Boganaire by Paddy Manning

Author:Paddy Manning [Paddy Manning]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Tinkler turned on the FFA itself. Its chairman, Lowy, was in the middle of a public battle with the volatile owner of Gold Coast United, Clive Palmer, whose team had consistently had the worst attendance figures of any club in the A-League. Attacking the FFA publicly, the colourful mining magnate skited in an interview with SBS: ‘We’ve paid $500,000 for our licence. Poor old Nathan Tinkler had to fork out $7 million for his … I don’t know why that happened.’ In late February 2012, after Palmer sent his team out wearing ‘Freedom of Speech’ logos, he was stripped of his A-League licence by the FFA. Gold Coast United would be replaced by the Western Sydney Wanderers in 2012–13.

Palmer had his figures wrong, but nevertheless Tinkler was incensed: the clear implication was that he’d had his pants pulled down by Lowy. Two days after Palmer’s outburst, Ken Edwards resigned as chairman of the Hunter Sports Group, ostensibly to spend more time with his family. More than anyone, it was Edwards who had delivered the Jets and the Knights into Tinkler’s hands. But according to press reports at the time, when Tinkler started looking into what he had paid for the Jets, he was furious to find that Edwards had been paid a hefty bonus – somewhere between a quarter and half a million dollars – for luring Hunter Sports into a takeover of the club.

The FFA said Hunter Sports had known at the time that Edwards was working for the FFA and would be remunerated in the normal course of business. Edwards, being under a confidentiality agreement, made no public comment.

HSG demanded to know how the FFA had calculated the $4.5-million purchase price for the Jets. Former A-League chief Archie Fraser told media that the ‘acquisition fee’ of $3.5 million, which made up the bulk of the deal, had been ‘invented’ to extract as much money as possible out of Tinkler. No other club had had to pay it! The FFA denied that, but said the acquisition fee was unique to each club and reflected the market, its population, history and supporter base. Newcastle, with a decade’s history and the third-biggest turnout in the comp, was simply worth more than the Gold Coast. For Hunter Sports, that didn’t wash: it claimed it had been told the acquisition fee was standard. Plus, there was the Culina saga.

On 10 April 2012 Tinkler dramatically announced that the Hunter Sports Group would hand back the Jets’ licence altogether, citing an irrevocable breakdown of confidence in the present FFA management, and walk away from its investment of some $12 million over 18 months. Tinkler slammed the FFA, which had just revealed combined losses of $27 million across the 10 clubs of the A-League, comparing it unfavourably to the NRL.

The Jets’ players and supporters were stunned. It was unthinkable that Newcastle would be without a soccer team. The FFA hit back immediately, with CEO Ben Buckley telling the media there had been repeated attempts to negotiate

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