Ridsdale vows to weather Leeds storm

Peter Ridsdale, the Leeds United chairman, is determined to prove he can lead the troubled club "in difficult times as well as good".

Ridsdale has faced a tortuous past few months, coming under fire from fans angry at the departures of several key players this season, including Rio Ferdinand, Jonathan Woodgate and Robbie Fowler. Many supporters believe Ridsdale should resign given what they consider to be his financial mismanagement of the Elland Road club, which last summer saw overall debts soar to £77.8m.

Leeds' interim figures for 2002 are due out later this month, when it is expected that figure will have been significantly reduced, even before the £15m made on Fowler and Woodgate is taken into account.

Ridsdale has vowed to weather the storm and remain in charge, even though cuts are being made across the board behind the scenes at the club in a bid to save a further £3m per year, with operations director David Spencer departing on Friday.

"For five years at this football club we've had some enjoyable football, with two European semi-finals and top five [in the Premiership] every year," Ridsdale said. "If you take the club's history, there aren't too many periods in it where we've repeated that sustained five-year period. We've just had nine months of difficult times.

"Now if every management team in the first period of difficulty walked away, you'd have management leaving every day of the week. You'd see turmoil and changeover in clubs throughout the country, the like of which you'd never seen before. My challenge, and that of my colleagues, is to try to put us back to where we were, to prove that I can now manage in difficult times as well as good times."

Ridsdale again justified his decision, and that of the plc, to sell players of Woodgate's calibre, with the England defender's £9m move to Newcastle sparking a wave of protests. Ridsdale believes Leeds' problems this season are widespread in football, and that other clubs are certain to follow suit and sell players.

"In 20 years' time people will look back with fond memories of the trips we had in the Champions' League, of going to the semi-final," Ridsdale said. "What we then did was miss by one place, two years running, the opportunity to repeat it.

"What we are now doing is a combination of the financial implications of that, of carrying too many players for too long, while we are also seeing a fundamental change in the finances of football. The combination of those three things has meant we've had to readjust.

"In the January transfer window I know for a fact there were many chairmen and managers trying to reduce their playing staff, trying to find homes for players they were prepared to let go. Don't tell me there aren't 17 or 18 other football clubs out there also trying to readjust at the moment. The difference is we've managed to do it because we had assets other people wanted."