Grants are normally 50/50 so it would have been 75k from the playing budget and 75k from us fans.loan_star wrote:This could be why the club are playing it from the "we didn't have the money for 500 seats" angle.al_quaker wrote: "The FA National Ground Grading Criteria requires clubs at Step 2 to have 250 seats. Whilst it is acknowledged that the National League requires Step 2 clubs to have 500 seats to be eligible to participate in the “play-offs”, the additional 250 seats would not be eligible unless there was a demonstrable need in terms of average attendance."
That to me suggests help for 250 seats (that is, the cat B requirement), but no more than that (without demonstrable need), at step 2. Which makes the 500 seats needed for promotion quite unfair - which perhaps is the basis of our appeal.
If they couldn't afford 500 seats due to a grant only being available up to 250 seats then the league should take that into consideration. Asking clubs to spend money they can't afford despite meeting the regs for the current league could put clubs in financial difficulty.
All very well saying reduce the playing budget to help pay for the stand but if it really is £150k to double the size of the current stand then thats probably all of our playing budget out of the window.
I wouldn't expect this loophole to have any success, we didn't follow the rules whether we agree with them or not.