Less than a month after it was launched, the Bluebirds Trust are over halfway towards meeting their target in their Share Contribution Scheme.

The Trust will be taking up a ten per cent stake in Barrow AFC, as part of the new ownership consortium at the club that was put together by chairman Paul Hornby last month.

In order to ensure that supporters will have their own say in how AFC is run in the future, they needed to raise the £50,000 the shares are worth.

As of yesterday morning, £27,844 was in the bank, with there being no sign of a slow-down in response from the fans.

In a further attempt to drum up interest ahead of Christmas, the Bluebirds Trust have released a video on YouTube, where a selection of supporters speak about just how much the club means to them.

This includes BBC Radio Cumbria’s Barrow AFC commentator Adam Johnson, who has gone from fetching footballs at Holker Street to following the team to all corners of the country to keep fans up-to-date with the team’s fortunes.

Johnson said: “I’ve progressed from a ball boy to being a supporter to now being a radio commentator, following the club up and down the country.

“It makes it even better when you get to an away game and all you can see is, no matter how far you’ve gone in the country, is just blue-and-white scarves, blue-and-white shirts, friendly faces and friendly voices from the Barrow supporters who travel up and down the country.

“It’s not long ago that I was one of those myself, so it’s a lot like a family, supporting Barrow.

“It’s not just a football club: you make lasting friendships and meet people you stick with for the rest of your life.”

Kit man Les Houghton is a club legend at the Bluebirds, having had a connection with them that is closing in on 60 years and his family’s ties with the club go back even further.

“It started with my grandma and grandad, which must be going back to the early 1900s, when they first had a club,” Houghton said. “I think they went to the ground before they started at Holker Street.

“I started following Barrow in 1959 and I bet I’ve missed about ten home games since then.”

Given how close the stadiums at Holker Street and Craven Park, home of Barrow Raiders, are to each other in the town, it is not uncommon for people who live locally to watch the home games of both teams.

Occasionally, though, some eventually settle their focus on just the one of them, as was the case with Ray Beecham.

He said: “The first match I came to in Barrow, I took my two sons and we went to Craven Park and at the end of the game the younger one looked up to me and said ‘dad, next week we go to Holker Street,’ and I’ve been coming ever since.”

The youngest supporter featured on the video was Freya Dawes, who said: “I remember coming home from school saying ‘dad, please can we go to Barrow football on Saturday?’

“We went, played someone in red and got beat, but we never looked back.”

For Barrow supporters who are thinking of purchasing share contributions, the Bluebirds Trust have stated that the latest date that will guarantee delivery before Christmas is this Saturday.