Mr. C takes a closer look at the behind the scenes work at White Hart Lane, as much as being all over the press can be ‘behind the scenes’.
As Tottenham announce record profits of £28m; few could argue that things have never looked so rosy down N17. Given the £40m+ outlay in the summer was included in the overall figures it is quite staggering to see how a club who aren’t even playing CL football are generating this sort of revenue; is it any wonder that the chairman and the board are starting to get a little twitchy about performances on the pitch when everything is going well off it.
While few would expect the chairman sitting back this lunchtime dining with caviar and champagne looking back at a job well done; I’m guessing he is feeling slightly uncomfortable as the power struggle that has been brewing behind the scenes has been ripped open which has seen Paul Kemsley leave the club.
Paul Kemsley was the financial director at the club for years and anyone who has been present at any AGM; it is clear this man is the driving force behind the clubs current financial resurgence. He calls a spade a spade and his approach is very much alas Sir Alan Sugar where he rides roughshod to get what he wants. Kemsley is not everyone’s cup of tea but he is a fantastic businessman who knows how to generate money and I think that is the reason why Levy would have had sleepless nights over making this decision…how do you sack a man (assuming you don’t believe he’s suddenly decided to bugger off to pursue property development in the US) who makes a company so much money even if he may be a loose cannon in the boardroom? It is surely a decision that will come back to haunt him.
Kemsley came into prominence recently as the man who went over to meet Ramos in a decision that upset all the Jol-ettes, who would rather have a nice manager than a successful one. There were actual whispers going around at the time that Levy didn’t know anything about this approach and this was all from Kemsley who was looking at Ramos as the man to come in when his consortium made an eventual takeover of the club from ENIC…Had Kemsley finally broken ranks? Was this the reason that the Chairman had no option but to let the man who had dragged Tottenham into the finance big leagues go?
No doubt in the coming weeks it will all come out and we will find out what has really behind the scenes and if I was Levy I would be a worried man. Nobody knows more about the workings of the club than Kemsley and it would be interesting to find out who sowed the seeds for the ENIC takeover, which gave them near full ownership of the club. Was Kemsley looking at the bigger picture long term with an eye of a takeover himself? Is his best mate Mike Ashley, who has recently bought a huge mansion in North London, going to sell back Newcastle to the Shepherd consortium to team up with Kemsley at Spurs? We will wait and see but one thing is for sure; it’s never a dull place at the Lane.