Beefy is a legend

Yep I agree, I thought we spent the majority of the first half outplaying them. Some excellent passing and I thought Dimi and Max were both very good outlets. The second half Liverpool were dominant and our lack of pre-season showed to be honest. But I expect our match sharpness to improve and I expect us to be pretty competitive in a couple of weeks' time. Overall based upon our first half performance there is enough to suggest we are capable of staying in the league.

I'm going, lower Barclay Block C. Can't wait to watch the game with my brother in a packed Carrow Road. I'm not going to avoid doing the things the make life worth living.

We will still spend a huge % of our income on wages. It's hard to understand how so many people don't take the wage bill into consideration.

This is spot on, I realised it after doing a test to go to Trent Bridge. You don't even need to take the test, you just need the serial number on the test and then you tick the box to say that you had a negative result. Its total nonsense.

I'm fairly confident that it is Chairmen and Chief Execs, rather than managers, that conduct the negotiations...

I'm certainly not arguing that the PL are great philanthropists. But whatever their reasons, they do give a significant amount of money to the EFL every season, most of which is spent on wages and fees by Championship clubs.

I haven't been able to source more up to date figures but the Premier League simply gave away more than £100m to the EFL in 2018/19, not including parachute payments etc. Easy to forget that is something which the PL is not obligated to do by any means.

I don't disagree and this is the reason why the PL is giving interest free loans to clubs like Hull. They would help out Huddersfield too if they needed it, even though Hudds don't even bother to run an academy these days. But there is a limit to the assistance the PL can reasonably be expected to give - clubs like Arsenal have their own problems. And in the end, clubs have to manage their own individual affairs. The football family can, and does, help out other clubs when they are in trouble. But that help doesn't come from a bottomless pit of cash and is limited, and can never become a safety net so as to allow clubs to gamble on promotion without consequences if they fail. This is all why NCFC's self-funding approach is so laudable and why Covid hasn't affected us nearly as badly as it would have done say 4 years ago.

But it isn't clubs like Arsenal, Man Utd etc whose job it is to look after Hull City supporters, is it? And even though it isn't, they've still helped to provide Hull with an interest free loan to keep them out of the mire. Maybe they could do more, but they certainly do plenty compared with any other industries where big businesses wouldn't dream of helping out smaller rivals. Totally agree with you on fit and proper persons - that's one for the EFL itself to address.

That's true but then Arsenal have lost an absolute fortune, and no other clubs are going to bail them out. If Tesco ended up in trouble, they wouldn't expect Morrisons to help them out, would they? I sometimes just think it's a little easy to blame the greedy PL. The majority of clubs outside the PL that get themselves in trouble do so by chasing the PL dream or through the appointment of terrible owners.

I somewhat disagree. The PL doesn't have to give anything of the money which it has negotiated with broadcasters etc. It does give a significant amount of money to the EFL in solidarity payments, most of which is squandered by Championship clubs in an effort to get promotion. If I was the PL and saw that those payments essentially go on player purchases and wages, I'd be pretty annoyed about it, and that's exactly what happens to most of the money that the PL basically donates to EFL clubs. And per the article, it is an interest free loan from PL/EFL that has saved Hull from a fire sale. If clubs ran themselves the way NCFC now does, they wouldn't need such loans to get them out of trouble. That's perhaps simplistic because it takes certainly 3 or 4 years minimum to get an academy off the ground, but many of these clubs are spending well beyond their means and I don't see why the PL should have to come in and bail them out, especially with clubs like Hull who were supposedly bought by 'rich foreign investors' of the kind that some on this forum would like to see installed at NCFC.

Is it worth mentioning that the mask in general protects other people, not yourself?

Yes losses of some £8m in the accounts. Even though a huge proportion of the £110m+ debt has been written off by Evans during the sale, and even though they have bankrolled owners, the reality is that they can spend very little money on the playing squad due to 60% wage to turnover cap rules in League One. It doesn't stop the owners spending on infrastructure improvements such as to the stadium etc but that doesn't get them out of L1. They have their work cut out. By comparison, on turnover statistics Norwich City is now a twelve times larger business. If we're Tesco, they're a corner shop...

There's a useful summary of this in their local rag. https://www.eadt.co.uk/sport/ipswich-town/itfc-2020-accounts-8105518 According to that, their annual turnover is £10.6m. That is truly remarkably low. It ties their hands hugely in terms of recruitment due to salary cap rules too and explains why so many players have been released.

Maybe just put your feet up and relax until 5th July. That's the date that NCFC return to first team training. And that's when we should be concerned about what sort of squad we have put together. The next three weeks are for Webber to put some work into motion, now with the assuredness of the Buendia cash behind him. Give him the chance to do that.

These posts get so boring. The club will spend what it receives, be that in transfer fees, wages and bonuses etc. If you don't believe that, get yourself a full copy of the club accounts. The problem among many of our fan base is that they don't realise quite how much of our income goes on player wages. There's a reason, for example, that about £15m of the Buendia cash will be available for transfer fees. It's because most of the rest will go on the wages of the say, 3 players we sign. Plus some cash being set aside for youth recruitment, future covid losses (that look more and more likely to spill into next season now), and possible further stadium/training ground improvements. As I say, get yourself a copy of the accounts.

The transfer policy is decided by Webber. He literally said in a recent interview that Delia & Michael told him he could do what he wanted with the club. It's why he came here. You can't praise Webber when he signs a player, then criticise Delia and Michael when we sell one. It's hypocrisy of the highest order. If Webber decided that Emi & Max had to stay, Delia & Michael wouldn't have vetoed it. Webber makes the decisions and in the case of those players, he's decided it's in our best long term interests to sell one or both of them to fund around 6 or 7 signings that will bolster the overall depth of the squad, which we all know is needed.

They are mostly way too old and on too much money for us to have any interest. I don't like to speak disrespectfully of any club (except Ipswich) but I genuinely think that if Palace went down no one outside of that club would bat an eyelid. They have a 'functional' style, play at the worst ground in the league, and the Premier League is plenty London-centric enough without them. Even their kit is non-descript...I much prefer when the PL places are distributed around the country, much prefer to see a Forest, Bristol, Swansea etc in the Prem and spread the teams around the country.

With FFP rules it would be difficult to believe that 1p5wich could satisfy his wage demands. It's actually a bit of a problem for their new owners - even with a few quid to spend, translating that into a squad of promotion certainties will not be straightforward. And given that Cook is replacing most of the squad this summer, integrating a dozen new players is going to take a bit of time. With Wycombe, Sheff Weds, Charlton, Pompey, and probably Rotherham in that league next year, getting out of League One will still be a big ask for the binmen.

I agree that the club are aware and I think we've seen the foundations built this season of a more robust and athletic side, particularly with McLean and Skipp but also acquiring Hugill and Gibson. We will need to build further on that and I fully expect that there will be targets in mind of the likes of Choudhury at Leicester. We won't be signing too many Alex Pritchard's I suspect...

I don't think we can underestimate how difficult a task it will be. Even though, for example, Burnley might be an 'average team', they are organised and robust, and I do think that there is a gap in terms of our physical strength and athleticism compared to that sort of side. How will we stop Chris Wood winning headers in our penalty area? I don't have any worries at all that the quality of our passing and movement is better than several PL sides. I don't see scoring enough goals as an issue. But we will have to sign 2 or 3 players who are real strong athletes and I'd like to see those at centre back, CDM and no.10.

It's not a 'sexy' answer, but the truth is, it's not about how much you're packing, it's how you use it... What I do know is that if Webber has £15m to spend, he won't waste it on a Wildschut or Naismith. He'll buy, more than likely, someone around 25 years old, who has already played in Champions League or Europa League, with a few years of top flight experience in a European league, and who has scope of improve and increase in value. A Giannoulis type. It's all about scouting well and recruiting for Farke's style. And a higher wage ceiling will certainly help. So in many respects, I don't think the headline transfer fee is important at all.

It's remarkable that their best attacking player is a 30 year old journeyman who has never played higher than League One. They really do have such a lack of quality. I disagree with the comment above re. Cook. I would attach very little blame to him - he is really just telling it like it is. Their squad has failed miserably for three straight seasons now, under three separate managers. They are obviously excited by the prospect of the takeover. My concern if I was one of them would be: - FFP rules will severely limit what their new owners can actually spend. - The overhaul will be so extensive that it will be a huge task to gel a disjoint group of recruits together quickly and make them into promotion contenders. - Attracting the quality they want will not be easy given where they are. - They are going to have to finish above sides like Wycombe and Rotherham who will be streetwise at that level. Also the likes of Sheff Weds and potentially Sunderland, Portsmouth and Charlton. It won't be at all easy, even if Cook begins turning things around, for them to get out of that league next season. Shame.

Obviously this is all a little moot now as the thing is dead in the water, but in fact the UK Government could easily have caused massive issues with the ESL. Whether refusal to grant licenses could be overturned in Court, the government could refuse european clubs entry into the UK. They could have introduced an enormous tax programme affecting the ESL. And even if it was ruled that players could not technically be banned from World Cups, countries to simply instruct their national team coaches not to select any ESL players.

UK Government could refuse clubs licenses to host games at their stadiums. These big 6 have a massive fight on their hands.