Bet their is one on a wall in Monte Carlo.

Whilst most of you might have felt the no1 issue at Chelsea FC was how to keep John Terry away from Mrs Abramovich, it turns out what is concentrating the minds of the fans is a little spat in an obscure organisation that was originally set up by our old mucker Mr K W Bates. In order to explain what this spat is about we leave you in the capable hands of CFC net, unofficial Chelsea FC, published a few days ago…

“A few anonymous fans have contacted CFCnet with an article or twoabout Chelsea Pitch Owners.  We felt obliged to publish them because CFCnet is a Chelsea fans website and we don’t exist to censor content but merely to put it forward to fellow fans.

After all, CFCnet is run by fans for fans.  That’s our job.  If fans need to remain anonymous, so be it.

The Chelsea Pitch Owners saga is a difficult one.  Over 12,000 fans have purchased CPO shares since its inception – at £100 per share – and they did so upon the premise that they owned part of the freehold to Stamford Bridge.  This meant, of course, that no property developer could ever buy the freehold to Stamford Bridge and that the Club would remain in its spiritual home.

CPO was essentially a product of its time.  It was a defensive manoeuvre by both the Club and its fans to ensure that whatever the future held, no property developer could kick the Club out.  It was a worthy cause but since then, things have changed and this change of circumstance was never foreseen by the original draftees of the CPO Constitution.

With a Russian billionaire owning the Club, do we now need a ‘defensive CPO’ strategy? Or do we instead need to give the Club flexibility to move and build a bigger ground within the SW6 surrounds such as Earl’s Court?  Even Chelsea Pitch Owners Chairman, Richard King, is on record saying that CPO is ‘no longer valid’ and has served its purpose.

But ‘no longer valid’ to whom?

Every fan who bought those shares did so to protect our Club during good times and bad.  Whilst these are good times who can see what’s round the corner?  Wouldn’t CPO shares always be valid?  For this reason, some fans are actively lobbying for the removal of the CPO chairman Richard King.  After all, his remit is to represent the CPO constitution and shareholders, not to be seen to (allegedly) undermine them.

Other fans, and we hear from them on our Forums too, agree with King that CPO is outdated and would prefer CPO shareholders to allow the Club the right to move from Stamford Bridge if required – perhaps by transferring their CPO freehold share to a new ground.

CFCnet’s view?  CPO was created by Chelsea FC and its fans so that the Club and its name remained at Stamford Bridge.  If the Club ever wanted to change this it would need the approval of all 12,000 shareholders of CPO.

We can never see this happening simply because some old hermit living in a crofter’s hut in Scotland would probably want £1 million for his share.  Other fans, more keen to line their pockets than protect the club, would also lobby for a grand payment.

If someone then instigated legal action to claim that the shares were not valid in law, then the Club could be sued for misrepresentation in its original prospectus.

It’s a mess.

The only solution is for all discussions, debate and opinions to be ‘above board’ and transparent.  Machiavellian moves to invalidate or influence CPO by whatever means need to be stopped and true intentions revealed.

More importantly, those brave 12,000 fans who invested money to protect their Club need to be consulted.  If even one of those fans says ‘no’, that’s it.  End of story. The Club remains at Stamford Bridge.  Unless, of course, there is a majority ‘voting’ clause in CPO’s remit that allows the ‘majority’ to hold sway”. 

Pitch Owners was set up by former Chelsea chairman Mr K W Bates to “guard against property developers taking over” (oh god the irony level has just triggered a seizure) and this explanation from Wikipedia is classic him: 

“Chelsea Pitch Owners plc a is a non-profit organisation that owns both the freehold of the Stamford Bridge stadium and the naming rights of the Chelsea Football Club.

Chelsea suffered serious financial troubles during the 1970s and 1980s following a large-scale attempt to renovate Stamford Bridge. The financial crisis and a subsequent change of ownership at the club culminated in the sale of the Stamford Bridge freehold to property developers. The move almost saw Chelsea lose the stadium.

The future of the stadium (and hence the club) was only secured in 1992, when the property developers were forced into bankruptcy, allowing the then-chairman Ken Bates to do a deal with their bankers and to regain control of the stadium for the football club. Following this, Chelsea Pitch Owners was created, and in 1997 it purchased the Stamford Bridge freehold, the turnstiles, the pitch and the Chelsea FC name with the aid of a loan from Chelsea Village plc, the parent company of the club.

In purchasing the freehold and the naming rights, the intention was to ensure that Stamford Bridge could never again be sold to property developers and that the Chelsea FC name could not be traded on outside of the stadium. Should Chelsea decide to move to another stadium in the future, they will not be able to use the name Chelsea Football Club.

The company is not listed on any Stock Exchange. Its purpose is to raise the £9.2million needed to pay off the loan and then lease the freehold back to the club, on the strictly-defined proviso that the ground may only be used for football purposes. Irrespective of how many shares are owned by an individual, voting rights are limited to 100 per shareholder to prevent any one person or organisation gaining control. Fans are encouraged to purchase shares in order to secure the club’s future.”

So Bates basically set up a company to raise money to secure the freehold of the ground and then left them to spend the next 18 years paying off the loan and debating whether they have any function or role. If you look at Chelsea’s website you see the Pitch Owners are treated as if part of the club rather than a separate organisation. If I’m not mistaken a tentative idea to repeat this model with land surrounding Elland Road was muted a couple of years ago but quickly died a death. You can say what you like about Mr K W Bates (and we will just keep saying things) but one thing does ring true, he is never really gone from Stamford Bridge and sometime in the future, come what may, we could find he never really leaves Elland Road.