The 14 questions

[manc-mag 1]

PS I know that's a bit garbled but hopefully some relevant strands emerge, even if not instantly. Equally if theres any false premises, shoot them down now. For me it's all about narrowing the issues if possible.

 

I honestly don't think you can be competitive on an ongoing self-fianacing model.

 

There are always ups and downs...Some seasons extra cash has to be generated (that either comes from loans/player sales/ cash from owners).

 

Agreed.

 

Mentioned in another thread that I thought the sustainability model was to a degree a player turnover one. Not necessarily in that you automatically have to sell to buy, but because you'll inevitably lose players you can't afford to keep (because they'll be offered more elsewhere). In that scenario, if you're keeping on top of your fiscal responsibilities elsewhere I think those funds should automatically be going straight back into team development.

[LeazesMag 0]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

[manc-mag 1]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

[LeazesMag 0]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

which is proof of ambition, like West Ham, Wigan, QPR......

 

Edit

 

My other point is if they conduct transfer talks and bore them to fuck with all that rubbish that you call "good craic" then it would shove them away too.

 

You need to get into the real world. Footballers just don't give a toss about that sort of thing, they want to win trophies, play in europe and compete at the highest levels they can. You can talk about "good craic" as much as you like, but they will sign for the club that shows them the ambition, not the one with the "good business plan".

Edited September 21, 2011 by LeazesMag

[manc-mag 1]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

which is proof of ambition, like West Ham, Wigan, QPR......

 

Naturally, but their ambition isn't the club's ambition, it's the ambition of a private individual.

[LeazesMag 0]

I'll ask you again, ref your previous comments, if you were too dim to realise it was previously aimed at you.

 

Which clubs exactly, do you consider to be "bigger clubs" and "acceptable to sell our best players to". Are they Spurs, Wigan, QPR, West Ham, Liverpool and Villa ?

[Kitman 2207]

Retention is the key one for me btw; it's easy saying offer someone £10k above the wage cap to keep them, they're worth it, but when that then becomes every players target on re-negotiation, you can easy be talking an extra £5-10 million per year just to keep the same players and then you have to introduce new ones at a higher rate too. That's when it gets 'easier' to stick to a wage cap and constantly re-recruit. In the purely financial sense.

 

On that point there must be a tipping point where it's cheaper to offer a key player more money than it is to buy a replacement on cheaper wages, unless the new player is on a free transfer (and even then as we know you have to pay agents fees etc). I take your point about all of the squad wanting to re-negotiate though so there's a knock on effect. I'm just wondering whether it's true that you'll save money by replacing players, especially once the last high earners like Colo and Smith (and possibly Xisco) are shipped out.

 

You'd hope that replacing a player is a decision made on footballing grounds not financial ones. The Carrroll sale is obviously a financial decision whereas I would say the Nolan sale was possibly more of a footballing one - an ageing player who would offer less and less on the pitch but wanted a long contract.

[manc-mag 1]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

which is proof of ambition, like West Ham, Wigan, QPR......

 

Edit

 

My other point is if they conduct transfer talks and bore them to fuck with all that rubbish that you call "good craic" then it would shove them away too.

 

You need to get into the real world. Footballers just don't give a toss about that sort of thing, they want to win trophies, play in europe and compete at the highest levels they can. You can talk about "good craic" as much as you like, but they will sign for the club that shows them the ambition, not the one with the "good business plan".

 

The real world is how you're going to pay them. While I freely concede they're not going to want to talk business models during transfer talks, they would no doubt have something to say if you neglected to pay them/tried paying them in monopoly money.

[manc-mag 1]

I'll ask you again, ref your previous comments, if you were too dim to realise it was previously aimed at you.

 

Which clubs exactly, do you consider to be "bigger clubs" and "acceptable to sell our best players to". Are they Spurs, Wigan, QPR, West Ham, Liverpool and Villa ?

 

You're personalising the debate in a way which the players won't do, I can assure you. The answer is whoever will pay them more money, because it will be their choice to go.

[manc-mag 1]

Retention is the key one for me btw; it's easy saying offer someone £10k above the wage cap to keep them, they're worth it, but when that then becomes every players target on re-negotiation, you can easy be talking an extra £5-10 million per year just to keep the same players and then you have to introduce new ones at a higher rate too. That's when it gets 'easier' to stick to a wage cap and constantly re-recruit. In the purely financial sense.

 

On that point there must be a tipping point where it's cheaper to offer a key player more money than it is to buy a replacement on cheaper wages, unless the new player is on a free transfer (and even then as we know you have to pay agents fees etc). I take your point about all of the squad wanting to re-negotiate though so there's a knock on effect. I'm just wondering whether it's true that you'll save money by replacing players, especially once the last high earners like Colo and Smith (and possibly Xisco) are shipped out.

 

You'd hope that replacing a player is a decision made on footballing grounds not financial ones. The Carrroll sale is obviously a financial decision whereas I would say the Nolan sale was possibly more of a footballing one - an ageing player who would offer less and less on the pitch but wanted a long contract.

 

I'm sure there are increments that get discussed and I'm sure there will come a stage when the cap will get genuinely tested for the very reason you've mentioned. I'm not saying it's easy to live with on a personal level either, because it's not, it's gutting. I s'pose I try my best to get a bit less worked up about it though if possible, because if a player goes it'll ultimately be because they want more money. I think acquisition remains a more straightforward process than retention under our constraints. Thus when we decided we wouldn't buy a striker last window my reaction was I thought they were just taking the piss out of us. That was eminently do-able and would have made a real difference.

[Kitman 2207]

Retention is the key one for me btw; it's easy saying offer someone £10k above the wage cap to keep them, they're worth it, but when that then becomes every players target on re-negotiation, you can easy be talking an extra £5-10 million per year just to keep the same players and then you have to introduce new ones at a higher rate too. That's when it gets 'easier' to stick to a wage cap and constantly re-recruit. In the purely financial sense.

 

On that point there must be a tipping point where it's cheaper to offer a key player more money than it is to buy a replacement on cheaper wages, unless the new player is on a free transfer (and even then as we know you have to pay agents fees etc). I take your point about all of the squad wanting to re-negotiate though so there's a knock on effect. I'm just wondering whether it's true that you'll save money by replacing players, especially once the last high earners like Colo and Smith (and possibly Xisco) are shipped out.

 

You'd hope that replacing a player is a decision made on footballing grounds not financial ones. The Carrroll sale is obviously a financial decision whereas I would say the Nolan sale was possibly more of a footballing one - an ageing player who would offer less and less on the pitch but wanted a long contract.

 

I'm sure there are increments that get discussed and I'm sure there will come a stage when the cap will get genuinely tested for the very reason you've mentioned. I'm not saying it's easy to live with on a personal level either, because it's not, it's gutting. I s'pose I try my best to get a bit less worked up about it though if possible, because I think acquisition remains a more straightforward process than retention under those constraints. Thus when we decided we wouldn't buy a striker last window I thought they were just taking the piss out of us-that was eminently do-able and would have made a real difference.

 

Yes. I've wondered since whether there's a 'one out one in' component to that thinking i.e. some other reason a new striker didn't come through other than 'they made joke offers and fucked it up'. If financial discipline is all important then it wouldn't surprise me if a large part of why we didn't sign a new striker was that we couldn't get any of the old ones off the wage bill (Loven, Ameobi, Ranger in particular). Which would be crazy from a footballing pov of course.

 

I was hoping that the reason we signed up Shola to a new contract was we were preparing to ship him out but hey ho, another disappointment from the summer.

[Ollie Burtons Grandad 0]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

Thing is with the FCB in charge any player will be sold as soon as a decent offer comes in / or they manage to piss him off. That being the case we are destined to be a bottom half side until this lot sell up and fuck off.

Our revenue streams will continue to diminish; Attendances will continue to fall, fewer business will want to advertise at SJP which means more free advertising for the FCB ShiteDirect and we will appear less and less on TV as we will become a pisspoor team that no one wants to watch.

On a bright note Tiote having a bad start to the season should mean no one tries to buy him in the next transfer window.

[manc-mag 1]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

Thing is with the FCB in charge any player will be sold as soon as a decent offer comes in / or they manage to piss him off. That being the case we are destined to be a bottom half side until this lot sell up and fuck off.

Our revenue streams will continue to diminish; Attendances will continue to fall, fewer business will want to advertise at SJP which means more free advertising for the FCB ShiteDirect and we will appear less and less on TV as we will become a pisspoor team that no one wants to watch.

On a bright note Tiote having a bad start to the season should mean no one tries to buy him in the next transfer window.

 

And all things being equal, if we're self-sustaining (as he wants us to be-meaning that that money isn't required to plug holes elsewhere), then if it isn't re-invested in the team, we're having the piss taken out of us. Agreed.

 

He won't see it that way, because to him it's perfectly reasonable to make the point that an individual transfer sum isn't a large enough amount to take you to the next level and hence it's not worth re-investing in its entirety (ie he can get something adequate for cheaper), but as fans we know it's a pisstake all the same.

[peasepud 59]

Think your data is wrong, when i saw £124m i thought thats wrong. It was £87.1m in 2007 according to Swiss Ramble, not a perfect source but highly reputable.

 

So your % change may be wrong too.

 

With a full house, busy VIP boxes, European football and new TV deal, we should be able to break £110m.

 

Apologies you are correct, problem with trusting newspaper sites that incorrectly show Euro figures as Sterling!

 

Redone the figures, using the actual Sterling amounts in the Deloitte pdfs to get:

 

 

So as can be seen, the minimum increase in the UK for the other "UK Rich clubs" was just over 35% since 2007, we are on 0.01%

 

Using the average increase (as I did previously) would give an average increase since 2007 of 52.42%

 

Applying that to our £85.9m from 2007 should have seen us on £130.94m turnover for 2010. Spookily and I assume totally luckily this is virtually exactly the same answer as before

[Kitman 2207]

Think your data is wrong, when i saw £124m i thought thats wrong. It was £87.1m in 2007 according to Swiss Ramble, not a perfect source but highly reputable.

 

So your % change may be wrong too.

 

With a full house, busy VIP boxes, European football and new TV deal, we should be able to break £110m.

 

Apologies you are correct, problem with trusting newspaper sites that incorrectly show Euro figures as Sterling!

 

Redone the figures, using the actual Sterling amounts in the Deloitte pdfs to get:

 

 

So as can be seen, the minimum increase in the UK for the other "UK Rich clubs" was just over 35% since 2007, we are on 0.01%

 

Using the average increase (as I did previously) would give an average increase since 2007 of 52.42%

 

Applying that to our £85.9m from 2007 should have seen us on £130.94m turnover for 2010. Spookily and I assume totally luckily this is virtually exactly the same answer as before

 

0.1% actually. We've done 10 times better than you're claiming!

 

Presumably achieving 130 mill would be contingent on qualifying for the CL. I presume that's why Spurs have shown such a jump?

[OTF 7560]

And all things being equal, if we're self-sustaining (as he wants us to be-meaning that that money isn't required to plug holes elsewhere), then if it isn't re-invested in the team, we're having the piss taken out of us. Agreed.

 

He won't see it that way, because to him it's perfectly reasonable to make the point that an individual transfer sum isn't a large enough amount to take you to the next level and hence it's not worth re-investing in its entirety (ie he can get something adequate for cheaper), but as fans we know it's a pisstake all the same.

 

Can't help feeling that the path towards self-sustenance that Ashley is wanting to take the club on is one that will deride the profile and value of the club. It's not in his interest to do so, but being bargain basement barry in the transfer market always looking to do a deal in or out means that the profile of the club won't increase our chances of signing players of ability on an ongoing basis. Over a few year it won't be patently obvious, but when they're out there burning bridges with their transfer dealing the blacklist will grow and we'll have a even more negative reputation.

 

The problem with going the other way and aiming for self-sustenance by winning things, making the team better, increasing prize money, increasing corporate etc is that you're competing with teams that don't have the same self-sustenance goals and so are prepared to spend more. At the end of the day across a decent amount of time money is the ultimate power. The teams that spend more have better teams, finish higher on the table and win more trophies. The more teams that spend with a blatant disregard for their bottom line the worse it becomes for the rest.

 

All obvious stuff, but all a bit frustrating really.

[Happy Face 29]

To be fair it's not really statistically honest to cherry pick the top 6 teams in the league currently and show how their fortunes have

fared.

 

What you need to do is go back to 2007 and look at ALL the Premier League teams from then.

 

We finished below Boro, Portsmouth and Reading in 06/07, the season before Ashley picked up the reins.

 

Comparitively, I'd imagine our revenue looks much healthier.

[manc-mag 1]

MCFC turnover £87 million and they've spent about £300 million on players (before they even start paying them a weekly wage)

[manc-mag 1]

To be fair it's not really statistically honest to cherry pick the top 6 teams in the league currently and show how their fortunes have

fared.

 

What you need to do is go back to 2007 and look at ALL the Premier League teams from then.

 

We finished below Boro, Portsmouth and Reading in 06/07, the season before Ashley picked up the reins.

 

Comparitively, I'd imagine our revenue looks much healthier.

 

 

Good call. Man U, Arse, LFC and Chelsea have all made up the top four more or less consistently over that period too, suggesting you need to maintain that consistently to keep on that % growth forecast. We were already well out of those places despite spending beyond our means and were already looking to cut back as Leazes I think has mentioned. You can ignore Man C because theirs is entirely down to throwing £300 million around that has nothing to do with the club.

 

On the other hand, Tottenham provide the counterpoint to suggest its possible to remain on that percentage growth outside of the top four, however.

 

What's Everton's btw Pud? Champions league level finish during recent times but against a backdrop of fluctuating finishes/no private benefactor funding/owe money to outside lenders?

[LeazesMag 0]

is this how the club "sold itself" to Andy Carroll and Enrique ?

 

No wonder they fucked off.

 

No doubt Tiote will follow suit.....

 

Tiote will go if he's offered more than we're paying him.

 

Thing is with the FCB in charge any player will be sold as soon as a decent offer comes in / or they manage to piss him off. That being the case we are destined to be a bottom half side until this lot sell up and fuck off.

Our revenue streams will continue to diminish; Attendances will continue to fall, fewer business will want to advertise at SJP which means more free advertising for the FCB ShiteDirect and we will appear less and less on TV as we will become a pisspoor team that no one wants to watch.

On a bright note Tiote having a bad start to the season should mean no one tries to buy him in the next transfer window.

 

And all things being equal, if we're self-sustaining (as he wants us to be-meaning that that money isn't required to plug holes elsewhere), then if it isn't re-invested in the team, we're having the piss taken out of us. Agreed.

 

 

when you actually say that you agree with this, its difficult to see what you have been disagreeing with and bickering about all this time, because it is what some of us have been saying for a long time now.

 

Edit.

 

For those who continue to harp on putting finance over the football, football is different to a high street store. You can't cut costs like Mike Ashley is doing without revenues decreasing. Top footballers want the wages in return for the shirts, advertising and commercial publicity they generate. Owning a football team full of average players which loses football games effects the "business" in the way Gerald Ratners comments about his "product" did. It's fucked.

Edited September 22, 2011 by LeazesMag

[peasepud 59]

To be fair it's not really statistically honest to cherry pick the top 6 teams in the league currently and show how their fortunes have

fared.

 

What you need to do is go back to 2007 and look at ALL the Premier League teams from then.

 

We finished below Boro, Portsmouth and Reading in 06/07, the season before Ashley picked up the reins.

 

Comparitively, I'd imagine our revenue looks much healthier.

 

I havent cherry picked though, Ive taken the English teams who were close to us in terms of Earnings ie those in the top 20 Rich List. Its better to compare the fortunes of those like teams than others because you can argue they all had the same chances ie had excellent income therefore its how its used that matters.

 

We could take Stoke, Blackpool, West Brom, Birmingham if you want......

 

Blackpool: Increased from £3.92m to £9m (129.59%)

West Brom: 35.54m to 47m (32.24%)

Birmingham: 40.11m increased to 56.4m (40.61%)

Stoke...........seriously, are you ready for this...........£7.59m to £53.5m (604.87%)

 

So using those 4 as the yardstick instead then the average is 201.82% increase... meaning we should be on £259.26m

 

I havent done it yet but Id be willing to bet that across the whole PL we're in the bottom 3 for turnover increase over that time period.

[peasepud 59]

What's Everton's btw Pud? Champions league level finish during recent times but against a backdrop of fluctuating finishes/no private benefactor funding/owe money to outside lenders?

Went from £58.12m to £80m, increase of 37.64%

[OTF 7560]

To be fair it's not really statistically honest to cherry pick the top 6 teams in the league currently and show how their fortunes have

fared.

 

What you need to do is go back to 2007 and look at ALL the Premier League teams from then.

 

We finished below Boro, Portsmouth and Reading in 06/07, the season before Ashley picked up the reins.

 

Comparitively, I'd imagine our revenue looks much healthier.

 

 

Good call. Man U, Arse, LFC and Chelsea have all made up the top four more or less consistently over that period too, suggesting you need to maintain that consistently to keep on that % growth forecast. We were already well out of those places despite spending beyond our means and were already looking to cut back as Leazes I think has mentioned. You can ignore Man C because theirs is entirely down to throwing £300 million around that has nothing to do with the club.

 

What would be interesting is to see how much they've spent during this period to maintain their more or less continual presence in that top 4.

 

Things have changed since then with Manchester City one primary difference. TV revenues have risen substantially throughout that time as have wages.

[ChezGiven 0]

Figures still not right. NUFC turnover in 2009/10 was £52.4m according to this years account.

 

My prediction for 10/11 accounts is £94m ish. About a 50% increase fwiw which is nothing.

 

If you want to know where we could have been then you have to look at the 3 lines of Turnover (as i have already stated) and estimate for each one what their potential is. The CL money has been increasing each time the deal has been made so most of the growth in turnover from the clubs playing in the CL come from growth in that money. Not relevant to us, so the % in growth for the clubs playing in the CL needs to be stripped out.

 

Or you just dont approach the problem that way. If we were doing a business review, maximum potential revenue would not be calculated based on a % rise across those 6 clubs and applied to our 2007 revenue.

[Happy Face 29]

To be fair it's not really statistically honest to cherry pick the top 6 teams in the league currently and show how their fortunes have

fared.

 

What you need to do is go back to 2007 and look at ALL the Premier League teams from then.

 

We finished below Boro, Portsmouth and Reading in 06/07, the season before Ashley picked up the reins.

 

Comparitively, I'd imagine our revenue looks much healthier.

 

I havent cherry picked though, Ive taken the English teams who were close to us in terms of Earnings ie those in the top 20 Rich List. Its better to compare the fortunes of those like teams than others because you can argue they all had the same chances ie had excellent income therefore its how its used that matters.

 

We could take Stoke, Blackpool, West Brom, Birmingham if you want......

 

Blackpool: Increased from £3.92m to £9m (129.59%)

West Brom: 35.54m to 47m (32.24%)

Birmingham: 40.11m increased to 56.4m (40.61%)

Stoke...........seriously, are you ready for this...........£7.59m to £53.5m (604.87%)

 

So using those 4 as the yardstick instead then the average is 201.82% increase... meaning we should be on £259.26m

 

I havent done it yet but Id be willing to bet that across the whole PL we're in the bottom 3 for turnover increase over that time period.

 

You're still cherry picking. What about other Champions League qualifiers Leeds Utd and Blackburn Rovers, or European contenders in the Premier league years, like Norwich City and Nottingham Forest?

 

You've included Manchester City, they were never n the top 20 with us.

 

I don't know what the average would be so I'm not suggesting we've done well in terms of growth comparably...but it's "zombie stats" (painting the picture you want to see rather than the truth) which gives statistics a bad name. "You can prove anything with statistics" they say, well no, you can't, if you do it properly and include ALL the members of a group or a suitably randomised selection, then you'll get the truth to pretty accurate percentage of certainty.

 

Sorry, but it's a bugbear of mine.