What went wrong (4)

These blog posts are very much a first draft of history and I would like someone with the inside knowledge and contacts to write an authoritative account of the club's history since the departure of Curbs.'

A persistent belief of some Charlton fans is that prospective purchasers of the club are interested in a property play, although, of course, Roland currently owns The Valley and the training ground.  The Valley is a very awkward site for development and it is in South London not North London.   Watching University Challenge last night, I was struck by how many contestants representing UCL and King's Cambridge were from North London.

Conversion or demolition of The Valley would be expensive.  However, the biggest problem is the constrained access which would make planning permission difficult to secure, plus the steep slope on part of the site.

Nevertheless, one group of owners, sometimes referred to in some quarters as 'the spivs' (shurely visionary entrepreneurs, ed) were backed by sufficient cash to contemplate building a soulless functional replacement stadium near the O2.

Read here about the secret plan to leave The Valley: https://www.votvonline.com/home/the-2017-18-blogs/22-12-how-jimenez-schemed-to-leave-the-valley/

There were furher relevations in a court case: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/feb/09/charlton-khakshouri-jimenez-cash-modern-football

In summary, 'a man called Darius Khakshouri was awarded $4m in damages at the Royal Courts of Justice. In Court 9, Mr Justice Green found in favour of Khakshouri and against Tony Jimenez and Kevin Cash after the property developer claimed he had been deceived by the pair over a loan. That loan was of £1.8m, made in the autumn of 2013, in a last-minute bid to keep Charlton Athletic in business

Cash's  business operations based offshore and split between trusts and holding companies. A similarly nebulous structure was found to lie behind Charlton’s ownership during Jimenez’s and Cash’s involvement at the club. In his ruling, Justice Green found that neither Jimenez nor Cash actually owned Charlton, another reason why their representations to Khakshouri had been deceitful.'

In 2019 the Court of Appeal ruled that Jiminez would have to reveal details of his tax affairs: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-47075503

Charlton does seem to be attractive to entrepreneurs who fall below the highest standards of propriety.