April 2026 Newsletter

April Newsletter

Easter Greetings to you all. It was a busy time at PHS in the run up to Easter with much deliberation about the Hall of Fame dinner and its subsequent postponement. It just wasn’t going to work with it being Easter Sunday and having the game on Easter Monday being moved forward. We are looking for another suitable date as the Hall of Fame awards and the dinner do generate a lot of good feedback. We’ll let you know when the date is agreed. 

The Former Players day at the Oxford game went well with lots of players turning up with their guests and enjoying each other's company as well as being paraded on the pitch at half-time. A massive thanks to committee members Jake Payne, Colin Farmery and Roger Higgins for organising it, to Paul Maidment for taking pictures and to Mick Comben, Greg Hills and Phil Magrath for talking to fans and selling books and memberships in the Fan Zone. Phil got lots of player autographs in some of our books so they will make super raffle prizes at some stage. Well done Phil. And thanks to Mick, Roger, Greg and Phil for doing the stadium tours that started at 8am before coming to the Fan Zone! One Pompey Fan, “Gibraltar Monkey”, has subsequently posted a number of times on social media with pictures of the tour that he was on, including one of the boardroom picture of HMS Victory - near Gibraltar after the battle of Trafalgar - and also the monkey going out through the tunnel towards the pitch. We’re glad that they obviously enjoyed our tour. Tours take place before matches and during the school holidays, see the club’s website for details.

Other things to mention are:-

Our Latest Magazine

A few people have asked us for the link again so here it is. The latest magazine contains part two of the article on the various training grounds that the club has had over the years and other great items such as the article on Peter Ellis. It is what they call a “flip book” as you can flip the pages on the screen to read it like a book, or you can download it. The password is POMPEY, all upper case. Enjoy!

Fundraising

As mentioned in our last update, and communicated on the club’s website on Good Friday, commissioning a replica of the Women’s National League South trophy is the latest fundraising project for our Society. It follows an anonymous, substantial, donation, paving the way to ensure that the title the club has won an unprecedented three times is marked for posterity. The donor wanted the money to go to this cause but we need to raise another £1,000 to make the project happen and we've teamed up with the women’s team to raise the money by the end of the summer. We will do this in various ways including a bucket collection at the team’s final home fixture of the season against Nottingham Forest, at Fratton Park on April 26 (2pm). We believe that it is an important campaign as whilst the winners of many competitions receive a replica trophy from the organising authorities, the women’s National League winners get nothing. And given that our women’s team is the only one to have won this trophy three times – in 2012, 2015 and, most recently, in 2024 – the society feels it’s important that success is permanently represented in the club’s trophy cabinet. Members may recall that there is a precedent, as it was our society that commissioned the replicas of the Division One (1949 & 1950) and Division Three (1962 & 1983) men’s trophies, as the Football League didn’t issue them at the time. Eric Coleborn, a director of PFC Women, told us that he was delighted that the Society is leading on this and he will be asking supporters of the women’s club to contribute. Supporters can donate to our society’s Gerry Spragg's Fund – as you will recall, named after a former society member, and co-author of the 125 history book – using this link https://www.paypal.com/donate?campaign_id=PNNPZNF9TY36N  We’ll keep you updated re progress as usual.

John Jenkins Stadium

Committee member Chris Gibbs spotted that the plaques recording the names of those who donated to the project have been installed on the wall at the JJ Stadium. The PHS agreed back in 2022 to send a donation so we’re pleased that we helped with the building of the new stadium in a small way.

Treasurer

You will have seen before a request for someone to act as our treasurer. Paul Boynton wants to step down and concentrate on various projects for the Society and of course he wont leave us in the lurch but we really do now need to find a replacement as Paul has been wanting to change roles for quite a while. The charity cannot exist without a treasurer. We’ve spoken to a couple of people as a result of previous appeals but nothing has come of that and recently someone asked us for more details about this voluntary position so the following information should help.

The Treasurer would want to attend the majority of the monthly management committee meetings held in the Players Lounge at Fratton Park as well as the Trustees meetings, held every few months. Our Treasurer will look after the bank account although in a normal month we don't believe that this is too onerous, and of course do the general book-keeping of the charity, preparing a monthly verbal report for the Committee as well as the year end statements, helped by Committee member Richard Wilson. These statements are not complex, comprising an income and expenditure statement and a basic balance sheet showing our assets and liabilities.

The main responsibilities are:-

• Undertake day to day management of the bank accounts as a signatory and ensure the charity book-keeping and records are maintained in accordance with any specific requirements laid down by the Charity Commission
• Ensure monies are claimed for stadium tours and book sales from the club in a timely manner twice a year and pay any invoices after sign-off
• Use appropriate financial software such as the Lloyds Bank Business banking app together with MSExcel where required to record transactions
• Update the monthly management meeting and the Trustees meeting with basic financial data re income and expenditure and financial plans to include a basic cashflow budget

• Prepare the annual financial statements in a format suitable for charity purposes that meet any specific requirements of the Charity Commission 
• Present the annual accounts to the AGM for information and to the Board of Trustees for sign off
• Liaise with auditors as required annually – both the internal auditor within the charity and the University of Portsmouth Accountancy Faculty (who undertake our annual independent examination) ensuring they have all the records that they require for examination
• Input generally to meetings on any financial issue and perceived weakness in financial controls and adherence to financial systems and policies

Paul has various spreadsheets all set up and running alongside the bank account so we would hope that the role shouldn’t be too onerous for someone taking it on. We don't currently use accountancy software such as Xero but would want to move to that in time so when that time comes we will all have to learn what that involves and one of our trustees, Mark Parnell, is an expert so will help train us.

If you are interested, please just reply to this email and we will get Paul to contact you to answer any questions that you have.

And we wanted to thank both Paul and Richard Wilson for their work in producing our latest set of annual accounts. This year we were asked by Charity Commission rules to have an independent examination of the accounts and we were grateful that the University of Portsmouth provided this service for us free of charge. The accountancy faculty undertook the audit for us and produces a report at the end which gets sent onto the Charity Commissioners and we’re pleased to report that we have received an absolutely clean bill of health which is a fantastic achievement (although expected!!). Thank you Paul and Richard. So whoever does take over from Paul should benefit because our finances all make sense and are easy to understand. And tea and coffee are provided at our monthly meetings if that helps!!

Big Yellow

We recently asked for help with storing items in our archive as we were running out of space. As a result the guys at Big Yellow came forward and have allocated a unit to us. This is now in use, we have already moved a number of items in there and so a massive “thank you” to Big Yellow in Rodney Road, Portsmouth. We are also helped by member Michael Saunders who has taken various boxes of old stadium plans into his garage and is starting to go through them to record what's there. Reading about all the various attempts at having a new stadium over the years can be a bit depressing but as an architect he is the perfect person for the job so “thank you" to Michael for doing it.

Past Chimes

Pompey record holder Guy Whittingham was our latest guest on Richard Atkins-Greig's Express FM radio show, although this month it was with Colin Farmery standing in for Richard who is still recovering from major surgery. Do listen on past shows on Express FM catch up at: 

 https://www.mixcloud.com/pompeyonexpress/  

Our guest next month is to be a forward who had two spells at the club and who will be talking about his career and a cause dear to his heart. For more clues to who this is, see our social media throughout April!

Portsmouth 100 Project

It’s full steam ahead now under the leadership of committee member Phil Magrath. We are scoping a number of displays covering 100 years of PFC’s life; examples being a collection of programmes from every one of the 100 years, a Jimmy Dickinson exhibit with the England shirt we purchased last year and a pair of his shorts and other stuff, the life and times of Peter Harris with his gold medals, and so on. We’re trying to get something in place from each decade since 1926. They will all go live at the museum by the end of October and should look fabulous. And thanks to those of you who offered to help. Phil will be in touch with you soon if he hasn’t already. This is all really exciting as it will enable us to show off some of our collections to the public in a very professional setting.

The Leicester Match

The club is celebrating Portsmouth's 100 years of being a city at this match. There are still places available on the 8am tour and the guides will talk about the history of the Pompey vs Leicester matches over the years (and there have been quite a few interesting ones!) so if you fancy getting up early and joining us before the game then please do so.

Thats all for now. 

Play Up Pompey!