GREAT Harwood Town chairman Bill Holden is an optimist, which many people might think is just as well.

When your club is bottom of the league, without a manager and the fee for your star striker goes to help pay for refurbishing the floodlights, life's tough and a touch of optimism comes in useful.

But chairman Bill has a bucketful of the stuff.

Town suffered their fifth consecutive defeat in the UniBond League First Division on Wednesday night to leave them pinned even more firmly to the foot of the table.

But the man at the helm remains determined to construct a brighter future.

So how is he tackling the three prime problems of being rock-bottom of the table, finding a manager and sorting out the fund-raising for the £15,000 needed to upgrade the floodlights?

"I still don't think we will go down," said the chairman who can't give the manager a vote of confidence because he doesn't have one yet!

"We have 21 points to play for and a few of those games are against teams involved at the bottom of the league.

"One of the problems is that it is a vicious circle. For example, we wanted an experienced striker to help us climb the table, but they are thin on the ground and who's going to come to a bottom team?

"But it is important that we get the right people in to run the team soon enough.

"It's a good standard in the UniBond League and we want to stay there. But, having said that, if we were to go down, the North West Counties is a good league too."

Bill believes the appointment of a manager could well be the key to Town's hopes of staying up.

And he hopes to make an announcement in the next couple of weeks.

But, being chairman, he also has to run the finances and that means finding the money for the lights to add to the weekly running costs. "We sold Peter Smith to Barrow and that went a long way towards rewiring the lights," he said.

"But it wasn't just a financial decision. There was a clause in his contract that if a club from a higher league came in he could speak to them. We didn't want to sell him but the money did come in handy."

Heavily involved in local football virtually all his life, 52-year-old Bill has no doubt that the hardest part of his job is raising funds.

"If we had a lot of money in the bank it would take many of the problems away," he said.

"But at least we aren't in a precarious position and I don't intend us to get into a situation like that by spending silly money. I receive tremendous support behind the scenes from some brilliant people willing to work for the club and it is now essential to get the right men involved on the management side.

"If we do that, I don't see any reason why we cannot attract involvement from a couple of local businesses, or even a major sponsor.

"In many ways, this club provides a community service and that's another reason why I am an optimist. We have increased the number of youth teams we have here from one to five.

"We have good facilities and, hopefully, we will get the benefits in future, on and off the field. We would like local people and business to become more involved to their benefit as well as ours.

"It is now essential we appoint the right manager and he brings in the right people, then hopefully it will bear fruit.

"We are at a crossroads."

Bill admits he has never contemplated going to another club, because his heart is at The Showground.

With a little help from his friends behind the scenes, maybe some outside investment by way of sponsorship, plus the right man in charge, Bill believes the future is bright - and not just because of the new floodlights!

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.