The following was something that came to me early in the morning when I was pondering just how odd at times business practice can be. Got me to thinking about what would happen if other things, such as a sports team,were run in the same manner.
The current world financial crisis has claimed a new and unexpected victim with well known Football club Combined Consolidated United today seeking a government bailout.
CCU President Sir Reginald Frank-Barry emerged from the emergency board meeting of the club today with some rather sombre news for the footballing public.
“These are tough times, and despite our best management practices, we find that we also are not immune to the turmoil sweeping the global finance markets. As a result we have been forced to engage in a series of proactive cost-cutting measures that will ensure our long term viability as a company.
The foremost of these measures is the downsizing of the player base, effective immediately. In what we see as a remarkable new paradigm shift, we are reducing onfield player numbers to nine. This will produce a new leaner and meaner team that will enable us to get the edge over our competitor, who still favours the financial unviable eleven player teams.
We are also introducing a new 23% surcharge on all membership fees and 21% surcharge on gate entrance fees to increase cash flow to deal with factors arising from the current global climate. We understand that some of our supports may have some reservations about this, but the increased costs will be more than made up by our increased performance and services.”
Not all are so impressed by these new changes. Stan Winthrope, a support of the former Combined United before it merged with Consolidated United to form CCU, is one such person.
“We used to have a viable league of fourteen teams, but all these mergers have reduced it to just two, CCU and Amalgamated Unified United. Performances have dropped off given the lack of competition and they are asking three times as much to watch the single game of the week as they did when there were seven matches on. Now we hear as how Sir Reggie and the board have voted themselves 43% bonuses for performances. Meanwhile you can’t walk the streets without bumping into former players, support staff, coaches, trainers and the like all looking for work.”
Respected Football commentator Peter Thornton agrees. “The whole thing is a shambles, to be honest. We are in danger of seeing what remains of the competition fold completely. We had a perfectly viable fourteen side competition running, but it has been run into the ground by rampant mergers, staff cuts and price hikes. I warned at the start that this was what we were likely to see, but I was ignored.”
The government has announced that it is seriously considering the proposal to bail out the ailing clubs, as they do not wish to see a ‘valuable and respected community and cultural identity collapse.’
Mist and Shadows 