Khan’s legal showdown shadow spoils Irons great summer
The club are heading into a legal battle over what they believe is their right to increase the stadium’s capacity to 62,500 from the current 57,000.
It’s a big issue for the club who need a full stadium rather than empty spaces around the stadium as excitement grows over the club’s future under manager Manuel Pellegrini.
The 5,500 empty seats combined to an average 15 per cent ‘no-shows’ by season ticket holders can provide a bleak atmosphere inside the stadium with many empty seats clearly visible around the stadium.
By helping to solve that, the Mayor can do himself and the Hammers a big turn but currently he chooses not to preferring instead to attract easy political advantages by supporting the Trump visit protests by allowing ‘baby’ balloons to depict the Republican president.
Meanwhile, the Irons are being forced into legal proceedings to gain what they believe are their rights under the terms of their contract when Khan – if he chose – could sort the whole thing to everybody’s satisfaction. But no movement from him at all.
The new arrivals and big spending this summer should mean that everything in the Hammers garden is lovely right now but the Mayor of London’s ongoing silent war with the club means we cannot move on and put up the ‘house full signs’ until hopefully after a successful court hearing in October.
And even should we win we then have to get the safety licence from Newham council to cover the new capacity which may not be easy given the Burnley crowd incursions.
All of this can and should be avoided by Khan and his team sitting down and working out a solution with the Irons rather than possibly losing in court at a heavy cost to the taxpayer – a charge constantly and unfairly levelled at the club’s deal as anchor tenants.