DOUG DUG DEEP TO BUY ARENA FROM EX-BOSS ASHLEY

SKY BLUES OWNER HINTS HE SPENT BIG TO -SECURE CLUB'S FUTURE

- By ANDY TURNER Sky Blues Reporter

DOUG King has hinted that he has bought the CBS Arena for “significantly” more than Mike Ashley paid for it almost three years ago.

The Coventry City owner finally achieved what no previous incumbents managed to do by bringing the football club and stadium together as one, completing the purchase in the early hours of Saturday morning on the 20th anniversary of the first ever match there.

King said negotiations had been going on for some time but were finally completed at 1am ahead of the weekend’s game with QPR, which the Sky Blues turned into a celebration with a 7-1 thrashing of the London club in a party atmosphere in front of over 29,000 fans.

Former Newcastle United owner Ashley bought the Arena on behalf of his Frasers Group back in November 2022, paying a reported £17million for it. Asked if he had to fork out significantly more for the asset, which includes the hotel, casino, exhibition halls and surrounding land, King told CoventryLive: “Significantly more? I would say, certainly, we paid more than that, there’s no doubt about that.”

Sources have suggested to CoventryLive that Ashley will have doubled his money, if not hit close to the £40million mark. King, of course, was prepared to pay £25m back when he bid against Ashley in the courts.

“I did,” he agreed, “and if I look back to that time in November ‘22 in the bankruptcy court in London, I put an offer in to take the Arena at that time at £25 million and that didn’t get over the line for a lot of other reasons. So clearly, I think you can work out...