He never had the money to buy the ground like he promised ,he left the club with no ground and an impossible conundrum to sort out regarding the 1899 club. What a great guy!
Remember when he shut the gates and put posters on them to try to ward off the bailiffs?
He transferred the ground to one of his comapies in return for writing off £11M debt (not getting into the arguement about who caused the debt!!). This also allowed us to carry on operating solvently.
He also sold the ground at a value which I believe, as did others, was below market value (agan, not getting involved in arguing the “real” value). He could have left us with the ground AND £11M debt and just walked away.
Can’t let this slide: the transfer of the ground to Swann’s company was his own move, it did not help the club in any way. The idea it allowed us to carry on operating solvently is not my understanding of the situation at all.
As for selling the ground “below market value”: a wise man once said that something is only worth what someone else will pay for it. So you can tell everyone that the ground is worth £11m but if no one else is going to pay that price, it’s not worth that. Swann received £3m, largely of public money, in return for a stadium which SUFC owned until he transferred it to his own company. I’m astonished there’s not more outrage over that.
