On the Swindon front: I was extremely pleased to see Town sign the sponsorship deal with Fourfourtwo the other week.
The first I heard of this was through a friend of mine at Haymarket – Fourfourtwo were looking for a shirt deal and they had Swindon on the shortlist. They had a series of meetings with Nick Watkins and team, and thrashed out the deal that was signed the other week.
The deal isn’t about hard cash, it’s about raising Swindon’s profile. It potentially helps bring in other sponsors (who benefit from the wider coverage that Town will get) and should be good for ticket sales. It is, in my opinion, a forward thinking and creative deal that is exactly what the club needs at the present time, and I think Nick has made a great call to go for this rather than take the money for a flat cash deal.
Some people have been on the blog here asking if I’d been working on Betfair to come in as sponsors. I did raise it with them and they did take a look, but it wasn’t the right deal. I didn’t push it as apart from anything else I didn’t want it – I wanted us to sign the fourfourtwo deal.
I saw Ady Williams at Ascot and had a chat. I’ve asked him before where he thinks the club should be spending money, and he said the training ground. I had a long chat with Nick today and asked him about this and a few other things. He said that the pitch at the County Ground is really coming right and should be spot on for the first game. He said the training ground is a bit complex as we rent it and it’s recently been sold, but he’s conscious of getting it right. There are several other discussions going on, including those around ground relocation etc.
All good stuff – roll on next season.