Ken Bates is looking for a repeat cup performance against Spurs

Michael Hart
22 Jan 2010

Ken Bates regrets he is unable to attend Leeds United's latest bid to enrich FA Cup folklore. But the 78-year-old, who is holidaying in Cape Town, insists he will be 'glued to the box' when they visit Tottenham in the fourth-round tomorrow.

As a tax exile he is allowed only 90 days in the UK each year but this has done nothing to diminish his enthusiasm for Leeds nor his influence at Elland Road. Yesterday was exactly five years to the day since he took control at Leeds - five years in which he has transformed the club.

You may recall similarly dramatic improvements with his blueprint for Chelsea, a club in serious financial trouble when he took over in 1982. "Chelsea were losing £12,000 a week," he said. "When I went to Leeds they were losing £120,000 a week but still serving rose champagne in the boardroom. There were many similarities - too many freebies, too many freeloaders, too many people having a jolly good time at the club's expense. It had to change."

And change it did. The players' annual wage bill of £16million was cut to £6.5m and Bates introduced new income streams such as Leeds TV and Yorkshire Radio and beefed up the banqueting and conference business at Elland Road. He has plans for two hotels, a shopping arcade and a nightclub.

"You have to remember I've been doing this for 40 years," he said. "In my view a football club is a property business that hosts a football match 25 days a year and is shut for the other 340 days."

Bates remains as forthright as he was during his heyday at Stamford Bridge when he famously threatened to cage hooligan fans with electric fences and regularly breathed fire and brimstone along the game's corridors of power.

What do they think of him in Yorkshire? "You'll have to ask them but I think they're beginning to understand me," he replied.

Treated initially with some suspicion, Bates is in the process of winning over the Yorkshire yeomanry with his bluntness and vigour and the fact that, under his stewardship, the European Cup finalists of 1975 are finally beginning to look like a football club again.

The fall of Leeds, from the heady days of Don Revie in the seventies to relegation and administration, is a sobering fact of life for many of today's big spenders in the top flight.

"Some of the debt I read about is almost unimaginable," said Bates. "What really concerns me is that a club like us could win promotion to the Premier League and then face a real fight for survival.

"So many of the promoted clubs spend their new money up front on big players and big salaries and then, when it all goes wrong and they're relegated, they have very real financial problems. We won't spend money we don't have. We have no debts. We make a small profit."

Relegated in 2007 and cast into administration, Leeds are finally on the way back. Despite a 2-0 defeat at Exeter, they retain a three-point lead at the top of League One and are averaging gates of 25,000. "I think that's better than Burnley, Wigan, Portsmouth, Fulham, Hull, Blackburn, Bolton and Wolves," said Bates.

Now living in Monaco, he has seen 22 Leeds matches this season. "I missed Manchester United in the last round because I was on holiday," he said. "I told Simon Grayson to tell the players to go out and enjoy themselves at Old Trafford, not lose by more than two goals then come back and win promotion! Funny game, football. I watched it on the box. United's defeat was a big talking point in Cape Town for days."

Can Leeds repeat their surprise demolition of the champions? "Why not?" said the chairman.

He pointed out that Tottenham were once a regular source of satisfaction during his two decades in charge at Stamford Bridge.

"There was a period when Chelsea went about 12 years without losing to Spurs," he said. "Then we met them in the semi-final of the Worthington Cup back in 2002.

"We beat them 2-1 in the first leg then went to White Hart Lane for the return. Our fans used to refer to it as six-points Lane! We were confident of getting through but they hammered us 5-1. It was a bad night.

"A couple of weeks later we went back to White Hart Lane for the sixth round of the FA Cup. This time we won 4-0 and three days later they came to our place for a Premier League game and we won 4-0 again. Our fans were singing: 'Normal service is resumed.'"

Does he miss Chelsea? "I don't miss the club they have become but I do miss the fans," he said. "It's very pleasurable to go back there or watch a game from Stamford Bridge on the box and think 'I did that'. One day, hopefully, I'll be able to say the same about Leeds."