Derby County - brings back nightmare times (3 Viewers)

wingy said:

Which is what happened SW last season.
Who got it reduced,by around half I think.

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Sort of but not quite the same.

That was a different charge, namely breaching profitability and sustainability regulations (FFP basically) & there is no fixed penalty for that, depends on the severity etc. This is why the likes of Derby & Reading are negotiating with EFL now to agree a deduction rather than go to independent panel.

An independent panel decided on -12pts for Sheff Wednesday but then another independent 'appeals panel' felt that was too harsh as they had tried to mitigate it somewhat by selling Hillsborough etc but didn't do it in time. The appeal panel halved the deduction to -6pts.

Derby's case is different as they went into administration. This has a fixed penalty within EFL rules of -12pts.
Derby's argument is that they were running sustainably until Covid & are therefore claiming 'force majeure' hence they're now being asked to prove that by providing 6 years worth of accounts.

As @oldskyblue58 says, can't see any chance of success on that basis as they were anything but sustainable previously but also, as he says, probably worth a go as I don't think there's any penalty for 'frivolous appeal' although I believe cost is likely to be c.£400k based on Wigan's failed appeal last year.

oldskyblue58 said:

Who appointed the administrators? Might give a good indication as to who controls the process and their intentions

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Mel Morris I believe

oldskyblue58 said:

Could be that any potential buyers are only interested in Derby as a championship team. So the administrators have to at least try to make some sort of an appeal to give any potential deal a chance.

Value of Derby in championship is going to be more than Derby in league 1 so staying in current division gives greatest return to creditors.

Still think they are going to be league 1 next season though

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How much will it cost them to appeal?

SlowerThanPlatt said:

They’ve been relegated twice

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Sure , but would you say he's a bad owner really when he actually spent around 100 Mill to get them back up

Evo1883 said:

Sure , but would you say he's a bad owner really when he actually spent around 100 Mill to get them back up

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He's a pretty scummy individual but he's run the club in a financially sound way by comparison to most others which ironically will allow them to spend a fuck ton in January without breaking any rules.

Frostie said:

Mel Morris I believe

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Interesting points by OSB58 & Frostie, but surely Mel won't re-purchase Derby...i mean, he's lost tons of his personal wealth already, and he's not 'uber' wealthy. Also the fans do seem to have turned against him, with his 'blame everyone else' approach.

no_loyalty said:

How much will it cost them to appeal?

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Mentioned above but Wigan's failed appeal cost them in the region of £400k.

Hang on though covid hit march 2000. First Lock down was 23/03/2020. So for the 2020 financial year the hit was a couple of months. In 2018 Derby had a turnover of 29m compare that with CCFC. The main hit came August 2020 when season started with no fans That changed in 2020/21 season when income did crash but wages liability didn't. But they already had a long history of being operationally unsustainable, they kept afloat by selling the family silver.

If the situation was the same as 2018 then in 2019 and most of 2020 wages exceeded turnover by 137%. That's unsustainable and had nothing to do with covid at all. They couldn't pay the wages without loans from investors or owner let alone all the overheads even in a normal year.

March 2019 Morris was reported as looking to sell. Well before covid. In fact a deal in principle was agreed November 2020 but collapsed. That's during covid. Am guessing but due diligence possibly turned up more skeletons in the cupboard but I am not making any accusations.

Covid added to the problems but certainly was not the root cause. They were already in a mess and a worse one than their financials reported because of using dodgy accounting policies. We will never know the real situation because the 2019, 2020 and 2021 accounts will never be published. Which allows the spin that it was covids fault, a deeper look shows the business was unsustainable and subject to penalty and most likely insolvency well before covid.

The club was poorly run, had sold its major assets, paid over the odds for players who didn't perform and therefore did not hold value, had got found out by the authorities and an owner who had it looks reached his investment limit and wanted out.

The covid claim is good PR but the club was already in a perilous position and had built no means or plan to weather the storm.

Blame really lays at the feet of Morris