The second part of the announcement

By David Hibell
June 2 2003

In this part Malcolm thanked the sponsors, talked about the reasoning behind the timings of his announcement & his actions afterwards and thanked the people that had been involved in the club.

An important source of income for the club next season may come from all those people, 1500 plus, who signed up for the 5000 club within the last few months.  We will obviously be asking those supporters whose cheques have not yet been banked or indeed any credit card payments not processed to leave that situation as is & I'm hopeful that the majority will be happy to support the club even though we're no longer in the Premiership and playing in Division one and I hope as I've always said that other business sponsors would be happy to assist.

As I've said some people have been critical that I announced back in December that I would no longer be able to continue alone to support financially the club after the end of this season.  Nothing has changed since 1998 when I said I would support Bristol Rugby Club for five years.  I took the decision to announce that in December that was giving basically 6 months notice it was 4½ years.  4½ years plus 6 months is five years and that comes to an end at the end of May.

But I took the decision for two reasons; One - I thought it was only fair that everyone was conscious that things would have to change.  I was hopeful the Bristol community would come forward, I was also hopeful the supporter base would come forward to help and because I thought it would be wrong to make a shock announcement overnight at the end of the season.  I thought that was prudent to announce it six months hence.  Regrettably neither businesses or supporters came forward in sufficient numbers so we were driven to fully investigate a whole range of other options which you will remember included a possible move to Oxford or merging with the club down the road.  As you know I will be fined if I mention the name.

Although relegation for any club always produces a sombre mood I am asking supporters to reflect on the highlights of the last five years rather than to dwell on the difficulties of the last few months.

I think it's important to appreciate what we have all achieved collectively as a club together since the dark days of summer 1998.  And let us not forget the club was at that time facing oblivion and without the £5Million commitment I had to make to the RFU Bristol could  have been consigned to the lowest level of rugby as was the fate, for example, of Richmond.

AS it was you will recall that we were able to put together a team which won promotion back to the Premiership at the first attempt with that never to be forgotten win over Worcester.

Since then we've been able to sign some fantastic players from around the world to help in these five years such as Henry Honniball, Jason Little; Daryl Gibson, Agustin Pichot but to name but a few.  And we've attracted surely in my opinion and others the most prestigious main sponsor in English Rugby in Mitsubishi Motors and without that support it would have been extremely difficult and that support has been outstanding.

We've been to a Twickenham final, Powergen Cup Semi Final and last season faced some of the best teams in Europe in the Heineken Cup.  We've broken the hoodoo by beating Bath at the Rec (makes hand gesture) that cost me! And we we've smashed the Premiership attendance record by attracting nigh on 21, 000 people to a fantastic extravaganza day out of rugby at Ashton Gate so that's not all gloomy, not a bad record.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone at the club that they can be actually proud of what we've achieved and I am sure that the club will be in firm footings financially.