Tottenham suing for a stadium, and Fulham’s owner message to fans…

In the new this week around the Premier League this past week, Tottenham has gone forward with their lawsuit over the 2012 London Olympics Stadium which was awarded to West Ham United.  I had discussed the two proposed plans that both of these clubs had for the Olympic Stadiums and their bids in a previous post.  After West Ham United’s bid was chosen as the winner, Tottenham had been considering about whether it would be worth the risk of paying around $1 million in legal fees to launch a lawsuit.  As this article notes, Tottenham has begun their legal proceedings and have claimed there were issues with the process in which the winning bid was chosen.  As the stadium is said to be worth around $777 million U.S. dollars, it is not surprising that Tottenham was quite unhappy with this decision.  While their bid required them to put money into the project, it was much less than the cost of having to build a brand new facility, especially a state of the art one like that which is being built for the Olympics.  Clearly, Tottenham believes the $1 million in legal fees is a small risk, when the potential payoff is a three-quarter of a billion dollar brand new facility.

It’ll be curious to see how this plays out, however the Olympic group which is in charge of the stadium have already come out and said they believe that their decision to award the bid of converting the Olympic Stadium into a stadium for West Ham and other events will be vindicated in the courts. It is interesting to note that if the season ended today, Tottenham would be playing in the Europa League next season, while West Ham United would be relegated down to the nPower Championship League.

In one other piece of strange news… Fulham’s owner Mohamed Al Fayed decided to erect a statue of Michael Jackson in front of the clubs stadium.  Mr. Al Fayed who was a good friend of the late King of Pop did have some curious words for any Fulham fans who questioned his decision to put up the statue:

“I don’t want them to be fans. If they don’t understand and don’t believe in things I believe in, they can go to Chelsea, they can go to anywhere else.”

I checked the iTV site which has attendance numbers, and Fulham are at about 94.2% capacity in their 26,000 capacity stadium this season… while Chelsea are around 98% in their 42,000 seating stadium.  It seems to me that there is a higher demand for Chelsea, and another of the other clubs in London based on both percentage of capacity and total number of fans going to the games of other clubs.  Furthermore, Fulham is in the bottom quarter of the league in regards to average attendance.  I don’t why Mr. Al Fayed would even think of suggesting that fans go to other clubs, especially ones like Chelsea who are battling near the top of the table, while Fulham hovers at mid-table with no chance of playing in Europe.  If I was Fulham I would be worry about bringing fans into the games, not putting up statues for individuals who haven’t even really affected the Premier League on or off the field.

West Ham vs Tottenham, the Battle for the Olympic Stadium

This week the Premier League clubs West Ham United and Tottenham faced off in a battle for the ages, this one was not on the pitch, but was rather waged over the control of the 2012 London Summer Olympics Stadium.  The stadium which has been under construction will seat about 80,000 for the Olympic games and will be used for the opening and closing ceremony, as well as track and field events.  Originally the plan for the £537 million stadium was for it to be converted down to a 25,000 seat stadium to host athletic and other events after the Olympic Games.  In November of 2010, things got a bit more interesting when it was announced that there were two final bids for the stadium, both of which were coming from two notable Premier League clubs.

The first bid by Tottenham was also partially backed by Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), who are famous for their work on the Staples Center in Los Angeles, the Sprint Center in Kansas City, and potentially a new football stadium in Los Angeles next to the Staples Center.  Some had said that the AEG-Tottenham joint bid was a sure winner, especially after AEG converted the Millennium Dome into the O2 Arena, which is the world’s largest grossing concert arena.  The bid for the Olympic Stadium was said to a minimum of £250 million to convert the Olympic Stadium into a 60,000 seat venue for both Tottenham and large-scale concerts.  Tottenham’s biggest criticism seemed to be that the team is based a whopping 5 miles away from the Olympic Stadium, which is noted as being quite an issue for its supporters to travel.

The second from West Ham, U.S. based concert group Live Nation, and the Newham Council.  This plan decided to keep the track around the pitch in the stadium, and convert the venue into a 60,000 seat venue for West Ham matches, concerts, as well as other future athletic events.  It was reported by ESPN Soccernet that the Newham Council had given at least £40 million backing to the West Ham bid, which is said to be a conversion that will cost around £100 million.  The main issue with the West Ham bid seemed to be that the team was going to move out of 35,000 seat Upton Park to a stadium with 25,000 more seats, making some think that they would not be able to fill the Olympic Stadium.

As things began to heat up in the battle, both bids were presented with arguments from both clubs in the London Evening Standard.  In effort to try to make their bid even more pleasing Tottenham offered to even renovate Crystal Palace’s training facilities.  Today it was reported by the BBC that West Ham’s bid had won, and that the Hammers would be moving in at the new tenant after completing conversion of the stadium after the Olympics.  Where does that leave us?  Well Tottenham will probably now have to go back and start looking at their plans to move just north of the current location of White Hart Lane and build a 56,000 seat stadium as they had originally planned, and as had been approved by the Mayor of London.  That leaves Upton Park, which the club is claiming could be vacated and be used for redevelopment by 2014.

One Step Closer

The taxman today rejected Portsmouth FC’s offer regarding their tax arrears (a mere £7m), leaving the football (soccer) club yet closer to either administration (chapter 11 protection effectively) or liquidation as they face a High Court winding up order over the debts.

Nick (e.g. here) and myself on here have previously written on the perilous state of Portsmouth FC, already in the hands of about its fifteenth owner this season alone.

Portsmouth is avoiding administration as long as it possibly can because by FA regulations, clubs entering administration are docked 10 points – this would effectively relegate the club to the Championship as they are already six points away from the last safe spot in the Premiership. This is the usual nightmare situation facing clubs in a relegation/promotion set-up like European football – and West Ham’s new owners (another team in relegation trouble) have recently commented on the armageddon that relegation would mean for the club.

Incidentally, West Ham’s owners say their situation would be “worse than Newcastle” if they went down. Newcastle, out of interest, are currently sitting pretty at the top of the Championship, well on course for an immediately return to the Premiership…