The headline on the Charlton site today is that the womens team have been saved, so well done to Varney and co, for getting enough people together to cough up the sponsorship money. Its a shame it could not have been done earlier, but it would be churlish of me to say that. It will be interesting to see who the team are, given the departures due to the anticipated closure. Casey Stoney, Eniuolka, Natasha Dowie have all departed, in fact 2 players went to Chelsea, 7 players went to Watford and 5 to Fulham. The Fulham Ladies suffered what seemed to be a similar fate to the Charlton Women and the mens club withdrew their funding, so they have done a pretty good job staying afloat and have their own website.
The Womens League will be interesting next season, having challenged for honours against Arsenal for the last few years, albeit that we have come out second best, we are unlikely to make the running having lost our best players.
For the Club it is a shame that things could not have been sorted earlier, but we are a mens club and the thought needed to preserve the core business was always being a priority. Its a pity though that the management team for the womens (Bob Whitehand and Steve Sutherland) had not negotiated some of these deals earlier in the life of the team, rather than having it done at the last minute. A lot of hard work went in to the womens team to get it, and maintain, where it was, only for the men's team's relegation to send the womens house of cards crashing in.
It will be interesting to see next season if again the womens team can out do the mens, again.
2 comments:
Agree Kap, the situation was handled very badly. You would have thought that Whitehand and Sutherland could have seen relegation coming - it was hardly a shock was it?
Where did Natasha Dowie go? Coventry?
I was sure she had gone, but can't see a reference to her, so maybe I am wrong.
Post a Comment