“Having involvement with Elburton Villa, on and off, for the last twenty years or so, it is a sad state of affairs that I see at the club at this present time. The club began many years ago with the aim of providing football, in the Elburton area, for the local youth to play amateur football, the quarry company made the grounds availble with this ethos in mind, the park and ride scheme was over turned, on the strenght of the argument, that the venue was vital to youngsters playing football. Over the years the club has been cared for and nurtured by voluntary committees and hundreds of good, unsung voluntary helpers, who's aim has been to provide facilities for local youth football.
It appears that the present "caretakers" have taken their eye off the ball and are implementing their own interpritation as to where their emphesis of support should be directed, i.e. the first team.
Respect to Scott Bamford for his defence of the current situation at the club, however the Vice Chairman, who initiated the appeal for funds, is conspicuous by his absence from this site.
The managers have been asked to collect, what they condsider to be, fees beyond the comfort zone of the majority of the players parents. Yes, the managers where asked if they would continue to manage a team at the club,but after putting both their and the parents concerns to the committee about the fees and no compromise being reached, felt the committes was pricing DJM teams out of the club, so parents and managers have voted with their
feet and have subsequently left , taking the players with them to other clubs, who's fees they consider to be more realistic.
The voluntary manager's, who have the players interest at heart, have to take into consideration, not only fees to clubs for registration and administration, the manager then has to find finance for team strips,tracksuit tops,referee's fee's, training facilities and trophies at the end of the season, the cost's of which can be funded by sponsorship, (if you are fortunate to get any) the shortfall being met by the deep pockets of the parents.

One would suspect that the present committee at Elburton Villa would have had prior knowledge of the proposals, that are in offering from Plymouth Argyle,and subsequently use the financial benefits, from the professional club using the facilities at Haye Road, to help subsidise the club and it's teams or at least keep things at a staus quo and so ease financial pressures on the club, parents and managers.
Previous contributor's have asked how many spectators attend Elburton Villa home games, I think the point being made was that ,possibly at this time, stands are not paramount to the progress of the club at this present time of it's development.
Wishing all parties the best of luck in the future.”

“Dave , thanx for the first sensible response , I for one am sorry to see Jeff's team not playing at Haye Road next season , as you probably know My company sponsored the team for a couple of seasons and I came up to watch you at least half a dozen times last season , £160 per player is far to much money for anybody to pay but that money never went to the club and that is the point I am trying to get across . The fees for all teams at Haye Road are £1000 per season now , that includes team Reg , individual player I.D. , Insurance and pitch fees . I bit high it may be but the cost of running all three pitches is very high , In an ideal world the club would have a big sponsor so all teams would not have to pay any fees .
If your team or any team had got just 4 companies to sponsor boards around the pitch that would have paid the fees and left you paying a lot less to the manager of your team .
All the best at Hooe Rovers”

“Scott I do not want to ge into a public slanging match. The facts are that my son played for the under 15's. We were charged £100 for the year plus £2.50 a week for training (approximately £160 in total). The £2 match fees were not paid at Elburton but in response to a previous post who had stated what other teams charge. Whether you like it or not this is fraction of what other teams charge. The under 15's have now joined Hooe and are charged £10 a month for 8 months which includes everything and a lovely pitch to play on.”

“Ian , Plymouth &
Dave , Plymouth

In fact if you put up what team your son's played for last season , I will let you know if that team paid there fees to the club .
For a fact I can tell you that only 2 of the DJM Sides paid there pitch and reg. fees .
Where's the money gone ? ask your manager .
Why don't people get the facts before they comment ?”

“Ian , Plymouth &
Dave , Plymouth

The Money you are talking about is collected by the individual Managers not the club .
£1600 + £2 match fees does not go to the club .
Each team is run separately under the banner of Elburton Villa .
I'm sure that if players and parents did fund raisers and got sponsors then the Managers would lower what they asked you to pay .
Elburton Villa does not collect that sort of money from there teams - FACT .”

“On top of the £100 per year Elburton charge £2.50 a week for training. Also the £2 match fees would only be paid for approximatley 20 weeks not the whole year”

“Stev of NZ the £2 per week is the match fee so only paid when a game is played (about 20 a year)”

“I don't know any of the facts, nor do i know why the managers / youth teams have left Elburton, like most of the people posting comments I WAS NOT THERE.
But as an ex manager (DJM / P&D over 5years) I do know how hard the club have worked towards acheiving their goal. All members of the committee (as other clubs do i know) and the management team have donated countless hours and their own money into making Elbuton Villa all it can be. If you think for one minute that they wanted to kick the youth teams out and deprive the youngsters of having somewhere to play you need to have your head tested.
Get off the Ï hate villa' bandwagon
you don't know the facts, you obviously have never been involved in a club to know how hard it is to make it work and i would be very surprised if you knew your @rse from your elbow.
..... Muppets!
Youth football (all football) has always cost money, more than people realise, there are registration fees, pitch fees, insurance fees, refs fees and training facility fees. Also, money is required for training equipment, balls, bibs, cones, match kit, trackies, rain tops, nets and so on. Anyone who thinks that 2pound a week and a 20pound sign on fee is better than Villa's 1,600 fee needs to get a calculator out - 52weeks x 2pound = 104pound + 20pound sign on = 124pound x a squad of 15players = 1,860pounds...... makes Elburtons 1,600pounds seem reasonable now.
Even with sponsorship its a tough call. The council pitches are a joke, stolen and burnt cars, dog mess, broken bottles, unsafe areas to park cars while watching the game. 100pounds per player per year to play footy in a safe, great environment, works out at less than 2pound a week....value for money i say. 5years ago it cost at least that to run a team and costs have gone up since.
Keep believing Villa, keep up the good work you all do, good luck for the coming season.”

“That is absolute nonsense about the fees . My son has played for Elburton for 2 years. They now want to charge each team £1600 (over £100 per player paid up front) to use the pitch (this does not include training). I have now made some enquiries of other teams who generally charge £15-20 signing on fee and £2 a week match fees.You could argue that they don't play on as nice a pitch but the Elburton games always got postponed as they needed to keep the pitch for the more important teams! Consequently my son had to play 9 games in 3 weeks at the end of the season! Elburton Villa should not be allowed to get away with this, they obviously wanted to price the youth teams out and make more money by letting them to Plymouth Argyle.”

“all through last season i played proud with the elburton badge on my chest, but when i heard the news that there would be no elburton villa next year i couldnt belive it. elburton villa should be ashamed at kicking all the youngsters out because it was a great club to play for and i enjoyed my time there. although i would love to spend my last season of the DJM at haye road, i am now focusing on the league/cup double at tavistock town under 16's. cant wait for the new season for a fresh start =D”