The Roland Harris Column

Friday 28 June, 2002

Lets add our voice as Richmond comes back

Geoffrey Richmond is back at Valley Parade. I'm glad cause I get the distinct feeling that with out him having come back we would be looking at football in the Unibond League if we were lucky but I think that this time we have to change the rules for sitting in the big chair.

Now GR is back he has absolute power over all our football lives. We live, we die, at his behest. If he favours us then we prosper. If he takes his bat and ball home, as we have seen recently, they is not a huge queue of people who are able to fill his shoes.

Some guys are setting up a supporters trust, it's a good idea but it should not be needed.

The one thing that was put up for sale as being Bradford City was not the players, cause they were sacked or the ground which is in no one's des res area, but the fans.

We are the most important element of Bradford City.

Back in the olden days, and I know this cause of Simon Schaima Kings ruled cause they have the biggest armies. In modern times the leaders rule because the people let them. Michael Wood can be painfully dull when he talks about the differences between political elections here and over the Atlantic but he convinced me of the difference. In the US the President works for the people, they are not his subjects. That is what we should be trying to build at Valley Parade.

Geoffrey Richmond is a great fella. He saved us from boredom in the third division all them years ago and now he has saved us from eyes-bigger-than-wallet in the Premiership which he did but the rest of us, hand on heart, egged him on in doing. However I think that this time we should let the big man know that he works for us.

That what he owns only exisits because of us. That although he owns the club the club is us and we own ourselves.

We need more openness from the boardroom down, that will add to the investment of emotion we have in the club, and then we need to start acting like grown ups cause lets face it 99% of fans would run the club in a much more irresponsible way that GR, Prof Rhodes or whoever has.

I'm over the moon that Geoffrey Richmond is back behind his desk but now we know that he chose to sit there knowing everything he does about the club and about us. We are the prime asset of what he has bought and this time we need to add our own clear and responsible voice to goings on at Valley Parade.

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