If FFP didn't exist, would you like to see the Albion "go for it"?

[Rugrat]

but it expressly doesn't choke investment, you can spend as much as you like in infrastructure, like new stadiums, training facilities etc.

i take the view that not only are £15m losses not sustainable, but that Bloom may not have a unlimited funds to "go for it". no one know his wealth but assumes he has untold riches. there's no evidence for this, other than that which he has put into the club, from which people extrapolate arbitrary measures of how wealthy he must be.

I agree the first point save for the fact that it does “choke” investment in the playing side of things

I also accept that TB may not have bottomless pockets, indeed I’m of a view he might not be as uber loaded as some here think. But there are plenty of people that are and I think the word “sustainable” is bandied around far too much without any proper context.

So assume mega rich Ausse says to TB I’ll buy 40% of your shares for £40M to fund a push, but will also contract that you get to buy back for £1 if not in the Prem at end of year 3. That price is a big discount to the value he might expect to get in the Prem but he gets a risk free bash at it. The £40M is used to fund transfers and wages over and above our current run rate and being sensible he doesn’t take on any commitment that goes beyond the £40M

That to me is more than sustainable, at the end of the period we are either in the Prem “debt free” or where we are today “debt free”

It’s by no means farfetched either, the practice of speculating is hardly a new one.

I’m still of a view it won’t happen but can definitely see a situation where it could

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Sorry, don't understand your point in reply to mine?

I might have phrased it better, but you said it's easy to spend other people's money, and my response was (intended to be) that it's easy to let other people run up losses. Some albion fans might be happy to stay where we are, but it would be unreasonable IMHO for us expect the chairman to keep on absorbing those losses. He's due a tilt at the premier league shirley? Besides, he's already stated that the ambition is to reach the top tier, albeit without setting a time limit, so its a moot point really.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

I'd like to see salary caps for players, and agents being paid by players, not clubs. Millions go out of the game to agents.

 

[Biscuit]

We have to go for it, we need premiership money. It's as simple as that.

Is the correct answer. We can't sustain ourselves outside the Premiership. If we want to 'play it safe' and keep a steady ship, we need the Premiership money. Even with a squad on a shoestring you're going to be losing money in the Championship.

 

[Notters]

So many people seem to think Premier League = Money but it doesn't work like that.

 

[c0lz]

We already "Went for it" under Mr Poyet in my opinion.

And missed out on automatic promotion by three points in his second season.

 

[algie]

I'd like the chairman of each football club to be free to make these sort of decisions without the need for draconian rules imposed upon them.

Yes, I'm fully aware that this opens the door for another Portsmouth or Palace to overspend and risk the future of the club on a massive gamble, but if for example (not that I think for a second there's any truth in the rumours) Tony Bloom brings others onto the board who are willing to bankroll a push for promotion, with no strings attached (i.e. Money is not loaned) then why not?

The combination of tight FFP rules and the ever increasing number of teams with ever increasing Parachute payments is squeezing the rest of The Championship into a very tight corner, even those which are run in an exemplary way.

Agree with this. Allow owners to do what they want with their own money. But if clubs then go into administration then they should start in league 2. Throw the book at them like what happened to Rangers. League 2 clubs need only to drop down a single division.

 

[Iggle Piggle]

We already "Went for it" under Mr Poyet in my opinion.

Completely agree with this. Point me to one post when Bridge, Vicente, PIG and Upson arrived on god knows what wages asking Can we afford this? Like all football fans, we lapped it up and enjoyed the high profile signings coming in. The only reason we have started naval gazing and taking the moral high ground on FFP is because we have stopped spunking money up the wall. I'm not saying TB is wrong to do so - 160 million and counting, FFP and all that but I know which is more fun to watch from a fans perspective.

I also think that far from over achieving in the 12/13 season, we did the opposite. We blew it. It'll be a while before a manager gets as much as Poyet did to achieve promotion.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Completely agree with this. Point me to one post when Bridge, Vicente, PIG and Upson arrived on god knows what wages asking Can we afford this? Like all football fans, we lapped it up and enjoyed the high profile signings coming in. The only reason we have started naval gazing and taking the moral high ground on FFP is because we have stopped spunking money up the wall. I'm not saying TB is wrong to do so - 160 million and counting, FFP and all that but I know which is more fun to watch from a fans perspective.

I also think that far from over achieving in the 12/13 season, we did the opposite. We blew it. It'll be a while before a manager gets as much as Poyet did to achieve promotion.

Bridge was on 10K per week which was widely known. That's 3K a week less than we were prepared to pay Ward this time last week.

 

[sparkie]

We don't have to 'go for it' every year, but yes, 1 year every 2 or 3 may just push us over the line.

 

[Greavsey]

Completely agree with this. Point me to one post when Bridge, Vicente, PIG and Upson arrived on god knows what wages asking Can we afford this? Like all football fans, we lapped it up and enjoyed the high profile signings coming in. The only reason we have started naval gazing and taking the moral high ground on FFP is because we have stopped spunking money up the wall. I'm not saying TB is wrong to do so - 160 million and counting, FFP and all that but I know which is more fun to watch from a fans perspective.

I also think that far from over achieving in the 12/13 season, we did the opposite. We blew it. It'll be a while before a manager gets as much as Poyet did to achieve promotion.

Great post and bang on the money. Gus was forceful and clearly pushed and manipulated Bloom hard to give him the money to build that side. I think Bloom has learnt from that experience and clearly drawn a line under it and decided that is not the way he wants to run the club. This is why he has gone for more mild mannered coaches as opposed to managers.

 

[c0lz]

Just throwing money the club is not the answer but the club do seem to hide behind FFP at every opportunity,
And FFP will not work until the parachute payments are address and punishment imposed at the end of the season.

 

[Creaky]

Completely agree with this. Point me to one post when Bridge, Vicente, PIG and Upson arrived on god knows what wages asking Can we afford this? Like all football fans, we lapped it up and enjoyed the high profile signings coming in. The only reason we have started naval gazing and taking the moral high ground on FFP is because we have stopped spunking money up the wall. I'm not saying TB is wrong to do so - 160 million and counting, FFP and all that but I know which is more fun to watch from a fans perspective.

I also think that far from over achieving in the 12/13 season, we did the opposite. We blew it. It'll be a while before a manager gets as much as Poyet did to achieve promotion.

Losses have increased since GP left not fallen.

 

[portlock seagull]

I might have phrased it better, but you said it's easy to spend other people's money, and my response was (intended to be) that it's easy to let other people run up losses. Some albion fans might be happy to stay where we are, but it would be unreasonable IMHO for us expect the chairman to keep on absorbing those losses. He's due a tilt at the premier league shirley? Besides, he's already stated that the ambition is to reach the top tier, albeit without setting a time limit, so its a moot point really.

Ow absolutely, totally agree.

 

[clippedgull]

Throwing money at it is not the passport to guaranteed success. Burnley is a good example.

You need a manager and coaching staff that have the ability to encourage and motivate players to go out onto the pitch and give 100% of what they have to give, said players need a certain amount of quality to deliver the product on a consistent basis.

None of those players have to be multi million pound signings if they have the right qualities.

 

[Bozza]

Losses have increased since GP left not fallen.

That's not the case.

The last accounts, which we saw in February were for season 2012-13, which was Poyet's last season with us.

Although not reported yet, losses will have fallen since then - they have to in order for us to meet FFP.

 

[Iggle Piggle]

Losses have increased since GP left not fallen.

You what? The only accounts I can see are for the 2012/13 season where we lost 15.3 and Gus Poyet was manager.

I'll bet you any telephone number you want that number goes down when the next set is released.

 

[Pavilionaire]

Do you mean "go for it" a la Abramovich, or in the manner of Pompey / Leeds?

I'm sure there aren't many Chelsea fans that would have preferred life 'pre-Abramovich' to the successes they've enjoyed after he bought into the club. I'm also sure Leeds fans would prefer not to have gambled and lost, trading probably long-term Prem safety for a very uncertain future in the lower divisions.

The bottom line is that we all know about parachute payments but what's harder to take is seeing clubs that don't have any parachute payments splashing the cash and outbidding us, i.e. Forest, Middlesbrough, possibly even Bournemouth now. Long-term, the prospect of watching boring football in an uncompetitive division is not attractive.

 

[Iggle Piggle]

For the record on the 2012/13 season using [MENTION=31]El Presidente[/MENTION] s figures from the NSC article the other day.

We were 8th in the wage bill that season. Above us were ex Premier league teams who had shit players on high whacks. Wolves (Players like O'hara in the reservers on 50+ a week), Birmingham (zigic on 80+ a week if you believe it), Blackburn (Freefall from the chicken farmers) and Bolton. Unlike last year when QPR, Wigan and Reading were in and around the play off, Only Bolton narrowly missed out on the play offs with Wolves relegated.

Cardiff, Leicester and Hull were the other 3. 2 finished above us we finished above Leicester.

4th in that environment was about right in my book and we lost to a team with a wage bill 2.3 million less than us. Poyet though, convinced a far few he achieved it all on buttons that year. You only have to look at how many of that team now play premier league football to see what a chance we had. I think it will be a few years yet before a set of circumstances so advantageous towards promotion will present itself

 

[Guy Fawkes]

Is the correct answer. We can't sustain ourselves outside the Premiership. If we want to 'play it safe' and keep a steady ship, we need the Premiership money. Even with a squad on a shoestring you're going to be losing money in the Championship.

We could sustain ourselves in the Championship, but with a lower cost squad which is less likely to be battling it out for promotion and we would have less exciting players and big names but we could have a business model which meant we spent approximately what we earn't.

If we went up to the Premier League i can envision all those who seem to think that Premier League is what we must have because of the money saying that we must again overspend because we must stay in that league because of the money and need to sign well known players / expensive players to stand a chance. All we'd end up doing is losing even more money and risking the clubs future even quicker.

"But if we don't, we'd risk the JCL's abandoning ship and we'd only be left with the hardcore support left rattling around the Amex" is the usual response to that, but the truth is the only decenting voices to trying to be sensible tend to be from long term suppoerters who think they know what the newbies want and don't think the newbies can continue to go to matches without being offered the best players in the best league to watch. - A lot of them enjoy watching live football regardless, a lot will continue to go if we were mid-table in the Championship (or worse)

We signed unknown players from abroad and they were seen as world beaters, sign someone from a similar standard from a league in the UK and they are sh*t and we are doomed - the reason, it's not as exciting to the old heads who feel that the club must do a lot more to keep the newer fans coming, even if it means not supporting the manager (after a game or 2) or supporting our recent new signings (such as a proven Championship goalscorer like O'Grady) - How abouyt getting behind the side again, because, if they are as poor as these fans think, then they need our backing even more if we are to achieve anything. Too many clubs have had restless fans off the pitch and the playing side has suffered (Blackburn, Cardiff, Wolves etc) I hope this trend to criticise everything and everyone we sign can end soon and we can unite behind the players we have (regardless off who they are and who we will sign this and any future season)