Geoffrey Richmond today pledged to see Bradford City established as a Premiership club playing in an all-seater 29,000 capacity stadium at Valley Parade.

Those are his twin aims as he celebrates five years as City chairman this weekend.

He said: "It is my ambition for the club to take its rightful place in the Premiership and establish ourselves there..

"While that is going on I want to maximise the full potential of Valley Parade which I am advised is 29,000."

Richmond who took over City when they were a mid-table Second Division club has seen them rise to second place in the First Division with a great chance of winning promotion to the top flight this season.

He said: "When the time comes I want to hand over the club in a better shape than it was when I took over. But whoever is chairman or owns the club is only holding it in custody as trustee for the city and the supporters because the club is an institution in Bradford.

"It has to play its part in the life of the city and put back into the community as much as possible.

"It also has to represent the city in the most favourable light and give the city the image and profile it rightly deserves."

But as he outlined his future objectives he also revealed in an exclusive interview in today's Yorkshire Sports that he almost walked away from the club more than two months ago as plans to build a new £2.5 million all-seater Kop stand hung in the balance.

He said: "We had a major crisis on the planning application for the Kop stand, but I told some of the senior politicians in the city that if the application was turned down I would have resigned the same day.

"I wasn't bluffing or threatening -it was a statement of fact so that they fully understood the importance of the decision that was going to be made.

"The reason I came to the club in the first place was that I saw Bradford City being able to develop its potential.

"I believe we would be condemned to being a Second or Third Division club for ever if our plans had not gone through."

"For, without the capacity and therefore the income to drive the club forward there is no substance to any dream.

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