Yep, I fully understand that it's a non-starter for now. My original comment questioned whether, were we to emulate Yeovil's success, would a new pitch allow the women's team to play at SJP. Obviously, we're a long way off Yeovil right now, but if they can do it, why can't we?
Grow up yourself you fool, I’m saying nothing of the sort.
Nothing of the sort? Because it seems to be, almost verbatim, exactly what you're saying. Please correct me if I'm misreading your posts somehow, but it seems pretty clear from this exchange that you don't respect women's football much at all – comparing even professional women's teams to our U8 side.
Are you being deliberately thick or just suggesting some sort of political correctness? At the end of the day, ECFC is a commercial enterprise. A crowd of 10 or 11 (source: Andy Holloway in an earlier post) would not even pay the leccy bill, let alone staff to open the place, aside from putting more strain on the pitch at the risk of affecting the first team fixtures.
It's possible to have a point of view which doesn't correspond with your own without it being prejudiced, racialist, sexist, ageist or any other 'ist' you care too mention. The problem with political correctness is its almost slavish non adherence to this basic concept.....
...and often these criticisms are used to justify some form of positive discrimination.
Look at my original post.
It absolutely is possible to disagree without being prejudiced. However, saying that a professional women's football team (all division 1 Women's Super League sides must be professional from next season) is comparable to U8's is sexist. It's saying we should pay them as much heed as children. It's saying that they can never, ever earn the right to play on the Saint James' Park turf. That's sexist, no matter what way you spin it. Saying men can do something and women will never be able to. It's the definition of sexist.
The game has definitely kicked on since then, in the UK - at least at the upper echelons. From next season, top tier sides must all be fully professional, with a minimum of 16 contact hours per week, rising to 20 by 2020-21, and operate an academy. Improving the quality of the spectacle helps attract fans. Women's football attracts more women, and it would be fantastic for particularly the younger girls in Exeter to get involved with the club, to have role-models in the community. As mentioned earlier, these clubs must have a minimum attendance of 400 to be a member of the league, so I think that would push it past the break-even point in terms of opening up the ground, should the team ever progress to the WSL.
A reminder of my original post, that has somehow caused so, so much controversy.
I agree Malc. Many of Antonys posts in general have that authoritarian edge, which can be misconstrued as somewhat caustic. When you get to know him (on here) you get to realise that his style is brief, concise, and to the point. Whereas I cant cut a long story short!
What absolute tosh. Nobody is saying men can play at SJP, and women can’t - we’ve seen a female linesman let’s not forget. I’m a male Trust member, but I can’t play at SJP. Is that discriminatory? Of course not! You accuse me of not reading your post, but you don’t seem to understand it would need to be commercially viable. I would assume also that if the ladies team reached their cup semis or final, or whatever, they may well be afforded the opportunity to play at SJP.