Stuart Black has asked for this letter, and his vision for the Club, to be published online after departing the Albion Rovers Board of Directors.
The Club would like to place on record our thanks to Stuart for all of his hard work.
To those with Albion Rovers’ best interests at heart,
It has been mostly a pleasure, sometimes a frustration, but always an honour to serve on the Board of Directors at such a historic and proud club, even for the short time I was afforded. In the four months of my term, I made a small but significant impact on the Club, which, until the tumultuous AGM on the 19th of December 2024, had welcomed me with open arms. The Club, however, now stands at a significant crossroads. The steps that had been taken on a journey to a sustainable business model have been halted and the power to choose which direction the Club takes moving forward has been ripped away from the hands of the Board of Directors by five shareholders standing apart from the majority of the fanbase. Their intentions and motives are unclear, but their actions spanning the last two AGMs have the potential to bring the Club to ruin, and the support should be concerned about Albion Rovers Football Club continuing in its current guise and operating from its home at the Reigart Stadium.
I joined the Board of Directors for various reasons, partly due to Margaret Rizza, one of the most competent and insightful individuals I know. Our first conversation about the Club clarified how gargantuan the task was and how much support, time, and effort was needed. My other reasons are more complex to quantify; professionally, the last 10 years have been hugely successful; however, unexpected hardships and blows outside of work have been difficult. Thankfully, I have come through that stronger. This is all to say that when I first visited the stadium, wandered around the grounds that had seen better days, and soaked in stories about the Club, I felt a real kindred spirit with Albion Rovers FC. The Club had been knocked down but remained defiant and unbroken like myself. I saw the massive potential and a pathway to a future that would transform the Club to the benefit of the surrounding communities. I firmly believed I could be part of the catalyst that fuelled that journey. My main reason for joining was the challenge and the kinship I felt for the Club that first day.
I at no point expected to make any financial gains from this journey, but I was fully committed to making a difference until the unfortunate events of the AGM. In the weeks following that night, I have contemplated my time with the Club and considered my response to the events that unfolded.
A small group of shareholders, wielding an inflated amount of power due to the dormant share issue at the heart of the Club, have acted, in my opinion, with less diligence and care than I would have hoped for from a group that professes to have the Club’s best interests at heart. They may have acted out of a misguided attempt to protect the Club, but regardless of their intentions, I firmly believe that their actions during the last two AGMs have pushed the Club closer to a precipice that it has been sliding towards for the last decade.
Due to a lack of basic reporting, transparency, and housekeeping that goes back years, large parts of my time at the Club were spent digging for information that should have been readily available to assist the Board of Directors in decision-making processes. While trying to establish better business practices so that others would be saved from the purgatory that was Albion Rovers records and (lack of) reporting procedures, it became clear there has been a historical lack of sound practices and governance; basic onboarding was non-existent and while improvements have been made, starting from a such a point of disarray made the task of building a transparent and efficient infrastructure was an unenviable task but one the Board set to. I will be clear: the current Board are not responsible for those failings; they identified the historic mismanagement and then took the correct steps to start fixing it by recruiting individuals well-versed in good business practices.
I have never heard of another Board of Directors not having access to up-to-date online bank statements, as was the case for the first three months of my time at the Club. Furthermore, the pace at which the Club currently moves behind the scenes can be glacial, not due to a lack of care or passion, but because the Club is understaffed, with not enough qualified bodies to carry the workload and lacking the diversity of skillsets and experience on a Board hamstrung by major shareholders, who first rejected Iain Mulholland at the beginning of 2024, then myself at the tail end of the year which caused the subsequent resignation of Margaret Rizza. This sequence of events will undoubtedly make attracting new members to the Board with the necessary skills an uphill battle.
While I offered a positive vision for the Club and have attached a PDF outlining some of that for anyone brave enough to take up the baton, the major shareholders rejected it out of hand without offering any insight into what they would find an acceptable alternative or producing their own blueprint for securing the Club’s future.
The only suggestions on the night of the AGM involved a shout to “sell the family jewels” from one former Director and a question from another regarding the Board’s position on selling the ground. Both shareholders opposed my election to the Board.
At the junction where a Poll Vote regarding my election was called for at the AGM, I asked the largest shareholder directly if he would like to ask me any questions before he voted. He declined. He then proceeded to ask me post-vote why I had joined the Board after he had cast his vote to oust me, making any such information irrelevant. At the time I described this as disingenuous, I stand by this.
Furthermore, Margaret and I recently visited Hampden on behalf of Albion Rovers and reached out to see if the same shareholder would like to meet and have an informal chat about the future of the Club. This request was ignored, as have several previous requests by the Board of Directors. It leaves me no clearer as to theirs or any other large shareholders’ endgame.
I came into this venture with no ulterior motives. I gave up my sparse free time willingly, free of charge, to lend my experience and skills to a business that would have been unable to afford the cost of consultancy under different circumstances. You will have to forgive my quiet anger at having that help slapped away with such indifference and arrogance. To be rejected in such a manner, sentenced without a trial, after I gave up my valuable time away from my loved ones in an effort to help a Club I have no shares in, no prior emotional attachment to and who had been so disastrously run by some of those same men has been galling. That I was giving up nights at the stadium to dig through disorganised boxes half full of rubbish for important contracts that had been flung carelessly away rather than filed away with care was also galling. As was finding out the Club had an office, several printers, but no computer. I rectified that glaring omission amongst others that left me scratching my head.
Anyone who believes previous Boards, across the past decade, did a halfway competent job needs to rethink their stance; I can assure you that you are woefully mistaken the lack of good business practices in place was startling.
I will not waste any more time analysing the AGM other than to say I have neither the patience nor the crayons to explain to a former Financial Director how bizarre it was to be asked questions about figures on last year’s accounts that were next to figures he was responsible for from the previous year or that we were covering the financial year past not the current one we are midway through.
The last point from that night I would address concerns the defence for rejecting my election to the Board of the largest shareholder. Stating that past votes you have cast have saved the Club is not a Free Pass to be played when you are called out for your current actions, which many believe are jeopardising Albion Rovers future, by fellow shareholders who rightly fear for their Club.
Albion Rovers needed their shareholders to empower the Board of Directors to give the Club a fighting chance of building a brighter future. On the 19th of December 2024, five failed to do so, derailing the progress made, plunging the Club into a state of disarray and uncertainty that I suspect will not be looked back on kindly by the passionate support. Any previous goodwill built up from voting to save the Club will be insufficient to dampen the rightful anger the fanbase will feel when they realise the consequences of your vote.
If anyone is reading this as a fan and thought the Club had reached rock bottom with their relegatin from the professional leagues, I’m afraid to inform you that the largest Shareholders got their shovels out and started to dig. It’s grim viewing from where I stood, though granted, you may feel different if you have a financial gain to be made if the Club is put into administration and forced to sell the ground.
Albion Rovers is at a crossroads. Further cost-cutting is urgently needed at the same time as foundations are laid to boost revenues. One path leads to a very bleak future, perhaps surviving but more than likely ground sharing away from the Reigart Stadium. The other path has become much more challenging to traverse, but I will be rooting for the Club to do so.
To clarify one point made post-AGM about my election, I was asked a question on the night, again post-poll vote, which I would like to clarify. I did reach out via the Board of Directors to the shareholder who posed the question on the night about my other Director positions, but I received no response. I currently have one other Directorship, which I answered on the night in response to the question I thought I had been asked. I was told later that I was actually asked how many I had previously held, not how many others I currently held. With the whispering in my ear and everything else going on in the room, I misheard and was mostly bewildered by that line of questioning. I have been in full-time employment with Northwind Leisure for over a decade, and the other three lapsed companies I have listed against my name never traded for various reasons, including changes in circumstances brought on by promotions, my father’s major stroke, and other circumstances that are not mine alone to divulge.
The SFA and Companies House both passed me as a fit and proper person to be appointed to the Board. Any concerns from the shareholders could have easily been cleared up pre-AGM by email or in person on the night before we commenced. Anyone with any degree of sense will see that this reasoning was, at best, a smokescreen, a diversion from a decision that was taken prior to the AGM for reasons that only those five shareholders truly know.
My personal email address is included in the attached PDF, and I will answer any questions anyone has regarding my vision for the future if others wish to take up the challenge in my stead.
I will finish by saying thank you to everyone who was so open and welcoming, from the effervescent Mary, my fellow Board members, Peter whose patter on the PA and in my ear during games made me chuckle, the talented media team, especially the talented Calum Moore and not forgetting both the Community and Supporters Trusts who I had looked forward to working with and to everyone else that took their time to say hello.
While I arrived with no previous ties to the Wee Rovers, I leave as a supporter and a well-wisher who will keep a very interested eye on results and developments at the Club.
Sincerely,
Stuart Black
