Alan Hardy: ‘I was seduced by football industry’

Alan Hardy

Alan Hardy, the former owner of Notts County, has said he was “seduced” by the football industry and that the club became a “toxic environment” near the end of his ill-fated reign.

Speaking to FourFourTwo magazine, Hardy said despite the Magpies being relegated from the Football League last season, the club now has “solid foundations to build on”, unlike the “chaotic conditions” he found when he bought it from Ray Trew in 2017.

However, Hardy, who sold the club to a Danish consortium over the summer, said he felt unprepared for life at the helm of the world’s oldest professional league club. He told FourFourTwo: “I’ll be honest and say, even with a decent amount of business experience behind me, it was a very steep learning curve. It happened very quickly, literally in four days from December 19 to Christmas, with the lawyers and accountants working over the holiday to complete the due diligence process.

“Arriving new into the club in January 2017, without a business plan or model to follow, was enormously challenging. Despite running multiple businesses, I was incredibly exposed and unprepared for what lay ahead.”

Hardy said his biggest mistake was not getting a grip on Notts County’s finances. He added: “I got seduced by the industry and chased success.

“Allowing a manager to bring in players at a whim was perhaps a mistake on my part.”

Notts County have had a mixed start to the season. The club currently lies 15th in the National League, with just two wins from their first nine games.

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