This Is Guernsey

GFA officials put their five year plan to a meeting earlier this year.

‘WE do not like being held to ransom by the Guernsey Football Association.’

That is the feeling of some top Priaulx League club officials.

The GFA executive committee has put forward a five-year-plan that will radically change football in the island.

And it has told member clubs that if they do not vote in favour of the new proposals at the AGM in June, then it will walk out en masse. That has not been met kindly in some quarters.

‘I’m not impressed,’ said Rovers secretary Brian Horsepool.

‘Ultimatums are not impressive. They don’t take place in the business world.

‘If that’s the way they want to go, that’s their prerogative, but nobody likes having threats hanging over them.’

Horsepool also hopes that the GFA split the vote at the AGM.

As it stands, the plan will be voted on as one entity – accept it, all or nothing.

The Rovers secretary, however, feels that the proposals affecting the women’s game should be decided separately from the men’s.

Bels president Hilary Sarre also has strong views on the GFA’s latest announcement.

‘It is disappointing,’ he said. ‘Democratic elections are supposed to avoid this.’

Sarre said the Bels committee would be meeting soon to discuss the plan, but it will not be discussing the GFA’s resignation threat.

‘We won’t be considering that. We’ll be considering the report,’ he said.

‘These are things for discussion. Our committee are not fully committed to the idea [the five-year plan].

‘There are pluses and minuses. We aren’t against progress, but I think it needs fine-tuning. But it seems like they do not want to fine-tune it.’

The proposal in the plan that is causing the biggest furore with the clubs is the new 16-to-23-year-old league that will replace the Youth One and Jackson leagues.

The feedback coming out of the clubs is that they are concerned as to where the 16-year-olds who are not good enough for the new league will play their football.

That is certainly a concern for St Martin’s president Henry Davey who, like Horsepool and Sarre, was keen to point out that his comments were his own views and not those of his club.

He read about the GFA board’s decision to resign en masse if the AGM does not go their way in Tuesday’s Guernsey Press.

‘That sort of attitude won’t go down well with the clubs,’ said Davey.

‘It seems very dictatorial. I don’t think that’s the right way to speak to anybody.

‘The clubs are so anti the 16-to-23 league, but the GFA are going ahead with it. Why didn’t they call the club presidents together and say, “these are our proposals”?

‘We didn’t speak to them. You’re having all these protests about China and human rights but I don’t think there’s any human rights in Guernsey football.’