I began supporting Gillingham as far back as 1995, when the club was in administration and facing an uncertain future. I still recall the final home game of the season against Hereford United when we invaded the home pitch and sang 'We'll support you evermore!' as we didn't know if we'd have a club to support the following season.
Paul Scally came in along with Tony Pullis (as per Tony Smith's recommendations on the sale of club). What we then witnessed was unprecedented success for Gillingham Football Club and Championship or second tier football for the first time ever a few years later. It is absolutely right that Scally takes the credit for investing in this project; a project that has proved, ultimately, to be successful.
Are we thankful for this? Yes. But during this time we began to see the more questionable elements of Paul Scally's tenure.
For starters, there were his internal disputes with key club stakeholders - he surely must now regret going to war with the then GFC Supporters Club, and banning it's chairman Alan Liptrott. Moreover, it was a grave mistake to ban the local KM Newspaper group at the same time, a primary outlet with which to promote or advertise the club to new or potential audiences amongst the wider Medway region and beyond, across Kent.
He also perhaps could have done more in the aftermath of the death of Matthew Fox at Priestfield Stadium when we played Fulham in 1998 and couldn't understand why he was ostracised by Mohammed Al Fayed (Fulham's then chairman) in the boardroom at Craven Cottage a few years later. Granted, there probably wasn't a lot he could have done. But there is enough argument that he could have done more to difuse what has become a bitterly incendiary rivalry between the two clubs. Whether he was right or wrong, he shouldn't have made any references to Al Fayed in his programme notes following the exchange, and rose above it.
Then there's Charlton. Granted, none of us really like our closest (geographic) divisional rivals. But Scally's incessant whinging about how their pricing and ticketing structure was depriving us of Kent-based Gills fans (and revenue) because 'there are no Charlton fans living in Charlton', even implying that it was a 'Millwall area', compounded the animosity from Charlton fans, some of whom made clear that they hated Paul Scally, not Gillingham (especially as they were aware that he was previously a box holder and director at The Den).
Then there was the ITV Digital fiasco, demanding settlement and compensation from a bankrupt TV company, which perhaps suggested his occasional naivety when it came to business. Then there was the new stadium and casino which he demanded Medway council build using millions from local taxpayers (of course, this idea didn't materialise).
Of course, we overlooked this because he was investing heavily in the team, we were building on our success, we had drawn 42,000 fans to Wembley, and we were riding a 'purple wave'. He was utterly right to draw attention to the club's potential and proximity to the European mainland at a time when we were still in the European Union and sponsored by a prominent French cross-channel ferry operator (Sea France). But it some became clear during the Credit Crunch that much of our spending on players, facilities etc was financed by as much as £25 million of debt from HBOS, and we needed lower league austerity to restructure and pay our debts. It soon became clear that things had become so bad that we weren't paying our electricity bill (hence why the ticket office was closed), nor for our use of the training ground (which our players were locked out of). At around the same time, he unwisely applauded the decision to dock Leeds United 20 points for falling into administration, which Ken Bates used to pin to the dressing room wall for motivation when we played our final L1 game in 2008 at Elland Road, where we needed to win to stay up (we didn't), and savage Scally's Medway United and 'Medway Village' plans.
Since then, we've heard regular bombast about aspirations for more Championship football but with no corresponding ambition or investment. It's also clear that Scally pushed many fans over the edge by appointing a manager who was public enemy numero uno with Gills fans (Steve Evans), which we accepted on the proviso that he would be given the means to put together a promotion winning team. Alas, we are still in league one, paying £24 a game to watch a team languishing in mid-table league one, and fans seem to be in sympathy with Steve Evans who has been dropping hints that it's increasiny a difficult proposition to build a successful team on a thinning budget.
The lack of current success doesn't concern me too much. The relatively expensive cost of a matchday (£20-£25) isn't a problem really either. Neither are the long queues in the factory or even just to buy a one-off matchday ticket, nor the relatively stressful matchday experience for casual fans who attend Priestfield (although we do need to do everything we can to get new supporters to come to Priestfield and not jump on the High-Speed train to the Emirates/London Stadiums or other London teams like Chelsea/Palace etc).
What *does* bother me, and I suspect I'm not alone, is that these issues are increasingly intolerable in the current Post-Covid world, and Scally's vituperative and unreasonable response to (some of the fair) criticisms of his lack of preparation to adapt to the new global reality, the apparent indifference towards paying punters, when we should be working out how to forge flourish, minimise losses and progress in a new, imperiled world which shows no mercy to impossibly tight margins, is trying the collective patience of Gills fans. The fact that there sometimes seems to be 'something of the Trump' about Paul Scally -at least one or two of Scally's businesses reportedly went bankrupt under his watch too- hasn't helped, and there is increasingly less patience now for creative licensing and accounting nowadays, asone or two of my friends who run businesses or work in sales-driven environments now can attest.
Now I should make clear that I don't spend my time abusing Scally, or by busting my spleen and various other internal organs, in part because there are laws, I'm civilised, old enough to know better etc. I also utterly condemn anyone who needs to resort to verbal or physical abuse.
But I'm largely indifferent. Why? Because I suspect he won't be around too much longer. His recent appearances alongside that Bauvill owner from Chatham Town suggest that soon there may be new ownership, and there will be a mutual relief on the part of *everyone* that Gillingham as a football club can stabilise and move forward.
