Vice chairman says secrecy was wrong, but our hands were tied

28 March 2011 09:01
Legal reasons behind secrecy says John Clarke. Coventry City's vice chairman, local busisnessman John Clarke, speaking to the Coventry Telegraph, has said he thinks the club was wrong in not communicating with  the fans in regard to the resignation of chairman Ray Ranson, but he explained there were legal reasons why they had to keep silent. The board are set to make a statement sometime today to clarify the situation, but ahead of the statement Mr Clarke in his interview with the CT revealed that an advisory board, composed of local businessmen who are also associate directors of the club, is being formed with the aim of improving links between the board and the fans. Mr Clarke also reiterated the mantra of late that Sisu remain committed to the club and will continue to financially support it and they even expect to get to a "break even" point by this time next season.  Answering questions about the ongoing furore among the supporters who are disappointed with not only the lack of success on the pitch, but with the way the board are running the club, he said, “We accept as a club and board that communication has not been as good as it could be, but in recent weeks with legal agreements being put together by the lawyers etc, we have had our hands tied." “We have had to go through that process but I can assure the fans that it is a committed board policy, as they will see from this week, that we are going to be far, far more open with our communications policy once we get the legal agreements signed up. "That is absolute policy." “We identify that as where we have had a problem. We would have liked to have clarified the situation and it has been frustrating but I think the fans will see that there will be a more open communication in the future to their queries about the club.” Mr Clarke was asked if he thought the club needed to apologise to the fans for the recent turmoil and he replied,  “I think the best thing we can do for the fans is put the club back on the right track both on and off the field to regain their confidence "The best way we can apologise is to say to the fans that we haven’t got it right on the communications and we are committed to improving that in the future. There is a new era from Wednesday when the new future will be announced, and communications is one of the top priorities.” Mr Clarke would not absolutely confirm that chairman Ray Ranson has resigned, or even if it had been accepted b the club, but he did say, “The statement today will confirm that and all the contractual agreements will be in that statement. That is in the hands of the lawyers and I really don’t know how far that process has gone." "It is going through a process, lawyers take their time and I am told there will be a statement today.” When pressed  Ranson's successor would be Ken Dulieu, Mr Clarke said, “Ken will be at the press conference on Wednesday where an announcement as to the new chairman will be unveiled.” It was widely reported last week that Mr Ranson would remain at the club as a consultant until the end of the season and that the club could go into administration or even be liquidated. As for Ranson’s continuing role as a consultant on footballing matters until the end of the season, Clarke insists the out-going chairman remains committed to playing a “key role” in ensuring City stay up and revealed that he hopes Ranson will be at Wednesday’s conference. There has been a lot of concern from fans that the club are about to go into administration and Mr Clarke addressed these very real concerns saying, “Sisu have committed themselves to further funding and I think that speaks for itself. "  "If I had not had complete faith in Sisu’s continued commitment, integrity and future intentions for the club I would not have considered rejoining the board and I would also say that the board is actively pursuing new investors to take the club forward and that is very active involving our new directors, and we are hopeful there will be a positive result in the future.”  

Source: FOOTYMAD