The owners - what went wrong for them

[URZZZZZZZZ]

It doesn’t seem like the stadium improvements have gone down well, lots of people querying where the £5 million has gone…

[Sutekh]

It doesn’t seem like the stadium improvements have gone down well, lots of people querying where the £5 million has gone…

It’s going into a new striker of course….

[Uke]

It doesn’t seem like the stadium improvements have gone down well, lots of people querying where the £5 million has gone…

Lots of quantity surveyors in our crowd?

[Hound]

The pitch has been relaid. Yes it isn’t great at the moment but then ridiculous summer heat and drought. Assume it’ll improve

The tannoy was a lot better

The safe standing looked good

Didn’t see much else but then I was only really there for the game

[URZZZZZZZZ]

It doesn’t seem like the stadium improvements have gone down well, lots of people querying where the £5 million has gone…

Lots of quantity surveyors in our crowd?

I don’t think you need to be a quantity surveyor to see the seats are dirty, the tannoy was making a squeaky noise and bizarrely some urinals were missing.

[Brogue]

It doesn’t seem like the stadium improvements have gone down well, lots of people querying where the £5 million has gone…

Lots of quantity surveyors in our crowd?

I don’t think you need to be a quantity surveyor to see the seats are dirty, the tannoy was making a squeaky noise and bizarrely some urinals we’re missing.

We are not allowed to talk about this sort of thing. Mid Sussex royal says we aren’t allowed to criticise

[yuomi]

Seats in the ED haven't been touched. Nor the terrace, signage or paint.
There's an irritating clicking sound coming out of the PA on the concourse that I'm sure was there last season.
Toilets are either closed for renovations or as they were.
Stadium PA is much better. Lights TBC.
On the pitch, if we let anyone play rugby on that surface it'll be like the Somme by November. The southern end in particular looks ropey AF.

[jonnyroyal1871]

Lots of quantity surveyors in our crowd?

I don’t think you need to be a quantity surveyor to see the seats are dirty, the tannoy was making a squeaky noise and bizarrely some urinals we’re missing.

We are not allowed to talk about this sort of thing. Mid Sussex royal says we aren’t allowed to criticise

They haven't spend 5 million pounds on that lot.

[Clyde1998]

Seats in the ED haven't been touched. Nor the terrace, signage or paint.
There's an irritating clicking sound coming out of the PA on the concourse that I'm sure was there last season.
Toilets are either closed for renovations or as they were.
Stadium PA is much better. Lights TBC.
On the pitch, if we let anyone play rugby on that surface it'll be like the Somme by November. The southern end in particular looks ropey AF.

My seat in the East Stand had clearly been done, with a rough texture being the key indicator. The signage hadn't been changed.

Can't comment on the concourse PA, as I wasn't in there long enough to notice anything. Didn't go to the toilet either, so can't say if they've been modified in any manner.

The stadium PA was clear and probably set too loud tbh. I noticed a few people had a startle reflex at the start of announcements.

Thought the pitch looked acceptable given the summer we've had; some meaningful rain will no doubt help.

[URZZZZZZZZ]

I’m hearing Tim Kilpatrick has been made redundant and left the club.

[Royal Ginger]

I don’t manage a stadium but I look after significant venues on the south coast, and from our size up every project runs into the 100s of thousands.

Didn’t they fix a lot of the undergubbins of the pitch? Heating and sprinkling? That’s got to cost an absolute bomb in and of itself.

New sound array and lighting for the whole stadium is going to be huge cost.

The south stand standing will equally cost far more than it would initially seem.

I would also expect a number of Martyn’s law improvements around terror protection (new law is in place and inspectable from April which puts a lot more on the club) and that’s likely going to include CCTV upgrades and protections against hostile vehicles.

Factor in possible corporate and dressing room upgrades and maybe some unsexy things we don’t see like plumbing or electrical upgrades and you can easily spend £5million in a flash with nothing obvious to show for it.

[Brogue]

I’m hearing Tim Kilpatrick has been made redundant and left the club.

So has Luke bishop

[URZZZZZZZZ]

I’m hearing Tim Kilpatrick has been made redundant and left the club.

So has Luke bishop

Disgraceful

[fred sharpes nose]

Ref the question do you trust the owners - think I've fallen into the binary answer of No.

Too much USA bullshit (worked for loads of US tech companies seen the double stadards face up) over promise under deliver, some minions fault. Upper West improvemnts- only thing noticeable is closure of the bar FFS

I think Couhig has bitten off more than he can chew. Mentioned somewhere above, a rumour about wants to get out quick, make attractive for sale etc.. He is not the sort of guy who seems flush with cash, is getting on and maybe thinks time to cut his losses - "fail fast" is a US friendly business phrase.

Marriots hatrick puts him in the shop window for a last minute deadline day deal - recoup much ££s for Rob and Todd

Comment provided by "Conspiracy Theories Are Us"

[West F]

I don’t manage a stadium but I look after significant venues on the south coast, and from our size up every project runs into the 100s of thousands.

Didn’t they fix a lot of the undergubbins of the pitch? Heating and sprinkling? That’s got to cost an absolute bomb in and of itself.

New sound array and lighting for the whole stadium is going to be huge cost.

The south stand standing will equally cost far more than it would initially seem.

I would also expect a number of Martyn’s law improvements around terror protection (new law is in place and inspectable from April which puts a lot more on the club) and that’s likely going to include CCTV upgrades and protections against hostile vehicles.

Factor in possible corporate and dressing room upgrades and maybe some unsexy things we don’t see like plumbing or electrical upgrades and you can easily spend £5million in a flash with nothing obvious to show for it.

Normal preseason pitch works consist of scarifying and reseeding with some top dressing. There is also an opportunity to fully address any outstanding pitch health problems such as nematodes, fungal growth or grass diseases. Regular soil and analysis of leaf and root health by the chosen pitch consultant will shape this program.

What has happened this close season is a complete pitch reconstruction. Removing all of the drainage, irrigation and under soil heating layers and building each layer back up to exact specifications. It is about as major as any pitch work goes. All of this is further complicated by the fact that the stadium pitch uses a Desso grass master system, injecting artificial fibres nine inches into the soil to strengthen the pitch surface by stabilising the surface and providing a hybrid playing surface. This process begins before you can seed and takes up a lot of time. The whole project has to be managed against the obvious time bounded constraints of meeting the date of the first home match and start of the season.

The pitch project works would have been effected by the other stadium projects that where scheduled to take place during the same close season window. Each one having maybe minor, but nonetheless cumulative effects on each other. This issue, along with making the experienced and capable staff redundant reduced the overall delivery of said projects into a runaway clusterfuck of individual deadlines and deliveries in what is an overall jazz approach to critical project delivery.

The most glaring mismanagement was the failure to cancel the Charlton friendly from the outset. Not leave it to the last minute in the hope that everything would miraculously come together somehow. With such time pressure on each and every deliverable, the overall effect is ‘get-there-itis’. This results in corner cutting and compromises, and has an obvious effect on the quality of the overall product.

They took on far too much in the time available. There are going to be issues which may impact product delivery beyond the completion date. Many of the individual deliverables should have been moved to windows within the season itself with the key ones prioritised and delivered preseason

[Hound]

Pitch looked and played basically fine anyway. I’m sure it’ll be be perfectly decent in a few weeks time

[Forbury Lion]

New pitch - Looks good, about 2 meters narrower on each side I would guess so I doubt we'll have players running down the wings crossing balls in. Not sure how that will affect corners though, for us and the opposition.

Toilets in the Lower West, Hopefully not finished as they have removed a whole wall of urinals on one side and half on the other, I'd accuse them of taking the p*ss but maybe they're actually taking less as a result.

New Sound system is good, but it sounds like the PA guy still has the same microphone as that didn't sound any clearer. Maybe they just needed a new microphone all along?

New floodlights - Didn't see them in action, Looks like they left one of the old ones on the top of the East Stand - Maybe the screws were cross threaded and they couldn't get it off.

Didn't notice any other changes

[Forbury Lion]

Is a decent pitch going to help us more than it helps the opposition?

[Hound]

Is a decent pitch going to help us more than it helps the opposition?

Dunno - the worst pitch I can remember in recent history was the Stam season 1 pitch when we came within a couple of kicks of promotion to the Prem with a pretty dodgy squad

[Royalwaster]

I’m hearing Tim Kilpatrick has been made redundant and left the club.

So has Luke bishop

Who are these?