Sports Direct founder says he cannot recall making £15m deal in pub and brands his £2.2bn fortune as ‘wallpaper’

Sports Direct boss Mike Ashley has described himself as a “power drinker” and dismissed his £2.2bn fortune as “wallpaper” at the high court.

The tracksuits and trainers tycoon is defending claims he agreed to pay a banker £15m while binge drinking in a London pub.



He told the court on Thursday that he could not remember making any such deal with former banker and colleague Jeff Blue. He said he would have downed the first four pints of the session in about an hour and told how the beers were “coming like machine guns” every few minutes that night.

“I like to get drunk, I’m a power drinker,” Ashley said. “My thing is not to drink regularly, it’s to binge drink. I’m trying to get drunk – will you accept that? I was drinking to get pissed and have a good night out.”

Ashley, the 54th wealthiest person in the UK according to the Sunday Times rich list, told the high court his fortune was mostly tied up in Sports Direct’s shares and he could only realise the money if he sold them, which he did not intend to do.

“Do you honestly think I’m worth £2bn less [than] when the shares were at £9?” he said. “It doesn’t make any difference until you sell them if they’re worth £20-a-share – they’re wallpaper.” Sports Direct shares peaked at 922p in 2014 but are now changing hands at 298p.

Ashley told the court this week that he was so “fabulously wealthy” that he didn’t know what to spend his money on when Sports Direct floated on the stock market 10 years ago and made him a paper billionaire. “What do you think I did in the morning – went out and bought the neighbour’s house? I already owned it.”

When Ashley invited the media to Sports Direct’s Shirebrook warehouse last year in an attempt to dispell the impression that working conditions were similar to a “gulag”, he revealed a wad of £50 notes as he made his way through security. I’ve just been to the casino,” he said at the time before adding: “Don’t write that.”

Ashley is defending himself against allegations that during a “night of heavy drinking” in January 2013 he agreed to pay Blue £15m if Sports Direct’s shares doubled to £8. The shares did hit £8 but have since collapsed, in part because of reputational damage caused by a Guardian investigation that revealed the retailer was in effect paying staff in its warehouse less than the minimum wage. A report by MPs later accused Ashley of running Sports Direct like a “Victorian workhouse”.

Ashley, who also owns Newcastle United football club, said he would rather have “put needles in my eyes” than go to the meeting with boring bankers at the Horse & Groom pub in Fitzrovia, central London, in January 2013. But he said he had been asked by Blue to make it a “fun night” and started drinking quickly.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Former banker Jeff Blue arrives at the high court. Photograph: Barcroft

Ashley said he would have had four to five pints within the first hour. “We would have had the first pint in between five and 10 minutes,” he said. “The second pint would probably be between 10 and, longest case, 15 minutes. The third pint is what 30 minute-ish – you’re slowing down by then.”

Jeffrey Chapman QC, Blue’s lawyer, put it to Ashley that his recollection of drinking quite so many pints so quickly might not be true because he had not factored in the time taken to go to the bar and order more drinks.

Ashley said it was the “job” of another banker in the pub to “get the drinks in”. “He got the drinks in before the round was finished … they were coming like machine guns.”

The businessman said he did not want to go the pub meeting with City brokers but Blue had “all but begged” him to go and told him to make it a fun night and impress the brokers with his larger-than-life personality.

Ashley said he would have made Blue keep pace with the drinking early on, but doubted that he would have been able to keep up. “He’s a lightweight when it comes to drinking – that’s a fact – and he wouldn’t have been physically able to keep up.”

Blue claims Ashley often conducts business in pubs, casinos and various other “unusual venues” while under the influence of alcohol and the meeting’s venue should not invalidate the alleged deal.

This week, Blue gave the court an extraordinary picture of Ashley’s working practices, including a claim that he would challenge subordinates to extreme drinking competitions that once ended with the 52-year-old billionaire vomiting into a fireplace.

Asked whether Ashley took calls about player transfers at Newcastle United during the meeting in the pub, he said he could not recall that and that managers at his club were “really not interested in my opinion on football”.

“Do you think I make the decisions for Newcastle United?” he said. “I’m like the last person to know.”

Ashley denied Blue’s allegations that he paid senior Sports Direct managers multimillion-pound bonuses from his personal funds to artificially keep down the pay of other staff.

“He knows that’s lies. Jeff Blue knows that’s utter bullshit,” Ashley told the court on Wednesday. He said he had never made any payments of more than £1m to any Sports Direct employees.

Blue had made the claim based on a conversation with Peter Cowgill, the boss of JD Sports, a rival of Sports Direct. Cowgill told the court on Thursday that he had no knowledge of the senior management’s pay.

Ashley clarified on Thursday that he had paid his brother John, who was in charge of IT at Sports Direct, “millions of pounds”.

The case continues.