NUST release statement after successful meeting with Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi

A statement from the Newcastle United Supporters Trust (NUST) after three representatives met with the club’s new co-owners at St James’ Park last week.

NUST Meet with Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi

The Trust is delighted to inform you that three representatives from the Trust Board met with co-owners of Newcastle United Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi on Friday, April 7th at St James’ Park.

An informal introductory meeting took place where Greg Tomlinson, Thomas Concannon, and Alex Hurst met co-owners and senior club staff in the boardroom at St. James’ Park.

The meeting was a success as the owners confirmed they shared a passion for fan engagement and reiterated their belief in the importance of fan contribution to Newcastle United.

It was agreed that the Trust would play a role in helping the club with its formal structured dialogue policy which the club hopes to evolve after the season ends.

The Trust understands that keeping the club in the Premier League must be the focus of everyone at the club, including co-owners and fans, and when this important objective and season are finished the club will work on their relationship with fans and how that will look moving forward.

Six months into the takeover current owners have already surpassed the previous owner. Amanda and Mehrdad taking time out of their very busy schedule to meet with the Trust face to face is something that failed to happen in 14 years of Mike Ashley’s ownership. It is a promising sign for all Newcastle United supporters that current co-owners of the club have made such an effort to be accessible to the Trust and the wider fan base.

We are incredibly excited and motivated to work with the club and co-owners to build a better future for Newcastle United fans in terms of how the club and supporters can best engage with one another.

As a gesture of tremendous goodwill, the club has offered the Trust the opportunity to host its AGM at St James’ Park in 2023.

Now is the time to make this, England’s largest Supporters Trust, even bigger as Newcastle United becomes bigger and better. We are emboldened by the positive words of owners and club from our meeting on Friday and believe the future is incredibly bright for this football club. A strong Newcastle United Supporters Trust can help a strong Newcastle United.

In the coming weeks and months, the Trust Board will be seeking the views of Trust members on key aspects of the club and supporting it to help better inform the club when structured dialogue begins.

We hope to be able to update members in the near future with more positive developments involving the Trust and the football club. The Trust exists to help give fans a voice directly with their football club. After many years of division between fans and club the city, region, and supporters find themselves with owners we both trust and believe in.

The future is very bright for Newcastle United.

About Olly Hawkins

As a Junior Magpie since birth and season ticket holder, I eat, sleep and breathe all things NUFC! Here at the blog, I aim to bring you news, views, match reports and transfer exclusives as and when I get them.

16 thoughts on “NUST release statement after successful meeting with Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi

  1. Have the TRUST decided what they are going to do with the money they got when wanting to buy a 1% stake in the club? I have no objection to what they are doing now, but that was a farce. SBR and Shearer foundations would be my choice. And 10 grand to Ukraine wouldnt bother me. They have about a quarter of a mil in the bank and they will not refund it to donors.

    They said that from the start about not refunding people’s mony, so fans were knowing what they were getting into. Anybody who has ever read anything on the chat section here knows I said it was a massive fail from the start.

      (Quote)

  2. I am not saying we should not support the Trust and their engagement with the new owners. I am saying what they did before was a massive failure that a mole with a white stick could have seen coming.

      (Quote)

  3. Eric+Sykes:
    Have the TRUST decided what they are going to do with the money they got when wanting to buy a 1% stake in the club? I have no objection to what they are doing now, but that was a farce. SBR and Shearer foundations would be my choice. And 10 grand to Ukraine wouldnt bother me. They have about a quarter of a mil in the bank and they will not refund it to donors.

    They said that from the start about not refunding people’s mony, so fans were knowing what they were getting into. Anybody who has ever read anything on the chat sectionhere knows I said it was a massive fail from the start.

    Not sure how it’s a massive fail when it was always a win-win. Either they raised enough to buy a 1% stake under new owners or thousands of pounds went to a local charity.

    They have stopped all direct debits to the fund and will be donating to the charities soon.

      (Quote)

  4. It was never a win/win. The end result was never going to be bad because the money would end up with local charities. The premise was wrong-headed from the start because it was a non-starter that Ashley would sell them any of the club and a new owner would price them out of any stake.

    If you looked at the numbers, NUST would have needed 3 million to buy 1% and at the rate they were bringing in money that would have taken 10 years. AND THAT IS FOR 1%, which gets you no say. really.

    The fans that signed up for this scheme could have sent their money to their own self-directed charities.

    I am not even saying it was a bad thing. Just a dumb idea and there may be a good outcome. So, LOSE – WIN. In my opinion.

      (Quote)

  5. It is not a win/win because fans could have directed their charity donations to the red cross or SBR foundation at their own discretion and not have NUST take their money and decide according to some hare-brained idea of buying part of the club.

    NUST may get some say in the future as a dole-out from the new owners BUT, it will not be part of a wrong-headed 1% buy-in that would have taken 10 years at the valuation when they set up the NUST Pledge.

      (Quote)

  6. If I said I was going to get elocution and acting lessons and become the next James Bond if you fund me 20k a month, but if I fail the money would go to a charity of my choice, how would that be a win/win.

    IMHO that is what The Pledge was. A stupid idea from the start with a fallback.

    Can you send me the 20k beginning May 1st Olly. I am 59 years old but I think Roger Moore and Sean Connery were in James Bond Movies at my age.

      (Quote)

  7. Nice try Olly.
    I tried over a period of years, to save enough money to buy a used Bentley Continental GT. I failed miserably and ended up buying a used S Class Mercedes instead, which is very nice, but its not a Bentley.
    The fact I bought a Mercedes BY DEFINITION means I failed to buy a Bentley, in the same way that the NUST not buying a share in the club means they also failed to achieve their stated goal. In the same way they failed when they launched a bid to try to raise the money to buy the ENTIRE CLUB from Ashley a few years ago.
    What’s next for NUST – corner flags and embroidered cushions?
    As Eric said – it was a farce, and as has been said before by others, it was unrealistic with NUST having no idea of the scale of the task.
    At a time when people were getting laid off work or were on reduced wages do you really think fans were giving their hard earned cash away hoping it would go to charity? No, of course they weren’t.
    NUST giving the raised money to charity is the lazy way out.
    They have the names of everyone who donated, and how much they gave. If they were a serious, ethical organisation they would put in the effort required to get the donations back to the donors. But no, that sounds too much like hard work.
    Regardless of what they said when launching the fund, they should at least set up a way to give donors the option to either donate their contribution to charity, or have it returned.

      (Quote)

  8. Very true in relation to what the main aim of of NUST was & the back-up of charitable donations made it loss-win as you say(& I am a NUST member). Think it was an idea borne out purely of 14 years frustration without proper thought.

    Eric+Sykes:
    If I said I was going to get elocution and acting lessons and become the next James Bond if you fund me 20k a month, but if I fail the money would go to a charity of my choice, how would that be a win/win.

    IMHO that is what The Pledge was. A stupid idea from the start with a fallback.

    Can you send me the 20k beginning May 1st Olly. I am 59 years old but I think Roger Moore and Sean Connery were in James Bond Movies at my age.

      (Quote)

  9. Not sure why the hate against NUST. They stated very clearly right from the start what was going to happen to that money, with or without “success”. And we all donated that money WILLINGLY.

    If you want to complain about them sitting on it for months now, okay fine. But as long as that money gets to local charities as stated, what is the big problem here..?

      (Quote)

  10. Reality Check:
    Not sure why the hate against NUST. They stated very clearly right from the start what was going to happen to that money, with or without “success”. And we all donated that money WILLINGLY.

    If you want to complain about them sitting on it for months now, okay fine. But as long as that money gets to local charities as stated, what is the big problem here..?

    EXACTLY.

    Anyone who donated was happy to see that money go to local charity if the pledge didn’t lead to fans owning a 1% stake, hence why I called it a win-win earlier.

    The money will definitely be going to good causes soon and I personally think it was a commendable idea. Ambitious yes and they themselves knew it was a long shot, but why some feel the need to slate it when the plan was made clear from the start just baffles me.

      (Quote)

  11. It was a lost cause from the beginning and I said so on this Blog. The people it benefited most was NUST and their membership drive. It was never going to happen and was a hoax from the beginning.

      (Quote)

  12. Eric+Sykes:
    It was a lost cause from the beginning and I said so on this Blog. The people it benefited most was NUST and their membership drive. It was never going to happen and was a hoax from the beginning.

    And as I’ve said, there’s still plenty good that’s come from in it when they said from the outset all donations would go to local charities if they were unsuccesful.

    They also said from the outset that it was very ambitious and a long shot – they didn’t ever overpromise.

    To call it a hoax is beyond cynical mate!

      (Quote)

  13. I said what it was from the day they announced “The Pledge” and said it would fail. It wasnt cynical and I am not being cynical now. The hatred of Ashley was at its peak when they launched the pledge and it didnt seem their was any light at the end of the tunnel because the PL had blocked the takeover.

    NUFC cynically exploited well meaning NUFC fans to boost their membership and raise their profile. They must have known the pledge was pie in the sky.

    We will have to agree to disagree on this one. But, as I have said, if fans wanted to donate to a charity they could have picked their own.

      (Quote)

  14. So they found out what the Co owners already told us… Well done ? ??

    Next time ask a question that we don’t already know the answer to…

      (Quote)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *