Manwork04
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The fact of the matter is you need BOTH, a successful team and the right infrastructure to sustain it. I guess it all boils down to the vision and longevity of the chairman and investors at the club, I'm sure you can all draw your own conclusions on the incumbent, if you have a short term view then you will only invest in the team, if you have a medium to long term view you would build the infrastructure to sustain it going forward.
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Rule Britannia
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WasRambo
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This is a self perpetuating debate tbh. You can argue either way. I have my reasons for believing that you need an attractive football product in order to properly utilise a 12k stadium.
I agree that corporate facilities and offices, if fully rented add to income but again, there's some huge assumptions being made about how attractive to the customer even those would be. Saying your office, or wedding is at Old Trafford is likely far more attractive than Sixfields (where? Say 90% of the country)
I guess it depends on your viewpoint, do you want a football club that happens to have offices at the stadium, or an office block that happens to have a football team...
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Shoemaker
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I wonder which we will get next year
Investment in the squad..... Unlikely as we need outside investment to compete,it’s my opinion that the only reason we signed players for fees last season was due to the extra chinese money. This now looks like it may not have hit the bank and DB had to pick up the tab(which asks the question why he didn’t just use that money in the first place)
Stadium redevelopment I’m struggling to keep up with all this but I’m sure when KT took over he was ready to build the stand. The council have said he can start when he wants. Nothing.... The land around the stadium seems to be the carrot and what KT has got involved for. Like others have said this land should benefit the club and the council want to have a good look at themselves if they sell it on elsewhere.
I can see KT being told he can’t have the surrounding land and pulling the plug.
Either way I can’t see him hanging around. He will either disappear with a lovely profit or get the hump and leave.
The football club seem secondary to this. I hope I’m very much wrong on this but I fear the worst.
The council need to make a statement on their intentions surrounding the land issue and how it will or will not benefit the club and the town.
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EssTeeFree
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I know I'm going to regret asking this but I've done some searching and I can't find the definitive answer....
My understanding is that the delay in developing the East stand is solely due to conflicting leases being held by different parties for the land the stand sits on, not the surrounding land. 50% of the posts on this thread now seem to be about Thomas trying to 'grab' surrounding land. He may well be, I genuinely don't know but that doesn't seem relevant to the status of the East.
Can anyone give a factual breakdown of the current status - without using is as vehicle to have a go at the current board / the council / the alt-left / brexit or whatever?
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Mathius
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As NBC have failed to meet their own deadline, couldn't the trust approach them for an update?
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meccanostand
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I know I'm going to regret asking this but I've done some searching and I can't find the definitive answer....
My understanding is that the delay in developing the East stand is solely due to conflicting leases being held by different parties for the land the stand sits on, not the surrounding land. 50% of the posts on this thread now seem to be about Thomas trying to 'grab' surrounding land. He may well be, I genuinely don't know but that doesn't seem relevant to the status of the East.
Can anyone give a factual breakdown of the current status - without using is as vehicle to have a go at the current board / the council / the alt-left / brexit or whatever?
Think the rumours have come about due to a vacuum of info on how the East Stand works will be funded. Why will or should Bower spend his own money finish the stand off with small chance of a return? Remember that mysterious sum £3mil was it? What's happened to that? If it's being funded by a straight loan what would the terms be and what will it be secured against as the club owns v little? If it's being funded by an enabling deal using adjacent land is that in the best interest of the club and taxpayers? Cardozas plans offered little value to the club. Imo if the Sixfields land is used it should be for a saints/cobblers stadium truly worthy of the town.
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EssTeeFree
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Think the rumours have come about due to a vacuum of info on how the East Stand works will be funded.
Why will or should Bower spend his own money finish the stand off with small chance of a return? Remember that mysterious sum £3mil was it? What's happened to that?
If it's being funded by a straight loan what would the terms be and what will it be secured against as the club owns v little?
If it's being funded by an enabling deal using adjacent land is that in the best interest of the club and taxpayers?
Cardozas plans offered little value to the club. Imo if the Sixfields land is used it should be for a saints/cobblers stadium truly worthy of the town.
So as I understood it there is 4 million ring-fenced and ready to go to complete the East stand once the lease issue for the land the stand sits on is sorted. What that 4 million is secured against I have no idea, although I thought the fact that Thomas and Bower were stepping in and completing the build was the reason they got control of the club cheaply. So in theory they could complete the land, sell the club (if someone out there wanted to take it on) and make a modest profit. I don't doubt they have eyes on the surrounding land and would use it to a) enable any further development / infrastructure and b) make some money from it themselves. I do think this has been conflated with the East Stand issue and they are, in fact, separate projects / plans. Appreciate I may be hugely naïve but that is what I have managed to piece together. Honestly very happy to be educated on this but it seems to be conjecture and guesswork mainly in this thread. Someone most know something more concrete?
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meccanostand
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What further work is there to do once that modest stand is finished? Not sure what right any private individuals have to further land. It should benefit the whole town with something that makes up for all the pain of the cardoz period.
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EssTeeFree
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Maybe no further work, I really don't know, as I said I'm just trying to piece together the facts as they currently stand. Regards your second sentence onward, I don't disagree with you one bit!
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« Last Edit: April 13, 2018, 10:49:54 am by EssTeeFree »
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GrangeParkCobbler
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There is no further work to be done!!
Thomas and co said at the outset they had the money to complete the stand. NBC said completion of the stand had nothing to do with the leases...NTFC already have control over the East Stand (otherwise why is it still not the seatless shell it was? They must have done the work and got a safety certificate for it in its current form) KT and co said the Council were incorrect and wanted the lease issue sorting before the stand could be completed. (This was 7 months ago)
KT and co keep going on about the leases, keep going on about the council holding the club back, but KT's reply to questions asked this week stated that there was no business case to increase capacity to 1000/12000 at the present time.
So i'll ask again.....apart from installing his 18 boxes in the East Stand what is the council holding up?? And the fact the council don't believe they are holding that work up anyway should be taken into account.
The whole redev saga is as it stands dead in the water.....nobody is doing anything and they're all blaming each other....yet we don't want to build anything anyway as there is no business case....and will be even less so upon probable relegation to league 2.
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The Hotel End GTA Champion 2006/7, 2007/8, 2011/12, 2012/13 and 2018/19
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EssTeeFree
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If the council aren't holding anything up what was the deadline of the end of March to cover?
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Mathius
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Even the trust said that NBC had told them that everything should be sorted by the end of March. So this is an NBC delay - nothing to do with owners.
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guest2539
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Can somebody somewhere get an answer from their local Borough Councillor, as surely they are the people who should know?
They are supposed to represent their local electorate!
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Vintage Cobbler
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Sooner rather than later KT is going to run out of excuses and run out of road with supporters on this issue. A case of crap or get off the pot.
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EssTeeFree
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Sooner rather than later KT is going to run out of excuses and run out of road with supporters on this issue. A case of crap or get off the pot.
So you believe Thomas is holding it up rather than the council then Vintage? What do you think is stopping him proceeding?
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Vintage Cobbler
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NBC is reported as saying there is nothing to stop the construction proceeding. My own take on it is that, if you recall, KT said £4million was reserved for the Stand. The Chinese then turned up out of the blue and KT alluded to a wider redevelopment. Pure spin IMO. Then came the knowledge in January that all was not well with 5USport although KT tried to duck and dive on the issue and was, shall we say, economical with the truth. Come January and with the side struggling, with the Chinese having defaulted on their commitment DB had to dig into his own money to finance the transfer window signings. It could be that part of the so-called East Stand fund was drawn-down in a desperate and seemingly failed attempt to avoid relegation. Then JFH was sacked and more money will have to be found to pay him off (a 3 year contract). So, my guess is that the appetite of DB, he being the important one not KT, has waned. How far I don't know. But my thinking is that the owners are dragging their feet. I am with those that think the real objective is the CDNL land and whilst I wouldn't put it as Beds does in his regular postings questions need to be asked and answered. Maybe DB & KT are not having it all their way with NBC and for the club that could be a good thing in the long run.
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Mathius
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The latest comment by NBC was at the beginning of March when they said any remaining obstacles would be resolved by the end of the month, so with no announcement, the issue is with them.
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guest3063
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Can somebody somewhere get an answer from their local Borough Councillor, as surely they are the people who should know?
They are supposed to represent their local electorate!
Strange you should say that. I sent an email to NBC yesterday (a moment of frustration at the on going situation) not to a councillor but the offices. If a reply is forthcoming I will let you all know.
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EssTeeFree
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NBC is reported as saying there is nothing to stop the construction proceeding. My own take on it is that, if you recall, KT said £4million was reserved for the Stand. The Chinese then turned up out of the blue and KT alluded to a wider redevelopment. Pure spin IMO. Then came the knowledge in January that all was not well with 5USport although KT tried to duck and dive on the issue and was, shall we say, economical with the truth. Come January and with the side struggling, with the Chinese having defaulted on their commitment DB had to dig into his own money to finance the transfer window signings. It could be that part of the so-called East Stand fund was drawn-down in a desperate and seemingly failed attempt to avoid relegation. Then JFH was sacked and more money will have to be found to pay him off (a 3 year contract). So, my guess is that the appetite of DB, he being the important one not KT, has waned. How far I don't know. But my thinking is that the owners are dragging their feet. I am with those that think the real objective is the CDNL land and whilst I wouldn't put it as Beds does in his regular postings questions need to be asked and answered. Maybe DB & KT are not having it all their way with NBC and for the club that could be a good thing in the long run.
Thanks Vintage. I might be wrong but I think the original NBC line that "there is nothing to stop the construction proceeding" was disputed at the time and the council accepted this. They then agreed a deadline with the trust to sort out the lease issues, which they have since missed. I said earlier I would be surprised if Thomas and Bower aren't looking to profit from the land around the ground and supporters / tax payers deserve to get the best deal for themselves and the football club over any outside investors. However, digging around today I can only find anything concrete pointing to the delay of the East stand being down to the council. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I think the East Stand issue is being conflated with opinions on the future intentions of the board
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GrangeParkCobbler
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Thanks Vintage. I might be wrong but I think the original NBC line that "there is nothing to stop the construction proceeding" was disputed at the time and the council accepted this. They then agreed a deadline with the trust to sort out the lease issues, which they have since missed.
I said earlier I would be surprised if Thomas and Bower aren't looking to profit from the land around the ground and supporters / tax payers deserve to get the best deal for themselves and the football club over any outside investors. However, digging around today I can only find anything concrete pointing to the delay of the East stand being down to the council.
As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I think the East Stand issue is being conflated with opinions on the future intentions of the board
I can't find anything which said that the Council accepted KT's argument. There was certainly a difference between what the Council thought and what KT thought. This is the original article...again! # https://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/cobblers-chairman-disputes-council-s-claim-he-can-proceed-with-developing-the-east-stand-1-8170398Telling that the Council spokesman said this.... "Any possible future development of the publicly-owned land around the stadium will only be done at a time and in a way that ensures the maximum benefit to the town and its residents, and this is not linked to the football club or to the East Stand.” Why would they say that the land and therefore the redevelopment of it was not linked to the football club?
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The Hotel End GTA Champion 2006/7, 2007/8, 2011/12, 2012/13 and 2018/19
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