Reading’s owner Sir John Madejski made what was effectively a sales pitch for the football club in an interview in The Sunday Times Business News yesterday. But he also made it clear that he would not sell the club to anyone.
Reading’s owner Sir John Madejski made what was effectively a sales pitch for the football club in an interview in The Sunday Times Business News yesterday. But he also made it clear that he would not sell the club to anyone.
Madejski’s fortunes have taken something of a downturn. His development and investment company, Sackville Properties, was hit by the collapse of the property market and he is renegotiating his loans with the Royal Bank of Scotland. Clearview Traffic, a road technology start-up, is also in restructuring talks with its lender. The five-star Royal Palm Hotel he owns in the Galapagos Islands has been put on the market for £10m.
He made it clear that anyone who wanted to buy Reading would have to have billionaire status: ‘I’ve spent 20 years building this up and I’m not just going to sell it to some asset stripper or some consortium that will fall out and sell it all off in bits.’ The club made a £1.9m pre-tax profit last year.
Making his sales pitch, Madejski said, ‘I need to find someone who has deep enough pockets to support the team … it’s a good way of attracting profile. And not only that, but he would very wise to buy Reading because they are in the championship and they would have the kudos of taking them to the Premier League.’
It has been known for some time that Madejski would be prepared to sell the club to the right bidder, but no definite offers have been made. However, he insisted that there were ‘the right people out there.’ They could certainly make worse buys than Reading with its 25,000-seater stadium, hotel and conference facilities, all located in one of the most prosperous areas of the country.