Manchester City, Hyde FC and a 125th Anniversary makeover

The recent financial gift-giving agreement between the Conference and the Premier League indicated that the evil empire, whatever its motivations, sees some value in keeping non-league football alive. I for one don't believe this to be an altruistic involvement on the Premier League's part, and I am similarly suspicious of the intentions behind one top flight club's interference in non-league.

Hyde United, a Blue Square Bet North club from Greater Manchester, announced in June that they would be making some significant changes to mark the club's 125th anniversary. As well as the mysterious dropping of 'United' from the club's name, the materials from 9th June reveal that "there is also a plan to incorporate the club's original colours of black and white in the new 2010/2011 playing strip, which will be launched in advance of the new season". In one fell swoop, a red Hyde United reverted to a black and white Hyde.

Observing from the outside it all seemed like a strange way of marking a club's long football history. Just days later, it appeared to become a little clearer, although the parties involved deny the logical causality. On 14th June, a press release codified Hyde's existing friendship with Manchester City. It doesn't take much of a cynic to make the connection between City's distaste for the colour red and the word United and Hyde's celebrations announced less than a week earlier.

The official intentions of the deal are that City's hilariously named Elite Squad (the stiffs) will play their matches at Hyde's Ewen Fields home, that City will pay for "improvement and uplift" of the facilities and that City in the Community will be Hyde's shirt sponsor.

Instinctively I find the idea concerning but Hyde, from what I understand, could really do with the funding that results from this relationship. A troublesome few years seem to have finally been put right but further investment at that level is unlikely to be met with anything other than open arms. My worry is that Hyde's side of this bargain requires more sacrifice than City's, which essentially amounts to dipping a teaspoon into an endless vat of money.

The improvements to Ewen Fields would make many of their peer clubs envious. Tom, a Hyde supporter of 11 years' standing, told me what is on the job sheet: "There are loads of improvements including a refurbed sponsors' lounge, new seats, scoreboard, a 'Premier League standard' home dressing room, new sprinkler system, and a few other unsexy things like a water tank, storage for the groundsman's equipment, astroturf down the side of the pitch and a new tunnel."

So what am I complaining about? Well, those new seats are sky blue. The stadium's also undergone a nice shiny new paint job - that's blue too. And just for good measure there's a nice big fat City crest at the top of the main stand. I'm not sure a City crest was on the wish list of Hyde secretary Tony Beard, who told the City website that "City have made improvements to the ground that were all on the wish list but we just couldn't do them."

For me, that crest rings alarm bells, but Tom has experienced lean times with the club and I'm really not in a position to speak with any authority on the harsh realities involved here.

"The board have told us that City's investment has helped secure the future of football in Hyde for the foreseeable future, and if that's the case then there's no question that that's a positive. Ewen Fields has had a £250,000 revamp at no cost to us, and the club's profile has already been boosted - we seem to be featured every other day on the City website at the moment, and hopefully we'll attract a few of their fans who're looking for football at three o'clock on a Saturday afternoon."

Manchester City supporter and blogger Jack Pitt-Brooke thinks his club is doing right by a local club, something he believes to be important: "For them, the positives are obvious: investment in infrastructure. By all accounts they've got new floodlights, a new pitch and irrigation system, a re-painting of the stadium and so forth. I don't know what the CITC sponsorship deal will give them relative to their previous deal but I think from a purely material perspective they have done well out of this. Whether their other concerns would outweigh these positives, you'd have to ask Hyde fans."

Tom's feelings on the deal indicate a tension between gratitude - not surprising from a supporter of a club recently in dire straits - and fear for Hyde's identity: "We've changed our name and play in a different colour, so our identity has already changed significantly. I just hope we don't become known by fans and the media as a Manchester City 'satellite club' - we need to be seen as a separate entity, although I imagine we'll be criticised and patronised in equal measure along the way."

"The news that we were changing our name and colours for the 125th anniversary seemed to be met with total bemusement, but as the jigsaw fell into place when the City partnership was announced people seemed to be more accepting. The priority is that we all still have a football club to go and watch on a Saturday afternoon - and we have."

I want to be indignant about this whole thing. I'm not convinced by denials that City forced Hyde to drop both their colours and their name because of similarities with City's neighbouring giants. However, if City's involvement is the difference between Hyde seeing 126-years-old and not, I must defer to their supporters to decide the priorities (although the crest, for me, is an abuse of the relationship). Jack shares the view that Hyde fans are important in all this: "I would defer to the judgement of Hyde fans. I wouldn't want to claim to speak for them. If they think it's a good deal then it's a good deal. If they think we've annexed them for the sake of PR, well, I'd accept that judgement too. If that is what they think, that we've sucked the soul out of their club, then that is obviously a real shame."

He also sees value for City in the deal, something I had been questioning, telling me that "City get a lot of bad press - not all of it justified in my opinion - and so our using our money altruistically is worthwhile. We've also got a new ground to play reserve and youth fixtures on (I wouldn't be surprised if we let Hyde have some of our Academy players, who are often quite good), and a bit more publicity for our very impressive 'City in the Community' programme. So there's quite a few positives for City."

It would be hypocritical to give City both barrels given my opinion that the Premier League is disgracefully negligent when it comes to English football as a whole. The word that worries me is 'annex', and although that's not the case here - as far as we know - it's just one step further and would be difficult to stomach.

(Pic via The 100 Football Grounds Club)