At probably the lengthiest council meeting ever, on Monday at Springfield – it finished at 35 minutes after midnight – the council members got through a busy agenda under the guidance of new president Ricky Weir.
‘It was an extremely good meeting,’ Weir said afterwards.
‘It was long but not laborious, because there were many things discussed, including setting up various committees.’ Ex-president and honorary life member Brian Ahier will chair a committee to look into the possible introduction of a membership scheme for the start of the 2007-8 season.
Earlier this summer Steve Meiklejohn’s working party, set up by the JFA, recommended that the association look at introducing a membership scheme for players, putting forward the following example: if the 2,200 seniors registered to play paid an annual fee of £100, with a sliding scale for juniors between £50 and £25, more than £150,000 would be raised, with development and Island clubs benefiting.
Weir said: ‘Football’s recent working party made recommendations; we will not shy away from the difficult issues and just do the easy bits, we will look at everything.
‘We can now confirm that Jersey will send men’s and ladies’ teams to the Island Games in Rhodes next summer, and we have sanctioned Scotland under-16s to play two matches here next month.’ The Scotland team is the national team and not a schoolboys’ XI, which was the case when Northern Ireland’s U16s played in Jersey recently.
The matches, which will be against Jersey Youth XIs, have been organised by Sporting Eventualities for the JFA.
Money raised from entrance fees and a match programme will go to the JFA.
Weir added: ‘We also spoke about the Island U16s training with the U18s now that Clive Richardson has stood down as U16 manager.
The section has run for two years and it appears it would work better incorporated with the U18s because the first-year intake of U16s work under the secondary schools’ banner, in preparation for the Star Trophy match.
‘Stanton Monks will head a group to look at the formal segregation of all competitions with a view to their being run by the Jersey Football Combination.
New JFA vice-president Charlie Browne has been installed to chair the grounds committee and Paul Sowney has been named as commercial manager.
Former president Charlie Tostevin will represent the JFA on the inter-insular committee and will replace Browne on the referees’ committee.
‘Having former presidents Brian Ahier and Charlie Tostevin continuing to be involved with JFA work is fantastic,’ said Weir.
‘They have a wealth of experience and they give us continuity.
Several of us are newcomers and we need guidance with the structure.
The help we get will be of enormous benefit to everyone.
‘Brian will be supported on the membership scheme committee by Eileen Vowden, Derek de la Haye, Jon Welsh and one other.
They will look at the possible introduction of a scheme for the start of the 2007-8 season.
There is a lot of consultation to be done with the clubs, as well as speaking to other sports who run their own membership schemes.’ Experienced groundsmen Steve Landick, of Public Services, and Nick Allison, a greenkeeper at Les Ormes Golf Club, have been co-opted onto the grounds committee.
Council supported a proposition that all administrators who retired recently would receive appropriate honorary recognition.
Weir concluded: ‘It was approved unanimously but we can’t do it all immediately because we have a minor problem with one rule.We have to reconvene the annual general meeting to adopt the annual accounts so we can make the rule change then.’
