We need to protect The Valley

No one seems to know what exactly is going on with the ‘takeover’ bid at Charlton. However we do know that Charlie Methven and his team have signed an exclusivity clause with Sandgaard to get a deal done. This doesnt mean they will get a deal done but probably gives them until the end of Jan to complete the transaction. We know that Duchatelet wont accept anything less than £50m for The Valley and Sparrows Lane so you can be pretty sure that Methven & Co are not going to buy those.

Most of the potential buyers of Charlton including Southall before and probably Methven & Co now see it as a property play in some way to make money. Maybe they think we could ground share or build a smaller ground somewhere else. Maybe they want to plough lots of money in to get us into the Premier League – BUT I THINK THAT OPTION IS VERY UNLIKELY.

Even if a richer ‘white knight’ like Andrew Barclay arrives and acquires the Valley, when he gets fed up, he would pull the same property card as Glikstein and Duchatelet have before him.

The news this week that Rishi Sunak has signed off on the new Football Regulator role, one of whose principal jobs is to safeguard the stadia for clubs presents a fantastic new opportunity for us to lobby to render The Valley in particular of no value for development for 100 years or in perpetuity if you prefer. How this is done whether through strengthening of existing Community Value Asset rules or new legislation doesn’t matter, but until we resolve this ground separated from club issue, the future of our club will always be under threat.

We aren’t the only club where this presents a problem and it will be a populist policy to safeguard stadia in our national sport. It has the added advantage of buggering up Duchatelet and other potential scavengers and would be property developers all around the UK

This should become a Lobbying issue for CAST and all of us. Now is the time.