He said, "This is something I need to talk about because it's vital to the future and central to our hopes of reaching the Championship. We've put together a good squad of players, headed by a good management team, but we simply cannot sustain it with attendances like this. I understand it's expensive, people are struggling and others might be on holiday but, seriously, the future of this squad is completely in the hands of the public. There are no worries about the club itself because we've engineered it so there won't be any danger, but our destiny is not in our own hands. We beat Cheltenham with a fantastic performance, but the shine was taken off when a crowd of 4,600 was announced. It was very, very disappointing. I was gutted and upset, and I just wish the peripheral fans realised we have been backed into a corner."
"The way things are, we can't keep our squad going on such low gates and we've got no choice but to look at other ways of raising money. We are doing all we can to hold on to our players, but it's a genuine and major concern because we can't keep doing that forever. In the budget we allow ourselves to lose a lot of money by getting crowds of between 5,500 and 6,000. We actually need 7,500 to break even, but 6,000 is manageable — the figure on Saturday definitely wasn't. In no way am I pouring cold water on a great start to the season. It has been tremendous and I know some people will say I'm being negative, but I'm afraid it's the truth. Keeping this team and squad together is dependent on people attending games. I'm not screaming and shouting about it, I just want everyone to realise our situation. If 1,000 more fans came through the turnstiles we could cover half of our weekly losses (of around £15,000) and maybe even bring more players in. We won our first two league games, including a great victory at Leeds, and then only 4,600 turned up here the following week. We have a very good team this season and, for many reasons, I hope people come along to see it."