Truro City’s Canadian chairman Eric Perez was scrolling down the National League South results, searching for succour on a chastening day. Big-spending rivals Torquay and Boreham Wood both won but Weston-super-Mare and Worthing conceded late goals to draw. Damage limitation is food for the soul when a home defeat drops you from first to fourth.
Nobody died, remarked board member and Under-21 manager John Fabby. “Great, we are into our third round of nobody died, already,” responded Perez, the sardonic wit of Toronto meeting the dry humour of Scouser Fabby.
The defeat to Maidstone United, last season’s FA Cup romance generators, in front of the third biggest gate of the season, 1,725, poured lumpy custard over the Christmas celebrations planned for later that Saturday night.
But only for an hour or so. When the players emerged for their routine gladhanding with the fans in the pitch-side hospitality marquee a sense of proportion had already settled on a cold December evening.
And why wouldn’t it? Truro were playing a home match at a brand new facility in Truro, something a novelty after three seasons on the road, hanging on to survival by their fingernails in Plymouth, Taunton and finally, Gloucester, the small matter of 200 miles away.
Ownership of the club has passed through a number of hands in recent years, including that of the Cornish Pirates, the rugby union club who saw ownership of Truro City in part as a vehicle for their own rebrand in a new home in the city.
Those plans following the sale of Truro’s old ground to a supermarket chain did not progress, prompting the club’s sale to a Canadian consortium, who already had a presence in the Duchy of Cornwall following the launch of rugby league club Cornwall RLFC in nearby Penryn three years ago. Using the funding from the club’s old Treyew Road site, a deal was struck with the council to develop the new ground, which will provide Truro with a secure, long-term tenancy.
In August last year the club finally received permission to begin work. Twelve months to the day after planning permission was granted, just 24 hours before the first fixture was due to kick off this season, the authorities certified the new ground.
The final hurdle was the public address system, validated when Fabby put his phone on speaker and held it aloft in the centre circle. “Can you hear that?” he asked the administrator. Indeed he could. It was official, Truro were back among their own.
Four months later, the only professional football club in Cornwall is thriving under the Canadian leadership of Perez, founder of the Toronto Wolfpack rugby league team, and enlightened football consultant and former PFA agent, Alex Black.
They are by no means the only levers pulling Truro from the abyss, to which Fabby, a reformed surfer dude and electrician, who built and sold a windfarm empire, would attest, not to mention 50-years married John and Veronica running the hospitality in the director’s suite, which is a grandiose term for one of the many portable cabins serving as matchday infrastructure alongside two permanent stands.
The ground development is part of a joint venture with a progressive Cornwall council which is also building more than 4,000 houses at the Garden Village site. The Sports Hub, which will be host to myriad community projects, is an amenity knitting the project together. On the day I arrive, 50 primary school children are seated in the hospitality marquee lapping up the exposure to the players, who stop by for autographs and selfies.
Twenty-four hours later, on matchday, a gaggle of nippers spills from a car more than three hours before kick-off. Parking, a shared park-and-ride facility taking visitors and shoppers into the centre of the cathedral city, is free.
The kids are full of it, thrilled to be engaged with an event, something significant happening live on a Saturday afternoon in their city, Truro, a place dismissed as the arse-end of nowhere by visiting fans high on metropolitan hauteur.
As pretty as the setting is among the rolling hills south of Bodmin Moor, they have a point. Maidstone fans pulling into Exeter Services for a toilet break more than 200 miles from home, still had another 100 to go.
It proved a worthwhile journey. A goal in each half from a more composed group, gave Maidstone a deserved victory. For once in this miracle season that saw them start the game top of a monstrously competitive league full of teams like Maidstone on three times their budget, Truro looked what they are, a part-time outfit managing transition, and on this day running on fumes.
The loss of Moroccan-born ex-Forest youth, Yassine En-Neyah, to injury in the warm-up cost them talented legs in midfield. Whilst Christian Oxlade-Chamberlain, the younger brother of Alex, on loan from Kidderminster Harriers, shone for Truro, there were too many holes to plug against a Maidstone side well drilled by last season’s FA Cup star turn George Elokobi.
For their trouble, each member of Maidstone’s travelling support exchanged high fives with their heroes, many of whom were on first-name terms, behind a goal at the final whistle.
If you want to know where to find the sense of belonging and community lost in the modern game, it is located in the lower tiers, a monumentally uplifting experience that reminds us of football’s inclusive roots, its capacity to bring folk together.
Perez, an irrepressible force of nature who describes himself as a ‘culture creator’ and sports entrepreneur, had flown in from Toronto for the fixture. He explained his vision for Truro. “This is one of the best places on the planet. Football is my sport. I’m passionate about it. You may have noticed but there is a bit of a thing for sport among north Americans. I believe people here under value it.
“Buying a non-league club has even more value because if you get it into the Football League the value grows exponentially. But also its about doing something for the community. Truro City is the Manchester United of Cornwall and will get bigger. We are aiming to get into the Football League within five years. This is going to be one of my crowning life achievements getting Truro into the EFL. No kidding.”
Perhaps because getting anywhere in Canada from Toronto is measured in airmiles, the four-hour schlep from Gatwick to Truro barely moves the needle. And when you are looking for opportunity in difference, Cornwall is an open goal.
“It’s unique,” he said, “the biggest catchment area in the UK for football [in terms of geographical area served]. The nearest club in the pyramid is Plymouth Argyle [60 miles away], Exeter is next [100 miles]. That’s unprecedented. There are 400,000 people within a 40-minute drive.
“Also Cornwall is a nation within a nation. It has its own identity, its own culture. To be able to represent that at the highest level is an opportunity in itself. And there is a big Cornwall diaspora all over the world, Canada, the States, Australia, etc. The list is endless why this club is different.
“In my view a football club is part of the cultural tapestry of a place. Truro has the potential to be that. Cornwall is on the up right now and Truro can be a microcosm of that, a symbol of it. Everyone will know Truro, and that is really cool, right?”
Damn right, on the evidence all about me. The guest of honour for the visit of Maidstone is the leader of Cornwall council Linda Taylor, for whom this was a first exposure to live football on the site.
She described it as the most memorable public duty since welcoming American President Joe Biden and the First Lady to Britain as they came down the steps of Air Force One at Newquay Airport for the G7 summit three years ago.
“I engaged with Erik very early on. It was a shame the club had to leave Cornwall. This Garden Village project is a huge ambition for Cornwall Council. Four thousand homes, key-worker affordable on the open market. It’s the first time as a local authority that we have planned with real design like this. And part of that is having these facilities. It was so logical when Erik approached me. I said, ‘what can we do to bring Truro City home’? We wanted the same thing.”
Taylor is a former banker who came to the political space in retirement. She knows her constituency very well, but there is genuine feeling when she says this club is not just for Truro but for Cornwall.
“When people buy their tickets the club gets a heat map showing that they are coming from all over the county. I’m so pleased to be here myself. I think it’s amazing, so exciting to have a professional team in Cornwall with these facilities. And it’s not just an investment in the game but in the community. I know people talk about the tangibles, and that’s important but it’s also about engagement. It’s a brilliant partnership and it’s helping to put Truro on the map.”
The man who put all the pieces together, Black, spent his formative years in football working for the PFA, helping shape the careers of, among others, Rio Ferdinand and Gareth Barry, before branching out with his own consultancy.
Black answered the call of his wife’s cousin, who was on the board of the Pirates seeking his counsel about football matters at a time when the vision was to ground share with the club in Truro.
When the parties went their separate ways Black stayed on to oversee the project on behalf of the Canadian owners. When he first walked through the gates Truro were still domiciled at Treyew Road, notable for its magnificent hilltop view of Truro Cathedral in the centre of town.
The site is now home to Aldi, but much of the old infrastructure remains, including two thirds of the pitch, wildly overgrown, and the old changing facilities and bar, complete with club crest still visible in the ruins. The club would get about 500 through the door in those days, a figure that collapsed to 50 in Plymouth.
Fabby, upon whom much of the administration of the new project has fallen, joked about his anxiety over the new toilet blocks at the Garden Village, wondering if the 100-plus loos he ordered would outnumber the supporters. He needn’t have worried.
The club was close to the 3,000 capacity for that inaugural match in August and is consistently around 1,500. The plan is to build out to reach a 10,000 capacity as they climb the pyramid.
Saturday’s result demonstrated how bumpy the road can be. “Against an established team like Maidstone, we have to be at our absolute best to compete and hope they have an off day,” Black said.
“This is to be expected when you understand what we are facing, basically teams like Maidstone, Torquay, Weston-super-Mare with way bigger budgets than we have. The owners know this. We will make the necessary adjustments in time. Results like this tell us where we are.”
Two points off table-topping Torquay after 21 games is outperforming targets. Especially against rivals who are fully professional. Manager John Askey, who took Macclesfield back to the EFL in 2018 as National League champions despite one of the lowest budgets in the division, is familiar with the territory. Half his squad are part-timers, impacting training sessions, some of which are held at venues 30 and 50 miles away until practice facilities are completed at their new home.
Attracting players to the remote south west is not straightforward on a low budget. Perhaps he should share pictures of his rental in Par, where he often ends the day with a pint overlooking the ocean on Cornwall’s south-east coast.
“The standards are improving as more and more teams go full-time. Teams are more organised. There is not a lot between the teams in our division, a lot of ex-league players. Recruitment is tricky. We have to ask 50 players before we get one. We are doing well, but we only want players who are going to improve us, so we are getting more picky now. As long as we can keep people fit. That’s the important thing.”
Perez concedes there is still so much to do. “I’m determined to build this club. There are a lot of start-up costs. First of all you have to buy it. Then you have to sustain it. It will be a while before this club turns a profit. But there are wins to be had in sponsorships, ticket sales, merchandise and partnerships. This is just the start.”
It falls to Black to keep a sense of proportion, and everyone pointing in the right direction.
After each home game he sits down on the club’s coveted leather sofa in the manager’s office to pore over the critical moments with Askey and determine what actions might be necessary. Truro meet ‘local’ rivals Weston-super-Mare at home on Boxing Day and Torquay away on New Year’s Day, festive derbies guaranteed to set the west country ablaze.
This is all a million miles from the misery of the homeless years, a fact reflected in the enthusiasms of home supporters who sang the team off the pitch despite losing, and the wise counsel of Black. “When we first started John was putting on sessions for two or three players, because we hadn’t got players signed. The whole squad from last season were all part-timers. Every time a player leaves we look to bring in a full-time player.
“It would be easy to say let’s get full-time players in to make the team better, but some of our part-time players [mostly teachers, plus Billy Palfrey, who makes fishing nets] are actually our better players. So you can’t just throw it all up. The reason they don’t go full-time is they are at this stage better off part-time.
“We do miss out on players because they say it’s just too far away. But those who get in the car and drive down here, you know there is something in their character that says they really want to play football and do well.
“They might be hard to get but when you get them here they are committed. We were fortunate that John was out of a job when we were looking for a new manager. He has bought into the project. You can see it is growing and developing.
“We accelerated out of the traps much faster than we thought we would, but that does not change the philosophy. It’s fantastic at the moment yet we all know in the football department that you can’t run before you can walk. There isn’t a quick fix. You have to install the right things.”
Truro City have waited a long time to feel this good about themselves. The staff and volunteers are endlessly welcoming and polite. In the scheme of things the faltering step against Maidstone is just detail which didn’t come close to denting the enthusiasm of those involved with the project.
A special note of thanks goes to tea monitors John and Veronica for their unstinting attention and smiles. John mentioned with pride how his mother performed the same role at the old ground many years ago. That, more than anything, summed up Truro City, a place of belonging, generosity and unassuming pride. We are all Truro now.
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