Save your club urges Rangers chairman
Stafford chairman Jon Downing has called for the town to save their football club as their hour of need draws ever closer.
Rangers need £50,000 by July 7 to settle a bill owed for hired seating at their Marston Road home - or face possible court action hanging over their heads for the season ahead.
The club made an appeal 10 days ago for supporters to loan them the money under a scheme where 250 supporters would lend them £200, to be repaid one-by-one over the next 250 weeks, with the last to receive £1,000.
It was a last resort - an application for a bank loan had already been refused.
This time last week it was looking good, an anonymous fan bought half of the 250 tickets in one fell swoop at a cost of £25,000.
The chairman estimates that since that the club have reached the 200-mark, but 50 tickets and £10,000 is still needed.
Downing said: "We are quite optimistic - although it looks bad - that we can get the money, or a large enough portion of it so that we can do a deal. But things need to happen and we are not out of the woods yet.
"Our short-term debts are under £100,000, so if we can get the finance together to meet them we will put ourselves on a comparatively decent footing for the season ahead.
"But we have got to rally round and be positive about it."
Another financial crisis is the last thing the club needs after the traumas that wrecked the 2008/09 season, but if the target is met the club can then look to matters on the field for the season ahead.
But in a week where Farsley Celtic - who came down with Rangers from the Blue Square Premier in 2007/08 - could be wound up by Wednesday, the path to sustaining a football club at non-league level is becoming increasingly fraught with danger.
At least Rangers are still relatively high in the best-attended charts, and Downing is confident the fans will continue to come to the club's aid.
He said: "I would say we are about 60-40 of getting to the target at the moment. Our supporters have been great, throughout last season and over this summer when we have needed them.
"When it gets to he 11th hour, I think a lot of them will rally round and save the club."
There are still club tickets available and anybody wishing to buy one should contact the club on 01785 602 430.
