CASH-STRAPPED Norwich claim they are too poor to avoid using taxpayers’ money to cover staff wages.
Fan fury forced Liverpool and Tottenham into embarrassing U-turns over furloughing non-playing staff during the coronavirus crisis.
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Delia Smith and husband Michael Wynn-Jones had no choice but to accept the Government’s furlough scheme
And yesterday, Chelsea became the latest Premier League club to turn down the Government scheme.
But the billionaires who own those clubs dwarf the Canaries in terms of financial pulling power.
The Premier League’s bottom dwellers estimate the virus will cost them £18million and maybe as much as £35m.
And they claim that blow plus heavy losses from their previous top-flight campaign forced them to apply for state aid.
Chief operating officer Ben Kensell told the BBC: “The decision we made was in the best interests of the club and its staff.
“We’ve been very transparent that we’re run in a self-financed manner. We generate a turnover of £123m — £93m of that is from broadcast and we’ve spent £125m this year.
“If we had the available cashflow to not have to take up schemes then, like other clubs, we would.
“The difference is we’re running it as a business and we’re running it the best way we believe will help it for the future.
“It’s also about our staff. What we don’t want is a raft of redundancies.
“We knew we would get criticised as a result — what we’re not going to do is take a different view on that.
“We’ll stick to our guns and we believe we are doing it for the right reasons.”
BEST OWNERS… NOT THE RICHEST
Norwich have applied to use the furlough scheme for around 200 employees, so 80 per cent of their wages will be funded by the taxpayer.
Newcastle are doing the same while Sheffield United have furloughed some permanent and casual staff.
But Kensell praised owners Delia Smith and husband Michael Wynn-Jones, who have been joint majority shareholders since 1997.
He said: “We’ve got the best owners in football — that’s a fact. We haven’t got the richest owners but we like to think we’re doing things the right way.”
So far the Canaries have resisted asking players and coaching staff to take wage cuts.
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Sporting director Stuart Webber said: “It almost became an obsession of putting the footballers out on the street. As we sit here we don’t know when we’re going to play football again.
“So it’s difficult to say that we are definitely going to lose this, which means we need to reclaim X amount.
“Until that time comes and we get more clarity, we won’t be talking to any of our players or staff about deferrals or cuts.”
Premier League football back ‘within weeks’ with all games live on TV for free as grounds stay shut
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
