The Ugly Side of the Beautiful Game: Darlington FC

“Who?” and “Why should I care?”

These were probably and understandably the first two questions to enter your head. So let’s answer them. Darlington, a fifth division English football club, was born in 1883 and is older than most Premier League clubs, including Arsenal and Chelsea. They are known as The Quakers, the nickname being a reference to the religious movement that influenced the town of Darlington for many generations.  They have previously won a few divisional league titles, reached the last 16 of the FA Cup, and won the FA Trophy last season.

Why should you care? Because greedy, foolish owners are prowling around in every professional sport and this is an important story of a very old soccer club brought to the brink of extinction by the scandalous actions of a former owner.  The players and staff involved with clubs like Darlington are paid (far) less in a year than Yaya Toure is paid in a week. Some players don’t even make enough to play football full-time; they take on nightly jobs during the week after training during the day. These are young men struggling with bills, families, laundry, and car problems just like you and me. The only reason the club played their league game last weekend was because their amazing fans raised £8,000 to ensure it went ahead. And on Monday the club’s entire playing staff was laid off.

So how does a club that has warmed the town’s heart for 129 years sink to the point of liquidation? Have a look at Darlington in their old stadium Feethams, where they played from 1883 until 2003. The happier times.

Darlington’s slow but certain execution began when it was taken over by a man named George Reynolds in 1999. To understand the ridiculous decisions he made while in charge, it’s essential to first examine this man’s self-proclaimed rags-to-riches history.

Reynolds, born in 1937, grew up in the slums of Sunderland where he fell victim to a life of crime. His first documented crime was, as a teenager, stealing cigarettes to trade for bread to feed his family (ok, we can accept this one as a Robin Hood act). In the early 1960s he spent six months in jail for smuggling expensive watches and another four years for safe-cracking. He was again imprisoned in 1970 and 1976 for burglary and theft, respectively. While in prison in ’76, a visit from a Catholic priest (you can’t make this stuff up) convinced Reynolds to turn his life around – somewhat. He established a chain of businesses all over England (including a popular kitchen surface factory) and amassed a multi-million dollar fortune. So the man overcame his dark past and became an angel, right? Ahem…

So this repeatedly-convicted-criminal-turned-millionaire-businessman arrived in Darlington in 1999 and pledged to build a brand new stadium and take the club up to the Premier League within five years (yep, we’ve found someone more deluded than Blackburn’s poultry-based owners). The club had never been higher than the second division, and that was achieved back in the 1920s. Historically, their average attendance at Feethams typically fell between 2,500-3,000 people. If ever there was a time for the Football Association to stand up and say “We don’t care how much money you have, you clearly aren’t competent enough to run a football club,” this was it. But somehow he passed all their “Fit and Proper” regulations and began the process of making Darlington FC a powerhouse. And so began the club’s excruciatingly slow downfall.

Initially, all seemed well. The fans were just thrilled that a man with lots of money had chosen their club to put his millions into. But Reynolds’ very first decision was what sealed the club’s fate. He funded a brand new 25,000-seat stadium on the outskirts of the city. Worse, he named the stadium after himself. He expected a then-fourth division club to fill a stadium bigger than many Premier League and Championship clubs. The reasons why this could never work are obvious: for one, Darlington and the area’s surrounding clubs (Middlesbrough, Sunderland, and Newcastle to name a few) had already had their fan bases established for decades. It’s not possible to change what decades of history have already laid down. So the club moved into its new stadium, where attendances barely increased over the next several years.

Secondly, the club’s fortunes didn’t improve. They continued to languish in League Two (fourth division) and quickly amassed a mountain of debt thanks to the stadium, where average attendance remained 2,000-2,500. Failure to progress on the field and a lifeless atmosphere in the stands- but surely Reynolds, with his millions, could sustain this debt easily enough, right? As you may have guessed, it’s not that simple.  Reynolds had managed the cost of the stadium partly through interest loans which he couldn’t pay back, and the club went into administration in 2004. He had also blown his money on cars, houses, helicopters, a yacht, and so forth. Later that year, Reynolds was arrested on suspicion of money laundering and he later admitted to being involved in tax evasion, to the staggering sum of £650,000. He soon resigned as owner of Darlington, declared himself bankrupt, and went back to prison. He has since been in and out of prison and now owns a vending machine company.

As for Darlington’s future, after 2004 they continued plying their trade in League Two while racking up more debts. They staved off administration two more times but the final nail in the coffin came last season, which saw them relegated to the Conference (fifth division). A 25,000-capacity stadium in a division where the average attendance is barely over 1,000 – you don’t need to be a financial genius to figure it out. The club’s then-owner, Raj Singh, tried his best and took the club out of administration for a while but could not sustain the debt for long and he resigned in late 2011.

As of this writing, a “rescue group” has provided enough funds for Darlington to complete their remaining fixtures in January. It is unknown who the interim manager will be and only a few youth team players are still available to play. The club still does not have a buyer, and the situation remains bleak. After 129 years, thanks to a lifelong criminal taking charge of their club, it is almost certain that the people of Darlington will no longer have their own football club to support. And all of the players and staff, who depend on their weekly paychecks just to feed their families and pay the bills, face more uncertain futures than ever. This is life in the real world of football (take note Roberto Mancini) and they are the true victims here.

This isn’t the first story of a crooked owner ruining a football club, nor will it be the last. The F.A., which in my opinion is just as much at fault as Reynolds, must start putting down some higher standards when examining potential owners. Darlington’s future had been written practically from the start of Reynolds’ tenure. And now an old and famous English club is on its final breath.

You can also check out this very revealing account from a former Darlington goalkeeper of what life was like under Reynolds’ tenure.

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