Whilst for the first seventy or so years the history of Leeds United concentrated mainly on matters on the field, the last ten years have seen off field matters in the forefront.
The Johnathan Woodgate/Lee Bowyer court case took two years to resolve. Both players were said to be involved in an affray which left an Asian student in hospital. Later two Leeds supporters, Christopher Loftus and Kevin Speight, were stabbed to death in Galatasaray before a UFEA Cup game which Leeds lost.
At this time David O'Leary was in charge and his team never finished outside the top five of the Premiership, but again it was off the field where problems occured.
Bulmers, the Hereford based cider-makers, decided they would sponsor Leeds in 2000 and for three years Strongbow appeared on the shirts of the club but Leeds were hitting the headlines for all the wrong reasons at this time and it is doubtful whether the sponsorship, which cost several million ponds, was a success.
In 2001 Leeds lost a semi-final game against Valencia in the UEFA Champions League. Peter Ridsdale was chairman and had taken out large loans with the hope that income from the competition would be forth-coming. It wasn't long before they sold Rio Ferdinand to Manchester United for approximately £30m which didn't please manager O'Leary who soon left to be replaced by Terry Venables and then, after he too fell out with Ridsdale, by Peter Reid.
Reid just managed to keep Leeds in the Premiership but Ridsdale resigned as chairman and was replaced by so-called money expert Professor John McKenkie. He didn't last long as Leeds was taken over by a local consortium led by Gerald Krasner, an insolvency expert. Eddie Gray was in charge but could do little to stop Leeds dropping out of the Premiership in 2004 after fourteen years.
Under Krasner anything that could be sold was to try and stabilise the club. The training ground went and then Elland Road itself for about £25 million. And then came the arrival of Ken Bates.
Bates has been involved with many ventures over the years. He made his fortune in haulage, concrete and dairy farming in the sixties and early seventies but had his first brush with controversory when his Irish Trust Bank left investors out of pocket in 1976. At this time he was chairman of Oldham Football Club but it was his purchase of Chelsea for just £1 in 1982 that will be remembered as the time Bates arrived on the football scene.
Bates eventually sold Chelsea to Roman Abramovich for £17 million not before he had alienated many involved with the club. He was then reported as saying he needed one last challenge so after failing to buy into Sheffield Wenesday he purchased 50% of Leeds. He tried to take on Chelsea after he alledged that they had tapped up three young Leeds players and was reported by Chelsea for reportedly commenting that the current Chelsea directors are "a bunch of shysters from Siberia".
Bates brought in Denis Wise from Milwall to manage the team during October 2006. Previously Kevin Blackwell had been in charge but the 2006/07 season had started poorly. Wise couldn't stop the drift to relegation and Bates decided to put the club into a CVA, not disimilar to Hereford's several years ago.
However Bates is a clever man and he when the club was put up for sale by administrators KPMG he bought the club.
At the time the club was said to be £35m in debt. As Bates owned half of it in effect he would have owed £17.5 milion to its creditors. His first attempt to buy back the club was with an offer of just 8p in the pound to the creditors. But this was opposed by the Inland Revenue who were owed £7.7million in unpaid taxes. However a deal was done and Bates, with the help of Wise, are on the road top recovery both on and off the field.
Although the Football League imposed a 15 pint deduction on Leeds they are climbing the League One table quickly and look certain for promotion. Attendances are topping 30,000 unheard of in League One and both Bates and Wise must be pleased with progress.
However there are always set-backs in any season at any level. Last weekend Leeds lost 3-1 at Carlisle. They will hope to get back to winning ways this evening at Bournemouth.
On Friday Hereford United have the opportunity to put a (small) spanner in the works by defeating Leeds in the FA Cup. Even if this does happen it's unlikely to have much of an effect on Bates and Wise as they return Leeds to their proper place close to, or at, the top of English football.
Meanwhile it has been confirmed that in adavance of Friday's game Leeds United are staying at Holme Lacy House and training at Pegasus's ground.
Text at top (next game etc)
Next Game: Scarborough In The League At Edgar Street On Tuesday 19th November At 7.45pm