What Barnsley FC chairman Neerav Parekh told the Chronicle this week on...
THE NEW LEASE AT OAKWELL
We made promises when we came in as a new board and I hope we can keep all of them – this is one.
There is no doubt Barnsley Football Club needs to stay in Barnsley – this achieves that. I am very excited but I don’t want to jump ahead of ourselves because the real work begins now. This is when the investment begins and this is when Oakwell gets modernised.
THE PROMOTION CHALLENGE
We’re very pleased. The away form has been good throughout and we’re seeing the home form improve now. We have a lot of tough games left but we’re right in the mix. Every league position is up for grabs with how tight the table is.
The fact that Neill (Collins) has a settled squad helps significantly. He’s getting the best out of a lot of players. But he’s the first one to recognise improvement is needed if we’re going to keep this consistency going.We’re picking up the points, but we want to see performances for 90 minutes and he’s well aware of that.
DIRECTOR OF FOOTBALL AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE
(Bobby Hassell and Jon Flatman have been doing the jobs on an interim basis)
We’re talking to both of them about it. We have interviewed a number of candidates for the roles.
Hopefully we will have more information on that over the next two weeks. We are happy with the job they are doing. Bobby will continue until the end of the month at the very least.
I don’t think anyone can have any complaints about the job Bobby is doing. We know how much he cares about the club and he’s done a great job.
SATURDAY’S POSTPONEMENT AT STEVENAGE
It’s absurd. Given the protocol the EFL has set down there is nothing either club could have done about it.
It needs to change from the top down. It’s ridiculous it happened last season at Exeter and this season at Stevenage. For fans to spend that money and time going down then find out so late it is called off. We will talk to EFL about making changes because it’s a recurring theme every year. It’s just a poor system.
There needs to be a cut-off point where the decision just has to be made.
Obviously it’s nice to give it another chance and hope the pitch will be playable but you have to counter-balance that with the fact there are 1,000 plus people travelling down. You need to put the fans front and centre of the decision-making process.
