Aldershot Town FC released a long letter from General Manager Richard Petty regarding an incident on Saturday:

Firstly it must be acknowledged what a superb performance the whole team put in on the pitch on Saturday, it wasn't just the result that was important but the manner in which we played, Gary and the boys have yet again shown us why we can have faith in having an excellent season and watch some very exciting football.

In my programme notes I thanked the volunteers and the staff for the immense amount of work they all did during the close season to get the club ready for this season, I would like to take the opportunity to do the same again here. We have some wonderful people associated with this club and their contribution is very much appreciated and speaking personally I can honestly say I have never had the pleasure of working with a nicer group of people, staff and volunteers alike.

I would also like to take this opportunity to extend a very warm welcome to the EBB stadium to our new caterers who are operating all the mobile units and the three fixed units (North Stand, High St slab and the Families Room) the team from Russell's catering have provided us with a high level of quality and service both in presentation and product that as some of our staff and volunteers were discussing today is the best this club has ever had (they also provided the Ice Cream van that many of you will have seen at the front of the ground). Russell's have plenty of experience of providing catering to football clubs such as Southampton, and Fulham as well as being regular caterers for the Oval, I believe we have been very fortunate in being able to bring them to the EBB Stadium.

Many supporters spoke enthusiastically about the new banner advertising at the High St end of the ground, the plan over the next few weeks is to sell the remaining banner space right to the end of that area which will effectively close off that end of the ground giving us the impression of a four sided ground. By the way sorry to those fans who visited and got all excited when the saw the footings going in for this, I believe a number of them thought we were building a new stand, one day, one day.........

A massive thank you as well to the Supporters club who made two specific donations on Saturday for their chosen projects, Keith presented me and Andy Nunn with the cheques on the pitch before the game, thank you to all the supporters who by supporting the Supporters Club helped to make those donations possible.

After the game on Saturday I also had the pleasure of attending as a guest the RBA's annual meeting, the enthusiasm and positivity that surrounded that meeting was wonderful, they are looking to do a lot of things to help support the team and the club over the forthcoming season and I for one will happily do anything I can to give them any help they might need from the club.

The club values all our supporter groups whether it be the Supporters Club, The Shots Trust, the RBA or Stray Shots (apologies to anyone I have missed out) everyone involved with any of these groups are people who care about our club and as far as I am concerned deserve equal respect and recognition for what they do.

Communication is something which it seems we never manage to get quite right and this is something that I and my colleagues will be trying our best to improve over the weeks and months ahead. I had tried to communicate directly with supporters through the forum on the unofficial website, unfortunately it became clear after a very short time that this would not work and that sadly by doing so it got me embroiled with some people who use that site for their own personal ends, regrettably they end up being the ones dominating that forum. However the good news we have some better ways that we can use to keep you in touch with what's going on.

Firstly those that purchased a programme will have read that Tony Taylor and I intend to hold a monthly focus group meeting with supporters, we will try and give different supporters an opportunity to attend each time so that we always get the widest possible points of view. These meetings will commence at the beginning of September.

Secondly I intend to make regular news posts on the this website to keep supporters up to date with some of the things that we are doing around the stadium and to keep you updated on any projects or promotions that we might be working on, such as the Kids For A Quid game in association with "96.4 The Eagle" against Port Vale on the 12th September. I will also use it to try and address any concerns or issues that supporters may have thus hopefully minimising rumours and instead giving you the facts.

I would now like to address in this message something not so positive which has come out of Saturday and that is a very poor article in the Darlington Echo regarding Four Supporters who arrived late to the game. The article states that they were refused entry due to their late arrival, this is not the case, there is a strict policy in place which makes it possible for anyone arriving late to still enter the ground at any time up to and including half time.

In the case of these Four gentlemen they arrived after the second half had kicked off which meant that tickets which would have been readily available up to second half kicking off had been removed as usual at that time and returned to the office which had now closed. However in contrast to what was said in the article the four were not told they could not enter they were asked to wait while someone was contacted to get access to the tickets (The law prohibits anyone from entering the stadium without a valid ticket). During the wait they were joined by two more Darlington Supporters who were leaving early and obviously unhappy with the scoreline, (we had just scored again) these two were abusive and aggressive towards our stewards and proceeded to wind up the other four who up to that point had been fine, all six then became abusive and aggressive which resulted in a decision being correctly taken that they would no longer be allowed to enter the ground.

This was an unfortunate incident and my sympathy goes out to the four who had such a terrible journey but whatever the circumstances and the provocation we cannot and never will condone abusive and aggressive behaviour towards our staff whatever their role at the club including Stewards.

From the clubs point of view there is one area however which I will be addressing and that is that tickets will in future remain immediately available to the gate stewards throughout the entire game not just until half time, if that had been the case on Saturday then we accept the four gentlemen could have entered almost immediately and might never have got involved with the other two in which case their behaviour would most likely have remained appropriate for entry into the ground.

I hope you have found this message of interest and that you will also enjoy reading future messages like this which I will do whenever I feel there is something of interest to keep you all informed of.

Thanks for reading and I look forward to seeing many of you in Bristol Tomorrow night.

Grays Athletic Football Club released defender Michael Haswell today. They also signed midfielder Paul Terry and striker Dean Morgan. Paul has had spells at Charlton, Millwall, Dagenham & Redbridge, Yeovil and more recently Leyton Orient. His younger brother, John, is captain of Chelsea FC and the English national team. Dean was previously with Leyton Orient, Colchester, Reading, Luton, Southend & Crew.

Our Take: The signing of Paul Terry brings an experienced midfielder and a household name to the Football Conference.

English Football Daily for Sunday, August 9

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