There have been several points raised. Many of them (not just by you) have sought to justify an apparant high price. The floodlights, the toilets, the world class facilitues. Duffer also has the "Sky Blue John" amendment -- unless we know why its higher how can you question it - there may be a valid reason.
There's a difference between trying to justify a price and discussion about why the price could be high. Lets make it simple. If the cost of staging the game is £5K and the hire charge is £5K then its a very reasonable offer from ACL. If the cost of staging the game is £1K and the hire charge is £5K causing the loss of the booking that is poor business from ACL.
We know there have been people who have hired the Ricoh for games with no issue so either, as I have stated before, either ACL have ramped the price up for no reason and lost the business, poor show from them if they have or there's a reason the price has gone up. I don't see that as siding with ACL or trying to justify anything, it's just common sense.
Personally I think it would be naive to think the cost of staging a game at the Memorial, Sixfields, Ricoh or Wembley should all be the same on the basis that they are all just football pitches.
Now lets all have an honest 5 minutes here. Lets assume sisu still rented the ground and lets just say they said they did not want this game to go ahead unless Sisu received £5,000. Can you, Duffer et al honestly tell me you would have gone to such lengths to justify this stance? I am sorry I cannot believe you would.
I think if we were back at the Ricoh there would be nowhere near this level of interest in every potential booking there. But if you want an answer I would think exactly the same.
Another point. People constantly tell us this is a community asset. Really? So a game in the local community is now being refused for profit. Well those hard nosed hedge fund people we can expect this from but the council and the charitable ACL? This means it isnt a community asset at all because unless the price is paid the community best move up the M6.
As far as I know the Ricoh is not registered as a community asset however it does fall under one of the categories so would most likely qualify. I don't know enough about the process to tell you if becoming a community asset impacts the ability to make profit or if you have to adopt a charity or social enterprise model.
I cannot see why posters such as you and Duffer go to great lengths to justify a decision that is only justifiable if profit is the only motive and I certainly do not believe if sisu had asked for such recompense you would be leaping to the defence of the clubs' owners.
I'm not trying to justify a decision, especially when I don't know if there is good reasoning behind the decision! If SISU choose to profit in the future from renting the ground out the only complaints from me will be if it not for the benefit of the club. If poor business decisions are made that lose business they are poor decisions whether made by ACL or SISU.