Birmingham chief Karen Brady set to quit club
Published 16:34 31/08/09 By Exclusive By James Nursey
Karen Brady is set to quit Birmingham once the club is taken over by Carson Yeung.
High-profile Brady, 40, has been Brum MD since being appointed at the age of 23 when the club was saved from bankruptcy in 1993 by David Sullivan and the Gold brothers.
She has played a huge role in reviving the club’s fortunes after being parachuted into St Andrews as City were relegated to the third tier.
But Brady has been considering her future ever since Yeung, who bought 29.9 per cent of City in July 2007, returned earlier this month with a bid to complete an £80million takeover.
And it is now inevitable Brady will leave Birmingham should Yeung succeed with his buy-out as expected next month.
Hong Kong businessman Yeung has stated publicly he intends to keep Brady at the club.
But relations between Brady and Yeung’s camp remain very frosty from his original failed bid to buy the club two years ago.
A Chinese delegation immediately irritated Brady by barging into her office unannounced when they were doing their due diligence in the past.
And she even threatened to sue some of Yeung’s representatives in 2007 as his attempts to gain control turned ugly.
Now Yeung is yet to be invited to St Andrews this season despite having a £57m offer to buy Sullivan and the Gold’s remaining shares accepted.
And the tycoon has lined up his trusted aide Sammy Yu to run Birmingham once his company Grandtop International gain formal control.
Yu, who watched Blues defeat at Spurs on Saturday before flying back to Hong Kong, met Brady for initial talks last week.
And Brady has already described Yu as “the chap who is replacing me”.
Consequently, Brady has decided to expand her role alongside Alan Sugar on the hit television show The Apprentice by replacing Margaret Mountford.
It is the first concrete signal Brady, dubbed the First Lady of Football, is set to leave Birmingham for new challenges.
She is also chairman of Emap’s Kerrang, has a seat on the board of Sport England and is a non-executive director of Mothercare and Channel 4 television.
But she will not be short of new offers after the City of London Police and HM’s Revenue and Customs recently confirmed neither she or Sullivan will face any charges after a two-year probe into the club over alleged tax irregularities.
Brady, who recovered from a potentially fatal cerebral aneurysm in 2006, took over Birmingham when it was in administration and in her first year at the helm, the club recorded a financial trading profit.
Sullivan has since stated he gave Brady the job because she was a “sacker“.
In 1996 City made an overall profit for the first time in recent history and in February 1997 the club launched on the stock market.
That eventually led to Yeung pursuing Brum as he paid £15m for an initial stake in 2007 before pledging to buy the rest.
And Brady now knows her time has come to leave as Yu has done plenty of homework on Blues and has extensive contacts in football already through his work in football in the Far East.
He counts several ex-international players like Steven McManaman as friends and hopes to work closely with manager Alex McLeish in future to bring in new stars in January.
