"We're not a PR arm of the football club"

[Pyro Pete 1,889]

Great to hear Paddy's defiant response in today's Pink Un podcast to the pathetic 'breach of trust' allegations made by Anthony Richens last week.

The allegations relate to the Pink Un breaking the Mark Attanasio story, when the club asked them to sit on it.

Paddy saying, "We're not a PR arm of the football club. Never have been, never will be. We're there to inform. We're there to serve the fan base."

You can hear Paddy's full comments at 48mins 30secs in the podcast. Or just click the link below:

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4vG0pWUSKSTb9IBAMjzqLt?si=usFqMrF-Ty2FxGUT9e9HAQ&utm_source=copy-link&t=2911

[shefcanary 2,385]

It's a bit naive of the club to ask the paper not to divulge details of Attanasio's interest without an offer of alternative access elsewhere. If the club feels burned, can I suggest it's their own fault for not working hard enough.

Again, proper Corporate Governance in place would have ensured that all aspects of that project would have been considered and media briefings etc (exclusives et al) would have been better planned.

I continue to be underwhelmed by the current marketing team of the club, who seem to focus on "nice to have's and flashy media projects" rather than focus on the bread and butter stuff like connecting with the fans. What are most fans unhappy with; a disconnection from the club. Sort that and they might find having local media on side is actually rather helpful, no matter how critical.

I've said it before, what are the club scared of? Increasingly I feel it is being found out that all aspects of the club are below par.

Edited October 30, 2022 by shefcanary

[littleyellowbirdie 2,510]

Yeah, I agree it's not reasonable to expect them to sit on that given that the club was making it glaringly obvious something was going on by the club being seen to entertain Attanasio and co at an internationally televised event where literally everybody could tell this was something of interest. That's effectively demanding that Archant should wait for others to break the story. 

I took out.a Pink Un+ subscription the other day, so I guess that says all you need to know about my overall opinion of the Pink Un teams' journalism. 

Edited October 30, 2022 by littleyellowbirdie

[Monty13 2,229]

The clubs media/PR strategy has been suspect for a while IMO. It was all smiles when everything’s going well, as soon as there’s anything to criticise they’ve battened down the hatches. To then expect the media to not report a legitimate story and be upset when they do is baffling.

[canarybubbles 1,915]

Good for Davitt. And for Connor Southwell, too. I know he often uses fifty words when ten would do, but he isn't scared of being honest about how he sees the club.

Webber crows about how honest and straightforward he is, but he can't cope with honesty from others.

[GodlyOtsemobor 2,248]

25 minutes ago, canarybubbles said:

Good for Davitt. And for Connor Southwell, too. I know he often uses fifty words when ten would do, but he isn't scared of being honest about how he sees the club.

Webber crows about how honest and straightforward he is, but he can't cope with honesty from others.

Sounds like a few people I've met over the years, bleating on about how they're brutality honest and don't care about upsetting people etc. Then as soon as you tell them some home truth's they get all sulky and their nose is all out of joint. 

[crispeduk 282]

Who's Anthony Richens?

[hertfordyellow 460]

4 hours ago, canarybubbles said:

Good for Davitt. And for Connor Southwell, too. I know he often uses fifty words when ten would do, but he isn't scared of being honest about how he sees the club.

Webber crows about how honest and straightforward he is, but he can't cope with honesty from others.

What has Webber got to do with Anthony Richens interview? People will take any opportunity to have a pop.

[king canary 7,578]

6 hours ago, Pyro Pete said:

Great to hear Paddy's defiant response in today's Pink Un podcast to the pathetic 'breach of trust' allegations made by Anthony Richens last week.

The allegations relate to the Pink Un breaking the Mark Attanasio story, when the club asked them to sit on it.

Paddy saying, "We're not a PR arm of the football club. Never have been, never will be. We're there to inform. We're there to serve the fan base."

You can hear Paddy's full comments at 48mins 30secs in the podcast. Or just click the link below:

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4vG0pWUSKSTb9IBAMjzqLt?si=usFqMrF-Ty2FxGUT9e9HAQ&utm_source=copy-link&t=2911

Glad to hear them sticking up for themselves.

For the fans its important the media aren't too cosy with the powers that be at the club and for the execs to expect the local press to sit on such a significant story is at best naive at worst remarkably stupid. Neither paints them in a great light.

[canarydan23 4,060]

2 minutes ago, crispeduk said:

Who's Anthony Richens?

I wouldn't have known this time last week.

Wish I still didn't know.

[Gordon Bennett 780]

While shutting the local media out is rather petty I can understand the club's annoyance if they wanted the Attanasio thing kept quiet until I's were dotted and T's crossed.

[king canary 7,578]

1 minute ago, Gordon Bennett said:

While shutting the local media out is rather petty I can understand the club's annoyance if they wanted the Attanasio thing kept quiet until I's were dotted and T's crossed.

Their annoyance should be directed internally then.

[Gordon Bennett 780]

16 minutes ago, king canary said:

Their annoyance should be directed internally then.

Perhaps, but if Archant were asked directly to hold fire you can understand the club's frustration that they didn't.

[crispeduk 282]

Classic deflection to avoid attention being paid to shortcomings. The club needs media more than any media needs them as sweethearts and they know it,  as demonstrated by the Pinkun and Athletic lads still having access to the ground. This stuff rarely ends well for clubs and they usually quietly fold in the end, on condition that hacks don't crow too much about it. And before anyone suggests saying this risks putting ideas of a lockout into the club's heads, well, honestly that makes a better storyline - in the past reporters elsewhere have gone through the turnstiles to sit or stand with the fans or been invited into the private boxes of sympathetic supporters with deep pockets the clubs can't afford to pi** off. It's even easier now with the tech tools available to us all. As others have suggested, time to draw a line under this ..... but then again, it's a good running story with lots of clicks and I have no idea if Paddy, Connor, Michael etc were actually in the ground yesterday anyway 🤣🤣 🤣

[Branston Pickle 3,635]

I’ve always been intrigued by the relationship between local media and the football club, as they have to coexist and it makes little sense for one to ‘upset’ the other too much. It’s a balancing act, the club can benefit from having ‘friendly’ journalists and the journalists in turn will be fed snippets of information without releasing too much.

That said, there’s obviously times when the relationship is stretched - the job of media is to report important stories and the news about potential investment clearly fitted that bill and was ‘in the public interest’ (or at least supporter interest; I’m less sure about the EEN gunning for Webber, it was a bit too personal).  From the club’s side they will (not totally unreasonably) say it could have scuppered the deal.

All in all I don’t think the club should really dig in too much about it, everything ended ok and hopefully things can revert to a more balanced relationship again.

[king canary 7,578]

1 minute ago, Gordon Bennett said:

Perhaps, but if Archant were asked directly to hold fire you can understand the club's frustration that they didn't.

No I can't, for the exact reason stated in the title.

If you don't want the local media reporting on something like this, probably don't put the people planning on investing in full display outside the directors box. Expecting them to not do their jobs as a favour to you (especially when the relationship was already antagonistic following Webber's refusal to talk to them) is just a bit stupid really. Nobody to blame but themselves.

[Gordon Bennett 780]

1 minute ago, king canary said:

No I can't, for the exact reason stated in the title.

If you don't want the local media reporting on something like this, probably don't put the people planning on investing in full display outside the directors box. Expecting them to not do their jobs as a favour to you (especially when the relationship was already antagonistic following Webber's refusal to talk to them) is just a bit stupid really. Nobody to blame but themselves.

Fair point. Agree to disagree though. 

[CardiffCanary 128]

What an absolute farce this has become 

good on you Paddy and MB for sticking up for yourselves.  Another sorry chapter in the gaping hole between us and the club.  It wasn’t that long ago that you could walk around the training ground and chat to the players and the staff.  
 

Was it this bad under Jez Moxey 🤣🤣🤣

[Mengo 821]

7 minutes ago, CardiffCanary said:

What an absolute farce this has become 

good on you Paddy and MB for sticking up for yourselves.  Another sorry chapter in the gaping hole between us and the club.  It wasn’t that long ago that you could walk around the training ground and chat to the players and the staff.  
 

Was it this bad under Jez Moxey 🤣🤣🤣

What an absolute farce this has become.

It certainly has indeed. I wonder what ego is responsible for this utter soap opera. 

Lost the plot the ego has a long time ago. The clock ⏰️ is ticking , tick tock.

[crispeduk 282]

Just noticed - the clocks went back.

[Disco Dales Jockstrap 1,891]

When you employ someone as your sporting director who is clearly a d1ck, don't be surprised when the club starts to reflect his less-endearing characteristics. 

5 hours ago, GodlyOtsemobor said:

Sounds like a few people I've met over the years, bleating on about how they're brutality honest and don't care about upsetting people etc. Then as soon as you tell them some home truth's they get all sulky and their nose is all out of joint. 

⬆️ This in spades.

On a more positive note, I thought the podcast was a most informative listen - thanks @Pyro Pete

OTBC

[canarybubbles 1,915]

8 hours ago, hertfordyellow said:

What has Webber got to do with Anthony Richens interview? People will take any opportunity to have a pop.

Do you seriously believe that this interview and its contents were not personally OK'd by Webber before it was released? I find this extremely unlikely.

[Jim Smith 2,314]

It’s got nothing to do with the Attanasio story in my view. My understanding is they were already being frozen out before that due to a number of other articles perceived to be critical by those at CR with a thin skin and brought to a head by “do you really want this job Mr Webber.”

Archant would not have run that headline if things were all sweetness and light with the club. 

Edited October 31, 2022 by Jim Smith

[Midlands Yellow 3,935]

Not much comment from the Webber fan club on this matter. 

[Monty13 2,229]

10 hours ago, Gordon Bennett said:

Perhaps, but if Archant were asked directly to hold fire you can understand the club's frustration that they didn't.

‘Hey I know we’ve been ghosting you, denying you access and generally being petty…but now you know something we don’t want you to, you can’t don’t do anything with it we don’t want you to as that’s not fair!’

[Capt. Pants 4,195]

Well I hadn't heard of Anthony Richens until last week. He's a bit of a PR disaster in himself by the sounds of it.

 

[Kenny Foggo 1,116]

 

 

12 hours ago, hertfordyellow said:

What has Webber got to do with Anthony Richens interview? People will take any opportunity to have a 

The atmosphere inside the club is the reason that so many people have left and I know for a fact the culture is not great. That is down to couple of people that think raising your voice is how you get respect. I for one will be happy when they leave.

[Graham Paddons Beard 2,424]

12 hours ago, Gordon Bennett said:

While shutting the local media out is rather petty I can understand the club's annoyance if they wanted the Attanasio thing kept quiet until I's were dotted and T's crossed.

If I wanted to keep things quiet Gordon , I probably wouldn’t invite seven of them over , get them into the ground with due pomp , sit them in the directors box next to the FD , and have them stand on the pitch whilst the journo’s are still in the ground writing their final copy. 

 

[Monty13 2,229]

3 minutes ago, Graham Paddons Beard said:

If I wanted to keep things quiet Gordon , I probably wouldn’t invite seven of them over , get them into the ground with due pomp , sit them in the directors box next to the FD , and have them stand on the pitch whilst the journo’s are still in the ground writing their final copy. 

 

That does suggest at least some level of contempt if they thought nobody would notice.

[TeemuVanBasten 3,327]

17 hours ago, GodlyOtsemobor said:

Sounds like a few people I've met over the years, bleating on about how they're brutality honest and don't care about upsetting people etc. Then as soon as you tell them some home truth's they get all sulky and their nose is all out of joint. 

Webber is definitely one of those people who can dish it out but can't take it.