Big turn-out last night including a few new faces. The majority of the meeting was given over to Tim to talk about the on-going situation. I've summarised that below. I had to leave before the end for another appointment. Perhaps Steve or any of the other attendees who are also on here could add anything i missed. We'd moved on to AOB by then so I think i've probably captured the major stuff below. Once the minutes are circulated i'll update you all on anything else that dropped out.
Anyway - to the meeting.
There are 2 plans.
Plan A is to continue pressing ahead to build a new stadium
Plan B is to purchase the freehold of the Ricoh
Plan A
Currently in discussions with 2 other councils and presenting the benefits and economic impact of a multi-purpose stadium. Both those councils instantly see the benefits. The same presentation was made to Martin Reeves and Chris West with regard to the Ricoh and was ignored.
Club want to have a stadium consultation group – made up of fans – who work with the club to ensure new stadium meets wants and needs of fans as much as possible. What is critical is to get the site right. Ideally it will be a large site as the plan is to have the academy next to the stadium. It has to be within 8 miles of Earl Street, although if an absolutely perfect site is found at say 9 miles then he wouldn’t expect the league to block it.
In terms of timescales on what they can tell the fans, once the site is secure then they can go public. Hopefully that will put some fans minds at ease. It was made clear by a few members of the group that until something clear and concrete is in place and announced, fans will continue to be sceptical.
It could take 2 years to get planning permission (COULD!) but only 12 months to build. The build could be about £20m, plus £5m for the land, plus a contingency because construction is nearly always over budget.
Plan B
Ann Lucas will consider selling the freehold to Otium. A tenancy agreement just wouldn’t work because of the agreement CCC have with ACL.
Given the recent developments this is as close as we’ve been so far to negotiating a deal on the freehold. Still tough as CCC usual policy is not to sell freeholds. IF it can be done, great, but we continue with Plan A until then.
Tim expects Joy and Ann to meet within next two weeks and Joy is clear, if the freehold is for sale, she will buy it.
In terms of how it would work, there would be a prop-co and an op-co, which is normal. For example, at Sheffield United The new owner owns the Op-co, and Kevin McCabe (???) owns the Prop-co, but the new owner has option to buy the Prop-co.
Tim was clear though, all revenues, both matchday and non-match day would go to CCFC.
He thinks too much has gone on in public. He thinks now is the time to stop that, and if a deal is there to be done to do it in private – not in the papers.
Short –Term Deal.
A 3 year run-off was proposed to ACL and they dismissed it. This is a company who forced the club into administration, then rejected the CVA costing the club 10 points – so it’s difficult to do business with someone who did that to the club.
Players
Calumn Wilson, Connor Thomas and Cyrus Christie are all in discussion on new deals. Hope to secure all of them.
Steven Pressley is still on 1 in 1 out rule. You’re allowed to do that a limited number of times and we essentially have 4 ‘credits’ left, although Pressley will only do it if it’s right. He’s happy at the moment.
With regard to players leaving in January, the club don’t need to sell. The value of promotion is at least £5m. So unless something silly comes in the club would rather take the risk of getting promotion, than letting someone go for not very much.
Academy
Higgs agreement is nearly done to get back to the Higgs. Hopefully sorted in the next 2 weeks.
Other
Tickets and Retail has been combined – this might be old news – and Stacey will now lead on SCG. They are about to open the new superstore at Gallagher Retail which will increase footfall. Some staff will work from there and they will have players visiting, sell tickets, etc.
