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The Great Mass Debater

Stadium Expansion

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Surprised that this hasnt been brought up recently, as previously a constant source of debate. Noone suggested yet that we should be investing in the stadium and the 3 year thing instead of the squad.

Its an odd conundrum, in that in the past, stadium capacity was inextricably linked to success - bigger stadium, bigger income and gate receipts. In this day and age, income from stadium capacity is dwarfed byt he TV money, so stadium expansion must be a less attractive option from a business sense.

Stadium capacity is still a status symbol though, and it must be easier to get quality players in with an impressive stadium.

Rumblings recently have been suggestive that the board had cooled on expanding the stadium. With the three year mooted period approaching at the end of the season, will be interesting to see how this develops.

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Didn''t McNasty state that they would look at expansion after 3 years in the premier league? That would mean if we stayed up this year .....

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We''ve all mass debated on this subject already and we are all exhausted.

 

No doubt we will all be up for more towards the end of the season when hopefully a further season in the Prem will be assured.

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I was having loads of fun debating with the great orator city1st on this very subject this week, check out the £45 thread.

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Yeah this has been talked about and we can leave it there.

There is no rush to expand, yes improve the facilities so within the city stand, changing rooms etc.

But squad a building this club up is more important than an extre few thousand seats, money does not come in that way to a club, it is sponsorship, so improve the facilities there and in tv money. An extra 6 thousand seats is not priority when we need to build a squad, a youth system to support that etc.

We are on the crest of a wave and bringing in the most exciting players that can build something here. Lets not get ahead of ourselves. 26,000 is good enough at the moment. Lets wait till we have some things in place for the next 3-5 years.

Still my worry is finance after delia hangs up her association, we need to be looking at sensible investment and with that will come stadium expansion, but lets get the areas right that bring in the real money. Unfortunately season tickets bring in a bit of money but proportionally it is not a significant difference in 26k to 30k stkt s.

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After the hotel err... debate, I wrote to  Mr. McNally and he sent a  reply saying there was to be no money spent on expanding the stadium at all and that every available penny is to be spent on developing the team.    No time scale, but it would appear that the club realises that to keep pace with other clubs'' spending, we have to put every available resource into the team. 

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[quote user="Scooby"]Didn''t McNasty state that they would look at expansion after 3 years in the premier league? That would mean if we stayed up this year .....[/quote]

No. the The original policy, stated about three years ago, was that they would consider expansion to 34,000 or 35,000 seats if we stayed in the Premier League into a third year. Not after three but into a third. The point we are now at. But last September McNally kicked that policy into the long grass with a much vaguer quote. There had obviously been rather strong second thoughts, and since then I haven''t seen anything official that suggests expansion is a possibility any time soon.

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@PurpleCanary: Just a quick question - you have any idea when the new TV money deal was struck and announced?

I ask simply because I have a feeling that it may have been after September that it was confirmed - I could be wrong.

I am just looking at the figures in terms of the TV money now and if we have now eradicated external debts what would our projected turn over look like with the new TV money (obviously very roughly)?

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I say in the short-term forget stadium expansion but in the medium term consider a new stadium. In 10-20 years with Sky money and a big stadium we can achieve anything. I would not rule out competing with the top six.  Think BIG !!!!    

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I would imagine it will be happening in the next year or two. My opinion is we are spending a lot of money this season on players that will make us a comfortably established premiership side, meaning over the next two seasons we won''t need to spend as much on players. This freeing up funds for stadium increase. Just my view on it

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There really is no need to relocate.

The current site could probably house a stadium of the size the board have talked about. I very much doubt we would ever need a stadium bigger than that.

I also doubt very much that after paying out for the new stand and various other bits and pieces such as the TV gantry, that a board at the club will consider paying for a new stadium for at least another 15-20 years.

A new stadium would be massively expensive, we''d have only a few ways of paying for it. Hugely slash the transfer budget and risk surrendering what could be a growing solid position in the prem and possible bankruptcy.

Effectively take a mortgage out on the existing site to pay for a new one and construction of a new stadium and hope that we can sell the plot of land at Carrow Road and it will cover all of the expenses at the end of it all. Again - this could go horribly wrong if there is another slide in real estate prices.

Or try and get a bank loan - although I think it would be highly doubtful and could once again, come back to bite us on the proverbial.

Carrow Road is perfect where it is. Easily accessible and still with a good amount of space around it for expansion.

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[quote user="flecky76"]Two words should be a warning to us all on this subject: Wolverhampton Wanderers.[/quote]You''ll have to expand on that as all I can think of with WW is that they sacked a perfectly competent manager in McCarthy, effectively committing Prem ''suicide''. As long as we spend within our limits, prudently, there will be no financial problems for us, if that is what you''re getting at.

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[quote user="chicken"]@PurpleCanary: Just a quick question - you have any idea when the new TV money deal was struck and announced?

I ask simply because I have a feeling that it may have been after September that it was confirmed - I could be wrong.

I am just looking at the figures in terms of the TV money now and if we have now eradicated external debts what would our projected turn over look like with the new TV money (obviously very roughly)?[/quote]

 

You do realise my research costs you extra at the weekend?1) The domestic part of the new TV deal was announced in June 2012, with the overseas bits dribbling in for several months afterwards.2) Our turnover for the season just finished should be similar to the season before (which was £74m) or a touch higher. Say £80m at best.3) With the extra TV money our turnover for the season to come could touch £100m.Bear in mind that paying off the debt doesn''t really affect turnover, which is just a jargon word for income. Profits are another thing altogether.

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Err, after staying in the PL for 2 seasons, Wolves announced a massive building plan of Molinuex. The first stand costi around £20m and 2 relegations later, they find themselves in League 1 and with the plan for the remaining 2 stands unsurprisingly put on hold.

Owner Steve Morgan is good friends with Alan Bowkett. McNallys decision to hold fire on our own re-development was largely down the warning sign from Wolves. Get your team in order first is the primary objective.

http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2013/01/08/molineux-rebuild-put-on-hold-by-wolves-owner-steve-morgan/

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@PurpleCanary: Ok, so I guess I should have really asked for a ball park profit figure!!!!

Am I right in saying that with debt repayments gone and the increase in TV revenue this will be quite substantial compared to the last two seasons?

And as for costs more, I guess I''ll have to show my face at some point and buy you a pint . . . ;oD

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[quote user="chicken"]There really is no need to relocate.

The current site could probably house a stadium of the size the board have talked about. I very much doubt we would ever need a stadium bigger than that.

I also doubt very much that after paying out for the new stand and various other bits and pieces such as the TV gantry, that a board at the club will consider paying for a new stadium for at least another 15-20 years.

A new stadium would be massively expensive, we''d have only a few ways of paying for it. Hugely slash the transfer budget and risk surrendering what could be a growing solid position in the prem and possible bankruptcy.

Effectively take a mortgage out on the existing site to pay for a new one and construction of a new stadium and hope that we can sell the plot of land at Carrow Road and it will cover all of the expenses at the end of it all. Again - this could go horribly wrong if there is another slide in real estate prices.

Or try and get a bank loan - although I think it would be highly doubtful and could once again, come back to bite us on the proverbial.

Carrow Road is perfect where it is. Easily accessible and still with a good amount of space around it for expansion.[/quote]I understand the feelings there, but if  eventually we can support a 60-70,000 stadium, would Carrow Road infrastructure cope ? Also, would the council allow planning permission for our BIG plans. I see many obstacles, already severe parking restrictions exist, roads cannot cope, policing difficult and exceedingly expensive etc etc.  An out of town stadium could have a massive free car park, better outside crowd control and take much pressure off of the City.  I''m sure there any many other great advantages.  

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[quote user="lake district canary"]After the hotel err... debate, I wrote to  Mr. McNally and he sent a  reply saying there was to be no money spent on expanding the stadium at all and that every available penny is to be spent on developing the team.    No time scale, but it would appear that the club realises that to keep pace with other clubs'' spending, we have to put every available resource into the team. 



[/quote]

 

A point that more than a few pointed out to you in your long-winded hotel thread where you advocated spending money in a harebrained way made sense. 

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[quote user="flecky76"]Err, after staying in the PL for 2 seasons, Wolves announced a massive building plan of Molinuex. The first stand costi around £20m and 2 relegations later, they find themselves in League 1 and with the plan for the remaining 2 stands unsurprisingly put on hold.

Owner Steve Morgan is good friends with Alan Bowkett. McNallys decision to hold fire on our own re-development was largely down the warning sign from Wolves. Get your team in order first is the primary objective.

http://www.expressandstar.com/news/2013/01/08/molineux-rebuild-put-on-hold-by-wolves-owner-steve-morgan/[/quote]They obviously did it too quickly and I did say ''forget short-term expansion'' as I feel that would be expensive tinkering at the edges. I''m thinking 10-20 years ahead and of a substainable plan such as Arsenal have achieved.  

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Yeh I agree with that timescale. To be fair, to properly expand Carrow Road, you would need to replace the River End and Barclay roofs, so that the supporting roof supports can be removed, which would eventually mean no restricted views.

An expensive job, but one sweeping cantaliever roof round all 3 stands, together with a two tiered City Stand would be pretty awesome. Though expensive!

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Arsenal is a poor example.

The reason being is that Arsenal have been in the premiership since its conception, and have repeatedly qualified for Champions League football netting them more money, not to mention bigger sponsorship deals and a larger global income from abroad.

That''s without taking into account that they had a prime piece of real estate in London to sell once they moved.

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[quote user="chicken"]@PurpleCanary: Ok, so I guess I should have really asked for a ball park profit figure!!!!

Am I right in saying that with debt repayments gone and the increase in TV revenue this will be quite substantial compared to the last two seasons?

And as for costs more, I guess I''ll have to show my face at some point and buy you a pint . . . ;oD[/quote]

 

Ah, you want me to speculate! That costs way more than a pint.Our profit for the previous season (2011-12) was £16m. But in large part because we still had a great deal of external debt to pay off. That, as you know, we had to eliminate in the season just gone. So I doubt we have made anything like £16m profit. Will the TV deal mean, though, that we shoot back into a big profits for the season to come, as you hope?!Without answering that I would make a couple of cautionary points. One is, look at the amounts we are now spending on transfer fees. The other is, what are we now offering in terms of wages? In our first season back (2011-12) our wage to turnover ratio was very low by PL standards. My strong suspicion is that the accounts for the season just gone will show it rose significantly. And although it seems (based on QPR apparently offering Hooper more money than we did) we are still being sensible I assume we have increased our wage budget again.The extra money from the TV deal was never ever going to translate into pure profit, for us or any other club.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[quote user="chicken"]Arsenal is a poor example.

The reason being is that Arsenal have been in the premiership since its conception, and have repeatedly qualified for Champions League football netting them more money, not to mention bigger sponsorship deals and a larger global income from abroad.

That''s without taking into account that they had a prime piece of real estate in London to sell once they moved.[/quote]We''ll have to agree to disagree as surely selling Carrow road would provide a large chunk to finance a new stadium. Also, Prem money is now far more than it was only a couple of years ago. A few years of that money coming in, maybe even qualifying for Europe ourselves, Prem consolidation, and a new stadium will be very affordable. 

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I''m mainly disagreeing because you using pie in the sky thinking. There is very little evidence to suggest what you are predicting is accurate.

First of all you are suggesting saving up money over 15-20 years to fund a stadium that more than doubles our current capacity.

You''d have to ask where all of those fans would come from in that period?

As for Arsenal, it is a poor comparison. A team that has had continued success in the top flight for over 20years. By that I mean winning titles, European football and being located in a city of 11 million people.

The main reason they moved was for space but let''s also not forget that they took out a massive loan to pay for it. They also have wealthy backers and are well established.

If we could achieve what they have done we would have to continue to expand car row road up to a point anyway, just to make sure those extra 40k people remained interested.

Lastly, by the time they moved High bury had taken them as far as it could, they didn''t have the space to expand properly. Look at QPR as a good example, it''s limited in it''s plot, surrounded by residential areas and main roads.

Carrow Road is ideally situated, close to the station for away fans and not so close home fans from the likes of Yarmouth and further away. Not to mention bus routes. It also has the support of the local council as the county hall car park is made available on match days, to the club.

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[quote user="chicken"]I''m mainly disagreeing because you using pie in the sky thinking. There is very little evidence to suggest what you are predicting is accurate.

First of all you are suggesting saving up money over 15-20 years to fund a stadium that more than doubles our current capacity.

You''d have to ask where all of those fans would come from in that period?

As for Arsenal, it is a poor comparison. A team that has had continued success in the top flight for over 20years. By that I mean winning titles, European football and being located in a city of 11 million people.

The main reason they moved was for space but let''s also not forget that they took out a massive loan to pay for it. They also have wealthy backers and are well established.

If we could achieve what they have done we would have to continue to expand car row road up to a point anyway, just to make sure those extra 40k people remained interested.

Lastly, by the time they moved High bury had taken them as far as it could, they didn''t have the space to expand properly. Look at QPR as a good example, it''s limited in it''s plot, surrounded by residential areas and main roads.

Carrow Road is ideally situated, close to the station for away fans and not so close home fans from the likes of Yarmouth and further away. Not to mention bus routes. It also has the support of the local council as the county hall car park is made available on match days, to the club.[/quote]

Where did I say save up ?   The sale of Carrow road could provide 20-30% of the money, and the rest would be via a sustainable fixed-interest or offset mortgage over 50 years perhaps. The annual SKY money would still be available barring 10 million or so a season mortgage repayments. Savings made would be on the removal of periodic expensive upgrades to Carrow Road which would definitely impact on attendance figures (AND revenue) and potentially squad morale during those upgrades. Maybe 100-150  million or so is saved alone on these upgrades which still have to be financed even if we stay there. Then the cost of the land would be cheap for an out of town stadium.  A new stadium adds up for many reasons.  It needs thinking about seriously and not be clouded by ''knee-jerk'' emotional reactions.

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[quote user="paul moy"]

Where did I say save up ?   The sale of Carrow road could provide 20-30% of the money, and the rest would be via a sustainable fixed-interest or offset mortgage over 50 years perhaps. The annual SKY money would still be available barring 10 million or so a season mortgage repayments. [/quote]

 

So the Premier League and Sky are going to carry on for 50 years and we are going to stay in the Premier League for all those 50 years? Fantastic! That is good to know.

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[quote user="PurpleCanary"]

[quote user="paul moy"]

Where did I say save up ?   The sale of Carrow road could provide 20-30% of the money, and the rest would be via a sustainable fixed-interest or offset mortgage over 50 years perhaps. The annual SKY money would still be available barring 10 million or so a season mortgage repayments. [/quote]

 

So the Premier League and Sky are going to carry on for 50 years and we are going to stay in the Premier League for all those 50 years? Fantastic! That is good to know.

[/quote]Maybe not because all private companies are vulnerable to the market, but sufficient revenue will definitely be there in some way or other if we remain in the top division. That''s why I mentioned ''sustainable, in that obviously worst case scenarios and proper contingency planning are essential. If we are relegated for instance we could have a clause whereby repayments halve until we get back, just as I hope we have similar clauses in players'' contracts. 

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