Mike Ashley has left Sevco crippled despite Dave King’s heroic victory over the billionaire.
As soon as the South African based criminal swept to power in March 2015 he vowed to get rid of the retail and merchandising deals that instantly gave Charles Green’s new club high street credibility.
Last June King called a media conference to announce the termination of the contract with a 12 month notice period. In November the club’s audited accounts revealed that £3m had been paid to Sports Direct to terminate the deal.
Slowly now the full details of the termination deal are emerging with Sevco fans left bewildered by the secrecy involving their club.
Sevco’s deal with Puma is believed to end of July 1 with a further month on the contract with Sports Direct.
Effectively that means that there won’t be any Hummel kit on show until August- assuming that King can find distributors willing to sell the new kit.
There will be no sales surge for Steven Gerrard on June 1 or for the school summer holidays.
With those sort of conditions and the threat of the cold shoulder hanging over King it’s hardly surprising that the biggest names in sportswear avoided the Sevco contract leaving the door open to a minor operator from Denmark.
By the time that the Hummel strips hit the streets the full extent of Gerrard’s war-chest will be public knowledge.