Royal Navy: Relegated from the Premiership
In a stormy meeting Chairman and owner of Royal Navy FC, Mr Cameron, met with his beleaguered manager Mr Stanhope and told him to “Put up or shut up, focus on the football while I run the club”. The meeting followed a press conference where Stanhope admitted that RNFC would struggle to win anything this season as the playing squad was now just too small. Recently RNFC has sold off some of its best players. Despite repeated requests from the manager and fans, the chairman has refused to fund any new transfers and wants to sell more players in order to make drastic savings on the wage bill. The chairman, who is said to be very keen on playing in Europe, remains exceptionally bullish in the face of mounting criticism and says he still expects the club to remain in the top 4 in the Premiership and is demanding a good showing in the FA Cup and League Cup. RNFC, once the biggest club in the world and until recently holding a consistent 3rd place, has been rapidly overtaken by other clubs and even once despised local rivals. Most pundits say that relegation from the Premiership is now a certainty because with such a small and ageing squad RNFC, simply can’t keep up in the long hard season ahead.
Mr Fox, on the club’s board of directors, says people simply don’t understand how much of a mess that previous owners of the club had left.“We’re doing our best to balance the books but economies have to be made although we can still be a successful club”. There have been a few new signings of very expensive British players but most agree the club paid way over-the odds for them and they have yet to really show their potential. In the long-term 2 of the world’s best players are contracted to join the club but that is sometime in the future and will be frankly bizarre as it looks likely the club could be playing in League One by then.
Amongst the players the mood is sombre. Everyone agrees “the team have always given 110% on the pitch” but good team spirit and plenty of experience can only take you so far and can’t make up for lack of investment in the club. Many of the players won’t have their contracts renewed at the end of the season and several players have had to play in matches while carrying injuries. Speaking off the record to local journalists a member of the team admitted that “morale is very brittle, there is huge anger and resentment in the team, players are exhausted and struggling with the fixture congestion and everyone blames the chairman and the board”. Despite the seriousness of the situation, the national media have largely ignored the unfolding crisis at RNFC and are more interested in the chairman’s other interests. As the problems get worse shouts of “Sack the board” and “Cameron out” are increasingly being heard on the terraces.
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Asking the Navy to do more and more with less and less
HMS Ocean - Image via Wikipedia
Just at the very moment that the decisions of the October 2010 “Strategic Defence Review” start to bite, the Royal Navy is being asked by government to do more than ever. With the crisis in Libya and the Middle East showing no signs of ending, RN warships are spread thin across the globe. A quick snapshot of the fleet shows the pace of operations. With such a tiny fleet, our naval ports are almost empty and there are few vessels able to provide reliefs should the Libya crisis continue or escalate.
RN ships involved in Operation Ellamy off Libya include HMS Ocean, HMS Albion, HMS Sutherland, HMS Liverpool, HMS Brocklesby and HMS Bangor and HMS Triumph. The RFA is playing an increasing role with RFA Fort Rosalie, RFA Wave Knight supporting them. RFA Argus, RFA Fort Victoria and RFA Cardigan Bay are ready off Yemen should UK citizens need to be evacuated. RN patrols in the Arabian Gulf continue (as they have since 1980) with HMS St Albans sailing this week to relieve HMS Iron Duke in addition to the 4 permanently deployed RN minehunters in the Gulf. HMS Richmond is involved in exercises in the Far East and HMS Edinburgh has sailed to relieve HMS York in the South Atlantic along with HMS Scott. RFA Wave Ruler is in the Caribbean ready to provide relief in case of hurricanes.
In the last few months the RN has paid off submarine HMS Trafalgar, aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal, 4 frigates; HMS Cornwall, HMS Chatham, HMS Campbeltown, & Cumberland and 2 destroyers; HMS Manchester & HMS Gloucester, 3 auxiliaries; RFA Fort George, RFA Largs Bay & RFA Bayleaf. Of the few new vessels joining the fleet, the 3 new Type 45 destroyers are not ready to be deployed on operations and submarine HMS Astute’s epic sea trails have been dogged by bad luck. The only other ship to join the RN is HMS Protector – a Norwegian ice-breaker which should be a good replacement for HMS Endurance.
It would appear that the Navy is actually indispensable to this government (like all before) who are tasking it with more and more. This tempo can be maintained for a short time but is not sustainable as there is simply no back up. More pressure is being put on ageing ships for which no replacements are forthcoming and personnel are being worked harder, some even under threat of redundancy. It is shameful that the government will not reverse the defence cuts in the light of events, and is grinding our forces down with over-work and under investment.
Related articles
- Marines on UK Yemen exit standby (bbc.co.uk)
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- Britain says military assets deployed near Yemen (telegraph.co.uk)
