Coventry City: Championship-bound club to stay at Birmingham City's St Andrew's

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Coventry City: Championship-bound club to stay at Birmingham City's St Andrew's

Postby dutchman » Sun Jul 26, 2020 4:47 am

Coventry City will stay at Birmingham City's St Andrew's ground for the 2020-21 campaign

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The Sky Blues had been in negotiations with landlords Wasps over a potential return to the Ricoh Arena, but have not been able to agree a deal.

Coventry played at St Andrew's last season and won the League One title - joining Birmingham in the Championship.

Wasps said they were "deeply disappointed" at a "wasted opportunity".

While Coventry said "what the landlord requested of CCFC’s owners and the club was simply not deliverable".

Despite promotion, the Sky Blues 'home' league gates were almost halved from the season before. And, on Tuesday, the club announced long-term plans to return to Coventry by building a new stadium on the south-west edge of the city on land owned by the University of Warwick.

The English Football League said it will "support the club where it can to help find a solution to get back playing in the Coventry area at the earliest opportunity".

"The same issues that prevented a deal last season have again prevented a deal for the upcoming season," a statement on the Sky Blues website said.

"We regret that their efforts and ours did not come to fruition.

"We completely understand the feeling of fans regarding groundshare and playing in Birmingham - we have made every effort behind the scenes to avoid this scenario, but now this is the case we will again be making the best of this situation for our fans, players, staff and everyone connected with the club, and urge fans to again back Mark Robins and the team next season back in the Championship."

Wasps said: "We were very close to reaching commercial agreement on a deal.

"We had held positive and constructive talks with the football club at management level for several months.

"Both sides believed they had a workable arrangement which was good for all and would see Coventry City back at the Ricoh."

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Re: Coventry City: Championship-bound club to stay at Birmingham City's St Andrew's

Postby dutchman » Sun Jul 26, 2020 5:16 pm

Coventry City deny Wasps claims they withdrew from Ricoh Arena negotiations

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Coventry City have rejected Wasps' claims they withdrew from negotiations to play home games at the Ricoh Arena.

The Sky Blues say an EFL deadline to confirm their home for 2020-21 elapsed on Friday, thus they will instead play games at Birmingham City's St Andrew's.

In response to City's confirmation of the return to Birmingham next term, Wasps had denied the claim that an indemnity was part of any agreement.

Now, City chief executive Dave Boddy says it was "absolutely a requirement".

"This indemnity would have put the football club at substantial risk and jeopardise its very future," Boddy said in Coventry's latest statement.

"We would be happy to produce correspondence to support all of our claims but unfortunately we are bound by the NDA [non-disclosure agreement], which we signed at the start of talks at the insistence of Wasps.

"Because progress was being made the EFL extended the deadline twice during this week to Friday; and on that expiry we were instructed by them to confirm where we would play. All parties in the process were well aware of these extensions.

"We were faced with exactly the same problem last season, and were effectively 'timed out' by them again."

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