We’ve Been There and We Stand With You

The crises currently unfolding at Sheffield Wednesday and Morecambe FC are painfully familiar to those of us at Fulham Football Club. We have been to the brink ourselves—not once, but several times—and we understand all too well the devastation and uncertainty that supporters of both clubs are experiencing.

In the 1980s, Fulham came perilously close to disappearing altogether. Under Ernie Clay’s ownership and later through the efforts of developers like Marler Estates and Bulstrode Estates, we faced hostile attempts to merge our Club with QPR to form the soulless “Fulham Park Rangers”—a move that would have erased our identity, our heritage and over a century of history.

In the early 2000s, we faced another crisis when Mohamed Al Fayed sold Craven Cottage, with plans to redevelop the site. The Club was forced to groundshare at Loftus Road.

Each time, it was the fans - ordinary people who loved this club - who fought back and saved it. It was their unwavering commitment that brought us back and preserved our legacy.

These moments are etched into our history—not just as warnings, but as proof of what happens when football clubs are treated as assets to be traded or developed, rather than community institutions. And now, we watch with deep concern as Sheffield Wednesday and Morecambe FC face their own battles against mismanagement and neglect.

That’s why the Fulham Lillies are standing in full solidarity with the fans of Sheffield Wednesday and Morecambe FC. What’s happening at these clubs is horrifying but not unfamiliar. At Sheffield Wednesday, the reports of unpaid wages and partial stadium closures due to safety issues echo the worst days of our own past. At Morecambe, the situation is equally dire, with owner Jason Whittingham—already associated with the collapse of Worcester Warriors—taking the club to the edge of extinction.

Football fans - especially women and girls - know how hard we fight to feel welsome, to be heard, to belong. To have our clubs undermined by incompetent or reckless ownership is a betrayal of everything we stand for.

We want to give particular support to our sisters at Sheffield Wednesday Women’s Supporters Group. Your strength and advocacy is vital at this trying time.

What makes this even harder to accept is that these failures aren’t new. It’s been over 40 years since our club nearly vanished, yet nothing has fundamentally changed. The structures that should protect our clubs are still failing. The authorities are still reactive rather than preventative. Owners can still treat clubs as toys or business ventures without consequences - until it’s too late.

This has to stop.

We urge the newly created independent football regulator to investigate both situations with urgency and to set out firm recommendations. English football cannot afford to keep repeating the same mistakes. Clubs are more than businesses—they are lifelines for their communities, and they deserve protection from those who would exploit them.

Football belongs to the fans.