West Ham told to pay staggering £300,000-a-year for claret carpet to cover London Stadium athletics track
Hammers made bid for a carpet to match the club's colours but the landlords are demanding a huge fee
WEST HAM must pay a staggering £300,000-a-year if they want to cover the London Stadium athletics track with a claret carpet, it is understood.
The club reportedly made a bid to pay for the club-coloured carpet and to have it installed but the landlords want an annual fee.
According to the , a one-off £380,000 payment would have covered the cost of replacing the current green carpet.
The new chief executive of the London Legacy Development Corporation, though, wants a yearly payment from West Ham to cover the lost commercial benefits of the pitch-side branding.
Lyn Garner also suggested the rent being paid by the Hammers - £2.5million-a-year - is not enough to even cover staging matches and is causing financial problems.
Garner said: "No other Premier League football club has such an opportunity to have a track cover with its colours on.
"We think the club should pay not a one-off cost for the track cover but an annual fee. It is not unreasonable.
"What is really driving the problems here are the low rents paid by the concessionaires, particularly West Ham."
In a statement, West Ham said they offered to buy the stadium but since agreeing the tenancy, have honoured the terms.
It read: "West Ham United initially offered to purchase London Stadium but our request was denied. We were given a tenancy agreement because we were the best offer by far on the table.
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"All we have ever done is honour the terms of our tenancy agreement which has 97 years to run."
West Ham have lost every match of the new Premier League season under Chilean manager Manuel Pellegrini, who was brought in this summer.
Their last win at the London Stadium came on the final day of last season as they beat Everton 3-1 and has been the Hammers' home ground since the beginning of the 2016/17 season.