Last Saturday saw the start of the Football League season and the first match for Crystal Palace under the new ownership of CPFC 2010 - a consortium of 4 people drawn together in a joint effort to save this famous football club (established in 1905) from extinction.
The four new owners come from four completely different business backgrounds. The driving force behind the consortium is Advertising man Steve Parish who is the CEO of Tag Worldwide. Co-chairman is Martin Long, the man who founded Churchill Insurance. Jeremy Hosking is a very successful investment fund manager whose passion for saving famous names has also seen him buy Gravetye Manor hotel in Sussex and several classic steam trains. And there's me, the owner of Farr Vintners.
Our first job, once we had bought the club, was to appoint a new manager. We chose the hugely experienced ex Scotland, Ipswich, Southampton and Derby manager George Burley. His brief is to sign new players, bring talent through from the youth team, play attractive passing football and just maybe get us promoted back to the Premier League, of which we were a founding member.
One of my jobs was to get some decent wine in the boardroom and the Farr Vintners executive box. Crystal Palace is now the only football club (as far as I know) where wine lovers can bring their own wine to their box and pay no corkage. We're improving the catering too, as well as the quality of the football. If you would like to combine a passion for wine and football then do send me an e-mail at stephen@farrvintners.com
Our Chateau Carignan 2003 went down particularly well at the opening game against Leicester City - final score Palace 3 : Leicester 2. It was enjoyed by guests that included novelist Julian Barnes and actor Neil Morrissey. We hope to entertain more people from the world of wine during the coming season. Frederic Engerer of Chateau Latour already has a Palace shirt with Latour 59 on the back and Jean-Charles Cazes has a Lynch 09 shirt on the way to him. Apart from Delia Smith, whose Norwich City visit us on boxing day, there are other wine and football fans who we may see one day if their clubs visit us in league or cup games:
Many of our friends in Bordeaux support, of course, Les Girondins whose manager Laurent Blanc has just left to take over the French national team. The president of Bordeaux is also a wine producer - making Chateaux Saint Pierre and Gloria in Saint Julien. Another vineyard owner, Jean Tigana, has just been appointed the new manager. James Suckling is a fan of his local team in Tuscany - Fiorentina. We're not sure who Robert Parker supports, but there is a Crystal Palace affiliate team in Baltimore if he'd like to watch a game of football, sorry Soccer....
