Football's Magic Money Tree

[Chester Perry]

This blog post was inspired by @AndyhHolts long thread this week and by John Nicholson's rage against the capitalisation of the game and subsequent manifesto - it is probably one of many, but one of the better ones. I post not because I necessarily agree but because it is a voice that should be heard, and an delivered as a thought out, considered and constructed whole, a long one maybe (actually vey, very long), but still should be heard

https://mclfoot.blogspot.com/2020/04/ca ... otbal.html

[Chester Perry]

It has been quite some time since I posted about this kind of thing on this thread.

Following the news about the indictments in the US of former FIFA ExCo members on bribery charges for the Russian and Qatar World Cup bids the social media sphere and general media has been abuzz with comments (especially pertaining to the 2022 World Cup being abandoned or taken away from Qatar). Almost immediately new accounts appeared trying to change the message.

https://twitter.com/uglygame/status/1249292849058897928

[Chester Perry]

Tottenham take the Sheffield United approach to furlough - Staff will be payed by the club not the government for April and May, to be reviewed thereafter

https://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/news/2 ... -covid-19/

[Chester Perry]

The Football Today Podcast looks at the FIFA/Gianni Infantino/Trinidad and Tobago FA affair that I have posted about a few times

https://www.footballtodaypodcast.com/po ... cal-weapon

[Chester Perry]

Even though it is a Bank Holiday John Nicholson still managed to get his weekly column out (and after writing 2 last week) to he looked at the wages of footballers asking "Why do we care how much footballers earn?" - (The lifelong Middlesbrough fan appears to think Newcastle may have wasted far too much on Joelinton)

https://www.football365.com/news/john-n ... ball-wages

[Chester Perry]

@Miguel Delaney in the Independent - and the desperate call for Premier League players to understand the financial crisis clubs are facing

Coronavirus: Premier League clubs fearful for their survival to press first-team players for wage cuts
Exclusive: Premier League clubs are fearful for their survival and will attempt to impress on players the severity of their financial situation, leading to a potentially ugly stand-off

Miguel Delaney - Chief Football Writer

A series of Premier League clubs are set to return to their playing squads and press for wage cuts rather than deferrals in order to survive, in the ongoing stand-off about pay.

The players are currently ‘hardline’ in their insistence that they do not agree to any cuts, with the collective preference for any money to go the NHS or charitable causes.

It is increasingly felt this is noble but unrealistic, however, as many clubs – including some in the top six – are now seeking to impress on their players the severity of the situation. One executive has privately talked about how the game is “facing unprecedented challenges that nobody could have predicted”, that will force fundamental shifts in how clubs structure themselves financially.

While most of the emphasis in recent weeks has been on the potential loss of broadcast money, Premier League clubs are increasingly concerned about the medium-to-long term effect on a series of other revenue streams.

There is worry that many of the finance options – like specific financing companies – used for season tickets won’t be there going forward, and could mean thousands not being taken up. There is also fear the restricted climate will see companies no longer spend so much on extras that are not essential, such as corporate boxes and premium seats in stadiums.

One big-six club has 40 boxes up for renewal this summer, and are increasingly concerned they won’t be taken up.

Premier League executives are worried this could lead to the loss of millions of pounds per game, as there is also incremental revenue on everything beyond the seat.

Force majeure in many sponsorship contracts will meanwhile ensure many bonuses are not paid.

“The financial black hole is going to be massive,” one source sad. “There are going to be huge shortfalls which simply can’t be made up. It is why they have to go back to the players, and why mere deferrals are meaningless. Player wages are the current biggest expense, but that was from the pre-Coronavirus economics. It’s unsustainable now.

“Deferrals actually cost a player nothing. For a club, though, it’s just debt down the road. Players simply need to have their salaries cut.”

A key principle for the players has been that billionaire owners should be putting their hands in their pockets before anyone, but connected sources maintain this is not possible for the majority of Premier League clubs, such as Watford and Bournemouth. Extra money is needed now, which is why many will return to the players with a harder line.

“Players need a reality check,” one source said. “This is just going to lead to many of those out of contract not getting renewed, and they won’t be able to get anything like their current money elsewhere.”
It is an issue that is likely to only get uglier.

[IanMcL]

Gary Neville made a very good point.

How can these top prem clubs, on the one hand ask players to cut salaries and then go and bid many millions for new players?

[Chester Perry]

Gary Neville made a very good point.

How can these top prem clubs, on the one hand ask players to cut salaries and then go and bid many millions for new players?

It is a fair one, and it does seem repugnant to talk some of the numbers being bounced around (Harry Kane for £200m anyone) - you do feel a lot has to do with journo's and media outlets desperate to buy clicks to fund their organisations and wages, a fact made harder by the falling price of advertising

But teams will need new players, and plenty of players want their club to sign new/better players to help them be more competitive, and stay in the only league that can guarantee an income behind closed doors. How they go about that will be an intriguing watch in most cases and I suspect in the case of the few who have the financial wherewithal there will be utterly ruthless in their bargaining not just on price but on wages too. Players at the end of contract, especially, are going to find that the new deals they were looking for have dropped by at least 30% in value.

[dsr]

Gary Neville made a very good point.

How can these top prem clubs, on the one hand ask players to cut salaries and then go and bid many millions for new players?

But to put a question from the other side, how can players demand (and get) salaries of something like 70-75% of their employer's gross income, and then expect to carry on getting that money when their employer's income is cut by a quarter?

[Chester Perry]

@SwissRamble revisits the financial impact of the pandemic on football in particular the Premier League

https://twitter.com/SwissRamble/status/ ... 9415083008

Given that we come out of this looking rather solid in relation to our competitors I am going to spend the rest of the day hoping for a Royboyclaret comment - getting very worried for you mate

[Chester Perry]

But to put a question from the other side, how can players demand (and get) salaries of something like 70-75% of their employer's gross income, and then expect to carry on getting that money when their employer's income is cut by a quarter?

That @SwissRamble thread this morning really drives your point home - though we knew most of it already

Not that the players appear to be getting the message yet, or is it that they don't want to hear the message

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 63371.html

[IanMcL]

But to put a question from the other side, how can players demand (and get) salaries of something like 70-75% of their employer's gross income, and then expect to carry on getting that money when their employer's income is cut by a quarter?

If every industry was subject to the same penalty, then no issue. They are not.

Footballers are at least trying. Many others not.

It still does not answer why the club, having cut player wages, can then bid in the transfer market.

[Chester Perry]

Signs not good for that Newcastle sale or for Leeds and their hopes for Qatari investment - as both countries sell debt to raise cash to meet immediate needs within their borders

https://twitter.com/Prof_Chadwick/statu ... 6923878400

[Chester Perry]

Today's Ornstein & Chapman Podcast discusses the refusal of a pay cut by Arsenal players (also that Phil Bardsley Interview) also talk about Chelsea.

https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0c ... IDBAE&ep=6

The scale of the differences of understanding between club and players is very significant - if you take this as a reflection of what is going on across the league - you wonder what mindset they will approach the behind closed door games if they are not united with the club and do not have fans to push them

Abramovich pumped £250m into the club last season, you can see him doing that again at least this season subject to FFP relaxations (which I am not in favour of)

[Chester Perry]

That @SwissRamble thread this morning really drives your point home - though we knew most of it already

Not that the players appear to be getting the message yet, or is it that they don't want to hear the message

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 63371.html

This linked @MiguelDelaney article prompted Simon Chadwick to post some links to light reading on Exit Strategy

as he put's it "In-fighting between players & owners is somewhat ironic given decades long concerns expressed by many fans. Now would seem to be an appropriate time to reflect upon an ideological choice made 30 years ago. New deal, new direction must be up for discussion. Part of exit strategy?"

http://wyplosz.org/ICMB/Home_files/Geneva15.pdf

http://web.stanford.edu/~johntayl/Onlin ... rategy.pdf

[Chester Perry]

Simon Stone at the BBC - 'Clubs at every level are at risk' - the financial nightmare facing football

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/52275018

it partners well with this from @Marcotti yesterday - Football needs creative solutions to resuming in England.

https://www.espn.com/soccer/english-pre ... bold-plans

[ChorltonCharlie]

This blog post was inspired by @AndyhHolts long thread this week and by John Nicholson's rage against the capitalisation of the game and subsequent manifesto - it is probably one of many, but one of the better ones. I post not because I necessarily agree but because it is a voice that should be heard, and an delivered as a thought out, considered and constructed whole, a long one maybe (actually vey, very long), but still should be heard

https://mclfoot.blogspot.com/2020/04/ca ... otbal.html

I thought that was a good blog and I liked the theory behind it. Football has needed a change for a while and COVID-19 may be the straw that breaks the camels back that makes it change. Only problem for me, was trying to get clubs to go for it. We’d get a much better product overall, but the most influential wouldn’t like it. This is where Andy Holt’s idea of an independent regulator would need to come in. Not sure of the legalities of that, but if the government could make that happen you’d have a chance.

I’ve thought for a while that short term pain for long term gain would be hugely beneficial for football as a competitive sport in England. The short term pain should be to tell the big clubs, these are the new rules and if you don’t like it then you don’t have to play. The big clubs would then likely have a dilemma; take the new rules and carry on with English football in the new environment, or take their ball and go off and form a money rich European super league. They’d likely go with the latter, which would see TV income fall massively for the rest of the English game and be more like the Championship currently is. The European league would be full of cash and aimed at the global market, whilst the English game would be much more suitable for match going fans and with wage caps, etc which would lead to a much more competitive pyramid. Yes to start with there’d be a lack of prestige for winning the title, and there’d be no Euro qualification. On the other hand is it more prestigious to finish 7th in a league that contains the big 6, or finish 1st in one that doesn’t? Europe has become a poisoned chalice for most clubs, so apart from a European tour there’s no loss there. There are other problems I’d foresee. The transfer market is one with players in a Euro super league being far more valuable than in club football. We’d also want to get away from the big clubs hoovering up young talent and maintaining huge squads.

[Chester Perry]

I thought that was a good blog and I liked the theory behind it. Football has needed a change for a while and COVID-19 may be the straw that breaks the camels back that makes it change. Only problem for me, was trying to get clubs to go for it. We’d get a much better product overall, but the most influential wouldn’t like it. This is where Andy Holt’s idea of an independent regulator would need to come in. Not sure of the legalities of that, but if the government could make that happen you’d have a chance.

I’ve thought for a while that short term pain for long term gain would be hugely beneficial for football as a competitive sport in England. The short term pain should be to tell the big clubs, these are the new rules and if you don’t like it then you don’t have to play. The big clubs would then likely have a dilemma; take the new rules and carry on with English football in the new environment, or take their ball and go off and form a money rich European super league. They’d likely go with the latter, which would see TV income fall massively for the rest of the English game and be more like the Championship currently is. The European league would be full of cash and aimed at the global market, whilst the English game would be much more suitable for match going fans and with wage caps, etc which would lead to a much more competitive pyramid. Yes to start with there’d be a lack of prestige for winning the title, and there’d be no Euro qualification. On the other hand is it more prestigious to finish 7th in a league that contains the big 6, or finish 1st in one that doesn’t? Europe has become a poisoned chalice for most clubs, so apart from a European tour there’s no loss there. There are other problems I’d foresee. The transfer market is one with players in a Euro super league being far more valuable than in club football. We’d also want to get away from the big clubs hoovering up young talent and maintaining huge squads.

Glad you enjoyed

Re the English game post European Super League (and not allowing the big 6 to participate in both - which is their preferred option), for clubs like ours without the partial equalising strength of TV revenue we would struggle in a league where matchday income became so important (ticket prices for all clubs would have to go up quite a bit I suspect)

[ChorltonCharlie]

Glad you enjoyed

Re the English game post European Super League (and not allowing the big 6 to participate in both - which is their preferred option), for clubs like ours without the partial equalising strength of TV revenue we would struggle in a league where matchday income became so important (ticket prices for all clubs would have to go up quite a bit I suspect)

I think the idea would be to make it a much more level playing field. There's loads of ways they could approach it, but the guy in the blog mentioned that a wage cap that all team should be able to afford was the best way of achieving that. Now that would be controversial, and I think there should be some balance with bigger clubs gaining some advantage, and much would depend how much money was still generated by TV and commercial income. ... but any changes need to be made so that the league is more competitive, if we just end up with clubs like Villa, Leeds and Everton blowing away the rest, then nothing will have been achieved.

Personally, I'd look at the two main problem statements in a simplified way, the the second being more about the current lower leagues.

• How do we stop clubs in the same division spending multiple times what some of their rivals are?

• How do we ensure all clubs are spending within their means.

For the second, I think there's always the challenge of allowing investment in clubs and enabling a club to have a benefactor of some kind. Football doesn't seem to have done a good job of striking a balance on FFP with investment. I don't think there's anything wrong with how people like Walker invested at that lot down the road (just a shame it was them). You'd like to think though that wage caps would mean the benefactors influence couldn't be that big at any club.

As for Burnley, I think true fans go whatever the level of football. However, history would tell us that we have a chance though in a more level playing field. Even in the PL we're at a huge disadvantage because we live within our means and don't have a billionaire who can rescue us if we overpay and still get relegated. I think without the big 6, we'd be a top 2 tier level team, but the idea would be that when you're in the top tier, with a good manager anything is possible.

[Chester Perry]

Signs not good for that Newcastle sale or for Leeds and their hopes for Qatari investment - as both countries sell debt to raise cash to meet immediate needs within their borders

https://twitter.com/Prof_Chadwick/statu ... 6923878400

yet the story Newcastle buyout story still managers to trundle on - https://www.shieldsgazette.com/sport/fo ... er-2537873 - Stavely seems be the one forcing it into the news

[dsr]

If every industry was subject to the same penalty, then no issue. They are not.

Footballers are at least trying. Many others not.

It still does not answer why the club, having cut player wages, can then bid in the transfer market.

If they were to be treated the same as other industries, they would be on furlough by now. Most of the industries that have lost all their income and have nothing for the staff to do, have furloughed their staff.

Then the players would know what a pay cut is.

[ChorltonCharlie]

If they were to be treated the same as other industries, they would be on furlough by now. Most of the industries that have lost all their income and have nothing for the staff to do, have furloughed their staff.

Then the players would know what a pay cut is.

Football (at PL level) hasn't lost all it's income though. They still plan to play the games, and the money will still come rolling in. I read the other day that Sky are now considering not taking away any money due even if the season doesn't complete, they'll just look to get more games for next season(s). This actually makes sense, as Sky won't want to damage their 'product'.

[dsr]

Football (at PL level) hasn't lost all it's income though. They still plan to play the games, and the money will still come rolling in. I read the other day that Sky are now considering not taking away any money due even if the season doesn't complete, they'll just look to get more games for next season(s). This actually makes sense, as Sky won't want to damage their 'product'.

If that's guaranteed, then there isn't a problem, is there? No need to discuss a wage cut at all.

[ChorltonCharlie]

If that's guaranteed, then there isn't a problem, is there? No need to discuss a wage cut at all.

Should be noted that there's also BT and foreign TV money and that's considerable. The reason why players are deferring wages rather than cutting them at PL level is because they still hope to complete the season with most of the income. It's a different story at lower league level where some clubs have furloughed the players. Any player furloughed though has the right to leave on a free if not paid in full for I think 2 months.

[Paul Waine]

yet the story Newcastle buyout story still managers to trundle on - https://www.shieldsgazette.com/sport/fo ... er-2537873 - Stavely seems be the one forcing it into the news

and BBC has reported on developments in the past hour or so.

Thought it might merit a separate thread.

Now read Gazette. £150 million vendor financing is interesting and is possibly indicating how the buyer(s) and the seller square the circle of reaching agreement on price. "I sell to you for £300 million and I lend you £150 million, so you only need to pay me £150 million when the sale is completed."
Maybe there will also be provisions in the agreement about interest rate on the £150m loan. Maybe a "bonus" if the 2019-20 season is completed and/or tv money paid in full. Maybe a further "bonus" on outcome of 2020/21...

[Chester Perry]

and BBC has reported on developments in the past hour or so.

Thought it might merit a separate thread.

Now read Gazette. £150 million vendor financing is interesting and is possibly indicating how the buyer(s) and the seller square the circle of reaching agreement on price. "I sell to you for £300 million and I lend you £150 million, so you only need to pay me £150 million when the sale is completed."
Maybe there will also be provisions in the agreement about interest rate on the £150m loan. Maybe a "bonus" if the 2019-20 season is completed and/or tv money paid in full. Maybe a further "bonus" on outcome of 2020/21...

It is the only way Stavely could buy, cannot see the Saudi's being involved if they are raising cash as posted earlier today

[Chester Perry]

Bournemouth become the 3rd club to do the about turn on furloughing of staff

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/52287403

[Paul Waine]

It is the only way Stavely could buy, cannot see the Saudi's being involved if they are raising cash as posted earlier today

Check out what the FT is reporting tonight - see Newcastle Utd £300m thread.

[tiger76]

Bournemouth become the 3rd club to do the about turn on furloughing of staff

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/52287403

It's amazing what the prospect of a transfer ban will do isn't it,just Newcastle and Norwich of the PL now,how long can they both justify their stances,i'll give it a couple of days at most.

[Chester Perry]

As if we didn't know or see it coming - Why Premier League Transfer deals will fall this summer - from the Mail

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... value.html

You can foresee some real horse trading going on, with clubs offing players in lieu of cash.

Just be grateful that our outstanding payments are so low (relatively speaking), and assuming that the outstanding payments to us are from Watford, Stoke and Everton, we should get most of that in as both Stoke and Everton have owners willing and able to dip into their pockets, not so Watford whose owners have problems compounded by their business model and no great wealth outside of the game

EDIT it is possible that Aston Villa also owe us some money for Tom Heaton - their owners do like giving the club their money so that should be ok

[Tricky Trevor]

As if we didn't know or see it coming - Why Premier League Transfer deals will fall this summer - from the Mail

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... value.html

I’ve shouted for years that transfer fees should be paid in full at month end. That would stop this madness immediately. I would also scrap loans which corrupt the system.

[Chester Perry]

A subject of discussion in more than one thread on this board in the last couple of weeks - Poaching of players who have had wage cuts forced upon them - This article from the Mail suggests a treaty is being discussed to stop it

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... ayers.html

If the right player became available, I suspect the treaty would not be worth the paper it was written on

[Chester Perry]

The money madness of the EFL - From the Mail - who are churning out mountains of articles every day at the moment

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... -wall.html

[Chester Perry]

Andy Pilley (owner of Fleetwood) with the first of a series of videos on the current financial crisis in Football. If nothing else it shows just how diverse opinion still is in the EFL. This from a chap whose club last £6m last season and were hovering around the play-offs this season - for some reason he really wants to start losing even more money in the Championship.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=www5kAd ... e=youtu.be

[Paul Waine]

And, (by foresight or a technical glitch), this morning, I'm able to bring you an article from The Times (online) that is by lined Matt Dickinson Friday April 17 2020, 5.00pm, The Times.

Strictly the article isn't included in Times online today. More accurately it is linked as a related article under another football article. It caught my eye as they picture Charlie Taylor about to take a throw in.

I guess we should congratulate Matt in filing more than 2 days before his deadline. I expect the article will be in the print version on Saturday 18th.

Patience and prudence in football? I wouldn’t bet on it

The coronavirus is expected to change attitudes but football clubs have always survived on the edge of financial distress

Have you wondered during these extraordinary times about changes to life that you may hope to make permanent beyond the lockdown? Perhaps considered, now you cannot travel, whether you needed to travel as much in the first place? Contemplating how things may be different when this is all over?

There are many who wish that for English football — that it emerges wiser and more grounded, sensible and more prudent, out of this crisis.

As if, on quiet reflection, a club executive will think “I know I could gamble £30 million and £75,000 a week on that striker to get us up the table but, after coronavirus, I am going to save it up for a rainy day. You never know when another global pandemic might be coming”.

I think that is as likely as Manchester United fans weighing up Jordan Henderson’s contribution to the #PlayersTogether fund for NHS charities the next time he comes to Old Trafford and, instead of booing the Liverpool captain, giving him a polite round of applause.

Prudence? Patience? Was football ever built for those? Not when it began and not now, even after decades to consider a different, steadier way.

The better run clubs will have a measure of stability but the game is characterised by the dominance of a few and the rest, as the football economist Stefan Szymanski once noted, “survive on the edge of financial distress”.

They reside there not because they are all run by fools and chancers, the madly ambitious or naive — though we have seen those types, attracted by football’s profile and the opportunity to become a saviour (how often that ends badly).

Since the start, clubs have existed primarily to be competitive, not as businesses to build profits for owners and shareholders. Even in this day and age of global investors, those that do turn a profit are the exception. Values can rise for sale but fortunes can easily be lost.

Prudence? The fans demand that every penny, and more, be spent in pursuit of dreams. An appraisal of success comes every few days, bringing an air of short-termism that owners, directors and managers struggle to resist.

So we can look at football and wonder how, during a period of record income for clubs, there is not more cushioning to the impact of coronavirus.

We can listen to various sports finance experts explain — as they have been queuing up to do — how this crisis has “brought to light just how stretched the industry is and how many clubs live hand to mouth”. Or, as another said, how the “accounts are awful” and this was a car crash waiting to happen given an over-reliance on broadcast income.

But time for a reboot? A reawakening? A year of living sensibly? I suspect that will be like the one that never happened afrer the collapse of ITV Digital in 2002, described then as the “greatest crisis” in the history of the game.

According to a Guardian report at the time, 30 of the Football League’s 72 clubs were at risk of going under. “No one will pay that much again,” Greg Dyke, then BBC director general, said of a deal worth £105 million per year. The present one is worth £119 million annually to EFL clubs.

This is not to say that the collapse was without considerable pain in places — Bradford City among the worst hit, having recklessly over-spent — but the game recovered and continued with the seat-of-the-pants financial operation which can seem so crackers from the outside but is seemingly built into the competitive culture of an open pyramid.

Life is spent on the financial edge for most clubs but even if they topple there is usually someone there to catch them. Like cats they can have multiple lives.

Szymanski and co-author Simon Kuper established a few years ago in Soccernomics that of the 88 clubs that belonged to the Football League in 1923, 97 per cent still existed and 91 per cent were still in the top four divisions. Over that same period thousands of companies, substantial ones and notable high street brands, had collapsed, never to be seen again.

We should not be complacent but football clubs have a rare endurance even with so much mismanagement around and in the past 30 years have enjoyed an unprecedented financial boom at the top end. As for recklessness, the game has actually introduced unprecedented financial regulation — FFP, soft salary caps — even in a climate of free-market competition.

Perhaps you think it should do more to avoid the “prune juice” effect, but there is nothing like sport and certainly nothing like football with its lurching fortunes that can shift the entire mood of an organisation.

Of course, the better run clubs are more immune, and operate with calm purpose, but sport brings its own unique forces; pressures that come with profile, fickleness of fortune, cyclical downturns, certainty of relegation for some. Not much has to go wrong even at a shrewdly-run club like Burnley to be plunged back into the frenzy of the Championship.

The imbalance of English football gives that division in particular an inherent financial madness as clubs vie to reach the PL, the Promised Land.
Some hope that this crisis could bring about a reboot. Certainly there may be a significant reckoning across the game depending on how soon football can return, and existing broadcast deals protected.

Lower-league clubs are in grim survival mode and even at the top they fear that future TV contracts could be reduced. The transfer market may be drastically subdued.

Clubs may have to adjust significantly but that is very different from expecting a cultural shift to a more prudent way of being. As for patience, the daily clamour around players’ wages shows how that will never catch on. “People are demanding a solution when they don’t even know the problem yet,” as one senior figure said.

So we can all make our resolutions for life post-coronavirus but a new cautiousness in football? One banking industry insider was quoted this week saying that football clubs “make no sense” from a financial perspective. But were they ever meant to?

[Chester Perry]

The prospect of football returning behind closed doors is likely to happen simply because the commerce demands it, but will it be the same (I personally think not) and will armchair viewers quickly get bored of games with not fans - Andy Mitten discusses this in an opinion piece for the South China Morning Post (it is a global game remember)

https://www.scmp.com/sport/football/art ... going-fans

[Chester Perry]

While we wait and see if a consortium really does want to buy a Premier League club with debt during a shutdown caused by a pandemic for which there is no accurate antibody test let alone vaccine (it could happen - but I do not get why you would at that valuation). Here is an update on the depth of Chinese investment in European football

https://twitter.com/AllAfcFootball/stat ... 8707785728

[Chester Perry]

Much is being made of the Newcastle bid being at the Owners and Directors test stage at the moment and it's suitability for Saudi state ownership vehicles

https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... misgivings

What we are not reading about of course is the real elephant in the room for the Premier League is that the Saudi government have a state sponsored sports channel (BeoutQ) that has been pirating paid for Premier League rights by Qatari owned BeinSport for years. Where does that fit in to the test? and what message does it give to rights holders if they are allowed to own Newcastle. There was plenty of condemnation from the Premier League and UEFA (amongst) others at the beginning of the season about this.

[Chester Perry]

The Football Today Podcast looks at the recent Indictments from the US Authorities and FIFA officials - these can be a little dry for some but the detail is always excellent

https://www.footballtodaypodcast.com/po ... the-courts

[Chester Perry]

Andy Pilley with the second of his videos discussing the current crises and the future for the game

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK0QdnGFGAw

he refers to podcasts by Peterborough Owner, Darragh MacAnthony

they can be found here

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/f ... 1503576021

or here

https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0c ... Q&hl=en-GB

there is some interesting stuff on these broadcast from Pilley and MacAnthony while they may appear very different in approach to Andy Holt there is a lot of overlap too, add in Mark Palios and the guys at Port Vale and you begin to see hope on the horizon

[Chester Perry]

to follow that we see the different world of the big money leagues where only the players have stopped - much is going on behind the scenes as this New York Times article suggests

Soccer’s Business Hasn’t Stopped. It’s Just Waiting for the New Prices.
As a billion-dollar industry enters a second month in lockdown, scouts and sporting directors are finding they all need the same thing: patience.

By Rory Smith April 15, 2020

As far as Rámon Rodriguez Verdejo — the man everyone knows as Monchi — is concerned, there is as much work to do as there ever was. The game of soccer is paused, indefinitely, placed in the same anxious limbo as every other sport, as every other industry. But on laptop screens and cellphones, the business of it rumbles on as best it can.

So for Monchi, Sevilla’s sporting director — in charge of the club’s recruitment operations — there is still data to trawl and video to watch. Agents keep calling, pitching players, detailing salary demands. Monchi and his team feed it all in, then they deliberate and adjust their calculations accordingly. It is just as it would be in an ordinary April, in an ordinary world.

“The only difference is that meetings take place on video calls,” Monchi said. “So you do not have to wear a suit.”

European soccer is now a month into its first hiatus since the end of World War II. With a couple of exceptions — Turkey held out for a few more days, Belarus plays on, even now — nobody has kicked a ball since the strange, liminal evening of March 12, when a raft of Europa League games went ahead, several without fans in attendance — a last act before the sport’s delusion of immunity to the coronavirus pandemic was finally shattered.

Those first few days, of course, were fretful and busy. Stopping brought its own logistical challenges, as coaches scrambled to design conditioning programs for players confined to their homes and clubs rushed out specialized equipment — treadmills, exercise bikes, GPS units — to squads suddenly locked in isolation.

“We sent them all programs,” said Mark Molesley, the coach of the under-23 team at the Premier League club Bournemouth. “Exercises they can do at home, core workouts they could download from the internet, just as many ways to keep fit as possible.”

The complication, of course, was that nobody knew how long the cessation would last. Nobody knew what, or when, they were working toward. The players’ schedules were reviewed every week, altered as the date of a potential return to training — and then to games — was shifted back.


For Molesley’s Bournemouth colleague Carl Fletcher, the primary concern was player welfare. Fletcher’s role is to monitor the 26 players the club has out on loan; they are largely young, in their late teens and early 20s, farmed out to teams in the lower tiers of English soccer or sent to Scotland to hone their trade. (Though one, the experienced goalkeeper Asmir Begovic, is currently at A.C. Milan.)

“We had to make sure we knew where they were, what they were doing, and for the younger ones that they were fully aware of the situation,” he said. Fletcher felt it was crucial, too, that the players knew they could ask questions. “Mostly,” he said, “it was making sure they were coping, especially the ones that were quite far from home and not living with anyone.”

But once the fitness programs and the lines of communication were in place, the frenetic world of elite soccer had to learn a new, deeply unfamiliar virtue: patience.

Talks between Europe’s clubs, its leagues and its governing bodies have continued for weeks, but each round has only served to highlight the reality facing the sport: that the pandemic will determine the timetable, and nothing else.

As they wait — “just sort of floating,” as Sean Dyche, the Burnley manager, put it — all that managers, coaches, scouts and those in soccer’s back rooms and front offices can do is try to use their time as best they can.

Their experience will be familiar, by now. There is, front and center, the dull ache of anxiety over the virus, the concern about family, friends and colleagues. “The health and safety of everyone, the welfare of the players, they are the most important things,” Dyche said. Burnley, like most clubs, has made all of its services — conditioning, nutrition and psychological — available to its players.

There are the practical issues — looking after children no longer in school, arranging meals, checking on family, addressing the complexity of life in lockdown — and there are the displacement activities, the jobs that have never quite been done: Molesley has been building a patio (“It is nice to do some proper work,” he said); Dyche joked that he is “running out of things to jet wash.”

But there is also work. Some of that is the sporting equivalent of patio building: getting around to all the tasks that should already have been done, or might never have been done, as the season rolled remorselessly on as normal. “I’ve had a chance to go back through games that I hadn’t seen,” said Fletcher, the loan director. “We can look through videos and clips of individual performances, see what sort of things we might look out for, what we might have missed.”

Using Zoom, Microsoft Teams, FaceTime — the whole virtual arsenal — Dyche has tried to use the time for an internal appraisal of his team’s season. “There’s been some reflection on what we are doing,” he said. “We’ve asked whether things are going where we wanted them to be going, whether results tally up with what our instincts and our data are telling us. We have tried to lift our heads out of the sand a bit.”

And then, of course, there is recruitment. At most clubs, that is the one department that remains, effectively, fully operational in the absence of live matches, though some, including Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur, have placed their scouts on furlough. Many who make recruiting their work would echo Monchi’s thoughts, that it continues “with a certain normality, with our focus on the future.”

Across Europe, teams are working painstakingly through lists of targets, checking reports and analyses, identifying priorities. Thanks to the subscription services Wyscout and Instat, clubs can stream games involving possible signings. Hudl, a soccer-specific app, allows them to dive deeper still.

Then there are the virtual meetings. In some ways, several scouts said, the shift online should lead to better decisions: not only can more people dial in to discuss strategy or contribute to a decision, the lack of extensive travel means there is more time to come to a conclusion.

The complication is that nobody knows what the clubs are planning for. Even the richest ones are expecting a considerable financial downturn. The extent of that is not yet known, but in Italy, Spain, England and Germany, the estimates run at hundreds of millions of dollars.

Clubs do not know how much money they might have to spend. Most have downgraded their expectations and adjusted their equations to take into account new realities. Agents, increasingly, find that their inquiries are being met with a confession of ignorance.

It is here that even those bits of soccer that are still operating run into a wall. What Dyche called “background” recruitment can carry on. So much of the research has been done, so much of the data already gathered, that the absence of a handful of games at the end of the season hardly makes a difference.

But anything more concrete than that is impossible, when so much of what is to come is hypothetical. Nobody knows when soccer will return, what it will look like, what its budget might be, and nobody is prepared to guess. The future, like the present, is frozen.

That applies, too, to contract discussions. FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, has tried to guide clubs and players that current deals should be extended to cover the expansion of the current seasons — something that will depend both on good will, on both sides, and national contract law — but that is not enough to stave off the financial uncertainty.

Many clubs have shelved talks with players about extending or improving their current contracts. In some cases, offers that had been on the table only a few weeks ago have now been summarily withdrawn. The numbers on the page, both sides suspect, may look very different when they are next submitted.

Nobody knows when that will be. The game’s authorities keep talking, keep planning: late May, early June, late June. They will probably play out this season. They will protect next season. Belatedly, soccer’s power brokers have come to realize they are not in control of the situation.

And so, on their laptops and their cellphones, those who can still work in soccer do what they can. For everyone else, in an impatient, restless business, there is nothing to do but wait.

[Chester Perry]

Arsenal players become first in the Premier League to agree a pay cut (not a deferral)

https://theathletic.com/1751835/?source=twitteruk

[Chester Perry]

Not for the first time (and almost certainly not the last) Barney Ronay laments the lack of moral backbone in Football as that Newcastle takeover edges closer to a possible conclusion and points out the current scale of Saudi Interest in the Premier League - it is more wide ranging than many think

https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... se-of-saud

[Paul Waine]

Not for the first time (and almost certainly not the last) Barney Ronay laments the lack of moral backbone in Football as that Newcastle takeover edges closer to a possible conclusion 0 and points out the current scale of Saudi Interest in the Premier League - it is more wide ranging than many think

https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... se-of-saud

Good post. Good read in the Guardian. So, which billionaires do we (i.e. football fans) like?

[Chester Perry]

Good post. Good read in the Guardian. So, which billionaires do we (i.e. football fans) like?

I am pretty sure that Villa fans love the two they have - paid off all the debt and all new money comes in by the shedload in the form of shares so no debt real debt though some factoring, Leicester love theirs, though their debt is building, Bournemouth quite like theirs again debt is building. At Chelsea, Abramovich hasn't put a foot wrong on the community side for years and the clubs approach the pandemic has been exemplary https://twitter.com/RobHarris/status/12 ... 8402852864 - as is much of what he has done building the club since FFP, debt to him is colossal though and managers don't last very long.

Both Spurs and Liverpool keep misjudging the fans reaction - United's don't care what anybody thinks, City's do care (about their image) but should take the good work they do in Manchester home too, Ashley is a barrow boy (and very good at that), similar at Arsenal where it is about the bottom line. Every one Southampton have had want's out and Wolves have somehow blind-sided the authorities while actually being quite good and loved by the fans. Too soon to say about Everton but it does not read well so far, fast growing debt, huge losses, rapid turnover of managers and no tangible improvement overall, though Carlo was beginning to get a tune out of them before the great pause

I have said it many times, I much prefer our approach and don't want a billionaire, though if Mike, John and Barry were that wealthy I suspect (hope) they would want us to run the same way we do now. Brendan with that amount of cash would be a different story and to my mind a very scary one.

[Chester Perry]

this could be interesting for those of you stuck at home not working on Friday Morning - a webinar looking at the Newcastle takeover and human rights

https://twitter.com/InSport_Edu/status/ ... 8306260998

[Chester Perry]

What the Premier League Ownership table will look like if that barcode works at the till

https://twitter.com/vysyble/status/1250830377637285888

no UK owners would be Billionaires, though Tony Bloom was once heading that way before sinking north of £300m into Brighton and the current hiatus.

[Chester Perry]

@SwissRamble with a thread on Leeds United's 2018/19 financial results

https://twitter.com/SwissRamble/status/ ... 3058596865

Still waiting for him to do ours - we have seen him use the data in other threads but not a dedicated thread of our own.

[Chester Perry]

following on from last night's posts about the Newcastle takeover and overseas ownership - this - Overseas investment in football – there’s an agenda from Game of the people featuring contributions from Simon Chadwick

https://gameofthepeople.com/2020/04/16/ ... -agenda-2/

That last paragraph will have Leeds fans salivating

[Chester Perry]

I do not recall coming across the Game of the People site before but it looks very good for real football fans with a breadth of coverage both new and historic - they appear to take a very considered opinion on issues and do not get carried away with the hyperbole as this piece from last week on our club been thrown into the red-top spotlight re Mike Garlick's statement of having no cash by August

https://gameofthepeople.com/2020/04/11/ ... -tabloids/

other articles on us can be found here - definitely would interest a few regular posters

https://gameofthepeople.com/?s=burnley

they are also on twitter https://twitter.com/GameofthePeople