So Dunfermline Athletic live to fight another day, and that’s something everybody in Scottish football should be glad to see.
Yes there’s been pain, with some good people made redundant and remaining staff asked to take reduced hours to help make ends meet at East End Park. But, as Jim Jefferies has rightly pointed out on several occasions in recent weeks, fans should be thankful they’ve still got a club to support.
It’s been THAT dire a situation down Dunfermline way.
Looking at it from afar, there is an argument that suggests the Pars have been the victims of circumstance, a “perfect storm” of events which has hit East End Park harder than most.
First there was the £1 million hit through relegation from the SPL, and the economic recession has undoubtedly impacted on the ordinary punter’s income so that’s bound to have an impact.
The board came out in October and bemoaned the club’s lack of home games, the early exit from the Ramsdens Cup and the fact that attendances were lower than anticipated with the likes of Livingston bringing only 173 fans through the turnstiles at East End and Cowdenbeath not much better with 247 earlier this season.
Commercial income was down, hospitality income was down and all that created the cashflow problems the Fife club experienced in the autumn.
Then of course you’ve got the wider debate about the downward trend in attendances, with the lure of an afternoon with Jeff Stelling and the boys on Sky Sports’ Soccer Saturday far more appealing to some than a trip out to go and watch your local team.
And like many provincial towns across Scotland these days, you’ll see numerous buses packed full of Rangers and Celtic fans making their way to Ibrox or Parkhead on Saturday something that has been particularly galling for me when discussing what’s wrong with the Scottish game these days.
That’s all bound to have had an impact.
So when the club’s board came out to suggest the cashflow problem was merely a blip and might be solved by the lucrative festive fixtures, people perhaps had good reason to be convinced.
As we all know though, Santa Claus came and left, and the wages still weren’t paid every month all leading up to the club going into full administration this week.
By making all those points above, I wasn’t making excuses for the club’s board. Because I’m afraid there simply is no excuse for what’s happened to Dunfermline.
Clubs all across Scotland have had to adapt to changing circumstances and for me, Dunfermline’s majority shareholder Gavin Masterton just didn’t adapt quick enough if at all.
He spoke to me in February with a plan to get the Pars out of their plight and it was plausible. Annual costs of £2.4 million had to be reduced by around £500,000 and he knew how he was going to do that I genuinely believe he did while the share offer would rake in at least £300,000 to keep the club going.
Having said that, his financial model moving forward also appeared reliant on the £300,000-£400,000 or so the club would get from supposed league reconstruction this summer which, while hindsight is a wonderful thing, doesn’t look like materialising.
The sums didn’t add up in that hand-to-mouth existence and fans are too wise or weathered to simply throw money into what many perceived to be a black hole.
Whoever is to blame for the Pars’ current financial mess is now largely irrelevant though, because the focus should now turn to ensuring Dunfermline Athletic survive by whatever means necessary.
Good people with good money are waiting in the wings, and the creation of a fan-owned club must surely be better for the club’s long-term sustainability.
No-one knows what’s around the corner for the Pars and all people like myself can do is wish the club and their supporters well and watch to see what happens next.