Dear Sir, You would be wrong to believe that the only people opposing the Edgbaston cricket ground redevelopment are local residents (Comment April 9).
Many members and supporters have grave reservations about a plan which grew from a valid and serviceable solution of rebuilding the pavilion area to the current monolithic proposal of shops, bars, office blocks and multi-storey car parks championed by chief executive, Colin Povey. Notwithstanding the unacceptable scale of the project, the cost, which includes a £20m loan from the council repayable over 20 years, appears unsustainable. Annual repayments would be around £1.6m. The club’s one-off record profit in the 2005 Ashes year was £800,000.
Mr Povey has considerable form in the area of antagonising and alienating his audience as many Warwickshire members will attest. In his three-year tenure he has presided over an aggregated loss of £400,000 and a steep decline in membership and gate revenues. He will point to his success in selling out this year’s Ashes Test match but frankly – to paraphrase Geoff Boycott – my granny could have pulled that one off.
The redevelopment needs to be scaled back to something more sensible that will fulfil the ECB’s requirements and leave residents, members and supporters happy.
I believe Mr Povey has neither the ability or the will to carry this through and should seriously consider his position.
David Hill, Sutton Coldfield
