The Blue Union wishes to issue the following statement in response to the above comment made by Everton chairman Bill Kenwright during a brief and now well publicised exchange with a small group of Evertonians prior to Saturday’s 3rd round FA Cup tie with Tamworth at Goodison Park.
‘The Blue Union’ are a group of ordinary match-going fans who have come together in sharing a common goal – the safeguarding and betterment of Everton Football Club.
Whilst our aims and objectives are clearly contradictory to how we perceive the current direction of the club under Mr Kenwright’s leadership, we have always endeavoured to ensure that our protests have been carried out in a peaceful,transparent and dignified manner.
As fans who have put a lot of money, time and devotion into following our club through good times and bad, we find Mr Kenwright’s comments to be incredibly disrespectful, deliberately divisive and without any substance whatsoever. Not only are his words offensive to the officers of the group, but to the many thousands of Evertonians who have shown their direct support for our campaign.
The fans who questioned Mr Kenwright did so of their own volition, and independently of the members of The Blue Union that were present. We commend the civilised and dignified manner in which they tried to find answers to their concerns, and made particular note of the Chairman’s failings to answer any of them. We would encourage other Evertonians to question the chairman and other members of the board in a similarly civilised manner before all our games.
With regard to the specific allegation of betrayal, was it The Blue Union who informed the fans, the shareholders and the Council that the money was ring fenced for the then proposed iconic stadium on the Kings Dock? Was it The Blue Union who attempted to pass off a Walter Mitty character, Chris Samuelson, as an Evertonian investor at a shareholders meeting? Was it The Blue Union who attempted to move this great club to a former council refuse dump and in the process mislead the fans into believing that a supermarket chain were contributing £52m towards the construction cost of the stadium which turned out to be a bare faced lie?
Was it the Blue Union who handed over a legacy from Sir John Moores to the bank? Was it The Blue Union who attempted to mislead the fan base by informing them that the abortive Everton Place development was delayed due to an insurance problem? Nothing but the best is good enough? The sheer effrontery to attempt the deflection of responsibility for the many acts of betrayal against our famous motto by the chairman of the board is disgraceful.
With last Wednesday’s visit of Bolton Wanderers attracting the lowest home league gate for a decade (29,561), we would respectfully suggest that Mr Kenwright should be doing his utmost to bring fans back through the turnstiles as opposed to further disillusioning them.
Quite simply, Evertonians have had enough. Enough empty promises of investment, enough of the stagnation at the club, and enough of funding the contemptuous attitude that Mr Kenwright displays toward Evertonians – previously evidenced by the abolition of AGM’s at our club.
The Blue Union
