Madjeski

[Old Yella 0]

Interesting comments from Reading''s Madjeski who basically says that because of player costs, agents fees and transfer fees that there is no hope of Reading balancing their books in the Premiership. Not only that, but because of this he wants to sell out. Maybe this helps explain why we ended up even more in debt after the Premiership than we were before it.

None of the 3 promoted clubs this year are really spending and you have to think that they are all odds on to come straight back down. The trouble for them is if they do push the boat out and spend alot of money and it doesn''t work and they are still relegated they could be screwed for the next ten years. The best plan seems to be to spend modestly hope you survive/thrive like West Ham and Wigan and then really start spending after the first season or in January if your position is secure enough. Sad to think that but for our abject surrender at Craven Cottage (appropriately named for us that day) we would have had a chance at establishing ourselves as a Premier League side. With the increased TV money every year that passes will make it that much harder to make the transition.

[mystic megson 0]

When we were promoted,the club said they wouldn''t "break the bank" to stay in the Prem.  I didn''t have a problem with that, and I still don''t.  It was a pity that we got so close, because it makes me feel that if we''d spent just a little more we could well have stayed up, but that''s hindsight for you. 

The trouble is, I was naive enough to assume that if we didn''t stay up, at least we would be able to use that experience, and the parachute payment, to mount a big push for immediate repromotion with a better chance of staying up next time.  For whatever reason, none of the parachute money was spent on new players last summer.  We spent only just over £750,000, even though we received nearly £2.5 million from player sales last summer. As a result, we''re back to square one. 

I do have a major problem  with that.  I think we deserve an explanation. 

[blahblahblah 2]

[quote]For whatever reason, none of the parachute money was spent on new players last summer.  We spent only just over £750,000, even though we received nearly £2.5 million from player sales last summer. As a result, we''re back to square one.

I do have a major problem  with that.  I think we deserve an explanation.   [/quote]

You''re right, it''s a good question.  Could it be that the club used the parachute payments to recover from the overspending of the first premiership season ?  From what I''ve read it sounds like it went into stadium expansions and land though.  Long term sustainability at the expense of short-term success maybe ?

The problem is where would get an answer from ?  Neil Doncaster perhaps ?

[mystic megson 0]

[quote user="blahblahblah"]

[quote]For whatever reason, none of the parachute money was spent on new players last summer.  We spent only just over £750,000, even though we received nearly £2.5 million from player sales last summer. As a result, we''re back to square one.

I do have a major problem  with that.  I think we deserve an explanation.   [/quote]

You''re right, it''s a good question.  Could it be that the club used the parachute payments to recover from the overspending of the first premiership season ?  From what I''ve read it sounds like it went into stadium expansions and land though.  Long term sustainability at the expense of short-term success maybe ?

The problem is where would get an answer from ?  Neil Doncaster perhaps ?

[/quote]

blahblah, I''m not sure about overspending because we did make an operating profit of about £7 million in the Prem season.  The debt increased, but only slightly, by a few hundred thousand.  We may get a clearer idea where it went when the Annual Report comes out in the autumn.