Simon Jordan has lashed out at Leeds owner Andrea Radrizzani after he accused Derby of “cheating” over the sale of their stadium.
Pride Park was sold to a sister company of Derby owner Mel Morris and the club was able to record a profit on the sale to report a pre-tax profit of £14.9million overall.
Talking at an FT Business summit on Tuesday, Radrizzani said this was “more cheating than sending a scout to see [Derby] training”.
Radrizzani: Selling your stadium to a sister company is more cheating than sending a scout to see (Derby’s) training. #FTFootballSummit
— Raphael Honigstein? (@honigstein) May 21, 2019
Talking on the Jim White show (talkSPORT, Wednesday, 10.20am) Jordan lashed out at Radrizzani.
“Radrizzani has got to zip it up a bit. He had concerns with Wolves last year. There are rules around FPP and if he doesn’t like what Derby did with the stadium he had every opportunity at annual meetings to vote to change things.
“Sit down, shut your mouth. It’s ill mannered. Ultimately Leeds are no shining light here either, they’re losing money, they might fall foul of FFP if they’re not careful.
“I think Radrizzani has had s lot of things to say on a lot of issues and quite often he’s too loud.”
OPINION
Jordan is known for his forthright opinions and he didn’t cut Radrizzani any slack here. The language he used was strong and he obviously thinks that the Leeds owner is in the wrong in his latest spat with Derby. However, the Leeds owner was talking at a business summit and these are issues he thinks are important in the game. FFP is something that every club should adhere to and loopholes like selling your stadium to a sister company should be closed off. Perhaps Radrizzani’s language was wrong too, but English isn’t his first language. Cheating is a term that shouldn’t be bandied about without due care, although Derby could be accused of similar after the spygate scandal. Telling Radrizzani to “sit down” and “shut your mouth” isn’t very respectful though, from one former football owner to a current one. Jordan is known for making waves on talkSPORT though and we’d be interested to see if Radrizzani has anything else to say after this. perhaps they should get him in for an interview.