Here are some notes made by ISA secretary Kevin Whitehouse at the recent supporters meeting. They're not minutes but give a good idea of how the evening went.

Les Smith opened the meeting by explaining that this was an Open Public Meeting and not an ISA Members Meeting, and had been called to allow Chester City supporters a platform to vent their feelings.

Les introduced the top table Barry Hipkiss Chairman of the Official Chester City Supporters, Kevin Whitehouse, Secretary Chester City ISA and himself Les Smith, Chairman Of the Chester City ISA. After a short statement from Barry, in which he stated that he felt that if Ian Atkins was to be offered a contract then he was confident the attendance�s at the club would remain stable at around 1200-1500,but if Gordon Hill for example was to be offered the Manager�s position the gates could fall dramatically, possibly below 500.

Les then opened the meeting to the public.

Many questions were then asked, below is a short selection of those questions.

Question
Have we had any discussions with Terry Smith?
Answer
No!

Question
What is the position of the Ex ISA Directors, are they still Board Members?
Answer
They are all still Directors as far as we are aware, the ISA Committee have very little contact with the Director�s either formally or informally, we acknowledge that Mike Fair, and Paul Murray have both work very hard for the good of the club in extremely trying circumstances.

Question
Southport have recently signed Mike Marsh, these are surely the type of player that Chester should be looking at if they wish to bounce back into the Football League?
Answer
Terry has given a commitment, albeit only in the press that we will remain a fully professional side, but he needs to back-up these words with a contract for Ian Atkins and the necessary funds for Ian to be able to attract the right calibre of players.

Question
If Terry Smith was to go, who would be prepared to take over the club, we heard last year about different consortium, but Terry was the only one who put the money up.
Answer
We believe there are people prepared to buy the Club, but we are not in the position where we can name them for obvious reasons.

Question
How much do we believe the club to be worth?
Answer
Before we were relegated probably �700.000, 5 o�clock on Saturday after Peterborough more like �200.000

Question
Has anybody asked the Duke of Westminster or the local Business Community if they would be prepared to help fund the club?
Answer
These avenues were looked into last year with no great joy.

Question
Have the club got new sponsors for the new season?
Answer
No

Question
Did everybody else feel as embarrassed as I did when they read that Chester were trying to have Shrewsbury deducted points, because they allegedly made an illegal approach to Dave Fogg?

One of the Resolutions at the end of the meeting, which was passed unanimously, was that we should as Supporters totally distance ourselves from any action the club was taking against Shrewsbury. There were many occasions when people were shouting out that it was time for Smith to go but this would then be countered with the argument if he goes who will take over?

The mood of the meeting seemed to change when a member who asked to remain anonymous outside of the meeting but who did make himself known to the meeting explained that Ian Atkins had received by fax an offer of a contract from Terry Smith that day at 4 o'clock, within the contract were stipulations that Ian found totally unacceptable.

Another Resolution was proposed by a Solicitor from Neston he suggested that instead of people buying a Season Ticket they should send the money to a fund which would be set-up by trustees and this money would be held until such time that Terry Smith agreed to certain stipulations, the wording would be agreed after all the legal avenues had been explored, this was later put to the meeting in the form of a Resolution and was passed Unanimously.

The final Resolution was that the Meeting would pass a vote of no confidence in Terry Smith and request that he be forthcoming with what monetary value he was prepared to accept for the sale of the club.

Disclaimer Details given above are an accurate representation of the meeting, but are not a transcript of the meeting. Kevin Whitehouse