The 'toughness' of the Championship 2015-16 edition

[Hampster Gull]

I think we will be an also ran this season and play some ****ing turgid football to boot, hope I'm wrong particularly about the last part.

That is my half glassed filled view

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

Or Palace (who'd finished 17th in 11/12) in 12/13.
Four Four Two mag last year tipped Wigan for promotion.
And many feared Fulham especially after they "went for it" with£10msignings or forest last year with £8m signing and look how that ended up.
As for spending . We still spent big last year lest we forget. So we went for it too. On what turned out to be duffers. Sadly
So who knows ?

No we ****ing didnt. Thats the point. Yet YOU perpetuate this myth again and again and again.

We penny pinched and it ALL started with not paying Wolves circa 250k for an INTERNATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP PROVEN left back and being very pleased with ourselves that we didnt.

That was the FIRST of many warning signs last year.

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

Chailey Jem have you ever seen the Ripping Yarns episode The Testing of Eric Olthwaite? I only ask because you are a boring old tit.

 

[perseus]

There seems to be a fair few clubs 'going for it' this year. Off the top of my head, and to varying degrees...

Derby
Middlesbrough
Sheffield Wednesday
Brentford
Leeds
Reading

Additionally, you'd have to expect Burnley, Hull, Forest, Wolves and Ipswich to all be having a tilt at the right end of the table, whilst Bristol City arrive with a lot of positive momentum.

It's going to be tough, isn't it?

Thinking the same. It is going to be interesting. Are Forest, Fulham and Blackburn in the reckoning? Two of early home game opponents are restricted by FFP rules.

 

[Justice]

New attacking players are on their way calm down and stop urinating the bed.

 

[RexCathedra]

Originally Posted by Hillian1

We WILL be relegated this season.

No ambition.

We WILL finish BOTTOM this season.

And relegated the season thereafter. On the trot.
If not actually wound up.

Top that!

 

[chaileyjem]

No we ****ing didnt. Thats the point. Yet YOU perpetuate this myth again and again and again.

We penny pinched...

In a discussion on clubs "going for it" and it's impact on promotion I thought it's relevant to mention that the club
Spent a fortune on cog, Holla, Baldock, Gardner and the like and share the fact. As it's sadly not a myth , that bloom and barber said
These players who ended up 20th cost , with the rest of the squad "more then [any other squad] in the history of the club. Not my definition of penny pinching
But there you go.
Granted it's boring. And I'm definitely old and some would describe me as a git. (In jest) so I'll give you that.

 

[DarrenFreemansPerm]

In a discussion on clubs "going for it" and it's impact on promotion I thought it's relevant to mention that the club
Spent a fortune on cog, Holla, Baldock, Gardner and the like and share the fact. As it's sadly not a myth , that bloom and barber said
These players who ended up 20th cost , with the rest of the squad "more then [any other squad] in the history of the club. Not my definition of penny pinching
But there you go.
Granted it's boring. And I'm definitely old and some would describe me as a git. (In jest) so I'll give you that.

You constantly peddle the 'most expensive squad in the club's history' line, whilst it may be a fact it's also unsurprising, the cost of football on the whole is increasing year on year, we could spend more this summer but unless it's significantly more it'll likely be more very average additions.

 

[chaileyjem]

I'd bite someone's arm off for 4th bottom right now,all the time non football people are running the club we'll struggle.

"Non football" ? -
What is a "non football" person ?
Is Bloom "non football " ?
Barber might not be to your taste and some would call him lots of things but "non football"
He's not. (If working, watching and coaching football might count) .
What type of "football" CEO would you prefer ?

Or is it the rest of the board who aren't football enough ?

 

[Machiavelli]

If you have a division with a lot of tough teams, no one team will run away with it, as they will all take points off each other. The lesser teams take points off each other. Then you get freak results here and there. Which all makes for a somewhat unpredictable division. It also helps that it seems most years there's an expected top team that struggles, and an expected poor team that succeeds.

There tends to be a lot more of the former than the latter. Last season: us, Fulham, Wigan, Forest, Leeds(?)

 

[Hillian1]

"Non football" ? -
What is a "non football" person ?
Is Bloom "non football " ?
Barber might not be to your taste and some would call him lots of things but "non football"
He's not. (If working, watching and coaching football might count) .
What type of "football" CEO would you prefer ?

Or is it the rest of the board who aren't football enough ?

Morning Joseph.

 

[chaileyjem]

You constantly peddle the 'most expensive squad in the club's history' line, whilst it may be a fact it's also unsurprising, the cost of football on the whole is increasing year on year, we could spend more this summer but unless it's significantly more it'll likely be more very average additions.

True to an extent but we also typically outspend 15/16 of the other clubs in the division and reports indicate that was the case in 14/15. And not all champ clubs routinely increase their wages every year. The revenue for the championship from TV for example is actually flat. The new football league TV deal from Sky , in stark contrast to the prem deal, was flat or less (sky never publicly disclosed it). TV revenue isn't increasing.
What is going up is the size of money Bloom is putting into the club. Every year.

 

[Seasider78]

True to an extent but we also typically outspend 15/16 of the other clubs in the division and reports indicate that was the case in 14/15. And not all champ clubs routinely increase their wages every year. The revenue for the championship from TV for example is actually flat. The new football league TV deal from Sky , in stark contrast to the prem deal, was flat or less (sky never publicly disclosed it). TV revenue isn't increasing.
What is going up is the size of money Bloom is putting into the club. Every year.

What has gone up though is the £15m + we have received for our prize playing assets over the last years that have not been replaced with equal quality.

The club clearly took a direction of trimming playing costs as Gus alluded to before his departure. The ceiling was very real and is the large reason we no longer see the calibre of player we did in those first seasons.

I admire your backing of the club and maybe we are now just cutting our cloth accordingly but let's not pretend we are operating under the same strategy and conditions from the pre-barber era as we are clearly not

 

[spanish flair]

In a discussion on clubs "going for it" and it's impact on promotion I thought it's relevant to mention that the club
Spent a fortune on cog, Holla, Baldock, Gardner and the like and share the fact. As it's sadly not a myth , that bloom and barber said
These players who ended up 20th cost , with the rest of the squad "more then [any other squad] in the history of the club. Not my definition of penny pinching
But there you go.
Granted it's boring. And I'm definitely old and some would describe me as a git. (In jest) so I'll give you that.

I find it hard to believe that the players mentioned cost the "fortune" in football terms that you speak of, COG I believe was £500k, Holla Free transfer, Baldock £2mill and Gardner loan, unless we were overcharged by agents and Villa for Gardner's loan. As you seem to know, perhaps you can pass on to the rest of us what was the combined cost of those players to the club.

 

[chaileyjem]

The club clearly took a direction of trimming playing costs as Gus alluded to before his departure.

If trimming means reducing then they aren't doing a very good job of sticking to this strategy as the costs went up in 2013/14 and 14/15, as they had in 12/13.
ie: the "Barber era".

 

[DarrenFreemansPerm]

If trimming means reducing then they aren't doing a very good job of sticking to this strategy as the costs went up in 2013/14 and 14/15, as they had in 12/13.
ie: the "Barber era".

What's the 'official club line' in response to [MENTION=3147]Seasider78[/MENTION] 's first paragraph?

 

[Hotchilidog]

No we ****ing didnt. Thats the point. Yet YOU perpetuate this myth again and again and again.

We penny pinched and it ALL started with not paying Wolves circa 250k for an INTERNATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP PROVEN left back and being very pleased with ourselves that we didnt.

That was the FIRST of many warning signs last year.

Actually he's right. We did spend big, it's in the accounts, the wage bill was huge. The problem was we spent it on a pile of shit rather than decent players like Ward. That deal was indeed a warning, a warning that the decision makers had poor judgement.

Different people making the decisions this season, we need them to be an improvement. The current evidence suggests this maybe the case.

 

[Bozza]

Actually he's right. We did spend big, it's in the accounts, the wage bill was huge. The problem was we spent it on a pile of shit rather than decent players like Ward. That deal was indeed a warning, a warning that the decision makers had poor judgement.

Different people making the decisions this season, we need them to be an improvement. The current evidence suggests this maybe the case.

You can't know that - the accounts for last year have not been published yet - the accounting period for 2014-15 has only just finished.

However, there have been assurances from Bloom and/or Barber that last season the club had the largest footballing budget in the history of the club. We did spend on transfer fees (Stockdale, Baldock and COG at the very least) but the implication has to be that, as you say, we were paying very high wages.

I don't believe that Bloom and/or Barber would have made the statements over the size of our budget if it were not true, as I'm sure we'll see when the accounts for last season are published 6-7 months from now.

 

[chaileyjem]

I find it hard to believe that the players mentioned cost the "fortune" in football terms that you speak of, COG I believe was £500k, Holla Free transfer, Baldock £2mill and Gardner loan, unless we were overcharged by agents and Villa for Gardner's loan. As you seem to know, perhaps you can pass on to the rest of us what was the combined cost of those players to the club.

I'm just reminding NSC of the financial position of the Albion gleaned from what all clubs make available via their annual accounts, some rather good analysis of that by those that earn a living analysing football finances including some regular contributors / readers on here, and what the club have said publicly themselves in terms of their overall wage and football budget. I have no more knowledge than anyone else.
That shows we or rather Bloom spends a fortune (the annual football budget is £20m+, a fortune by any yardstick), its going up, its more than most other clubs in the Championship year on year including last year and its gone up in 12/13, 13/14 and 14/15.

That i think is useful information when considering , on this thread at least, whether other clubs are "going for it" or not and if the Albion are really competitive.
but I can understand if you think otherwise.
In lots of ways this sort of discussion isn't helpful to the club, even though you probably imagine i'm doing their bidding, . They're hardly proud of the fact that last summers spending spree resulted in a squad which finished 20th in the table and was self evidently weaker than before.

 

[KZNSeagull]

What's the 'official club line' in response to @Seasider78 's first paragraph?

No idea, but the 15m we received was for players that cost us no more than 4m combined, which is the market we are in, not the splurging 5m+ on one player market which some think we should be in. We need to find quality players which do not cost the earth. But I thought everyone knew that.