alleycat

As I understand, each club in the EFL will be given £800,000. This in an advance as it would normally have been given to the clubs at the end of the season. It’s from the Premier Leagues TV money. I think the concern from the EFL’s point of view is that if the clubs are given this money now and the clubs then use it to carry on paying the players in full then what happens when THAT money is spent? Surely it’s not to much to ask for players (certainly in the Championship) to defer their wages for say 2 months and then reassess the situation then?

The EFL actually say that the money won’t be distributed “while additional clarity is sought on other financial matters, particularly in respect to players wages”. Which I read as, they’re not going to give the money out just so the clubs can carry on paying obscene amounts to the players rather than using it to help with keeping the clubs running / afloat. If that’s the case then I think that’s fair enough.

Yep. Just had a look at the results towards the end of that season. With 2 games to go we were third and end up finishing fourth. The 4 results prior to this last game against Norwich were: 0-4 against Watford 0-0 against Chelsea 2-2 against Rotherham 1-3 against Bolton So we won one (the Norwich game) out of our last 5. So near and yet so far eh?

You’re right. It was the first season of 3 points for a win. Interesting fact. Norwich finished 3rd that season on 71 points and got promoted. We finished 4th on 70. Had it still been 2 points for a win, we’d have been promoted instead of Norwich as we’d have finished on 50 points to their 49.

This has got the potential to be a classic thread.

Decisions decisions.

Pretty accurate critique of Grandad.

Lamb rogan Josh Windass.

The laundry lady was Dot Mathieson. She lived on one of the roads off Penistone Road (the houses are no longer there). There were quite a few of the players who used to lodge with her.

The lower case y and upper case t bothers me.

Wednesday v Newcastle, December 1982?

So basically, we’ve spunked millions of pounds in transfer fees and wages over the last five years and are now, it seems, possibly reliant on a 32 year old we got on a free transfer. Says it all about the clubs recruitment policy over that time.

Not read the whole thread but a few observations. If it’s a limited offer then why not say how many it’s limited to? For all anyone knows it could be limited to 25000. By the same token, if it’s limited to say 500, then come and and say so. If enough people want to take the offer up then they’d be more inclined to do so if they thought they were going to lose out (basic marketing). My view is that it’s not in the least limited. If 10000 wanted to buy one then I reckon they’d be willing to sell 10000. Secondly, if you can afford it, it’s a good deal. In fact it’s a very very good deal. In fact it’s too good a deal. And that’s a worry. No matter what anyone thinks, football clubs don’t do deals this good for the fans benefit. It is 100% about getting some cash in and quick. I’ve said in other threads that I’m worried about the financial future of our club and this “deal” does nothing to alleviate those fears. If anything it smacks of yet more desperation.

Since the day DC took over the only business plan the club has had is to get into the Premier League, which in itself isn’t a bad plan..............as long as you actually get promoted to the Premier League!! Every year that’s passed since he arrived, and every year that passes going forward that we don’t get promoted just exacerbates the fact that there is absolutely no plan B and puts the club deeper in the mire. Season one. Ramping up the ticket prices to the highest in the league doesn’t matter because we’re going to get promoted this season and once we’re in the PL people will think nothing of paying these prices and we’ll sell the ground out every home game. Problem being that we didn’t get promoted, but we’d spent loads of money not getting promoted. Not to worry, we’ll throw loads more money at it in season two, keep the ticket prices high, and get promoted this year. Oops. And so on and so on. The issue with the original (and still the current) business plan is that he’s now got nowhere to go. It was 100% reliant on us going up that first season (or the second season as a last resort). Had we done so then everyone would have scrambled to buy a season ticket for fear of not being able to buy a ticket on a match by match basis but while ever we’re in the Championship we’ll max out at around 20k to 22k season ticket holders and you can now forget about POTG revenue as it’s negligible. The money the people who pay on the gate generate isn’t even a drop in the ocean. He’s backed himself into a corner. The clubs haemorrhaging money every day/month/year and therefore he can’t afford to drop season ticket prices as we’d just end up losing more money. Therefore, as the ST prices need to be kept at that level there’s no margin to reduce POTD prices. We’re now in a vicious circle. Every year that goes by without us getting promoted highlights the short sightedness of the business plan. Lets look at where we are now, compared to the day DC walked through the door: The new pitch looks great. Yeah but we’re still in the Championship. The scoreboard’s brilliant. Yeah but we’re still in the Championship. That first season was the best football we’d played for years. Yeah but we’re still in the Championship. We had a great day out at Wembley. We’re still in the Championship. We’ve got the highest ticket prices in the league. The (Championship) league. We pay some of the highest wages in the league. Still the (Championship) league. We’re in a big big mess. We’ve paid the big bucks to the “best” players over the last few years and rather than being in the PL we’re actually no better off league wise than the day he walked through the door. In actual fact, now that the plan hasn’t worked these “best” players will need to be off loaded (quite rightly as it happens, as by and large they’re a disgrace to the shirt) as we are in deep deep shite P&S wise. Which leads to the question of the ground sale and possible sanctions. The issue isn’t the value, it’s the fact that we put the ground sale into the previous years accounts (allegedly). So a question to all the people who think it was a master stroke and that there’s some conspiracy against us by the EFL. Why didn’t we just sell the ground a year earlier and put it in that years accounts. Non of this EFL stuff would then be happening. Answer is that (once again) he gambled that we’d get promoted. (Once again) we didn’t and therefore here we are facing a possible points deduction. Time will tell whether we, or the EFL are right but hey ho. The fact that the club were even in the position of having to “sell” the ground is a disgrace and down to one man and one man only. Some people can wax lyrical all they like about the great position the clubs in at the moment and that DC “saved” us but it would be because they’re looking through blue and white tinted specs. Any supporter who thinks about our current situation and looks at it objectively and isn’t deeply worried is a fool. This club is in a big big mess at the moment. And it’s not because we’ve lost three on the bounce. That’s the least of our worries.

Thanks for that. So I suppose if DC were to sell up it’d be relatively straightforward from a point of view that the buyer would be buying everything from one person still.