We are all angry at the way RD has run are club, but we have not honestly discussed the cost of running football clubs and what we believe is reasonable to expect. This came to my mind after browsing through the Swiss Rambler pages. Where practically every EFL team is a making a loss and most are huge. Here are a few examples for 2017/2018 (in £ per week.
Wolves 1,211,000; Cardiff 645,000; Preston 140,000; Notts Forest 390,00; Rotherham 27,000; Swindon 34,000;Aston Villa 32,000; Coventry 30,000; Burton 6000.) Gross losses that season QPR £38 million, Cardiff £39 million and so it goes on.
In the light of these facts do fans really believe they have a wright to demand owners chase the dream of promotion and should it be at any cost.
The other point to ask is how long can this go own before the house of cards collapses.
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47455998
I am sure that a Euro super league is on the way. For my part, I hope Brexit puts a stop to that tout de suite ((:>)
A point to consider is how many small (ish) clubs are owned by businessmen with wide interests who use their ownership of a 'struggling' club as a tax write off ? And/or a rich man and a few mates who are happy to lose a good few quid in their hobbyhorse football club and use games as a social focus for business and pleasure times ?
So the answer to the question is twofold .. billionaires will own the BIG BIG clubs (as is already) and the smaller clubs will have a more varied ownership structure varying from Senile old Belgians to co-op style sharing .. plus ca meme chose, plus ca change as they say in Brussels Paris
The tax write-off thing is a red herring - I would rather lose 45% in tax than 100% in losses!
The plain simple truth is that unless the revenue generated by football is redistributed fairly there is not enough to support 92 professional football clubs. So I agree with you that 20, perhaps 40 clubs making up one or two top divisions is about all that can be maintained and the rest is back to grass roots semi-professional or amatuer clubs used as creches for developing talent. Even then, with two divisions the riches of the current Premier League would need to be diluted across both - maybe one up one down and no relegation from the second tier.
Sad for the traditionalists but it will go that way.
My thoughts exactly. In 20 years or so, football in this country (and probably Europe) will have radically changed. The Premiership couldn't give a rat's arse about the lower leagues and if they had their way would cut off all monies that currently filter down. It's inevitable that we will see the demise of some clubs -probably one or two famous one. The non-league clubs may well benefit as fans seek somewhere to get their weekly fix.
The big clubs will certainly support one another as in the US (the draft system for example) so long as it suits the status quo. After all, the big boys need one another to make a game of it
We have moved from 'all in this together' to big fish swallow little fish. Tradition ? .. going, going gone the way of Morris dancing and trad jazz ((:>)
The football clubs at the top are getting richer and richer. Nowhere near enough money gets filtered down through the league's.
Unless something changes soon I can see plenty of clubs going out of business while the top clubs continue to increase their wealth.
So much wrong with football and society and it's getting worse .
Unless we can find away to change things the problem will remain.
I know we have discussed at length on this forum the pros & cons of potentially being owned by Red Bull, but in the absence of wealthy individual owners I wonder whether there may be an increase in corporate ownership of football clubs? Or is the market saturated?
It seems to me that the trend over the past decade has been for more non-league clubs to move from part-time to professional, so it will certainly take time to turn that juggernaut round and bring semi-professionalism to the league as some seem to be suggesting. (Although perhaps the EFL itself already leads the way in this!)
I guess if a number of league clubs fold in the same season, it might well concentrate minds and accelerate matters. Just hope we're not one of them...
By then it will be too late.
ShootersHillGuru said: The problem is there is so much money swilling around in the top division that they're developing an engine to bolt on to the handcart.
It may be that in order to preserve the Football League it'll have to be re-regionalised and go part-time in order to reduce costs and cut losses.
There is a lot of money 'swilling around' in the game, but just how much goes OUT of the game and into the pockets of agents who earn unbelievable amounts of cash?
The premier league could not therefore exist without the lower leagues.
I remain convinced that sometime in the future,the financial bubble will burst and a top club will go to the wall,as billionaires(Abramovic for example) tire of their toy.I probably wont be around to see it but would be delighted to see this happen.
Barcelona and Real Madrid are in theory a co-op and are owned by the fans.
The president is elected by the members/socios and can't put his own money in other than the same subs as the other 80k members. TV contributes so much as in England
Chelski are owned by a oligarch who was penniless at 25 and one of the riches people in the world at 35 (he's no Bill Gates)
Man city are owned by Sheikh Mansour who is worth about 7 billion and is deputy Prime minister of the UAE and is part of the Royal family.
Charlton are owned by a Walloon who is worth about 500 million and made his money by a patented electrical widget.
He is a failed politician and football owner and when he's in London he travels off peak so he can use a travel card. He owns 1 pair of shoes with plenty of duct tape.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47453599
Wolves lost 1 million a week last season in the championship
I still chuckle to myself at the name "Randy Lerner".
I wonder what lessons he learnt from his time at Villa?
2. Salary cap £250k p.a.
3. Ban agents
4. Cap away ticket price at £10
5. Cap home ticket price at £15
6. Half price tickets for over 62s ;-)
7. Under 14s tickets £5
Cheers
Jeremy
The average loss of a team promoted from the championship, over the last 4 years, is £550k a week!!
Also in one sense I can get why Roland is reluctant in one regard to return there as thats not sensible nor is it sustainable - Football authorities certainly need to get a control of it as its just not managable in the long run!!