Just because the journo took the wrong road to get to his conclusions, doesn't make his conclusion any less valid. The admin and Lyon treated the media like fools, and in most cases they deserved it. BUT, what the club has not done , is identify some Freo friendly media and cultivate that relationship to get messages across. Whether this was intentional or because the Steves & Lyon lived in a fools paradise makes no difference. I would guess that most if not all other clubs have their goto media for anything they want to present their side of the story on. Freo have Lyon's press conferences and Steves twitter, plus email & facebook. What we want to see is Stories on the tribunal inconsistency, treatment of Fyfe, Walters being vilified by commentators and the like to put the point across that the club supports the players and supporters.
As for using the club and players to entice supporters, the point about players mixing with supporters as they went about their lives between Freo Oval and South Terrace may not seem like much to the Steves and Lyon, but it means the world to the kids and older supporters to have a chat and get autographs. It also keeps the players in touch with what is happening in the real world. A big percentage of Freo supporters were against moving away from Freo for that very reason, but were ignored. No wonder we feel disconnected. A big number of supporters were disheartened by the style of footy being played by Freo, but they were ignored, No wonder we feel disconnected. Nothing was done until the very financial threat of a big fall in membership numbers was touted on supporter sites like D/L, it is almost too late, but I'm not sure the club admin can see that even now.
