Captain Dart
Well-Known Member
http://www.coventrycity-mad.co.uk/n...lair_at_diamond_club_lunch_883752/index.shtml
The final guest of the day was the Chief Executive Officer of the club, Chris Anderson. Chris took over the reins after the departure of Steve Waggott last November. Chris opened his speech to the assembled members by asking, “What can I tell you about Coventry City Football Club?” a rhetorical question to those fans who each have supported the club for 50 years or more.
Chris said he felt incredibly lucky to have the job at Coventry City. He said it had been a privilege to meet the people from outside the club in the city community. He emphasised that the club is now in his own words, ‘in a very good way’ and that it was a wonderful club to work for. He praised the organisation of the recent Jimmy Hill memorial service in the cathedral last month, saying it was a wonderful and moving event.
Chris then went on to talk about the importance of the football club to the city and the community. He identified three areas that he saw as vital for the success of the club. Firstly, he said the club needed to be a high performing sports club. Secondly, as a business it needed to be like all other businesses and make money through being run properly and efficiently and selling a high quality product. Thirdly as a community institution with the Sky Blues in the Community and Academy being at the forefront of promoting the club.
Mr Anderson said that if the club thrives, the community would also thrive. He said the club is having a good season despite the recent dip in form and performance on the pitch and was confident that if the club did not achieve promotion this season, it would do so next season.
He said the accounts had been filed on time, that off the field the club was doing well, and that at last it was a self-sustaining business. He was far from complacent though and admitted that there is still a lot of work that needs to be done, and reiterated that to be successful will take time. He spoke of the time when Jimmy Hill first came to the club it took a lot of hard work and some time to achieve success.
He used the phrase that Tony Mowbray used that it was a priority to get out of ‘this wretched division’.
Joe asked whether Chris preferred the academic or practical aspect of his career, to which Chris said he preferred doing the practical work rather than teaching. He praised the football management team of Tony Mowbray and Mark Venus, saying they were doing very well.
He then spoke of the commercial side of the club stating that generally there was now nothing wrong that cannot be fixed, but each problem needed to be worked on one at a time. He said it was his aim to leave the club in a far better position than when he arrived.
Joe then asked the prickly question about the ownership of the ground. He questioned the different positions of the owner Joy Seppala, who had previously stated that it was vital for the success of the club to own its own ground and his own opinion that it was not vital for the club to own its own ground and that the club could work with the stadium’s owners, Wasps RUFC.
Chris Anderson said that the club needs to control its own destiny but it was his opinion either that the club could do so as a tenant or if it owned its own ground. He admitted that currently the club was not in control of its own destiny and that it needed a long term home, but he did not think it mattered too much whether that was as owners or as tenants. He emphasised that the Ricoh was built for Coventry City Football Club, the seats are sky blue, there is a statue of Jimmy Hill outside the stadium and that there is a memorial garden within the grounds. He did admit that there is a lot of work that needs to be done on the question of a ground before the club would be in control of its destiny. He stated that the club needed to work closely with the council to achieve a successful outcome.
