Vincent Tan: Owner not 'asset stripping' Cardiff City says chairman

Cardiff City chairman Mehmet Dalman has dismissed suggestions owner Vincent Tan is "asset stripping" the club.

Dalman also denied speculation the club is being put into shape to be sold.

"Anybody who has an ounce of intellect in understanding numbers knows there are no assets which you are going to be stripping off," Dalman said.

"This club loses a double digit number (millions) a year. That is public knowledge, so what are you going to do? Strip what?"

Dalman added: "People should really be a bit more considerate than that."

He insisted that the Championship club is being run in a "healthy" manner.

"Without Vincent, we definitely would not exist," Dalman said. "Without him pumping money in every year in double digits (millions), this club would not exist.

"So unfortunately or fortunately - depending how you want to look on this - we are dependent on him."

Dalman was speaking for the first time since the transfer window closed on the last day of August.

Scotland goalkeeper David Marshall made more than 280 appearances for Cardiff City

On deadline day, Cardiff sold goalkeeper David Marshall to Hull City for a fee which could rise to £5m, and brought in former England striker Rickie Lambert from West Bromwich Albion.

Dalman explained the club were operating at the maximum loss - £13m per year - allowed by the Football League, to avoid a repeat of the transfer embargo for breaking Financial Fair Play rules, to which the club were subject last season.

He said: "Our profit and loss is not the healthiest in the world but we are very professional and we are very focused on that. So we had to work within our means… we need to get a healthy club. To get a healthy club you have to run it like a business.

"It's a business that will always lose money for you. We know that. It's a degree of how much money you can lose and we operate it quite prudently under that.

"That does not mean to say our ambition today is any less than it was two or three years ago. I just believe we are running this club on a much more professional basis than we have done for a long time."

Malaysian businessman Vincent Tan became Cardiff City in May 2010

Dalman also rejected speculation the club is being put into a better state to sell it.

"I am amazed where these stories have come from - certainly no-one has made a bid to me," he said. "If they have done it to somebody else, I don't know.

"That is not our intention, not our objective. It's an agenda that has never been discussed and if you could tell me who these people are who are interested, put them in in touch with me. I'll have a word with them."

Dalman said the commitment of Tan, who became Cardiff owner in 2010, was still as strong as ever, but that his business commitments prevented him from attending games.

He said: "Asia has not been the easiest market at the moment, he is spending a lot of time on his business. He is trying to make money there to pay for the losses here. His commitment has not changed."

The Cardiff chairman also sought to reassure Bluebirds fans who have voiced concerns at the club's transfer policy and their early season form.

''I think the message really is we need you with us," Dalman said.

"This is for you but we need you with us behind the team. I think in the last two years we have given you a lot to worry about I accept that and I like to think we have rectified a lot of things.

"This interview is all about football and direction of the club not all about political and legal issues which is great from my perspective.

"The message to the fans is come behind the team. This is Wales, this is Cardiff, Cardiff is the capital and we represent that capital and we are trying to implement that philosophy on the pitch as well as within the club and we'd love to have everybody on board.''

Meanwhile, the club insist they are on course to be debt free by 2021 and Tan's plans to convert debt into equity are progressing.