A coluna conversou com o brasileiro Guilherme Guimarães, que é um dos donos do Ebbsfleet e atualmente mora em Sheffield, onde cursa Gestão do Esporte e Entretenimento e desenvolve um trabalho de pesquisa sobre esse case de pioneirismo - no Brasil, na esteira do sucesso inglês, já existe também o Meu Time de Futebol, criado nos mesmos moldes.

Como é a participação dos acionistas?
Existem reuniões do board, eleito pelos membros, mas os encontros e discussões entre os acionistas são quase que exclusivamente virtuais. No site tem um fórum de discussões onde podemos postar opiniões e ter respostas, sugestões, críticas, etc. Cada um é livre para sugerir um assunto, mas existe um grupo voluntário que modera o debate.

Quais os pontos positivos e negativos até agora?
O projeto é, sem duvida, muito inovador. Considerando a realidade atual do futebol inglês, em que existe uma insatisfação por parte das pessoas com relação à extrema comercialização do campeonato e invasão de estrangeiros, essa democracia é algo muito interessante e retoma o sentimento de paixão pelos clubes. Mas existem problemas também. Muitos clamam pela mesma autonomia que tem em jogos de computadores como o FootballManager. Outro ponto que não está bem endereçado é a questão da estrutura. Parece-me que não estavam totalmente preparados para implementar o projeto.

Qual a repercussão na Europa?
Aqui tem havido cobertura desde os grandes veículos, como a BBC, até os menores. O fato de o time ter ganhado em Wembley o FA Trohpy (que é, talvez, a maior honraria para times "semi-profissionais" do Reino Unido) com certeza chamou ainda mais a atenção. Agora a Nike será a fornecedora de material esportivo do clube no próximo ano (não pagará por isso, mas não cobrará e existem clausulas de benefícios vinculados às vendas).

Shortly after my last post it seemed that things were getting really out of hand:

• The board and web team were being constantly criticised, with one board member in particular being singled out for not communicating with the members they were supposed to represent.
• The web team found themselves bogged down with preparations for Wembley, rather than being able to concentrate on the site, society and board.
• Team Selection was as contentious as ever - members were criticised by the web team for not using the application, members responsded that the application was not particularly useful and that they lacked the information to be able to make those choices. For example the BBC had fitness and availability reports long before matchday whilst the selection application was still showing out of date information. There was also little feedback on how the members selections compared to the Coaches.
• In addition to this there was a row about the Authority of the Forum team, moans about financial information, perceived "rubber stamping" of votes, and many a storm in a teacup.

The whole venture is still based around a web forum, with only a minority of society members taking part, and discussions going on for ages without any real resolution or means to take action. I think there's a sizeable portion of the main forum users that have never used an internet forum as extensively. At the same time (showing my age here) it feels like the generations below me just don't know how to deal with people and opinions they disagree with.

This is not helped by confusion from the top: the lines of communication are still not established, with the roles and relationships between the Operator, Board, club management, forum team still not clearly defined or set out anywhere. For me, this has to be the priority.

There is hope

Member contributions are starting to produce improvements. Diffdude created a simple calendar of Club / Society acitivies which can be viewed on the site, or downloaded into your own email client. The Podcast has been brought into the main site, and the weekly newsletter has also led to a daily newsletter. Best of all has been the MyFC Scout site, which aims to collate member's scouting reports from matches so that we're more informed for team selection.

These resources will only thrive if they are integrated or affiliated with the main site. The MyFC Foreign committee, set up by a group of users with the aim of translating important articles or propositions, also seems to have been left out in the cold for now.

I've been told that there is going to be a shift in emphasis of the main page, and hopefully some restructuring of the forums sometime soon. What I would like to see is a roadmap for development, so that we can see what is coming, and frame any discussions about functionality and requirements around that.

So there's still a long way to go, and I hope the web team crack on with improvments over the summer and open up to the talent that's available from the members.

I'm sure by now everybody knows the idea behind MyFC so I won't waste any time going over it here (if you are not familiar with the MyFootballClub concept you can visit the website and find out more by clicking here).

Well anywho, I signed up last August and then pretty much waited to see what would happen.

When it was announced that "we" had agreed a deal in principle with Ebbsfleet United of the Blue Square Premier I was pretty pleased, and since then have kind of yo-yo'd between taking an active interest and not doing an awful lot.

What I mean by that is I always take part in the votes and make sure I do my research so I'm going into them "blind", but I don't really hang around the forums too much other than just to get a general idea of what's going on (much as I do with the City message boards I guess).

Tomorrow is a massive day for the Fleet, as we're playing Torquay in the FA Trophy Final at Wembley, and I'll be there.

Truth be known I'm a little apprehensive. I'm obviously extremely excited at the prospect of making my first trip to "New" Wembley, but are there going to be hordes of angry Ebbsfleet fans waiting to attack me for not being a "proper" fan?

I hope not - I'll be wearing my "owner" polo shirt and everything. Come on the Fleet!

This has angered some, and given rise to conspiracy theories, countered by accusations of sour grapes. It seems to have surprised everyone, not least the board members themselves. Most people voted for a "balanced board"; unfortunately with a vast choice of candidates (many of whom appeared to have no distinguishing characteristics or skills) they did not vote for the same people.
There's some great statistical analysis on the forums, which seems to show that:

1) most people wanted 2 candidates who were local / already involved with MyFC. Because there were only a few of these candidates, their share of the vote was higher than a "random" candidate.

2) most people voted for at least one "international" candidate. But because no single candidate stood out as "the international choice", these votes were spread between them all.

Hogswell suggests that proportional representation would have produced the balanced board that most people favoured, but of course this would require Kent/UK/International to be different "parties". This could be something the Society considers in future, but until the board get to grips with the day to day running of the Society, there's no real mandate for this. Those that argued that "there should be international representation" could never make a convincing argument for why this was so, whereas the argument for having local members, especially those already involved in the club, was more obvious to most.

Footy19's analysis shows that higher turnout wouldn't have changed either of these two factors, and therefore the result would have been the same.

So did the Wisdom of Crowds apply? Perhaps, but only within the context of the information they were provided. There was a lack of clarity about the duties of the board and the role they would play in communications between the Club, Members and Operator, so it's no wonder that the "average" choice was to keep things in safe hands.

There's also an assumption amongst the less geeky members that the Operator is qualified and able to nurture a unique online community, without realising that there's no template for this. There are many examples of collaborative projects on the Internet, but those of us that understand the web need to explain to those that don't. The Society isn't going to appear overnight, we need to create the Republic of Football where we are.

So as of last week, I am officially part owner in an English Football Club (soccer that is...not American Football).  Thanks to the power of Wikinomics and crowdsourcing, I purchased a small share in Ebbsfleet United FC, which plays in the Blue Square Premier, with 28,300 of my "closest friends" through MyFootballClub.  While I have played soccer all my life, I never really followed English soccer.  However, the chance to own part of a professional sports club for only £35 was too tempting to resist.  The whole concept of crowdsourcing is one that marketers need to pay close attention to.  MyFootballClub is just the latest in series of business models that have cropped up where consumers are using the power of the crowd, partial ownership and technology to shake up business as usual.  Just look at Prosper.com in lending or Threadless.com in t-shirts/apparel.  This is one of those waves that once started doesnt show signs of stopping any time soon.

 Now the only question is how I am going to find a way to see my team actually play a game.  I don't think ESPN carries too many Blue Square Premier games.  Maybe I will need to look into fractional aircraft ownership over at NetJets and get myself a flight to

I will of course be getting myself an Ebbsfleet shirt to wear with pride along with my Blue and White Quartered one. I doubt I'll be heading to Stonebridge Road any time soon (160 odd miles is a bit far to travel for a Blue Square Premier match unfortunately) but there's a game against Forest Green Rovers in April which is a possible trip and there could be 2 Wembley finals later in the year.

Oooh Shiny
So with the new year comes the sales and I decided I'd to treat myself a little, even if what I bought wasn't exactly reduced. I bought myself a 16GB iPod Touch, a Panasonic DMC-TZ3 Digital Camera, a Rovers home and away shirt and a Wembley panoramic. Awesome stuff :)

Best of 2007
I was going to make an entire post for this, but can't be arsed to be honest. So here's my choices for the best Music and Games in 2007.
Best Album
3. Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
2. Editors - An End Has A Start
1. Bloc Party - A Weekend In The City

Best Xbox 360 Game
Halo 3 - Despite the single player campaign being a big disappointment, the multiplayer is absolutely incredible.

Best Wii Game
Super Mario Galaxy - An enjoyable return to form for Nintendo's Italian plumber, if a little too easy.

Best PC Game
Call of Duty 4 - The best, well told story in a video game for a long time in my opinion. 6 hours of sheer intensity and multiplayer is great too! Game of the Year!

"what I might have described as my "mild concerns" over the long term well-being of this club have now escalated to what I can only describe as "alarm"."

I've also asked a couple of questions on fans boards to what I assume has been one of the MyFC hierarchy, who also posted a comment on 200 per cent's original post. The responses, which I'll try and go into in the next couple days, raise as many questions as answers.

Chris Dillow and Tim Worstall have also given their opinions, which I hoped they would. Chris gives an excellent, reasoned argument as to why he's skeptical, while Tim also makes a very good point:

"This is one of the joys of liberal capitalism. That people can go off and make these experiments and then report back on whether they do work or not."

I hope, for Ebbsfleet's sake that it does work. I still suspect that, in the long-term, it won't.

According to Forbes Manchester United is the most valuable football club in the world with 50 million fans
world wide. Man U had $310m (£155m) income in 2006. This equates to just $6.2/fan/annum (£3.1/fan/annum)... So on this metric participatory-democracy seems to be worth 10x passive-consumerism. Sounds about right to me.

To put this into perspective: If Ebbsfleet United can get one million fans to contribute £35 (-7.50 admin charge) they could just about afford to buy a player like Rio Ferdinand (who Man U bought from Leeds for £29m in 2002).

At last, a participatory budgeting project that feels like a grass-roots initiative!

They seem to have generated a LOT of interest:

So why should Mr.Glazer and Mr. Abramovich be better than you? They shouldn't, and now you can emulate them and buy your own football club and just for £35. In fact, you'll be better than both of them since you will be able to literally control the team and also enter history.

The idea started by former football journalist Will Brooks and aimed to register 50,000 football enthusiasts, who would be willing to contribute £35 each and gather £1,375,000 to purchase a real football club.

The main idea is to give the power to the fans, who will vote on the club's affairs and even team selection and tactics.

After long months of negotiations, the MyFootballClub team have managed to find a suitable club with potential which is Ebbsfleet United F.C. Along with myself, you probably have never heard of this club before, that's because it's currently playing at the Conference division (equivalent to 5th division).

You can find more information and buy your share of the club on the MyFootballClub website.

Ebbsfleet United F.C Official website.

Les 50.000 fans ont donné chacun 72$ US, ce qui fait un joli total de 3.600.000$ US, le prix de vente du club est évalué a 1.450.000$ US, le reste de l'argent servira pour les structures, les salaires et les achats de joueurs.

Au niveau des décisions, l'entraîneur reste en place, mais ce sont les fans qui choisissent quel joueur est à aligner ou non, les changements durant le jeu, les tactiques etc...

Tout cela parait incroyable, mais les structures vont être au niveau, un forum spécialement adapté va bientôt voir le jour, des systèmes de votes par internet/sms vont être mis en place, dans le stade le speaker annoncera les votes et les fans voteront par sms, ou directement sur le site, il y aura aussi une radio dédiée au club... c'est énorme !

Le club est actuellement 9éme de Conférence Sud, il a pour objectif le maintient, mais les fans veulent le faire monter en Conférence Nationale ! (4éme division)

Autre petite chose sympa, dans ce club évolue un français, sous le nom de Sacha Opinel, il est inconnu et c'est normal, il a été formé à l'AS Cannes, puis à joué comme 3éme remplaçant à Lille et est partit s'exiler en Ecosse, le voila maintenant à Ebbsfleet United avec 50.000 entraîneurs ! il va falloir convaincre ! :p J'essaierai d'avoir une interview de ce joueur, je vous promet rien, mais je vais tout faire pour !

Nous avons donc là, le premier club de football 2.0 ! :-)

Considero esto una noticia historica y alentador para los fanaticos de futbol que quieren adquirir un club de futbol. Si es un exito, podemos hablar de otros equipos como Scarborough Athletic y/o incluso Manchester United adquirido por los fanaticos.

Mucha suerte y tienen mi apoyo los integrantes de Ebbsfleet United, Scarborough Athletic, Manchester United [Mediante el Fondo Ave Fenix], y los fanaticos de futbol.

The Football Fans Website MyFootballClub has agreed to pay 700,000 Pound Sterlings with members paying 35 Pound Sterling each. They will decide the future of Ebbsfleet United.

As a football fan, Roberto welcomes the idea of a football supporter website owning a football club. Some may have talked about the feasibility of such an experiment but it is a great idea.

Scarborough Athletic has a trust based on their supporters and it is hoped that one day supporters of Manchester United could use the Phoenix Fund to recover what was taken away from them by Glazer and company.

More power to football fans and clubs such as Scarborough Athletic and Ebbsfleet United.

For those not 100 per cent au fait with the altruistic website's aims (and who can't log onto it due to the heavy amount of traffic), it can basically be signed thus. Twenty thousand plus members have all chipped in £35 with the aim of buying a club, and running it along open, transparent and democratic principles, where the fans have control and vote on all aspects of the club, right down to team selection.

Sounds great, doesn't it? The REAL fans reconnecting with a club and keeping out all those evil millionaires who so slight the Beautiful Game. Which is fantastic, but this is a football club we're talking about - a private business - not a peace keeping mission to restore democracy to Pakistan, which seems almost more in keeping with the site's mission statement.

Still, there's been a real grassroots fans movement in recent years, with Supporters' Trusts coming to the fore. Surely this is not only a logical conclusion, but good news for the game in general.

Well, in a few words, no. No it isn't.

In longer words, It’s as near to pure communism or socialism as you’re going to get in football, and while a community owning the club is, in principle, seems attractive, there’s all sorts of areas that are heading for trouble on this.

Firstly, there’s the potential for this to be a footballing version of Orwell’s Animal Farm. You’ll have some people with more experience than others, you’ll have some with better ideas than others, and you’ll have some with inflated senses of their own importance. Eventually there’ll be the realisation that pure democracy within a business such as a football club isn’t effective, and there'll be much bickering as those at the top try to convince those at the bottom that THEY KNOW BEST.

Secondly, I can’t see somebody like Liam Daish, or any other football manager worth his salt being overly happy about having his tactics and plans dictated to him by fans. These views may differ wildly and you’ll probably end up with a conservative consensus formation for most games. That may be fine for some, but on other occasions a more attacking or specific formation/tactic may be required for a specific game. That’s what scouts are for. Having fans, especially a large number of whom who’re not familiar with lower league football, and who won’t have the inclination to scout Crawley v Droylsden to get a handle on tactics, is another recipe for disaster.

You’re also going to face problems with firstly signings and secondly cash flow. I can see a vast proportion of those who’ve put money in wanting ‘names’ to sign for them and there’s a real danger they could end up signing aging pros at the end of their career on vastly inflated salaries, at the expense of gems from the lower leagues, or even the youth system.

Take Dagenham and Redbridge. Their top scorer last season, Paul Benson, came from way down the lower leagues (not much further above park football), while Craig Mackail-Smith, now at Peterborough, also came from down the lower league pyramid. My team Exeter City signed a guy called Matt Taylor from Team Bath over the summer, who is somewhat of a lower-league Vidic and has turned out to be somewhat of an inspired signing, having netted for us half a dozen times this season from set pieces, make a couple of vital goal-line clearances and is generally a defensive colossus. Again, not the kind of player a group of fans would vote on, as they’d have never heard of him. That’s the manager and scouts’ job.

This doesn’t even consider the very daft idea of transparency which, presumably, involves ensuring the balance sheet is available to all. If rival clubs know how much cash the club can spend, they’ll adjust their prices upwards accordingly. That’s not going to help Ebbsfleet.

Also, there’s the players to consider in this as well. How would they feel knowing their future ultimately lies in the hands of the fans rather than the gaffer, who’ll often see things on the training ground the rest of us aren’t privy to.

For example, last season two Exeter players – Richard Logan and Dean Moxey – were out of contract. Logan had been signed in January on a six month contract and had looked average, bar the odd spectacular goal. Moxey was a youth product who’d had an injury hit couple of seasons and appeared to have lost his way. I advocated releasing them both. Paul Tisdale begged to differ with my opinion, and those of a vast proportion of our fanbase. The upshot? Logan is currently our top scorer having reached double figures before November, while Moxey is having the season of his life and has easily been our best, most consistent player and should be the first name on the team sheet each week at the moment. Goes to show what I know.

In the short term, and with the type of cash they’ve apparently got floating around, it could work. TCFKAGAN may sign a couple of decent players for their push to the play-offs, it’ll attract interest, and potentially more cash, for the club.

But the BSP (or Conference to you and I) is a notoriously difficult league to get out of , and if the success takes a while in coming, I can see interest in this dwindling as all those Premiership or casual fans who’ve got enthused lose interest in a team that’s hovering around in the top-tier of the non-league and gradually start to stop paying their subs.

Sure, Ebbsfleet may pick up a few extra fans, but how many of these will be there come the end of the season, or even the following season when Fleet need to travel to Northwich on a cold, wet Tuesday night to keep in touch with the play-offs. Say you, as an Arsenal fan, put you cash into it, but the team had a poor run of form and it was a choice between stumping up a bit more cash or staying in to watch the Gunners in the Champions League on the box? Which would you choose?

Finally, I think their choice of club is a poor one. Ebbsfleet are a bit of a ‘one of those’ clubs. They periodically threaten the play-offs and have a reasonable band of support but, much like Woking, they’ve not really achieved anything in recent years and suffer from their proximity to bigger teams in nearby London. They also changed their name to an as-yet non-existent place to tap into ‘burgeoning’ support, a la Franchise FC. They’re reasonably stable, but suffer from having bigger, ex-league clubs around and other non-league clubs with sugar daddies.

Myfootballclub would have been better, and more welcome, investing into a club with history and/or troubled by debt. Someone like Halifax or Swindon, for example. In that case they’d be more welcomed by fans and there would be a real sense of ‘Hey, we can achieve something here. We can awake a sleeping giant.’

Ebbsfleet, with no disrespect, are a bit of a ‘nothing’ team. They’re not especially bad, they’re not as good as the top teams, they simply exist. It’s hard to get excited about that kind of club, just as it’s hard to get excited about Chelsea suddenly buying their way to the best manager and players in the world. To be honest, even forming their own team and working their way up through the non-league pyramid would be a better, and more satisfying idea. You just can’t buy passion.

It could give them stability (although TCFKAGAN has always struck me as a very stable club). What’s more likely is, after a good first season, the great scheme will hit a few unforeseen problems and they’ll either start running into financial and administrative difficulties, they’ll start slipping down the league, or, as is most likely, they’ll be forced to sell. I give them about 36 months before the dream turns sour and TCFKAGAN is on the lookout for new owners.

It’s a nice idea in principle, but will bring chaos in practice.

There’s actually a couple of clubs out there who operate a similar, but more practical method. AFC Wimbledon immediately spring to mind, and that’s largely because they’ve got such a dedicated and large fanbase determined to stick one to Franchise FC. And good on them. Their model works because they’ve started from scratch, everybody’s clear on their aims and objectives and they didn’t try to shoe-horn an existing reasonably-well run football club, and an idealistic fans model together.

Exeter’s the other example, with the Supporters’ Trust taking over when we were on the verge of folding. But even then, there’s the realisation that we can’t have complete democracy and transparency in everything. Our original model worked well for the first season and a half, but there was soon a growing realisation that a fan’s passion was no substitute for business nous, and we couldn’t ask the supporters to dig into their pockets every time we needed cash.

We’ve now got a clearer line of communication between the Trust board (the majority shareholder) and the club’s directors – we’ve got a more business-like, commercial operation in place and we’re one of the very few teams now in the lower leagues to turn in a profit. It’s also very satisfying to know those in charge are, ultimately accountable to us – the fans – and we’ll never again be fleeced by a couple of conmen.

That’s not to say the Trust model is perfect, and there are problems and issues I won’t go into here. Trusts such as that at York City eventually sold up. There’s also the issue of investment. If a rich Exeter supporter offered to invest in the club for a space in the board, it that would cause a serious amount of soul-searching.

Fan involvement, and money IS a great idea, and I honestly believe more clubs should have some form of supporter trust representation involved at boardroom level, if not as majority shareholder (this won’t work for everyone) then at least being a shareholder with a say in how the trust is run. I'm a passionate believer in Supporters' Trusts and think their involvement is generally a positive thing in football, even if they come equipped with their own set of problems.

But myfootballclub.co.uk? It’ll go down as a worthy and well-intentioned, but ultimately unsuccessful, footnote in the annuls of non-league clogging.

I'd be interested to see what bloggers with a good understanding of economics, like Tim Worstall and Chris Dillow, make of it. But, for the time being, Two Hundred Per Cent has the final word:

"Ultimately, this club has been sold to be the plaything of a few thousand would-be Alex Fergusons. Whether this proves to be beneficial to the club and its supporters is open to question, but one thing remains certain. Myfootballclub and Jason Botley have done very nicely indeed out of this, and would appear to be the only thing that matters to them."

UPDATE: Brian's not too impressed either.

In a first for British football, Conference side Ebbsfleet United today agreed a deal to be taken over by fans' community website MyFootballClub.

The MyFootballClub inititive involved £20,000 members each paying £35 to provide the necessary £700,000 kitty to take over a football club. They were approached by nine different clubs before announcing today that the initiative now own 51% of Ebbsfleet United. Each member has an equal share in the club and MyFootballClub have the option to buy the club outright in the future.

So the fans of this online project now own a football club. Ebbsfleet United were previously known as Gravesend and Northfleet before being renamed this summer and currently lie in 9th position in the Blue Square Premier.Membership of MyFootballClub is annual so new members can join and become owners at any time and help boost the clubs finances.

This may sound like any other supporters trust takeover of a football club, such as at my club Exeter City where as a trust member I own an equal share of the football club and get to help make off-field decisions. But that's where the twist comes with MyFootballClub....

The 20,000 members will get to vote on transfers, player selections and all major club decisions!

The current board will stay at Ebbsfleet but as non-executives and current manager Liam Daish will obviously have his hands tied slightly by the takeover and his job as 'manager' has now evolved into 'head coach'. But Daish is confident the takeover will be a success, saying " I think the idea is fantastic. I look forward to the challenge of working with thousands of members to produce a winning team.

"Picking 11 players and formations isn't a precise science and luck often plays its part. During and after matches, Ebbsfleet supporters often give me their opinion on which players should or shouldn't start games. Now they can have their say.My job won't change that much. As a club, we'll select the starting 11 players and formation together."

There are plenty of chairman and directors of football around the world who sign players without the managers consent but Daish gets the chance to work with these fans who are providing his club with the transfer funds. He said how "It's the supporters' money that finances this club and pays my wages and those of the players. So there's a good argument for them having a say in what players they want to see."

Daish will still be the only one to give the team talks, to take training etc so his role at the club may be downgraded a little but with £700,000 being pumped into the club looks to have become a lot more exciting!

This story is unheard of in football, in an era where a lot of clubs are being owned by rich business men looking for a quick buck, Ebbsfleet United will join the list of clubs owned by Supporters Trusts, where the people in charge only care about what's best for their club. The Observer described MyFootballClub as "magnificently chaotic pure democracy" and the Times described how "attendances should shoot up as members turn up to follow a team that is, literally, theirs".

Ebbsfleet's owners may differ than most supporters trust as only a minority are long-time fans of the club, but MyFootballClub creator Will Brooks says how all MyFootballClub hope is that "MyFootballClub members and Ebbsfleet supporters will join forces and make the football club more sustainable and successful."

The Financial Services Authority has approved the setting up of a 'MyFootballClub Trust' to safeguard members' interests if the club ever ran into servere financial difficulties, showing just how well thought-through and professional MyFootballClub is.

Ebbsfleet Chairman Jason Botley was also confident ahead of the takeover saying, "The board, the coaching staff, club employees and myself are united in believing this is a great opportunity for Ebbsfleet United. This extra finance and support will enable our club to progress."

As a fan of the Blue Square Premier and football in general I look forward to the official takeover being completed to see just whether this exciting, innovative idea could work in practice. But as an Exeter City fan, only two league places above Ebbsfleet, I hope it takes a while to warm up!

If your a football fan who feels disillusioned by your clubs treatment of the fans and feel you aren't being listened to, Ebbsfleet and MyFootballClub have just created the answer!

What are your views on the takeover? Would you join myfootballclub? Would you want your club to be taken over?

Peter Evans - Sources BBC Online, Football365 and myfootballclub.co.uk!-- -->

I really hope it is successful ... my only concern is that a large part of the enjoyment of football seems to be complaining about the manager's selection decisions ... if they 'democratise' refereeing too, there won't be anything left to shout about!

Ebbsfleet United steht aktuell im gesicherten Mittelfeld der Conference National (oder Blue Square Premier), der fünfthöchsten Liga Englands.

Back in June we wrote about a clever idea that applied the wisdom of crowds idea to a football club. To recap, the idea is that thousands of football fans band together and buy a football club, each person is part owner of the club. Using the internet each person will be able to vote for team selection, formation, substitutions and discuss tactics and player transfers.

The update is that MyFootballClub has actually bought a conference team - Ebbsfleet United. It's going to be fascinating to see how the idea actually works in practice.

www.myfootballclub.co.uk

About six months ago Will Brooks, a British football fan, decided to start a website to test support for an absurd idea. Could a fan collective buy and manage a lower tier football club? Was there a group willing to pool talent, professional skill, and membership fees sufficient enough to achieve this pie-in-the-sky scheme? The Plan: pool resources, buy a club and make all major management decisions by internet plebiscite. Members could vote to fire the coach, approve player acquisitions, improve the ground (stadium), change the formation,.....Who would give money to these morons?

The result: over 53,000 people signed up and 700K+ British pounds have been collected so far. Enough funds are available to acquire a majority stake in a 3rd or 4th division club in the multi tiered British Football system and have money to spare for new players. My football club has all the same revenue streams as regular owners, but they also have the yearly membership fees and an instant international fan base. Hmmm...

"So what", you say. "a 3rd or 4th division team is not in the same league as Man U and Chelsea". Yes, that is true in more than one way. But, unlike American professional sports leagues, football leagues around the world are not static. The worst teams in each division are demoted at the end of the season. The best teams of the next lower tier are promoted to take their place. Over time teams can progress through the different levels, rising to the top division. Can you imagine where the Tampa Bay Devil Rays would be if baseball followed this scheme? God help those poor folks in Cleveland. So it is at least theoretically possible for Mighty Manchester United to, someday, be matched up against a no name team financed by an international consortium of fans with no other motive than victory on the pitch. Dare we dream of playing in Europe?

The skeptics warn this could be a internet scam of epic proportions! "For only a small transfer fee I can assure your lottery winnings will be deposited in your account" Sure, it's possible, but I sent in my £35 three months ago. If it's a scam, then the sheer entertainment value of it makes the money well spent. To be part of a grand social experiment answering the age old sports fan conundrum: "Can the arses on sports radio really do a better job?" Is the brain power of 50,000 fans, spread out over 70 countries, strong enough to produce a winning team. There's no debate on what constitutes success; the outcome metric is simple: win and advance.

As I have watched this story unfold, it looks more and more like this thing is for real. These folks are not all arm chair quarterbacks. Michael Fiddy, a former management official for the Premiership Club Fulham, is advising the group. So far My-Football-Club has spoken with 9 clubs. A best fit club was selected last week and should be announced in the next couple of weeks. We are performing our due diligence and a final contract should be in place before the transfer window closes. The Membership is excited. I'll keep you posted.

For those of you who want to join in on the madness:

www.myfootballclub.co.uk/