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£34 million loss

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If ever there was anything that shows external investment is required this is it as relegation will start the cycle yet again.

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Just now, TIL 1010 said:

If ever there was anything that shows external investment is required this is it as relegation will start the cycle yet again.

Exactly. The suggestion seems to be that if we'd have stayed down we'd have had to sell to just balance the books again. 

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Not necessarily though til. Digging below the headline and we had significant extra outlay from getting promoted, a including bonuses to everyone and the repaying of the bond and other infrastructure improvements. We will be a reliant on selling players if/when we get relegated again, but all champs clubs are either selling clubs or operating at a loss and racking up debt.

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1 minute ago, king canary said:

Exactly. The suggestion seems to be that if we'd have stayed down we'd have had to sell to just balance the books again. 

Well no, I think the whole point is that by doing this season the way we've done it (i.e not signing anyone for big money / big wages) we won't be in the same trap again. And by investing significantly into infrastructure and youth instead, we'll have the possibility of promoting young players into the squad for no money (compared to transfers).

If anything these figures explain to everyone why Webber is doing it the way he's doing it this season..

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It can only be a matter of time before someone quotes this, so I’m going to jump in first:

“Following promotion to the Premier League the club anticipates a substantial operating profit in the financial year to June 2020.”

Cue the “why didn’t we buy another central defender/midfield unit/cover for Pukki” posts .

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2 minutes ago, hogesar said:

Well no, I think the whole point is that by doing this season the way we've done it (i.e not signing anyone for big money / big wages) we won't be in the same trap again. And by investing significantly into infrastructure and youth instead, we'll have the possibility of promoting young players into the squad for no money (compared to transfers).

If anything these figures explain to everyone why Webber is doing it the way he's doing it this season..

From the article on the pinkun...

'That loss of £38m may seem an alarming drop but club bosses estimate not getting promotion would have meant a loss of between £10m and £15m, when player sales could then have been used to balance the books - as the sale of James Maddison to Leicester, for a reported initial £21m, demonstrated the previous summer.'

To me that reads as if we hadn't gone up we'd have needed to sell to balance the books. 

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1 minute ago, king canary said:

From the article on the pinkun...

'That loss of £38m may seem an alarming drop but club bosses estimate not getting promotion would have meant a loss of between £10m and £15m, when player sales could then have been used to balance the books - as the sale of James Maddison to Leicester, for a reported initial £21m, demonstrated the previous summer.'

To me that reads as if we hadn't gone up we'd have needed to sell to balance the books. 

I agree. But we DID go up. And now by carrying this season out the way we have done, we won't be in the same situation as we as before.

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Just now, hogesar said:

I agree. But we DID go up. And now by carrying this season out the way we have done, we won't be in the same situation as we as before.

Again, I'm not sure that is the case.

If we go down and don't bounce back before parachute payments run out we're in the exact same position as we were last season, even without excessive spending beforehand. We'd got the wage budget down to what appears to be a manageable level yet we're still talking about further player sales.

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10 minutes ago, TIL 1010 said:

If ever there was anything that shows external investment is required this is it as relegation will start the cycle yet again.

I'd argue that perhaps our more subdued transfer window could actually be intended to break this cycle.

 

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1 minute ago, hogesar said:

I agree. But we DID go up. And now by carrying this season out the way we have done, we won't be in the same situation as we as before.

If heaven forbid we get relegated what happens if we do not bounce back at the first attempt ? We will start losing money yet again.

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Here is what we know.

  • In our first year without parachute payments, our turnover was £33.7m
  • We kept our wage budget to a relatively modest 73% of TO or around £24m
  • With these figures, we were still projected to make a £10-15m loss, a hole that would need to be filled via player sales

As far as I'm aware our previous Premier League spending was almost irrelevant to this set of accounts- the wage budget was reigned in, the debts were paid off and yet we're still talking significant losses.

 

Edited by king canary
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The prize money for finishing bottom of the Prem is far higher than our last relegation, parachute payments will kick in and I am guessing we have not got the same issues we had before in respect of high wage earners etc. i am not sure that relegation will be any where near as much of a problem as it has in the past.........

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For goodness sakes! Why do people insist on looking on the bleak side all the time?  If we get relegated we will be in control of the finances, not spiralling into debt like last time.  We rescued that situation, got promoted, have increased the value of the squad many fold and are therefore in a good overall position.  Any loss that comes will be controllable through player sales - and any future success from will come from the building from the youth set up, which in case anyone hadn't noticed is key to the overall plan.

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3 minutes ago, king canary said:

Here is what we know.

  • In our first year without parachute payments, our turnover was £33.7m
  • We kept our wage budget to a relatively modest 73% of TO or around £24m
  • With these figures, we were still projected to make a £10-15m loss, a hole that would need to be filled via player sales

As far as I'm aware our previous Premier League season was almost irrelevant to this set of accounts- the wage budget was reigned in, the debts were paid off and yet we're still talking significant losses.

 

Still paying Naismith. I guess in the scenario that we find ourselves a championship.club with no parachute payment incoming - closest possible season 2021/22 it will need either the player sales as you, a further reduced wage bill or increased income from elsewhere such as commercial events.

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The whiff of relegation is around already which is quite sad but with no signs of previous lessons being learned it really is not surprising and no matter what manager or CEO has been in charge there is just the one constant.

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2 minutes ago, TIL 1010 said:

The whiff of relegation is around already which is quite sad but with no signs of previous lessons being learned it really is not surprising and no matter what manager or CEO has been in charge there is just the one constant.

The other day people were slaughtering the club for not having spent 10-15 million more in the summer. Now we have people.saying once we get relegated it's sad that we haven't learnt our lesson. What lessons are you wanting us to learn?

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It's worth noting that these figures don't include our first instalment of money for being in the Prem.

As they say in the article, about a third of the £95 million will be attributed putting us back in a better looking position.

Still, looking at these numbers, you can see why Webber was so concerned when he came in and mentioned that we were very close to administration. I imagine things will look healthier eventually and the investment in youth will prove to be crucial to us if we want to continue being a self-funding club.

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5 minutes ago, lake district canary said:

For goodness sakes! Why do people insist on looking on the bleak side all the time?  If we get relegated we will be in control of the finances, not spiralling into debt like last time.  We rescued that situation, got promoted, have increased the value of the squad many fold and are therefore in a good overall position.  Any loss that comes will be controllable through player sales - and any future success from will come from the building from the youth set up, which in case anyone hadn't noticed is key to the overall plan.

Because apparently getting behind your team rain or shine isn't nearly as entertaining as constantly b**ching and moaning about the same thing over and over, just in an ever so slightly different way.

Amusingly the OP was just offering a reason we aren't throwing money around - red rag to a bull on here I'm afraid.

I wish we were Fulham/Villa.

(terrifyingly I think that is the case with some...)

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8 minutes ago, Hillhead said:

The other day people were slaughtering the club for not having spent 10-15 million more in the summer. Now we have people.saying once we get relegated it's sad that we haven't learnt our lesson. What lessons are you wanting us to learn?

That you have to seize the opportunity to try and establish yourself not portray it as an enjoyable ride and just sit back and make the most of it while you can. There is no point in being promoted if your ambition to push on is zilch.

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This whole thread, in a nutshell, shows how Accounts can easily be misread/misunderstood - the figures are far from ‘bad’, my understanding is that  they include a shedload of outgoings with none of the PL income and it’s a timing thing as much as anything.  
 

For instance, we all know we took a £20m bridging loan in the summer to cover the cash needed for the bonuses/bond replacement.  This was a one-off ‘need’. 

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Funny how different fans can look at the same figures and come to radically different opinions...🤓

My happy-clapper view is that these figures show how sensible and brave was the decision at the end of the  2017-18 season, despite having another year of parachute payments, to start cutting back on wages.

Staff costs last season stayed the same, although overall wages fell by about £300,00, but if my maths is right then player wages (without promotion bonuses) fell from £30.5m in 2017-18 to £24m in 2018-19. That is quite a fall. Promotional bonuses cost an extra £10m.

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1 minute ago, PurpleCanary said:

Funny how different fans can look at the same figures and come to radically different opinions...🤓

My happy-clapper view is that these figures show how sensible and brave was the decision at the end of the  2017-18 season, despite having another year of parachute payments, to start cutting back on wages.

Staff costs last season stayed the same, although overall wages fell by about £300,00, but if my maths is right then player wages (without promotion bonuses) fell from £30.5m in 2017-18 to £24m in 2018-19. That is quite a fall. Promotional bonuses cost an extra £10m.

Yup - we had those one-off bonuses + the bond buy-back, so at least £15m directly linked to promotion. 

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8 minutes ago, PurpleCanary said:

Funny how different fans can look at the same figures and come to radically different opinions...🤓

My happy-clapper view is that these figures show how sensible and brave was the decision at the end of the  2017-18 season, despite having another year of parachute payments, to start cutting back on wages.

Staff costs last season stayed the same, although overall wages fell by about £300,00, but if my maths is right then player wages (without promotion bonuses) fell from £30.5m in 2017-18 to £24m in 2018-19. That is quite a fall. Promotional bonuses cost an extra £10m.

I get all of that. I guess what concerns me is the fact that with our new reduced wage budget we were still talking about a loss of £10-15m if we didn't go up. 

My worry is that if we have an extended spell in the Championship are we looking at having to sell £10-15m worth of players every year to sustain us? 

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19 minutes ago, king canary said:I get all of that. I guess what concerns me is the fact that with our new reduced wage budget we were still talking about a loss of £10-15m if we didn't go up. 

My worry is that if we have an extended spell in the Championship are we looking at having to sell £10-15m worth of players every year to sustain us? 

Therefore don't be anxious for tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. 

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Its a bit misleading as those figures include somewhere between £15m and £20m of promotion bonuses and extra transfer fees triggered by promotion but do not include any extra premier league tv or commercial revenues. 

That said, it does lay bare how hard the "self funding" model is and what would lay in store for us if we remain in the premier league. they already had the player wage bill down at £24m and it would seem likely it would need to drop a bit further still if we stayed there for any great length of time. 

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We released a fair bit of deadwood in the summer as well, Naismith the biggest but also Jarvis, Wildschut and Pinto.

Plus loans ended for Rhodes and Passlack.

I imagine if we hadn’t been promoted Klose might have gone as he’s still almost certainly a top earner.

Just food for thought on what our wages might have been this year without promotion.

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1 hour ago, TIL 1010 said:

If heaven forbid we get relegated what happens if we do not bounce back at the first attempt ? We will start losing money yet again.

Groundhog day, will posters ever tire of this the filthy rich owner pipedream? For a club like ours football is always going to be cyclical. Good years, followed by bad and then good again. The idea that you can kick on to the next level and become an established Premier League club on 27,000 crowds in a provincal city is a nonsense. Sure, some clubs do, for a while until gravity catches them. Equally, Stoke prove you can be a established Prem club with a filthy rich owner and still und up facing League 1.

Though I will give you it would be a pleasent change to have more than 1 or 2 consecutive years in the top flight.

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