A successful fans forum was held at Spotland on Monday evening. We look back at the evening, bringing you some of the highlights of the night.

The first half of the evening was spent with a number of presentations by the club. Almost every single area involved in the running of the club did a talk on how things were developing, and it was clear beyond anything else, that there is a clear goal demonstrating how they want to take the club forward.

Director Andy Kelly spoke about how he wants to undergo a "cultural re-engineering" at Spotland. He said that the club currently budgeted to lose £250,000 per year, and was dependent on the luck of a cup run, TV money or player sales. He is currently looking at a number of plans which will significantly improve the club's income, so that we were no longer banking on a bit of good fortune to balance the books.

The age old issue of the training facilities was brought up. 23 different training facilities have been used by the club during the season so far. The facilities at Bowlee have been completed by the contractors, but it is clearly in an unacceptable state at the moment. The club will be working closely with the council to ensure that it is brought up to standard, but this will not be ready until May 2008 at the earliest.

One long term option is through sponsors MMC. They are looking at giving Dale a plot of land on the current Turner Bros site, which would see Dale create a number of pitches, both indoor and outdoor, with facilities to boot.

We had a powerpoint display from Dave Flitcroft. You could only imagine previous assistant managers like Hinnigan and Hoyland thinking a power point was another name for a plug socket. Flicker spoke about a seven year plan for the club which will eventually see the club play at Championship level.

Arguably, the plans are ambitious, but both Hill and Flicker have proved their ambitions from day one. The plans were far from pie in the sky and looked at various budget levels they'd be working with, the stage that training facilities will be at, and even down to how many players will be coming through the ranks.

Other presentations spoke about injuries, rehabilitation, larger commercial activities including possible sponsorship of the stadium, and the youth development and where it is heading. As we said before, there is definitely a vision about where they want to take our club.

Once the open forum section of the night opened, forum bingo was won very early on after 17 questions all from the same person opened proceedings. It was fair to say that many of the questions were answered in the first half of the night, leaving few questions to be answered.

The purchase of Hornets' stadium company shares is at the solicitors' stage at the moment, with a few things needing ironing out that were "not for discussion at an open forum".

Former Dale player Scott Warner texted in a question about himself, and it was also announced that the club's AGM had not been delayed for any sinister reasons and was likely to take place on 13th March.

Flicker did his usual bit of trying to win quote of the night. We had gems such as "Everyone needs a bit of loving" and "they're our players and we love them". Love was most certainly in the air.

Postponements were said to cost the club an average of £10,000 per game, but most importantly of all, contractors are on the way to ensure that each and every floodlight has a full compliment of light bulbs.

Our club is in safe hands.

Photo: Action Images

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