From Fallen Blue Lion to Daring Blue Phoenix: The Incomplete Story of Macclesfield Town
“It consumed my life. I lived for that Saturday.”
It’s the 17th of February 2007, an eager and bewondered Tom Mannion is pulled along the touchline by his mate, cheekily late to the 4:00pm kick-off. He is 13, and is about to sit down for his first ever football match at Moss Rose, the intimate and poetically homely home-ground of Macclesfield Town Football Club.
“Against Peterborough United. We won 2–1 if I remember rightly, and I was so clueless about how it worked.”
He had remembered rightly, as he spoke to me 14 years later.
“I was hooked immediately.”
Macclesfield is a market town in Cheshire, England, about 16 miles south of the city of Manchester.
It’s entire population, 51,482, could fit comfortably into Manchester United’s Old Trafford stadium, just 20 miles up the M60 motorway.
Moss Rose sits unimposingly to the South West of Macclesfield. Put together in 1891, one of England’s oldest football stadiums can seat 2,500 people on a matchday, and it often has to.
Colloquially known as, ‘The Silkmen’, or ‘Macc Town’, Macclesfield Town were regulars in Football League Two, the fourth division of football in the U.K.
Players, who would double as painters and plumbers through the week around training, would walk out onto the pitch with an army behind them. An army present through more than just a matter of routine.
“My day would be ruined if we lost, but I’d be on cloud 9 if we won,” Tom says, with an air of certainty and clarity.
Macclesfield Town personified the magic of semi-professional football. Unapologetic in its modest existence and powerful in its illogical significance.
Sadly, this overriding theme of small club romance did nothing to soften the blow finally dealt to the Silkmen on the 16th of September 2020.
“I was absolutely distraught.”
“I was on a call with a client at work,” Tom says, “I immediately hung up and processed the news as I got the notification through on my phone.”
Macclesfield Town had collapsed, declared bankrupt after a virtual court procedure.
“Nothing prepares you for that feeling,” he says, “your club formed in 1874, going belly up because of the actions of one person, who will most likely never see the consequences of his actions.”
Tom is referring to Amar Alkadhi, majority shareholder at Macclesfield Town from 2003 until August 2020.
Maxonian (Macclesfield local), and lifelong Silkmen follower John Brewin, spoke to The Guardian’s ‘Football Weekly’ podcast about Alkadhi’s tenure, the day after the collapse was announced,
“To run a club at the bottom of the football league costs a lot of money,” he says, “And when that’s the case, you’re relying on the stewardship of the club to be tight, to be well-managed, and that’s exactly the opposite of what’s been happening over the last few years at Macclesfield Town.”
His voice doesn’t break, but it shakes either side of a pause,
“You speak to Macc’ fans 10 years ago or so and they probably would’ve thought he (Alkadhi) was okay. The club was still going… things seemed to be running a little better. But the last few years have been a disaster.”
Brewin sharpens his words and steadies his voice,
“You’ve got over 170 grand owing to John Asky, who is if not just the club’s greatest ever player, is the manager that pulled them out of the national league (the 5th division of English football), and going back to Sol Campbells tenure where he walked away saying he was owed 180 grand.” He sighs, “So, you’ve got a very, sorry story of a club on the financial brink.”
Or, we can hear the raw view of a disgruntled fan, unfiltered by the confines of a clean journalistic reputation, courtesy of Tom Mannion, “our c*nt of an owner started to take the piss and constantly said he needed more time, then continued to take money out of the club instead of paying the wages.”
Whichever speaks to you best.
To shine some extra light on the cause of the bankruptcy, Brewin does briefly touch on another contributing factor, as his intimate interview draws to a close, “I suppose once COVID-19 comes into the picture, there’s no cash flow, and that’s pretty much the end of the story.”
COVID-19 hit lower league football clubs hard, much harder than their Premier League counterparts.
According to Tifo Football, The Premier League’s current TV deal which will remain until 2022, is worth a staggering 3.1 billion pounds per year. To them, no matchday ticket sales was a shame, but not at all a financial threat.
However, according to Ben Fisher, via The Guardian Football Weekly, lower league clubs could not rely on match streaming for income in the locked-down England of 2020, “There are steaming services across the football league,” he says, “but when I spoke to Phil Wallace, the chairman at Stevenage (FC), he was saying that they bring in roughly 5 grand for a home game, rather than the 50,000 pounds that they would have (from physical match tickets) on a normal match day.”
These two factors tore Macclesfield Town to the ground. Inevitably, but brutally.
John Brewin trembles as he signs off, “Macclesfield town is as close to football as it was when it started back in 1874. It’s about community… and unfortunately, as I get a little older, I recognise that. To have that taken away, my hometown club… that’s brutal. It’s brutal.”
The Blue Phoenix
On the 13th of October 2020, Robert Smethurst, a Cheshire businessman boasting primary shares in football academies and even other football clubs, acquired the club’s assets, and has rebirthed The Silkmen.
Macclesfield FC will serve as a phoenix club to Macclesfield Town from the 2021/22 season, kicking off in July this year.
Smethurst has employed former Welsh international footballer Robbie Savage, whose senior career began up the road at Manchester United, to serve as the club’s Head of Football Operations.
Savage spoke to Talksport.com following his unveiling, “I was devastated to see what happened here at Macclesfield,” he said, “I live within a stone’s throw from the ground and have integral links with the club as a father who brings his kids here to spectate.”
Macclesfield Town’s wind up in September brought with it their expulsion from the EFL (English Football League). This means that The Silkmen of today must begin their journey in The North West Counties Football League, the 9th division in the English football pyramid.
This doesn’t bother Tom, who sums up the future of this club and its loyal fans beautifully, when I asked him what he would miss about Macclesfield Town, “Nothing. It’s the same club, the same Macclesfield. We will be back and stronger than ever. I’ll be there every step of the way.”
