Background to City crisis

The decision of the club's directors to effectively put the club up for sale - tagged with an ominous warning that it may even cease to exist within two months - has sent shivers down the spine of the club's beleaguered support.

Chairman Douglas Craig, never one to shirk flak or unpopular decisions, revealed at last night's annual meeting that the club's dwindling cash resources could force its sudden closure.

Unless someone with enough money and potential to 'make a success' of the club is found, then the board will resign at the end of the present season.

That prompted City manager Terry Dolan to declare that "December 20, 2001 is the date when realism" bit into York City.

How ironic, then, that such a stark reality should gouge the club's frayed financial flanks barely six months after Craig marked his decade as the man in charge at Bootham Crescent.

Those ten years have brought highs and lows - promotion at Wembley eight years ago, bottom of the basement just last year.

Running through those 3,800-plus days has been the seam of the chairman's steadfastly uncompromising attitude.

Four managers have come and gone, countless players - good and bad - too. Directors have also been to and fro, not all for the same reasons.

That promotion prize so cherished, and so gutsily won by City, was then followed by the longest uninterrupted stint as an established Second Division club, then more fatefully by demotion to the basement.

Even as the descent gathered momentum, City had the capacity to surprise so-called superior forces. Think of Port Vale, Reading (twice), Everton and, more uproariously of course, Manchester United.

As leader of the York pack the chairman, too, held high office in the Football League, serving on its board and several committees. He has also been a driving force behind the club's acquisition of a training complex and the founding of a much-envied youth development programme.

He has been reviled by hostile supporters, respected by others and, in some cases, revered.

But whether overseeing triumph, or trough, Craig has been consistent not just in his denigration of anything which might be deemed to threaten his authority, but also his admiration of financial prudence.

In an interview with the Evening Press on the occasion of that tenth anniversary, Craig cited his biggest achievement had been ''keeping the club solvent''.

That such a boast should take precedence over City's wondrous Wembley promotion triumph in 1993, or the humiliation of Manchester United in their Old Trafford citadel two years later, is a measure of the importance Craig and his fellow directors have placed on being financially secure.

By necessity, City have been a club which has had to strictly adhere to the policy of selling to survive - its swing to youth development paying dividends, even if it has meant that its cream has been ladled off to richer clubs in return for hard cash.

Look at the Crescent sales since that May-day magic of Wembley - Jon McCarthy, Nick Culkin, Paul Barnes, Dean Kiely, Jonathan Greening, Graeme Murty, Richard Cresswell and, only this season, youth team ace Chris Hogg.

But future prospects of maintaining such a profitable stream of talent have been damaged by threats to dismantle the present transfer system to fall in line with European legislation. That has put up the notch of uncertainty several ratchets.

As much as anything, that is a circumstance now way beyond the control of Craig, City, or the clan of other cash-troubled clubs as they all cope with the new century.

Football may be a booming business when it is snugly wrapped in the trappings of the Premiership. But for City it is gloom and possibly even doom.

Fewer fans are coming through the turnstiles, though that can hardly be surprising given the paucity of the fare on offer these past few years at Bootham Crescent.

Commercial backing of the club has similarly decreased and at a time when costs have soared astronomically. Those factors cannot be denied.

But where City have missed out crucially is on the intangible element of taking a risk, especially during the second half of the last decade. The saying that one must speculate to accumulate would appear an anathema to the Craig years.

There has been a lack of investment in excitement. The club have failed to sell themselves or their product, concentrating rather on placing the blame on dissidents.

To ensure survival, City have now declared they are in desperate need of investment. Without it, current Christmas cheerlessness will extend into 2002 and beyond.