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Ken Bates: Why Thorp Arch deal was kicked into touch
Leeds United chairman Ken Bates today gave his take on the dramatic collapse of the sale of the club's Thorp Arch training ground.
City council bosses had agreed in principle to purchase the complex for 6m from its current owner, Manchester-based company Barnaway.
The site, on prime development land near Wetherby, would then have been leased back to United.
But the council needed to complete due diligence checks before midnight on Thursday, when the club's exclusive option to buy Thorp Arch for a fixed price of 6m expired.
And yesterday it was revealed the deadline had passed without the option being exercised, with United blaming conditions the council had tried to attach to the deal.
Now Mr Bates has further upped the ante, saying: "We kept trying to put pressure on to get the outstanding matters resolved but it was like (pulling] dragon's teeth.
"As soon as one problem was solved, up came two more, and some of them were a bit nonsensical to put it mildly.
"It came to a situation at 4pm on Thursday afternoon where we were faced with 13 demands, most of which could have been raised weeks or even months ago and we only had seven hours to solve them all."
United can remain as tenants at Thorp Arch for another 20 years, under the terms of the site's original sale to Manchester businessman Jacob Adler.
But once their lease runs out, there would be nothing to stop the owner of the time evicting them.
Barnaway could in theory agree to sell Thorp Arch to the club or a third party prior to the expiry of the lease.
The amount the buyer would have to pay, however, is no longer fixed at 6m.
Thorp Arch's current market value is estimated to be 11m.
Leeds City Council's joint leader, Coun Andrew Carter, would not be drawn on the nature of the conditions sought by the local authority.
He did say, however, that they were designed to protect the interests of the council taxpayer.
The club would have surrendered their exclusive option on the training ground to the authority to allow the proposed deal to be done.
United approached the council for help after failing in attempts to raise money themselves for the buy-back.
Leeds, then under the chairmanship of Gerald Krasner, sold the training ground for 4m in 2004 as they tried to stave off financial collapse.
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Friday 10 February 2012
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