Fans’ despair as Blues ground sold to investor
Troubled club to pay £1.25m a year rent to mystery buyer
BIRMINGHAM City fans have condemnded the club’s Hong Kong owners after revealing they are to sell their remaining stake in the St Andrew’s ground. Birmingham Sports Holdings (BSH) has agreed to sell its stake in the company that owns the stadium. A 14-page announcement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, signed by Chairman Wenqing Zhao, confirmed the owners will sell 75 per cent of its stake in Birmingham City Stadium Ltd.
The buyer is named as Ms Kang Ming-Ming, a real estate investor using a British Virgin Islands company called Achiever Global Group Ltd to make the purchase.
The announcement confirmed that Ms Kang deals in real estate and properties in China, south east Asia and Europe.
Birmingham Sports Holdings confirmed the majority of the money raised from the sale of the stadium company will be used for working capital for the holding company in Hong Kong, with a smaller amount being set aside to help towards paying their debts.
Ms Kang is due to pay a £5.4 million deposit to BSH within 10 days and has until June 30 of this year to complete the deal.
If she changes her mind, or something else happens that stops the purchase going through, BSH will have to refund her deposit in full.
Although the stadium is listed as an asset of community value (ACV), as the company owning the stadium is being sold rather than the stadium itself, it cannot be enforced.
The latest announcement has left frustrated Blues fans very concerned with many posting their fears on internet forums.
But supporters do not need to worry according to a leading football finance expert. Kieran Maguire, senior teacher in accountancy at Liverpool University, said the sale will have ‘zero impact’ on fans.
Blues fans are clearly concerned at that prospect, but Maguire said: “It’s housework, to a large extent.
“It will give the holding company of Birmingham City a bit of cash to play with as they’ve got bills to pay.
“They’d already sold a quarter of the stadium and now they’ve sold the other three-quarters. But, as far as fans are concerned, it should have zero impact.
“The club had already sold the ground in 2018-19 to deal with FFP and didn’t own the ground anyway.
“But St Andrew’s is an asset of community value status. So, if anyone was worried that the ground might get knocked down and turned into a block of flats, that’s not going to happen.
“Things are just going to continue as they did before. The landlord just wants to get the rent – and Birmingham want somewhere to play football.
“The downside of the deal is that if Blues wanted to do something with the stadium, if let’s say they got back to the Premier League and wanted to expand, then they’d have to get the permission of the landlord to make any changes.”
Blues have been tenants at their spiritual home since 2019 and the new deal, which can be reviewed in four years, values the ground at £20.6 million and comes with a new agreement for Blues to continue renting until 2031. The rent is set at £1.25 million each year, which is likely to increase.
The other 25 per cent of the stadium company was previously sold in December 2020 to Cambodian businessman Vong Pech, in a deal that also saw him buy 21.64 per cent of the club. Vong Pech currently owns the largest stake in Birmingham City.