Coventry Evening Telegraph reporter Les Reid has secured quite a coup by getting Coventry City owner Joy Seppala to spend two hours talking to him. Seppala admits that she is a very private person.
Coventry Evening Telegraph reporter Les Reid has secured quite a coup by getting Coventry City owner Joy Seppala to spend two hours talking to him. Seppala admits that she is a very private person.
Whether it is a scoop is a matter for debate. Seppala says that Coventry City would only come back to the Ricoh as owners, but that has been evident for some time. She says that she and her colleagues have a long-term plan for the viability of the club, but it’s still unclear what it is, other than not spending money on big name signings and building up the Academy.
Her dislike of Coventry City Council shines through and it could be argued that one reason she is excited about a new beginning involved in building a new stadium is that she could put one over the council. She evidently favours a site just outside the city boundaries, but it is by no means clear that (say) Warwick District Council and Warwickshire County Council would roll over at such a prospect.
Although Seppala says that she was not personally involved in the acquistion of the Sky Blues by Sisu, it is still not clear to me how they thought they could make money out of the club. I am also quite surprised that there are new investors keen to back the costs of playing in Northampton and to contribute towards a new stadium. Admittedly one has to take some risks these days to get a return on anything, but this seems very high risk to me.
One also wonders whether Seppala’s cosmopolitan background really equips her to understand football or a city like Coventry. It’s difficult to see what a private, family oriented person gets out of all this when it makes her a figure of hate. But clearly she is convinced that she has the right answers. Whether she and Arena Coventry Ltd. and the City Council can come to a negotiated solution remains open to doubt.