Former Adelaide United executive chairman suing club for $684k in ‘unpaid salary’

The Reds’ former executive chairman is suing for hundreds of thousands in “unpaid salary” – but the club says it owes him nothing because he was “never an employee”.

Adelaide United executive chairman Piet van der Pol at Coopers Stadiium in Hindmarsh, September 2018. Picture: AAP / David Mariuz

Former Adelaide United executive chairman Piet van der Pol is suing for $684,000 in “unpaid salary” – but the club says it owes him nothing because he was “never an employee”.

On Friday, the club asked the Supreme Court to throw out Mr van der Pol’s statutory demand for immediate payment.

It told the court that, despite his former title and role at the club, Mr van der Pol’s actual employer was a company called Global Football Opportunities (GFO), based in Hong Kong.

GFO, it said, “supplied money” to Mr Van Der Pol in 2021 when he needed proof of income to secure a home loan – and used Adelaide United’s bank account to do so.

Counsel for Mr van der Pol denied the club’s assertions and asked the case be set down for hearing – and Judge Graham Dart agreed.

“This is going to get involved,” he said.

“The club’s position is there are no moneys owed, he was never employed, there’s no obligation to pay a salary to him.

“These are quite different stories … let’s see where we get to.”

Adelaide United executive chairman Piet van der Pol is suing for $684,000 in “unpaid salary”

In 2018, Mr van der Pol came to SA as the face of the consortium that had purchased the Reds from Greg Griffin, Robert Gerard, Bruno Marveggio and Dr Richard Noble.

He was, at the time, also president of the Qingdao Red Lions team based in Shangdong Province, China.

Mr van der Pol’s arrival kicked off five years of mystery surrounding the identities of the other three owners who, he said, wanted to maintain their privacy.

In April 2023, Dutch businessman Cor Adriaanse revealed himself as the club’s owner – and announced it had parted ways with Mr van der Pol.

Two weeks later, according to court papers, Mr van der Pol served a statutory demand on the club for payment of $684,000.

On Friday, Judge Dart said he had read both Mr van der Pol’s statutory demand and the Reds’ affidavit in response.

“The position of the club is that he was never employed and so there was never an obligation to pay him,” he said.

“It says he was always paid by a Hong Kong company called Global Football Opportunities, which was related to the Chinese club he was employed by.

“The position of Adelaide United is Mr van der Pol came to the club in 2021 and said ‘I need to get a home loan, the bank won’t give me money unless I can show employment’.

Mr van der Pol delivering Reds merchandise to the Tsokkos family in 2020. Picture: Brenton Edwards

“It asserts the payment to Mr van der Pol would be at no cost to Adelaide United because the money was to come from GFO (and) the club agreed because it wasn’t going to cost them anything.

“The money would be paid through Adelaide United’s bank account from that third part to Mr van der Pol so he could show the bank and he could get a home loan.

“I’m just regurgitating what the affidavit said.”

Judge Dart said there several key issues “jumped out” at him as needing to be resolved.

“Mr van der Pol was involved in some way with the purchase of the club from its previous owners,” he said.

“The club says that, for three or four years, it didn’t pay him anything – so there probably needs to be an explanation, if that’s correct.”

Counsel for the club responded: “There will be.”

Mr van der Pol’s counsel asked for time to file an affidavit from his client, saying he was currently overseas.

Judge Dart agreed, ordering all documents be served by the end of July and the matter be heard in August.