The whole Cov Utd thing comes across to me as a bit of an ego trip. If there's some money to put into local football why not put it into someone like Sphinx?
I'm all for supporting injured players and giving them a chance to prove themselves but Thomas seems to just get one injury after another.
Add in the concussion problems and he might want to consider retiring before he gets another blow on the head and potentially does long term damange that...
Couldn't care less about Leicester. Maybe it depends when you started going. I started in 86 and it was always Villa, Leicester never got a mention.
Happy to see anyone, apart from Villa, break up the monotony of the same handful of teams.
The players made a visit to University Hospital. They have a campaign on to raise £40K to do up the childrens emergency ward. Aaron Martin has donated a grand.
http://www.ccfc.co.uk/news/article/aaron-martin-donation-uhcw-charity-coventry-city-2843773.aspx
Off the top of my head I can think of AMG, AEG, SMG, Lloyds (to sit alongside the newly acquired Genting Arena and Barclaycard Arena in Birmingham), Eventim. Sure there's lots more that I'm not aware of hence why you should engage a specialist to ensure you reach all potential purchasers.
Maybe you could point me to some of the marketing material they sent out to potential purchasers, locally, nationally and internationally stating that ACL was for sale with a 210 year lease extension.
Doesn't matter how narrow the market is you should properly place it on that market to ensure every potential buyer is aware of its availability and on what terms.
You're right many people didn't believe anyone else would be interested but the very fact there was indicates they were wrong and...
I think an open and honest sale process should have taken place where any potential buyer was able to bid on the same thing. IMO that is the only way to achieve best return. If that process had taken place there would have been huge pressure on SISU to bid. If they didn't and someone else...
Certainly wasn't and by not having an open and competitive market the council can't possibly claim to have got the best return possible for the taxpayer.
We have some valuations on which to decide if a fair price was paid.
Council's Arena Construction Report from June 2006:
The Council's freehold interest in the Arena, i.e. the market value that could be obtainedfrom the sale of the freehold with the existing ACL lease in place, has been...