The Future of Sport: Building success on sound planning
YORKSHIRE’S football clubs aiming for the Premier League have been warned they need business plans to match their top flight ambitions.
The county is not represented in the top flight of English football but five clubs from the region go into the new season hoping to end that anomaly.
Clive Lawrence, from specialist sports law firm FrontRow Legal, says: “Leeds and at least one of the Sheffield clubs should be in the Premier League – they are clubs of great stature and with strong support.
“The challenge is though, not only achieving promotion, but staying there. We’’ve seen Barnsley, Bradford and more recently Hull City have all got into the top flight but failed to stay there.”
The business challenges facing the region’s sporting clubs are considered in more detail in The Future of Sport in Yorkshire, a new free supplement from TheBusinessDesk.com in partnership with FrontRow Legal and Sheffield Hallam University. Download it here.
Huddersfield Town, owned by businessman Dean Hoyle, was promoted to the Championship after a dramatic play-off final at Wembley at the end of last season and commercial director Sean Jarvis insists it will not be going for broke.
“I think this year has to be about consolidating and continuing to improve in everything we do day by day.
“Dean is of course a great owner and very supportive, but he is clear that as a business we have to have a plan and stick to it, and operate in certain financial
parameters.”
