Karren Brady`s comments yesterday about ‘rebranding` West Ham United and claiming that the club had ‘no culture` perfectly summarised the vision of football from the eyes of business people.
The former Birmingham City Managing Director claimed that The Hammers` move from Upton Park to the London Stadium had been a success. However, listening to West Ham fans on a TalkSport phone in suggested otherwise.
Taking a club away from their home of 112 years before stating that there was no culture at the club is hypocritical and typical of the problems modern day football faces.
Upton Park was a massive part of the clubs culture. West Ham are a working class club from the east end of London. The plans that are being put in motion at West Ham are similar to the plans Brady and co-owners David Sullivan and the Gold brothers earmarked for Blues.
The proposal was to uproot the club away from St. Andrews to a new, council owned, stadium. Prior to that, heavily inflated ticket prices priced the average fan out of cheering on their team. In one season following promotion, Blues` average ticket prices rose from £22 to £43.
Through it all, penny pinching in the transfer market cost Blues dearly as they were relegated several times. The hierarchy were content with the club being a big fish in the second tier but never quite had the ambition to match their words when it came to the top flight.
Time and time again, Sullivan flirted with selling the club. After yet another relegation in 2008, a section of supporters took to the pitch to voice their opinion. It was a vociferous campaign aimed at the ownership of the club and one which the Blues owners heard loud and clear.
While I don`t condone the behaviour of some fans that day, the frustration was inevitable. Sullivan harps on about ‘saving` Blues when he took over the club back in 1993. His 80% share was purchased for £10 so it was a no-lose situation.
For a tenna, the Welshman took control of a club based in England`s second biggest city with huge, untapped, potential. At the time, he described the club as a ‘sleeping giant`.
But over the years, it was evident that Sullivan, Gold and Brady were in it purely as a business venture and not for the love of the club. Their sole aim was to rebrand, uproot and change the face Birmingham City Football Club and as a result, make a shed load of cash while letting the club simply plod along.
There was no real ambition and no passion.
Eventually, they entered talks with Grandtop International, owned by Carson Yeung. A sale was agreed but almost fell through when Yeung could not provide evidence of his finances. That should have put an end to it.
But Yeung was soon back on the scene and used borrowed money to fund the purchase of the club for more than £80m, twice its value at the time.
Local business people warned Sullivan about selling the club to Yeung whose history and track record in business left a lot to be desired. But as usual, Sullivan saw only the pound signs and agreed a sale to the Chinese, money laundering, hair dresser.
Although the recent years have been very bleak, Blues are slowly coming out the other side. Blame for much of the recent troubles lay as much at Sullivan`s door as it does Yeung`s and his sidekick Peter Pannu`s.
West Ham are today being led down a similar path. Sullivan, Gold and Brady will treat the fans merely as customers and will do everything in their power to strain every little bit of money out of the venture.
Moving to the Olympic Stadium is just the start. Although our club have had some dark times since, Sullivan, Gold and Brady would never be welcomed back to B9.
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