Bairns' boardroom exit

Colin Liddell OBE resigned his position as director at the weekend, following Douglas McIntyre out of the Bairns boardroom over recent months.

It leaves the directors at the helm of the club as Andy Thomson, Lex Miller, Margaret Lang, Martin Ritchie and Ronnie Bateman, plus chairman Doug Henderson.

And The Falkirk Herald understands at least one other is considering their position on the club board and could follow Mr Liddell and Mr McIntyre at, or before, the next AGM.

Mr Liddell was a former vice chairman of the Bairns and returned to the board in 2014. However he has stepped down from his directorship for two new appointments away from football.

He said: “I am changing the balance between business and personal interests and the nature of the new appointments means that I have to devote a lot of time to them. I remain one of the group of major shareholders of the club and will continue to attend as many games, home and away, as I can”.

Earlier this summer former chairman Douglas McIntyre, one of the original group which oversaw the Bairns’ removal from provisional liquidation in 1998 along with Mr Liddell and Martin Ritchie, stepped down. He had made no secret his return to the board, in 2010, was short term and he assumed the chairmanship while Mr Ritchie conducted a strategic review of the club.

The Bairns board has seen a return to profitability of the club with it’s cash at bank trebling between 2014 and 2015 to £626,000 and shareholder funds sitting at £2.6m at the most recent accounts. However in recent weeks the board has come in for criticism from fans over a perceived lack of re-investment of transfer monies received following Will Vaulks’ move to Rotherham.