Sam Hammam: Difference between revisions

Sam Hammam (Arabic: سام همّام) is a Lebanese businessman, most notable for his high profile ownership of British football clubs. He has achieved a level of notoriety in English football for his unusual antics at matches, frequently walking around the pitchside during games, and his eccentric methods of publicising himself and his players.

Having trained as civil engineer, Hammam made his fortune as a building contractor in the Middle East. After emigrating to Britain in 1975, Hammam bought a majority stake in his local football team, Wimbledon F.C., becoming Chairman of the club.

Wimbledon FC

Hammam was in charge of the unfashionable South London club during its meteoric and record-breaking rise through the football league to the top flight and the infamous 1988 FA cup victory.

While the club's on-the-field success during Hammam's tenure as Chairman was undeniable, the situation off the pitch however was more colourful. Typically, merely hours after the club's FA Cup final victory, Hammam announced that the entire first team was up for sale! Hammam fostered the "Crazy Gang" image at the club, encouraging bizare 'rewards' and initiation ceremonies for new players - Hammam pledged to buy leading striker Dean Holdsworth a camel should he score 20 goals in a season, while at his first day at the club record signing John Hartson had his kit set on fire by his new team mates! Unfortunately however these eccentricities were not the extent of Hammam's controversial chairmanship, which led to him being dubbed "Sam the Sham" by Wimbledon supporters.

Hammam had arranged for ownership of the club's Plough Lane home ground to be held by a private company, of which Hammam himself was a director. After Wimbledon were forced to move out of their ground and groundshare at Selhurst Park with local rivals Crystal Palace in 1992, Hammam opened discussions with the Council to lift a covenant on the site, requiring it to be retained for sporting use. Once this was removed, Hammam went on to sell the site to supermarket giants, Safeway, for a substantial profit, leaving the club without a home ground.

Hammam was subsequently unsuccessful with his initial proposals for the club to relocate to, among other places, Dublin, Cardiff and Milton Keynes and eventually sold his stake in the homeless club to two Norwegian businessmen for a substantial fortune, reported at around £25 million. However it was his sale of the club's home ground which gave subsequent owners, Charles Koppel and Pete Winkleman, the opportunity to buy a football club for franchising to Milton Keynes.

Cardiff City FC

Having sold his interests in Wimbledon, Hammam purchased control of Cardiff City at the end of 2000, where he quickly picked up where he left off with Wimbledon. Shortly after taking over at Cardiff, Hammam controversially pledged to get the entire Welsh nation to support Cardiff by renaming the club "The Cardiff Celts" and changing the club colours to green, red and white.^[1],[2]. Whilst, as at Wimbledon, rumours persist that as part of the initiation ceremony for new players at the club are required to eat sheep's testicles^[3].

Having once again failed to deliver on his promises to secure a new ground for his club, Hammam was forced to stepp down as Bluebirds chairman in October 2006, leaving the club with multi-million pound debts, and was replaced by former Leeds United Chairman, Peter Ridsdale . As part of the deal, Hammam sold his majority stake in the club to a consortium of businessmen and hedge funds based in London. It was a debt for equity swap, cancelling most of the clubs debt. Shortly after the deal was announced, it went public that the new 30,000 stadium would be ready by Christmas 2008 and that JJB had signed up to the retail aspect. However, the contractors then announced that it would not be structurally possible to increase the capacity of the stadium to 60,000 if needs be, as Ridsdale had insisted. The saga goes on...

Ridsdale and rugby union side Cardiff Blues benefactor Peter Thomas want the Blues to share the ground with Cardiff City. Due to various reasons, most Blues fans are fiercely against this, depite the false claims certain supporters of the plan are making. Hammam had always insisted that Cardiff City would not share their new ground with any other team. In fact, when Hammam first took over Cardiff City, it was reported that his aim was to make football the overwhelmingly dominant sport in Wales, and that he wanted to batter rugby into submission^[4].

After failing to get the new stadium plans agreed by Cardiff Council due to concerns over financial security in 2006, Hammam agreed to a £27 million takeover by a consortia led by new chairman Peter Ridsdale and including lead developer of the new stadia Paul Guy. However, the takeover was in doubt until Friday 22 December, 2006 with the club in threat of administration until the consortia agreed to pay Hammam's company Rudgwick an extra £500,000 and £90,000 to Hammam's brother. Ex-Wales rugby captain Mike Hall said after the deal was completed: "That was money which would have been spent on players. But instead it's gone into Sam's pocket. It was the only way the deal was going to be done. I know people say he's a complex character, but at the end it was total greed and self-interest. It was amazing, but football is a murky world."^[5]

Trivia

• Hammam is a signed-up member of Wimbledons Crazy Gang
• Threatened poorly performing players with trips to the opera
• In 1994 he was caught scrawling abusive graffiti in the away dressing room at Upton Park
• When signing Robbie Earle from Port Vale, he locked the midfielder in his study until he signed.
• At Cardiff City he became a cult hero with fans for taking part in their head-patting 'do the Ayatollah' chant.
• Once quoted saying "We have to remain the English bulldog SAS club. We have to sustain ourselves by power and the attitude that we kick ass. Before we go down we'll leave a trail of blood from here to Timbuktu." As owner of Wimbledon, march 1999

Notes