Glenelg Football Club strikes financial deal with Holdfast Bay Council to help it survive
EXCLUSIVE: Twelve months after the Glenelg Football Club launched a ‘debt demolition’ campaign to save it being punted from the SANFL, the famous club is now poised to survive and thrive.
- Glenelg makes profit after four years of losses
- South, West and Glenelg reject ‘super club’ merger
- Glenelg launches ‘debt demolition’ campaign
TWELVE months after the Glenelg Football Club launched a debt demolition campaign to save it being punted from the SANFL, the famous club is now poised to survive and thrive.
SANFL competitors since 1921, the Tigers have faced an uncertain financial future after announcing a $3.4 million debt last year, have struck a deal with Holdfast Bay Council, guaranteeing their financial future.
The deal — to be announced Thursday — involves interest currently owed on the club’s council loan to be written off and interest for the next two years to be waived. In the past five years the club has paid about $1.2 million in “dead money’’.
The football club’s annual lease of Glenelg Oval has also been reduced significantly while the council has drawn up a master plan to turn the ground into a major sporting and community hub.
This includes knocking down the H.Y. Sparks grandstand, which lost its roof in a storm in December, at the end of the football season and building a grass mound with seating on the western side of the ground.
The agreement will be allow Glenelg, whose current debt is just under $2.2 million, to have “critical breathing room’’ which the club insists will guarantee its survival.
“This result not only ensures that we will survive but can thrive,’’ Tigers chief executive Glenn Elliott said.
“It’s been a really traumatic year for everybody involved with the club because the impact of the total debt and subsequent interest was literally crippling us.
“It just meant we weren’t able to progress and unless we were able to address the debt and the relationship with the council we would have continued to battle and, in all probability, it may well have reached the stage where we might not have been able to operate.
“But this new arrangement has injected life back into the club, a sense of belief and capacity to plan for the future.’’
Glenelg, whose financial problems began back in 2002 when it borrowed $2.4 million from the council to build its function centre, lost $1 million in trading profit from 2013-15 before making a small $16,000 profit last year.
The club’s high-profile “Save The Tigers’’ campaign last year was viewed as a success but raised only $70,000 for debut demolition.
The announcement of a brighter future comes amid speculation that Glenelg, currently sitting third with a 6-3 record, South Adelaide and West Adelaide were preparing to merge to become a “super’’ SANFL club.
All three clubs have denied the report.
Holdfast Bay mayor Stephen Patterson, a former Norwood and Collingwood player, said: “We’ve made a significant number of adjustments to our loan and leasing arrangements to benefit the club to date but council has now resolved that these further steps are necessary to help the club recover from their current trading position and move forward.
“Our business as a council is investing in our community and community clubs are places where young people learn skills, work with positive mentors, grow social networks, and strengthen their sense of purpose and belonging.”