💬 Interview | Co-Chairs Matt & Julie-Anne Uggla sit down following three months of ownership

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[Music] Matt Julian thank you for joining me uh just to catch you up this afternoon obviously you’ve been here three months now with the club start with you Julian as I say three months since you both became co-chairs of the football club how have you enjoyed the opening three months here uh We’ve absolutely loved it I mean it’s not been without his Rocky patches but the joys of what we’re experiencing far way the rocky bit uh people of Europe have been incredibly welcoming YK City Football Club as a club is amazing it’s got a great feel of everyone gels together everyone’s working together for the same reason so it’s an exciting place to be it’s it’s turned out to be um it’s turned out to be a really positive Journey so far and Mt them three months as well for yourself has it been as expected as what you thought when you first came in no definitely not it’s been um quite stressful but in a really good way uh there’s been a lot of ups and downs and changes but I think you know we’re on the right path now and and I’ve I’ve loved it but definitely a lot of sleepless nights and quite stressful I’ll touch upon that obviously the success that like ups and downs that we’ve had but what’s been your most memorable moment for you both so far football wise um most meable moments for me are every time we score uh probably dagging them away absolutely scenes great game saw you in the oend obviously at dagnam there created a relationship with the fans what’s that like oh it’s amazing I get on I mean I haven’t met anyone that I haven’t got on with yet everyone’s I really like the people of York and and just Yorkshire in general they’re a lot different to what I’m used to in London a lot Kinder and and welcoming and and you can have a chat kind of about everything so I’m really happy with the relationship with them at the moment and you both of us have moved up up north into North York sure what not both of us not both no um Matt lives definitely up north Miss been a lot more time here looking for a property if anybody’s got anything DM me um but no absolutely love love York love Yorkshire same as Matt love the people I know one could be friendlier more welcoming um love the accent and yor beautiful city as it is a club with a lot of potential just obviously how do you see the club’s potential growing over the next you guys I think I said it when we come in is that there’s not really a limit on this club you can take it as far as you want to take it what we didn’t really realize when we first came in is just yes you’ve got a really amazing fan base and um you know you’ve got a great stadium and stuff like that but the actual foundations of the club maybe you know before us weren’t laid for that success so obviously you don’t have a god-given right just because you’re in a great City and great fan base to to be up in the upper exons but I think what we’ve had to do since coming in is is start laying those foundations for sustained success rather than going oh we’re going to come in and everything’s already set up and we’re ready to go and go and go cuz if that was the case I mean they would have done it wouldn’t they and with the stadium here OB great facility just how does that play its part in helping the club achieve that goals going forward um the stadium definitely comes with its challenges because there’s quite a few stakeholders that you have to take into consideration every time you’re making a decision on anything and it’s challenging um we’re really hoping to work alongside the council and the other two stakeholders to alleviate some of the challenges and to enhance a match day experience for our supporters because that’s where we’re seeing the where there needs to be more alignment so so far you know the conversations are going on and everybody’s willing to speak about it so that’s those are the first steps and obviously with 3 months being here you’ll both been able to develop and understand of how everything is run on a match day at the football club what’s your view on how everything runs and how smooth you think it is I I think that it’s uh you know there’s definitely some work that needs to take place to make it like you’ve got obviously a top class facility but it’s just like said was uh with so many different stakeholders and who controls what and who does this and who does that it’s you know it’s kind of the cohesion maybe isn’t as as good as it should be um and then that has a trickle down effect and makes the experience not what we want it to be for for you know our fans I think one of the biggest things that mat and I really want to improve on from the stadium side is just that match day experience you know if if if the football side is all working and jellying and moving moving along then the other big important priority for us is to make sure that our supporters and our fans that are you know coming and supporting us actually have that incredible experience when they get here and that um undoubtedly still needs a little bit of work and a lot of a lot of supporters and fans have been really vocal and really honest with us about that and we are we are 100% working on it it’s not going to happen overnight but we are definitely 100% working on it because we want it to be a great experience for everybody when they get here and with improve that experience as you say there there’s many eff news that you can look at in terms of retail Hospitality how do you think they’ve kind of developed over the last few months well we’ve got new people in place now we’ve got a new head of commercial so I think our retail is starting to really really improve our our Hospitality that’s challenging you know we’ve got 5,000 fans showing up and we’ve got lineups and qes at the South stand we’ve got lineups and qes at the West End There’s issues with music and getting into the atmosphere um but as I say right now everybody’s willing to have a conversation about it so our hopes are that we’re going to fix it not overnight but it’s definitely in the works on the pitch obviously set goals to achieve certain time scales but how do you feel that the club are kind of matching them at the moment how are you monitoring them for example so I think obviously from the outside looking in we and like I said before when we come in you think everything’s laid for success but you know after being here for three months and I’m kind of realizing you know there’s a lot of work that needs to be done at the training ground there’s positions you know for example Sports scientists that needs to be filled uh data analysts that need to come in obviously we’ve got a new manager be fantastic who’s coming so I think for us it’s less of a concern of where we are in the table as long as we’re not right down there but um I’d say to the fans that this season is let’s get everything in place as much as we possibly can so that next year we can really make an assault on it and just a word on manager Neil lley you brought him in just over a month ago just how much of a positive positive impact sorry has he been on the players yeah I mean I I know from when I both to the players that they absolutely loved him coming in and I know we’ve loved having him here and he’s you know very straight talking and and he’s obviously been a successful football clubs before so he knows what it takes to to build one so it’s also having his input on a lot of the stuff that we’re trying to do is is is fantastic with them goals obviously set them you want to try and Achieve them but for the fans there’s a realistic goal of what they want to achieve do you feel that what you want to achieve and the fans want to achieve that they align I don’t know cuz I can’t speak for every fan but I think you know you’re always going to have the dreamers out there that think that we should be winning the league which you know one day I believe that will happen um I think that patience has to to ensue and and that’s key and you know you’ll see improvement improvement improvement I think it’s already begun um uh so I think for me fans can have their own opinion of where they think we should be finishing I think this is a long journey it’s not a one season sort of thing and let’s build for S sustained success and and hopefully they understand that and can come on the journey with us I think what’s really exciting for us is Matt and I often come into a lot of really positive messages from a lot of supporters saying that they can see that the change is is is going up it’s not we’re not going backwards we’re definitely going forwards and they can see as I think we said when we very first spoke um publicly is actions speak louder than words we can we can talk as much as we want about what we want to do but we’re actually really trying to do it and we don’t have a magic wand that’s going to go oh this is happening overnight but you know in the background there’s a lot going on um and it’s going on because we want New York City Football Club to be successful and away from the League this weekend we start the fa cook campaign against need and Market cook competition is what everyone would love to do whether that’s the cup or the trophy but for a business sense for you Julian how crucial and how big does an FA Cup run for example help the club oh my goodness you’re asking me a really big question because um I mean from I look at everything from a business point of view and a financial point of view it’s sort of like the partnership I mean obviously from a revenue point of view obviously it helps us greatly you know if we if we keep winning and we get the cup uh finals or semi-finals because see she don’t know what she talking about basically way too far that’s probably true I hope it’s semi-finals and finals but listen I think what she’s trying to say is let’s try and get to the third round get Arsenal away or Spurs away and and that’s the season paid for and then some so you have to remember it’s only recently I’ve really learned about the offside with a salt paper and a pepper shaper from my son so when you’re asking me football questions I’m probably going to kind of give you almost promised the semi-final final that’s uh did I yeah that would have been me might happen it might it might happen you never know maybe it’s a Freudian slip let’s go with that looking ahead now obviously the club obviously you’ve said what we want to achieve this season next is there anything away from on field anything that you want to try and engage with the fans more or anything that you want to implement to try and improve that like experience yes I think there things that we’re looking at in terms of you know retail stuff and and and uh Fan Experience closer to the stadium um I think we’ll probably overdue a fan forum at some point um I think it would be a good time to probably get one of those kinds so I think we got to look at when to do that and when that every you know what’s the best time to do that and that would probably be my piece on that and we want to get a lot more involved with um New York City businesses we want to get involved a lot more with how we can collaborate with other initiatives that are going on within New York city so we can get involved involved um we want to look at doing events um we want to look at doing a managers Q&A we just want everybody to understand it’s not just Matt and I that there’s a manager and an assistant manager and the players and get everyone um as involved as we can yeah and some of the stuff that we’ve implemented on a March Day this year we’ve looked at Foundation fixtures that focus on certain things such as mental health and stuff like that just how great is it to engage with that wider community in York I mean for us it’s huge it’s it’s it’s a it’s a you know working within the community and working with the foundation is an arm into the community to be able to engage um as much as we possibly can whether it’s through education whether it’s through um helping other Charities achieve their goals you know we want to get we’re trying we we’re trying to get much more involved but as you know it’s been three months and we’ve got a lot of initiatives planned for the coming year and one final question for me is there any messages that you want to give to the fans yeah yeah you want go with me first you go first okay so the best or last um no I would just say look it’s been amazing meeting everyone and and the way they’ve treated me and my family and my friends and has been fantastic and you know I feel at home here um I really hope you know you can stick with us through this sort of ups and downs cuz I think it will be um but and I don’t make a promise lightly but I promise you know really good times of coming to York and he just got to stick with us and and I believe that we’ll take the club to to where it belongs I mean I couldn’t agree with Matthew more I guess the one thing I would say is that you know we’ we’ve both of us have completely fallen in love with the York City Football Club as well as York City itself um you won’t get two more people in the background trying as hard as we possibly can and giving our very best to get where we all hopefully really want to be um um we’re sitting here trying every day to take the club forward um and we as Matt says I really hope that the supporters and the fans sit by us and stand behind us whilst we’re doing it