George Watts Chairman of Everton Football Club, August 1970 to August 1972 George Watts became club chairman in August 1970 with Everton celebrating the First Division Championship, and he had some expensive ambitions for the club, ranging from a hot-air system to keep the pitch free of frost to making Goodison Park fully covered. He told the Liverpool Echo: "Once the new stand is completed, and when we replenish our finances, we plan to build a cover over the Gwladys Street terraces. It will cost about £100,000. Complete cover "Much more in the future is development of the Stanley Park end of the ground. We have a lot of room behind that stand and we could enlarge it to take 10,000 seats. "We believe that the public will respond to improved facilities and amenities. We want to give them what they want. “Not every supporter wants to be seated, and although I think football grounds of the future — perhaps in ten to 20 years’ time — will work on the principle of having about 80 per cent of their accommodation in seats, we feel that there are many who prefer to stand on terraces. For that reason, we are not even thinking of putting seats on the terraces behind the goals at Goodison. But we do hope to have all the ground covered eventually. When the Goodison Road stand is complete, Goodison will have about 25,000 seats in their capacity of around 60,000. No other club ground in the country can match that ratio at present. Mr Watts said: "The board of directors are a team and, if you like. I'm the captain and a member of that team. I dislike the chairmanship cult. All the directors play a vital part in running the club — and I emphasize running affairs outside the playing side. “Each director works on committees and they are all tremendously enthusiastic and keen to further the cause of Everton. High quality This club was created by men of vision. Through the years there has always been someone to maintain that until now the club is famous everywhere for its quality in the highest class of football. “The present board intends to keep the club at its present level, and I would like to see us expand in Europe as well until people there acknowledge us as a very fine side and club. I think they do to some extent at present… I want to see our image grow in Europe. “The playing side, including coaching, training and the recruitment of young players, is in the very good hands of our manager, Harry Catterick. The directors and myself would only become concerned if it was not that way." A London man, Mr Watts was initially a Clapton Orient (now Orient) and Arsenal supporter in pre-war days and just after the war, in which he was a wing commander in the RAF. But in 1956 he moved to Merseyside, became a season ticket holder at Goodison and joined the board of Directors in 1967. He was managing director of Littlewoods Mail Order Stores and regarded the running of a football club in the same light as he directed the affairs of this giant organization. He encouraged top level management techniques to be used at Everton, and saw the board as similar to the executive approach of a big business. “I believe directors should be in the background. The team is the thing… and that is how we want it to continue at Everton. The directors are part of this team and our ambition, quite simply, is to keep Everton at its present quality level in the world of football." His business-like approach was very different to the outdated image which many supporters held of football club directors and should have maintained Everton at the peak.