The FFP smokescreen

[Goldstone1976]

Can you explain how this is happening? Are you saying the price we pay for a seat, one of the most expensive in the Championship should be £15 dearer or is this a knock on from the stadium purchase?

I think all El Pres is saying is that the club is losing £8m pa, which TB covers out of his own pocket. There are 23 home league games a season. So, if you do £8m/23/£15, you get an imputed attendance of 23,200, which is not a million miles away from actual attendances.

For sure, one way of covering the £8m loss would be to increase all seat prices by £15 (assuming you think that you'd still sell the same number of seats!). Other ways are to find other sources of revenue or to reduce operating costs. In practice, the club has demonstrated that it is adopting a mixed approach. Besides, they don't need to save the £8m pa immediately, it needs to be reduced to £5m for next season.

 

[KZNSeagull]

Impossible. That works out at £14.49p. It must be something else.

He's an accountant. So it includes the costs of his own time to make the calculation

 

[Paddy B]

High matchday revenue is one thing but our income is dwarfed by any club who happen to have been in the premier league in the last 3-4 years. These clubs can spend huge amounts on players and still operate within FFP regulations as parachute payments are still revenue generated by the club.

There are also clubs (e.g. Leicester, Forest) who have benefactors who have/are investing heavily on the playing side and effectively gambling on promotion to the PL and will accept any potential FFP fines as they are totally insignificant when compared to the riches on offer.

It remains to be seen how robust the implementation of FFP will be.

The other point I would make is that many fans confuse "playing budget" and amount of money spent on transfers. Transfers are funded in a completely different way (eg part of CMS transfer fee will still appear in the next set of accounts and possibly the year after) the playing budget is essentially wages.

So given the choice of taking a gamble with a benefactors money (Portsmouth) or spend sensibly and have a good youth system combined with a good manager (dare i say it... Crystal Palace) which option do you think we should choose.

 

[father_and_son]

Why is FFP even coming into this? It is in EVERYONE'S interest that this club is self financing, why do people find that difficult to grasp? Brighton fans should more than anyone realise the dangers of having a club over reliant on donations from a sugar daddy.

Too many with goldfish memories (or JCLs) to remember sitting on shaky scaffolding or worse!

 

[Bold Seagull]

Too many with goldfish memories (or JCLs) to remember sitting on shaky scaffolding or worse!

It does seem almost frightening that there are many fans on here demanding we spend beyond our means to attain success. I facepalm all of them!!!

 

[BensGrandad]

I do not believe that people are expecting TB to put our future in jeopardy as I am sure he wouldn't but wonder how much of this £8m loss is down to 'creative' accounting and how much is actual cash shortfall obviously nobody in a position to know can answer it publicly.

 

[Joe Gatting's Dad]

The facts are that the clubs income is 20m and the playing budget is half that.

TB is funding the capital expenditure of the Amex and training ground.

 

[Bold Seagull]

The facts are that the clubs income is 20m and the playing budget is half that.

TB is funding the capital expenditure of the Amex and training ground.

The playing budget is the only outgoings of the club?

 

[Joe Gatting's Dad]

No - but it absorbs fifty per cent of the money coming in. Fans have to be realistic as to how much is to spend work out the other overheads and you will see why we lose eight million and cannot throw money away on a quick fix.

 

[El Presidente]

Total losses in the Championship were £250 million in 2012. It is not a sustainable model, and FFP is A way of dealing with this.

Whether it work is another matter.

 

[spring hall convert]

Total losses in the Championship were £250 million in 2012. It is not a sustainable model, and FFP is A way of dealing with this.

Whether it work is another matter.

So that means our £8m pa loss is BELOW average for the league, which is why when we are looking to break even we are going to struggle to compete with clubs that are mortgaging their future on a 1 in 10 shot of making the premier league. I for one am very comfortable with us not doing this, now. Too many other clubs are gambling.

Let the dust settle on FFP, see how the land lies in a couple of years time, then make a call but to do it now is akin to buying a lottery ticket. Poker players don't enter lotteries, they wait until the odds are stacking in their favour.

 

[Bold Seagull]

So that means our £8m pa loss is BELOW average for the league, which is why when we are looking to break even we are going to struggle to compete with clubs that are mortgaging their future on a 1 in 10 shot of making the premier league. I for one am very comfortable with us not doing this, now. Too many other clubs are gambling.

Let the dust settle on FFP, see how the land lies in a couple of years time, then make a call but to do it now is akin to buying a lottery ticket. Poker players don't enter lotteries, they wait until the odds are stacking in their favour.

You only have to look at West Brom. Their fans clamoured for more spending the first couple of times they got into the Premier League, but regardless of their relegations, they were slowly building for a sound financial future. They are reaping the rewards for that planning and foresight.

 

[DavidinSouthampton]

So that means our £8m pa loss is BELOW average for the league, which is why when we are looking to break even we are going to struggle to compete with clubs that are mortgaging their future on a 1 in 10 shot of making the premier league. I for one am very comfortable with us not doing this, now. Too many other clubs are gambling.

Let the dust settle on FFP, see how the land lies in a couple of years time, then make a call but to do it now is akin to buying a lottery ticket. Poker players don't enter lotteries, they wait until the odds are stacking in their favour.

I had just worked that out as well. I demand we lose more!

But seriously, I'd join in the facepalming of anyone who wants to spend spend spend without generating the income to do so.

 

[Dave the OAP]

It does seem almost frightening that there are many fans on here demanding we spend beyond our means to attain success. I facepalm all of them!!!

....so are we suggesting that the ONLY person who is financing the club....El pres says bloom is " covering" the 8 million loss....is tony bloom? What about the other directors? Are they not putting anything into the club? If not..what are they directors for?

 

[Bold Seagull]

....so are we suggesting that the ONLY person who is financing the club....El pres says bloom is " covering" the 8 million loss....is tony bloom? What about the other directors? Are they not putting anything into the club? If not..what are they directors for?

I think you should think about this one for yourself a bit longer...

 

[BadFish]

Even if FFP wasn't with us I would hope that the club operates within it's means. Even if this meant that we stay a championship club for the foreseeable future. I remember only too well the days spent worrying that we would not have a club at all. I don't want The directors to gamble with the clubs future for a season or two in the Premier League. It would be better to become the change we want to see and run our club sensibly showing others how it can and should be done.

Demanding we over spend to get a shot at the Premier League (there are no guarantees) is stupid and short sighted. I join the face palmers.

 

[Questions]

I'm not saying spend bucket loads of money because you don't. There has been strikers out there we could have got on loan but didn't for what ever reason.

Wouldn't have minded a look at Macheda who signed for Doncaster.