Harty's Phone In Thread (18/02/06)

[BensGrandad]

Sorry LI have been having my meal.

Loss of TV Revenue

El President quoted on an earlier thread when this was mentioned that the loss of Sky TV money from CCC to Div 1 was £1m and he stated that this was equal to 25% of our budget. He has quoted figures and facts previously and they have been accepted as being correct because 'he is in the know' why should that be different this time because it doesn't suit the argument.

Drop In attendances.

The average home gates from yesterdays Div 1 fixtures was 6623 virtually the same as ours and we were playing a team who took up all of their away allocation as they are nearly top of the league and it is a fairly local journey. Compare this with playing the teams in Div 1 outside of Southend, Colchester,who will proably both get promoted and Gillingham and Bournemouth how many local games will we play? How many teams will sell out their full allocation of tickets? Not many if any perhaps Forest on a Saturday. The unrest caused concerning ST means that the numbers of those sold will drop drastically and the tickets sold per game will only increase if we are successful. If we are not the finances will take over again and players will need to be sold to keep us afloat.

 

[Yorkie]

So what is different?
Finances dictate now and players are sold to keep us afloat.

 

[Bromley shrimp]

Can do? We need more than management consultant jargon, fella!

Only in two of those examples I gave was that a factor. Do you realistically think we can compete with Ipswich in a bidding war with Alan Lee? Even if we had the money for the transfer fee (which we don't), could we then afford to commit ourselves long term to the wages he wants (his personal demands, and there would have to be a big premium that would make him turn down the midtable/upper table security of Portman Road) given the club's current hand to mouth existence? Run the budget of our club that way and you don't have a club.

The other example of Fallon and Swansea was not so costly as Lee but still expensive, but probably more a value judgement, this is a player with one good half-season of football behind him in tier 3 yet Swansea because of their stadium revenues were willing to gamble and pay over the odds for this guy. Should we have? Big, big gamble, fella, for a player with that track record.
We may have gone for him if Swansea's interest had not inflated his price unrealistically.


The economics of third-division football are also unclear. Iv'e asked BG to back up some of the statements he made on that but haven't heard from him yet.

Fallon & Brighton were the ones I had in mind.
Run the club your way and we're staring down the barrel of the 4th Division.
All I want is that if we sell players such that wages are freed up we invest the proceeds in the playing side, which clearly we're not.
Where would you spend or where do you think Knight's wages or McGammon's or Kuipers's wages are right now??
And that's just the tip when you look at Virgo, Harding, Cullip, Currie and what we've outlayed on players in return for their respective transfer fees.
No management speak there my friend. Just what players have we had in return, excl. the £150k on El Turi and £20k on Henderson?

 

[London Irish]

Sorry LI have been having my meal.

Loss of TV Revenue

El President quoted on an earlier thread when this was mentioned that the loss of Sky TV money from CCC to Div 1 was £1m and he stated that this was equal to 25% of our budget. He has quoted figures and facts previously and they have been accepted as being correct because 'he is in the know' why should that be different this time because it doesn't suit the argument.

Drop In attendances.

The average home gates from yesterdays Div 1 fixtures was 6623 virtually the same as ours and we were playing a team who took up all of their away allocation as they are nearly top of the league and it is a fairly local journey. Compare this with playing the teams in Div 1 outside of Southend, Colchester,who will proably both get promoted and Gillingham and Bournemouth how many local games will we play? How many teams will sell out their full allocation of tickets? Not many if any perhaps Forest on a Saturday. The unrest caused concerning ST means that the numbers of those sold will drop drastically and the tickets sold per game will only increase if we are successful. If we are not the finances will take over again and players will need to be sold to keep us afloat.

On TV money, fair enough, can you give me a guess when this thread appeared on NSC as I haven't read it and will attempt to find it.

Re. on gates, everyone knows that there will be a drop of revenue from away fans if we go to tier 3, that is common sense, what I was hoping was that there was some figures to actually quantify it. That's what you were implying when you put a global figure on our revenue drop. I would query that figure of yours without this missing piece of the jigsaw!

 

[BensGrandad]

On TV money, fair enough, can you give me a guess when this thread appeared on NSC as I haven't read it and will attempt to find it.

Re. on gates, everyone knows that there will be a drop of revenue from away fans if we go to tier 3, that is common sense, what I was hoping was that there was some figures to actually quantify it. That's what you were implying when you put a global figure on our revenue drop. I would query that figure of yours without this missing piece of the jigsaw!

1. Not sure exactly but about 3 / 4 weeks ago during the transfer window when the question of relegation beinga disaaster and this figure has been quoted many times by many people since as £1m

2. The figure of £250k was an estimate based on most clubs selling 50% of their allocation taking into acoiount that a few but not many may take up their full allocation but the vast majority won't and if we are playing any teams like Carlisle or Hartlepool on a Tuesday night they are going to have few possibly less than 100. This is a bit of an unknown quatity to predict accurately but you can make reasonable assumption and not be too far adrift of the truth as I believe that I have done.

 

[London Irish]

Fallon & Brighton were the ones I had in mind.
Run the club your way and we're staring down the barrel of the 4th Division.
All I want is that if we sell players such that wages are freed up we invest the proceeds in the playing side, which clearly we're not.
Where would you spend or where do you think Knight's wages or McGammon's or Kuipers's wages are right now??
And that's just the tip when you look at Virgo, Harding, Cullip, Currie and what we've outlayed on players in return for their respective transfer fees.
No management speak there my friend. Just what players have we had in return, excl. the £150k on El Turi and £20k on Henderson?

Talk of us being relegated to tier 4 is over-the-top scaremongering and unworthy of you. You have no evidence of the club struggling should it drop to tier 3, I have the evidence of its superb performance and recovery last time that happened.

Tom Brighton was pretty straightforward, a fee was agreed that was probably on the expensive side for a player devalued by an oncoming Bosman situation, but Clyde inflated it beyond even that. In business you can't cave into pressure like that, you have to back your judgement of a players' value or you end up being jerked around by every agent and chancer going. With the spectre of Turienzo constantly thrown in Knight/McGhee's faces, I'm glad we don't have management at this club who don't give into crap like that and who safeguard what limited money we have.

Regarding the fees we received from previous players like Virgs, this ground has been gone over hundreds of times on here. We make huge annual revenue losses at Withdean and that has to be financed somehow or you don't have a club to support.

Regarding who we should get in, that's the nub of the issue - there is a very, very limited supply of players who would improve on what we already have, that clubs will wiliingly release on loan and who would willingly join our appalling infrastructure set-up and be part of a difficult relegation struggle. People seem to think there is a queue of players that fit this criteria - wake up, there ain't. But we are trying our damndest to find one, that I have NO DOUBT.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

Talk of us being relegated to tier 4 is over-the-top scaremongering and unworthy of you. You have no evidence of the club struggling should it drop to tier 3, I have the evidence of its superb performance and recovery last time that happened.

Tom Brighton was pretty straightforward, a fee was agreed that was probably on the expensive side for a player devalued by an oncoming Bosman situation, but Clyde inflated it beyond even that. In business you can't cave into pressure like that, you have to back your judgement of a players' value or you end up being jerked around by every agent and chancer going. With the spectre of Turienzo constantly thrown in Knight/McGhee's faces, I'm glad we don't have management at this club who don't give into crap like that and who safeguard what limited money we have.

Regarding the fees we received from previous players like Virgs, this ground has been gone over hundreds of times on here. We make huge annual revenue losses at Withdean and that has to be financed somehow or you don't have a club to support.

Regarding who we should get in, that's the nub of the issue - there is a very, very limited supply of players who would improve on what we already have, that clubs will wiliingly release on loan and who would willingly join our appalling infrastructure set-up and be part of a difficult relegation struggle. People seem to think there is a queue of players that fit this criteria - wake up, there ain't. But we are trying our damndest to find one, that I have NO DOUBT.

I agree with you, The chances are very slim of going down unless half the squad is sold - saying that going back up again is not a given as some on here like to think.

 

[BensGrandad]

So what is different?
Finances dictate now and players are sold to keep us afloat.

Glad to see I have come off of 'your ignore list'.

If we are succesful we will sell out Withdean complete if not gates receipts will become a problem. If the TV money drops and do not forget a vast amount of the season ticket money will be paid in by March 15th, so will be used during the last few months of this season and the summer, to pay the bills, it is fair to assume that we will start next season with virtually nothing. This then brings about the problem of replacing players that have either left, not been retained, retired lor whatever. Some players will be available in the summer but without this TV revenue and DK being prudent, unlike Paul Scally at Gillingham, wont have spent it before hand buying players on the strength of it. Rightly so.

If this is the case and Wayne Henderson is receiving rave reviews, as we expect because he is a good goalkeeper, it is fair to suggest that somebody would come in for him. If the fee was above £100k I would expect DK to say that it is a fair return on our investment and sell him, again nobody could critisise his financial application.

So whatever way you view it the outlook is pretty grim if we get relegated.

 

[Bromley shrimp]

Talk of us being relegated to tier 4 is over-the-top scaremongering and unworthy of you. You have no evidence of the club struggling should it drop to tier 3, I have the evidence of its superb performance and recovery last time that happened.

Tom Brighton was pretty straightforward, a fee was agreed that was probably on the expensive side for a player devalued by an oncoming Bosman situation, but Clyde inflated it beyond even that. In business you can't cave into pressure like that, you have to back your judgement of a players' value or you end up being jerked around by every agent and chancer going. With the spectre of Turienzo constantly thrown in Knight/McGhee's faces, I'm glad we don't have management at this club who don't give into crap like that and who safeguard what limited money we have.

Regarding the fees we received from previous players like Virgs, this ground has been gone over hundreds of times on here. We make huge annual revenue losses at Withdean and that has to be financed somehow or you don't have a club to support.

Regarding who we should get in, that's the nub of the issue - there is a very, very limited supply of players who would improve on what we already have, that clubs will wiliingly release on loan and who would willingly join our appalling infrastructure set-up and be part of a difficult relegation struggle. People seem to think there is a queue of players that fit this criteria - wake up, there ain't. But we are trying our damndest to find one, that I have NO DOUBT.

Withdean has been increased in capacity, but seldom sells out.
What you're really saying is we don't have the regular fan base to support a 2nd Div outfit.

I don't buy the infrastructure argument as you are ruling out all players of the correct calibre, who would only have to commit to being here for a relatively short period of time in any event.

 

[Infernal Optimist]

Let's test that theory then. We indentified one loan target recently in Lee Barnard who we thought, despite his previous uninspiring loan record, might be good enough to improve our forward line. Surely he would want to come here rather than stay in Spurs reserves? Problem is, the changing situation at that club meant he was offered a glimpse of the big time and made it on to the bench at White Hart Lane. So if you were Barnard, would you stay put knowing that dream debut could be just one or two injuries away, or would you take yourself out of the picture entirely by taking yourself down to the worst ground in the entire football league to a team that are odds on at the bookies to get relegated? Hmmmmm.........



So you have been told we have tried for various players, but, errr......you are demanding to know who they are?

The list is endless really, isn't it? I'll have a quick go at the recent ones, there were too many to remember from the beginning of the season.

Alan Lee - couldn't compete with Ipswich's offer
Danny Dichio - Preston won't release him and has scored for their first team recently
Lee Barnard - Spurs won't release him
Neil Shipperley - Warnock won't release him.........yet.
Darren Byfield - this one is too recent to have made the Argus but we were chasing him last week
Tom Brighton - deal agreed but collapsed when Clyde wanted more
Dion Dublin - deal close to being agreed, but funnily enough, he chose one of the biggest clubs in the world over us
Rory Fallon - we took the judgement that the money Swansea were paying overvalued the player, so we left them to it
Eurcom League striker whose name I forget - probably not good enough

I'm sure I've missed some obvious ones but this is just the tip of iceberg, McGhee and his staff probably chase and consider more names than this in a single day that don't happen because the agents, players and clubs aren't interested. The ones that are, we then have to be checked out thoroughly to avoid another Turienzo situation, many of these won't then be regarded as good enough to help us in our current situation.

Assuming we actually made offers for any of these as very little has been confirmed by the club, although I will bow to your initmate inside knowledge and accept all of these for the moment

Is this the sum total, of strikers available in the FL? At this stage even a flyer on a teenage Premiership striker would be better than accepting our fate?

What I'm saying is that we as fans should be told all of this from the horses mouth rather than having to hear it from your doubtless well informed media sources.

Dick has used the media very effectively
in the past to pursue other agenda's. I don't think it is beyond him to use it to keep the fans informed.

A CF is a priority, as proved by these efforts you have listed above. What is a much bigger priority however, is that the bond between the board and the supporters in maintained and if anything increased.

Next season, is going to be very very difficult if we are relegated, if you can't see that... We are going to find it very difficult to maintain our current levels of support, let alone start to find the other, 5-6,000 we are going to need for Falmer without recapturing the close rapour the board and support had during the 1st years of Dick's reign.

Oh, and a Centre Forward? How about Martin Butler of Rotherham? Injury prone, but has a pretty good scoring record and with Rotherham's finances how they are we could probably get him. He might not be the saviour, but he would give us a lift and hope. Without cranking up my Championship Manager, I won't waste my time producing a list for you to rubbish, but time is running out rapidly.

The supporters are flat, disenchanted and resigned to relegation. The club need to address this. At least they are in the South Stand, perhaps over there with the roof, things seem different?

 

[Yorkie]

Assuming we actually made offers for any of these as very little has been confirmed by the club, although I will bow to your initmate inside knowledge and accept all of these for the moment


What I'm saying is that we as fans should be told all of this from the horses mouth rather than having to hear it from your doubtless well informed media sources.

Dick has used the media very effectively
in the past to pursue other agenda's. I don't think it is beyond him to use it to keep the fans informed.

Every single one of those has been mentioned in the Argus or on the official site.
Some people (not necessarily you) say they can't be bothered to read the .....(insert rude name for the Argus in here) or the official site.

 

[Bromley shrimp]

Dick has used the media very effectively
in the past to pursue other agenda's. I don't think it is beyond him to use it to keep the fans informed.

A CF is a priority, as proved by these efforts you have listed above. What is a much bigger priority however, is that the bond between the board and the supporters in maintained and if anything increased.

Next season, is going to be very very difficult if we are relegated, if you can't see that... We are going to find it very difficult to maintain our current levels of support, let alone start to find the other, 5-6,000 we are going to need for Falmer without recapturing the close rapour the board and support had during the 1st years of Dick's reign.

The supporters are flat, disenchanted and resigned to relegation. The club need to address this. At least they are in the South Stand, perhaps over there with the roof, things seem different?


Unless the agenda is "Relegation for All", why in heaven's name have Perry and Knight unacustomarily gone to ground? I can only imagine the reason to be that they want us to draw our own conclusions from what now amounts to Writing on the Wall.

 

[London Irish]

Isaying that going back up again is not a given as some on here like to think.

We are in rare agreement then, if we go down, I don't see us automatically going up either, I'd like the same target as we had last time, a top 6 play-off place. We are in the middle of a huge team rebuilding, the biggest since Adams in 1999 and 2000. That can take time and maybe a transitional year awaits.

If we survive this year, we face another very, very hard year in the Championship again next season when we will be odds on again to go down, if we go down this season, then it might be an opportunity to quicken the pace of rebuilding for the long term, and it's possible that may require a transitional year, as it did for Adams.

 

[London Irish]

Withdean has been increased in capacity, but seldom sells out.
What you're really saying is we don't have the regular fan base to support a 2nd Div outfit.

No, I'm not saying that at all

The potential fan base is huge, but the best marketeer/salesman in the world can't sell a primitive dump like Withdean to them, evidence, look at all the rocketing attendances of clubs that have moved from even better grounds than Withdean to modern stadiums, their attendances have shot up, the latest example this season is Swansea at the Liberty stadium.

We are now in an incredibly difficult position to compete with a team like Swansea given the new scale of their revenues and budgets.

 

[London Irish]

Assuming we actually made offers for any of these as very little has been confirmed by the club, although I will bow to your initmate inside knowledge and accept all of these for the moment

No inside knowledge, nearly all of that is in the public domain thanks to Argus reports. Or are you saying the Argus is in on Dick Knight's conspiracy and we haven't chased any of these players, fella?

I really don't what you want more from the club in being kept informed? The club give regular forthright interviews with journalists, the one in Saturday's Argus was excellent. McGhee's notes in the programme are always pretty upfront and informative. Martin Perry keeps us briefed excellently on the Falmer fight. McGhee has even invited you to go and have a look at players training if that takes your fancy in terms of a bit of team-spirit spotting!

So what do you want then?

Transfer matters are always conducted in relative secrecy because of issues of confidentiality and commercial sensitivity, so alas no you can't have the contents of McGhee's personal organiser and his mobile phone records put on NSC every day

 

[BensGrandad]

No, I'm not saying that at all

The potential fan base is huge, but the best marketeer/salesman in the world can't sell a primitive dump like Withdean to them, evidence, look at all the rocketing attendances of clubs that have moved from even better grounds than Withdean to modern stadiums, their attendances have shot up, the latest example this season is Swansea at the Liberty stadium.

We are now in an incredibly difficult position to compete with a team like Swansea given the new scale of their revenues and budgets.

According to Paul Scally on Meridian News a few nights ago it is an acknowledged fact that when a club moves to a new ground their attendance increases by between 45 - 50 %. based on that our attendance at Falmer will be 10500ish.

Where is the potential huge fan base or are you counting the fair weather cup final/play off attendees as potential every week fans. If so include my wife she went to the Cup Final, replay and play off finals at Wembley and Cardiff those are the four that she has been to since she stopped going regularly with me in the early 70s.

 

[London Irish]

According to Paul Scally on Meridian News a few nights ago it is an acknowledged fact that when a club moves to a new ground their attendance increases by between 45 - 50 %. based on that our attendance at Falmer will be 10500ish.

Not that I'd trust that shifty bastard as a reliable source on anything, but I think he was talking initial year increases, not accumulated ones. At Swansea, the attendances have gone up in excess of 100 per cent this season alone. At my other club London Irish, the accumulated increases over five years are almost 200 per cent and that included a move to an area of the country we never played at previously. It would be interesting to see average attendances increases of all the new stadium clubs, Reading must certainly be around the 150-200 per cent accumulated mark by now from Elm Park.

Here's Cardiff manager Dave Jones on Swansea:

For the first time in many years, Swansea City, top of League One and settling in to the their new 20,000-seater Liberty Stadium, have a higher average attendance (14,933) then their south Wales rivals.

Dave Jones says the increased support shows how a new stadium can boost attendance figures.

"When our new stadium is built, you'll see another 10,000 people coming through, (that's a 100 per cent rise BG) but we want them now," he added.

"We're in a good position. And what better position to be in than in the top half of the league?

"I could understand if we were near the bottom and the fans weren't coming.

"I've been to Swansea many times when there have been 2,000 people watching.

"But they've got a new stadium now, Kenny (Jackett) is doing a fantastic job."

 

[BensGrandad]

What is the average attendance for London Irish. The reason I ask is that I am soon to do some work at a pub where the secretary of the largest rugby club in SCR region drinks.

On one occassion I suggested to him that BHA should have gone in with Brighton Rugby Club and built 1 ground at Waterhall. His answer was that it wouldn't have worked because 'rugby is not a spectator sport' and that no clubs in rugby get an average gate that is anywhere near BHA average at Withdean. On the odd occassion they may get a larger gate against a well known club but generally not so.

His club get less than 1000 most home games and a lot of coverage on SCR.

Just to put your mind at rest my offer to buy 2 extra tickets was a genuine attempt to help raise the cash needed to pay the wages of a proven goalscorer. I know that DK has no money so I do not need any hidden agenda or to belittle him. I also offered a bet for charity that he will not be chairman when we get to Falmer in 2010 but nobody has taken me up on that.

 

[London Irish]

What is the average attendance for London Irish. The reason I ask is that I am soon to do some work at a pub where the secretary of the largest rugby club in SCR region drinks.

On one occassion I suggested to him that BHA should have gone in with Brighton Rugby Club and built 1 ground at Waterhall. His answer was that it wouldn't have worked because 'rugby is not a spectator sport' and that no clubs in rugby get an average gate that is anywhere near BHA average at Withdean. On the odd occassion they may get a larger gate against a well known club but generally not so.

His club get less than 1000 most home games and a lot of coverage on SCR.

London Irish are now at the 11k average mark, but we are having such a storming finish to the season, I reckon we are likely to finish with something like a 12k or 13k season average, two near sell-outs of the Madjet are forecast in coming months.

At our old Sunbury ground, we averaged just over 4k in our final season there in 1999. It's been steady year on year progress about 20 or 30 per cent a season, and it's been interesting to watch the various marketing and ticket offer techniques that have produced that huge rise.

A professional rugby franchise at the Falmer stadium would work very well I reckon, with star names I think you would get crowds of between 5 and 8 thousand very quickly.

A new rugby professional franchise has just been set up in Perth, Western Australia, its opening crowd was 37,000 and it already has 21,000 members. It didn't exist up to a year ago.

Leisure and sport is a massive growth industry worldwide. The potential for the Albion is phenomenal IMHO.

 

[Infernal Optimist]

No inside knowledge, nearly all of that is in the public domain thanks to Argus reports. Or are you saying the Argus is in on Dick Knight's conspiracy and we haven't chased any of these players, fella?

I really don't what you want more from the club in being kept informed? The club give regular forthright interviews with journalists, the one in Saturday's Argus was excellent. McGhee's notes in the programme are always pretty upfront and informative. Martin Perry keeps us briefed excellently on the Falmer fight. McGhee has even invited you to go and have a look at players training if that takes your fancy in terms of a bit of team-spirit spotting!

So what do you want then?

Transfer matters are always conducted in relative secrecy because of issues of confidentiality and commercial sensitivity, so alas no you can't have the contents of McGhee's personal organiser and his mobile phone records put on NSC every day

What I want is regular communcation between the board and the fans. eg. Supporters meetings. Three times a year is plenty. I do not want to know McGhee day to day movements or his transfer dealings until after the event, although it does allow you to post such witty prose on his behalf.

I try to avoid the Argus personally as much as possible. The last time I looked and I do pay to watch it, we had a club website. Surely, it would not be beyond McGhee to post a monthly report for example, after all I have to do it!

News on the website, within the same month as it occurs, would also be an improvement. The programme notes are OK as far as they go, by the nature they tend to be specific to one subject which given the length of the article is reasonable enough...

Do you think any of that unreasonable?
Am I stirring it, or stabbing McGhee or Knight in the back? No I think not, all I think is that the supporters deserved to be kept informed directly by the board and management, even of bad news, after all the Falmer black hole is going to have to be filled by us, the new supporters are going to have to be encouraged to go, by us, and the running costs are going to have to be met by us until we get there...