constructive is it?