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I would be interested in understanding what "I appreciate that this has been a vitriolic and heated discussion. Even I am shocked at some of the things posted" means as actually, given the severity of the events being discussed, what was said on that thread seemed to be a reasonable debate to me.
The Supporters Club have issued a statement on their side of this, which I have linked to in the original story http://www.fansfocus.net/dagenhamandred ... id=8324635.
I am still amazed that a group of people so far in a hole now keep on digging to be honest and my response to the statement issued follows.
OK I get that, but surely the committee members knew why these members wanted a face to face with the guy that has invested a lot of his own money into the club that they allegedly support, particularly when they were the ones in dispute with the club over the flags.Following the statement put on the club website on the 26th October 2017, on behalf of the Committee we would like to make the following observations.
2 members of the committee were present at the meeting on the 21st October at the request of our members to ensure nothing was misinterpreted or misunderstood. They were not representing or advising the members. It has always been the Supporters Club policy to help, where possible, any member who has an ongoing query or dispute that they cannot solve.
The item on DiggerDagger clearly states that it was one of the members that handed over the photo of the email. Had the committee members seen the photo of the email, and were they satisfied that it was genuine? In "good faith", implies that they had and in fact believed that the reassurances that they had previously had from several officers of the club that a broadcast email was not sent, were lies.The committee members did not hand Mr. Hopkin a copy of anything. Mr. Hopkin can confirm this. The paper in question was handed over to Mr. Hopkin by the members in, we believe, good faith.
No idea what this means. Anyone?We fully understood the seriousness of the situation and therefore had not divulged any information.
My understanding of this is that actually there was only one meeting between the flag owners, Glyn Hopkin and Dave Bennett previously, which happened after the previous interview on DiggerDagger in August. The previous statement by the Supporters Club bears this out. I understand that at this meeting both Glyn and Dave made it clear that there had been an investigation into the alleged email to all clubs and there was no truth in it.We would like to add that the members in question had several meetings with Mr. Hopkin and Mr. Bennett. At no time was Mr. Payne’s name ever mentioned in any of the meetings attended by the committee or our members. As observers at these meeting we can state categorically that at all times these members handled themselves with the utmost respect and fully believed that the e-mail was genuine and given to them in good faith.
Despite these assurances the matter was not dropped and when this clumsy effort to resurrect it two months later, and in doing so put Steve Thompson in a very difficult position was attempted, the Supporters Club Chairman and Secretary felt that it was OK to be associated with it.
As for Tony Payne not being involved, it was made clear that he was copied on the emails that were sent to AFC Fylde and Maidstone United, and I understand that he is also copied on the email photo that was handed over. Given the above investigation must have involved Glyn asking Tony whether he had seen the alleged broadcast email and to reach the conclusion that this was not sent, he must have denied it, this is by association accusing him of lying.
True, I did not speak to anyone from the Supporters Club prior to posting the story yesterday, which was in response to the football club demming the incident serious enough to issue an official statement.There has been discussion about this situation on various websites but again the committee have not spoken to or given any information to the people using these sites.
We would like our members to be assured that the Supporters Club is 100pct committed to helping the club in any way.
TBH I believe that the current Supporters Club committee have now lost all credibility over this issue and their stance in supporting the owners of two flags that have passed their sell by date and are at best in questionable taste given current world events, particularly as they have been asked not to do so by the club owners that they are apparently "100pct committed to helping".
It is clear to me that it is the agenda of a significant group within the Supporters Club to oust Steve Thompson by any means, in this case by proving that he lied to fellow board members over what is actually not a particularly major issue. I have previously challenged various people to either come up with the alleged email or shut up. They did neither, someone apparently fabricated the item that was handed to Glyn on Saturday instead.
Steve Thompson can undoubtedly be a difficult character, but his commitment and hard work in running the Daggers over many years cannot be questioned. He has the confidence of the current board of directors and is going to be one of the investors in the change of ownership when and if this change of structure ever actually goes through.
The danger at the moment is that these actions by a minority of our fans result in them throwing the baby out with the bathwater and we lose the investment from Glyn Hopkin out of frustration with this sort of stupidity from people that seriously ought to know better.
Rant over.
