Tynecastle sale gets go-ahead

THE conditional sale of Tynecastle has been passed by a narrow majority of Hearts shareholders, the club revealed yesterday. As expected, the large proxy vote all but carried the motion proposed at Monday night’s stormy extraordinary general meeting.

The percentage of Hearts’ total issued share capital which backed the ‘yes’ vote amounted to 52.2 per cent. The ‘no’ vote was 31.3 per cent, and 16.5 per cent did not exercise their vote.

The most surprising aspect of the result was the high number of abstentions. Of the club’s 4,039 shareholders, 2,957 did not vote. Only 153 shareholders voted for the resolution, with 929 voting against.

Key to the result was the block vote from the pro-Murrayfield lobby comprising chief executive Chris Robinson, the media group SMG, shareholder Calum Lancastle and Trafalgar Asset Managers. In total, this amounted to 46.2 per cent of issued share capital.

Another 6 per cent of the shareholding voted in favour of selling Tynecastle. The Bank of Scotland owns a 5.2 per cent stake in the club and was thought to have voted with the board. If that was indeed the case, individual shareholders contributed only 0.8 per cent of the ‘yes’ vote.

The result gives Hearts the mandate to sell Tynecastle, their home of 118 years, and move to Murrayfield. A conditional sale had already been agreed with Cala, who want to develop the site for housing. The headline price negotiated with Cala is 22million, with an agreement in place that this figure cannot drop below 20.5million.

However, if the Cala sale breaks down for any reason the club would be at liberty to sell Tynecastle to other parties.

A statement released last night by Hearts said: "The sale of Tynecastle to Cala Management Ltd remains conditional upon a number of matters, including the granting of planning consent. The sale is unlikely to be finalised before spring 2005 and cannot be concluded before 31 January 2005. Up until that date Hearts will have the right to withdraw unconditionally from its agreement with Cala, subject to the payment of reasonable expenses not exceeding 75,000."

George Foulkes, the Hearts chairman, stressed last night that he had insisted on the five-month get-out period in the resolution to sell. "I’ve always made it clear that there is that time for other options to be brought forward," he said. "My purpose has been to buy time to let people come up with alternatives."

The most prominent potential alternative at present comes from Lithuanian businessman Vladimir Romanov, who has been in talks with the club’s leading shareholders. "I have met him, but I do not take part in any of the discussions regarding significant blocks of shareholding," added Foulkes, who said he could not confirm whether Romanov would attend Hearts’ SPL match at Dunfermline on Sunday.

Romanov’s representatives have held talks with Robinson, SMG and Leslie Deans, the former Hearts chairman.

Foulkes acknowledged that if Robinson were to sell, the whole issue would be thrown into turmoil. "I understand that he has been considering the possibility of selling his shares," Foulkes said. "If that happens, then we are in a different position."

The vote in favour of the ground sale was virtually unchanged from the percentage which supported the board at January’s annual general meeting. After that meeting Doug Smith, Foulkes’s predecessor, said he would be loath to go ahead with the move to Murrayfield with such narrow backing, and three months later he resigned when it became clear the board had failed to win the supporters over.

Monday night made it clear that the division between the board and the majority of the support is as deep as ever, but Foulkes insisted yesterday he would stick to his task: "I’ve had lots of emails and phone calls from people asking me not to resign, even though there were some at the egm who called for my resignation. It will be the case that I will have to work alongside Chris during this period so that’s what I will do."

One of the main talking points of the egm came when Jim Clydesdale, the architect of the new Tynecastle when it was built last decade, contradicted a claim by Robinson that the pitch could not be lengthened to make it comply with UEFA rules. Foulkes explained he thought it fair to ask Clydesdale to speak after a statement of his made to the Hearts working party had been made public.

"I thought since Jim Clydesdale’s name had been mentioned, and criticism had been made of the stadium which he basically designed, he should be invited to speak. This was the first time I was aware of the point he made about the corner flags."

Clydesdale made it clear that, finances permitting, Tynecastle was indeed "fit for purpose" and could host UEFA Cup games safely by lengthening and narrowing the pitch so the four corner towers were further from the corner flags than present.

The working party will take this information into consideration, then report to the board at the end of the year. If, however, the working group recommends that Hearts stay at Tynecastle, there is nothing to suggest that Robinson and his fellow-directors Stewart Fraser, Brian Duffin and David Archer will accept that suggestion.