Providing sporting chance for the people of Hull

Hull City, after two ruinous years in the Premier League, were in such dire straits that the club was surely best left well alone by any prospective investors.

A takeover would, the financial experts all lined up to say last year, be little more than an invitation to pour money into a black hole.

Administration, it seemed, beckoned as worried fans fretted as to whether their club would follow the likes of Barnsley and Bradford City in falling even further down the leagues once out of the top flight.

Hull needed a financial miracle. Thankfully, that is what the club got in the form of Egyptian-born Assem Allam, who, along with his son Ehab, rode to the rescue late last year with a bid to buy the troubled Tigers that can only be described as philanthropy at its very best.

The motivation for 71-year-old Allam was simple – a desire to put something back into a community that had initially welcomed him with open arms when fleeing Egypt in 1968 to avoid persecution for speaking out against President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s regime.

“After being on the go for more than 100 years, Hull City was in danger of being lost forever,” says Allam, who over the past 30 years has built his business, Melton-based Allam Marine, into one of the region’s most successful.

“It was in such a bad state that the financial specialists said to me that if it had been allowed to go into administration, it would have been the first in England not to recover.

“There was a winding-up order issued by the courts when I took over the club. It was a matter of hours rather than weeks to save the club.

“As a normal business deal, I would not have touched it. But this was a chance to give a present to my locality and a city that has been very good to me.”

To those well versed in Hull life, Allam was well known for contributing to good causes in the city long before his involvement with the Tigers.

Among those to have enjoyed the patronage of a man who arrived in East Yorkshire with just £20 in his pocket and a family to support are Hull University, Hull Truck Theatre and various charities, including the Daisy Appeal for cancer and heart disease treatment.

At the university, he donated £1.5m to establish a bio-sciences research centre along with a maritime library and a 500-seat lecture theatre. In recognition of the role Allam has played in Hull life, the University last month awarded him an honorary doctorate – perhaps the first football club chairman to be honoured in such a way.

In terms of ploughing money into the local area, maybe only John Madejski at Reading – a town that has many facilities including the football club’s stadium named after its main benefactor – comes close to Allam, something the man himself wishes was not the case.

“Since coming into Hull City,” he says, “it has created more hard work. But I don’t mind that, providing I am doing something useful for the community.

“Buying the club was not about producing something for myself. I am spending, not gaining.

“But I think that is only right. We live in a community together and people should do all they can to help and serve the community.”

That desire to help the community was a major factor in Allam pressing ahead with the deal to buy the Tigers, even as the cash needed to keep the club going rose from the predicted £15m or so to the eye-watering £40m that was eventually required.

“Sport is very important to every city, not just Hull,” explains the Tigers’ chairman, who told the Yorkshire Post last week that the Championship club are likely to lose another £7m this season before breaking even in 2012-13.

“I did a lecture at Hull University recently that was called ‘the power of sport’.

“It is the most powerful tool to sort out many community problems. You don’t find someone with an ASBO being a swimmer or tennis player.

“When I was young, I enjoyed sport. I was a keen squash player, while I also played volleyball and basketball when at university. I was busy playing many sports and it helped me.

“Sport corrects people and I believe that makes a football club or rugby club vital to an area. It helps create better characters.”

As part of that dream to use sport as a powerful tool for social improvement, Allam revealed plans to buy the KC Stadium earlier this year from Hull City Council and build a £100m Sports Village.

The development will include all manner of sports facilities, from an Olympic-sized pool to basketball, squash, tennis and gymnastics amenities along with an ice arena.

Hull’s sporting mecca, which is also home to Hull FC rugby league team, would also see its capacity increased to 35,000.

Meetings have taken place between the council and Allam, who is now waiting to hear the response of the local authority to his plans.

Asked if there had been any recent progress, Allam says: “It has not really moved on, other than we have had a few meetings. They went well but the councillors have got their own reasons for wanting more time.

“I do not object to that. Councils take a lot of time.

“But I do believe a facility like a Sports Village would give the community all sorts of benefits.

“It wouldn’t be just football. There would also be an Olympic swimming pool, a squash complex, basketball and an international standard ice arena. There would also be all sorts of cafeterias and restaurants.

“I want the Sports Village to provide a good day out for the whole family. Parents can sit there in the cafeteria while the children do training or play sports. That is better than just sending your children to training and that is that.

“I am hoping the Sports Village will attract many, many teenagers away from the street corners. If they are playing sport, it means they go home exhausted and can only watch telly before going to bed. And not hang around on street corners.”

As touched as he was by the honorary doctorate bestowed on him last month, Allam admits the response from the ordinary man in the street has been equally humbling.

He adds: “I am enjoying the public and community being happy. The response from people has been magnificent.

“The final game of last season had a big banner in the East Stand that read ‘Thank you, Mr Allam’. That was very emotional for me.

“I didn’t know it was going to happen so it came as a surprise. It showed that people appreciate what we have done. Now, we want to push on and do more.”

Tomorrow: Richard Sutcliffe completes our pre-season package of interviews when he talks to Leeds United manager Simon Grayson.