The never ending development, the AGM and Milo Minderbinder.

One of the most interesting things to come out of Mondays AGM was Damian Irvines presentation on the property development and Craig Douglas' presentation on the financial situation of the club.

We all know the story: Financially, the club is stuffed.

Previous administrations have cheered that the property development will be our ecumenical lord and saviour and shower us with riches beyond our wildest dreams. Thank the real Lord that the new board isnt as silly as to believe this to be true. In fact, Damo outlined that the previous plan was full of holes (building a hotel at a cost of $20m for a value of $10m, wtf!?)and was potentially unviable. As such the board has made the decision, that because the Sharks expertise is not in property development, they will put this opportunity out to tender and get a "large reputable property developer" (I smell MultiPlex) to go into some kind of partnership with the club to develop the land and finish the project (finally, this is longer than War and Peace this thing). Several options will be put before the members at an EGM later in the year and hopefully work will begin sometime in 2011.



Good news for all people who love cash cow property developments.

Now to the financials, and somewhere in this, my point (Am I being boring? Probably). Craig outlined that the reason the club is doing so poorly is that trade in every facet of the leagues (gaming, drinks, food, the lot) is down. Merch sales, Gate takings and sponsorships are down. The costs to run the football club are up. The only good news is that the cost to run the leagues club is down, but this doesnt cover a damn thing.

So essentially what we have is a Leagues club that no-one wants to go to, a game day that doesnt make any money, a bucket load of debt and the approval for a development.

The thing I like about this approach with the development is that it is essentially a clean slate. Passing the buck to a developer with us as a 'client' means we get to drive the project and allow someone else to make it happen. The sad reality is that we get one shot at this, and thus we have to make it work.

Which brings me to Milo Minderbinder. In Joseph Hellers hilarious 1961 war satire CATCH 22 (Read it) Milo Minderbinder is charged with becoming the manager of the platoons mess hall. Being a generally enthusiastic fellow Milo rises to the challenge by saying.

"I want to be create the best damn mess hall in the entire army sir! Thats really something to shoot for isnt it!" (Well thats what he said in the movie anyway, I dont have the book handy, I lent it to a Sri Lankan girl named Deborah)

The thing about Milo is that he actually means this in a truly literal sense. And he goes out to create the best mest hall in the army with such a greedy, maniacal focus that he ends up making everyone in his platoon rich (he creates a syndicate in which everyone 'has a share' and makes millions by trading on the black market). Milo takes this obsession so far that he ends up flying missions with the Germans for money and bombs his own platoon, but in my mind this is irrelevant because he so successfully achieved his goals.

I also think the following is hilarious

"The men in Milos platoon quickly grew fat and moved about tamely with toothpicks upon their greasy lips"

What does this have to do with the Sharks development?

Well, the board basically admitted that the Leagues club leaks money cause its a giant white elephant that no bastard wants to go to. And game day revenues are down because of poor weather and worse performances.

My point is then that while they are going to develop the carpark, they should level the club, level the stadium and develop with the single minded fanaticism of Milo the best damn sporting facility/leagues club in the entire world!

Lets be frank. Toyota stadium is a joke. Apart from the new stand (which you would keep, but only cause it looks good from the road, who in HELL approved it being so far from the action?) the entire place is a hole to watch football from. Even the ET and PB stands (and PB gets wet) are miles from the action. It is the second worst stadium in the comp (behind only Brookvale)and that far behind best practice (Skilled Park, Suncorp, HiSense Arena) it is laughable.

The Leagues is losing money because it is too big, too old, and too hard to manage. While the bulldozers are rolling in, level the lot and start again!

In the meantime we can move our home games to the SFS (and actually make game day revenue again), take over one of the ailing clubs in the shire (can anyone say Caringbah Bizzos) and recreate a real benchmark in entertainment, sporting facilities and shopping. I went to Las Vegas last year. Lets just say the possibilities are endless.

I know that there is a concern that people will think that this is a ruse for re-location, but as long as work is being done on the Woolooware site the intentions of the club cannot be doubted, and this short term solution might just actually spit us out the other end on top of the heap.

My challenge to the board is to make this happen.