There’
s been a huge change in the opinion of fans who used to say, ‘We want success.’ ‘Spend more money.’ ‘Buy more players.’ What they’re now saying is, ‘Do your best, chairman, but don’t dare put us into administration. Don’t put the future of my club at risk.’
That’s a quantum change. In other words, the fan is now realising that the skill of the board is to spend the right amount of money on the right manager and the right players at the right time.
The fans now know that for them to have a prudent chairman, a prudent board, a prudent financial structure at their football club is so important to them whereas 20 years ago they didn’t have an understanding of it, administration wasn’t an issue then.
I didn’t have an understanding myself before I got involved. As a fan, I was the same. ‘Spend the money, borrow it and get Malcolm MacDonald’ or whoever the best striker of the day was. But there’s been a big change.
The fans also now realise the importance of the commercial side of the club. Our marketing people are important to us because the corporate side of the business is vital; you need to get the best sponsors on board.
The difference between one club and another who arc in competition – let’s say Aston Villa and Birmingham City -depends on a number of circumstances, including the fan base and commercial income. If our capacity is 30,000 and Villa’s is considerably more, then they have an advantage. But if we have greater corporate income than them, it begins to balance out. However if they’ve got a greater corporate contribution than us, then they stay above us in the league of finance.
There are other issues, whether we can encourage big sponsors to come to us and not to our competitors, this gives us the edge, so the financial side of the football club is vciy, very important because if you can generate more wealth than your competitor then you have the advantage.
Charlton, for instance, will have an income probably ten million pounds less than Birmingham City Football Club, but what they have over Birmingham City at the moment is more years in the Premiership, so they’re stronger in that sense. But we’re all in competition with each other, both financially and on the pitch and the supporters now have a greater understanding of this.
Southampton had to move stadium to basically double their capacity to compete on a level playing field commercially. Do you see that as a way forward for Blues eventually
I think there are four options:
– One, do nothing. If you can survive at 30,000 capacity without burdening yourself with debt – and we have no debt -there’s a case for that;
– Two, rebuild the main stand at a cost of £12 million to increase the capacity by five or six thousand seats, but they would be the most expensive seats to build in the Premier League.
The third possibility would be for us to build a brand new 40,000 seater stadium on our own which I think, unless we received help, doesn’t seem feasible. If you arc an Arsenal and have a 35,000 stadium, but have got 25,000 people on a waiting list for season tickets, you can build a 60,000 seater stadium for £200 million, knowing you’ll fill it and have the income coming in to cover it.
Birmingham City doesn’t have-that, you have to face the fact that we arc still building our fan base. We are seeing growth each year, we’re building and building the fan base at Birmingham City Football Club, but we have to say that the years in the gloom and doom of the past have taken its toll.
A fourth possibility is that the city of Birmingham builds a stadium, which we share. Birmingham is one of the greatest cities in Europe, and all great cities have their cathedrals and their cultural centres. Birmingham has all of that but it doesn’t have a great stadium.
Manchester has just proven that it can be done with the City of Manchester Stadium where Manchester City play. I believe that a great city like Birmingham should have the same. No disrespect to Sheffield or Bristol,
“I believe a great city like Birmingham should have a great stadium.”
but this is Birmingham, the centre of the country, the great second city and yet sometimes we fall sadly short. I think it’s time that we recognise that we arc a city to be proud of and that we’ve got to grasp the nettle.
We seem to accept second best as a city, with people saying ‘we can’t do this and we can’t do that, we haven’t got the money’. I think that kind of attitude has to change. This is an amazing city but if we’re not careful we can slip backwards. Just go into the centre of the city, you’re proud. Wow! This is my city. It’s stunning but you have to keep moving forward. ‘We need a City ol Birmingham Stadium, with a 60,000 capacity,’ I say to the city council, and the people of Birmingham, Birmingham City Football Club is a willing partner, join us and fulfil this
dream. Let’s look for a fantastic site in Birmingham, let’s look for a site that we can regenerate. I’m trying to get this enthusiasm because I’m enthusiastic about the idea but the city of Birmingham, the people of Birmingham have got to say, ‘I support this’.
It sounds like you think the national football stadium should have been in Birmingham and not at Wembleyl
The opportunities to build a National Stadium in Birmingham with everything, with roads, with parking, with railways, with an airport, hotels. For God’s sake, here was a once in a lifetime opportunity and what do we do? We stick it right back in the middle of the worst place in the world for a National Football Stadium. All the traffic going to Heathrow clogs it up. No motorway runs close to it. There’s just no way to get to it. Daft!
What about ground-sharing with our neighbours across the cityl
I don’t think that will ever happen. There would be too much opposition – from both sets of supporters. It happens in other countries of the world but I can’t see it happening in Birmingham – or in the other big footballing cities in Britain.
Are there any things you would have done differently at Birmingham}
I think we should have given Barry Fiy another year. Baz joined the football club and came up to me and said; “Chairman, I promise you, I’ll get you out of this poxy division.” We were in the First Division at the time and true to his word, he did, he got us into the Second!
But to this day, he is my pal. Twice a year we’ll have dinner and he’ll stay over at my house. That was a sad day, getting rid of Barry Fry; his sacking is something I regret to this day. We did it because we knew that.