Is this team the official successor club to the one which was expelled from the football league, or a "Phoenix club" which is completely separate from the old one? I think I read somewhere that the expelled club had been taken under new ownership as a going concern, while at the same time a fan-owned phoenix club had been established.
Given the struggles (off the field) in the last few years, I could see there being further problems if the fanbase ends up split in two.
Thereby lies a tale. Technically it's a completely different entity than Dale's Bury FC; grown from nothing by the fans to having a membership of 1000 and I think around 1500 shirt pre-sales. However, the (so-called) fans part of the original Bury, "Forever Bury" aka "Forever Useless" who are supposed to be custodians of the club, and don't have any money to buy from Dale, or pay the debts/mortgages etc HAVE indicated that it IS an option, should the FC eventually be sold or the ground become available, for the phoenix to slide sideways and become the "real" FC and play at Gigg.
As for the "split" there are a few noisy facebookers who simply won't accept AFC, but with no football this coming season, and a huge chance of liquidation and no more football whatsover, they seem to be small in number. The rest want to watch (a) Bury, don't want anything to do with Dale and are quite happy to get behind AFC and should FC reform, will stick with AFC.
Let's face it, although AFC have no ground of their own, there's no debt, no big-time wages and playing every week. And the general concensus seems to be that the water down here's quite nice. make that beer.
But the story will run and run....
EDIT - the pitch at Gigg is apparently in excellent condition, groundsman Mike Curtis is working hard and I'm not sure if he's being paid.
