Leeds owner Andrea Radrizzani has hit out at Derby County at the FT Business of Football Summit in London today.
Respected journalist Raphael Honigstein reported from the event where Radrizzani was speaking.
He quoted Radrizzani as saying, “Selling your stadium to a sister company is more cheating then sending a scout to see [Derby] training.”
Honigstein quoted Radrizzani on Tuesday morning from the event at Claridge’s in Mayfair.
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
Derby cut their losses after announcing that Pride Park Stadium was sold to a separate company owned by chairman Melvyn Morris. He paid more than £80m for the stadium and Derby were able to post a £39.9m profit on the deal, as reported in April this year by the Derby Telegraph.
OPINION
Fighting talk from Radrizzani aimed at a club who have had a fairly major falling out with Leeds this season. Frank Lampard and the Derby hierarchy made more of the spygate scandal than they should have and it cost Leeds £200,000, despite not breaking a rule. That’s obviously still smarting and Radrizzani went on the attack today at the FT Summit. There’s no doubt that football needs to get its house in order. With wider issues of racism attracting much smaller fines than Leeds were hit with over spygate and loopholes enabling clubs to circumnavigate the FPP rules, there are changes that need to happen. Radrizzani has never been shy about coming forward and made claims about the financial might of Wolves last season. Today’s comments are aimed squarely at a club who knocked them out of the play-offs in a shock reverse at Elland Road. He’s got a point but it’s strong language from the Leeds owner. The Leeds supporters won’t mind that one bit though and you can’t just dismiss this as sour grapes.