Why we will probably struggle next season - FFP (1 Viewer)

[JesusOnAir]

Financial Fair Play dictates that for the coming season, the wage bill may not exceed 60% of turnover. When SISU says that it needs to get the wage bill down to 2mm it is not joking, in my opinion this is exactly the number we must aim at.

Ignoring the 2 million number, I calculated what I thought might be a reasonable turnover value.

Our average home gate last season was nearly 11k, but for League 1 as a whole the average is closer to 5 or 6k. I think if we are playing 20 miles away, also considering the 'not a penny more' malarkey, 6k is a good number for planning.

Out ticket prices are expensive for League 1 - I kept these high at £20 average.

We have 23 home games and I assumed 4 cup games for which we share the takings.

This comes to a match day revenue number of 3mm. Sure, we may sell some beers and pies, but that isn't going to be a significant stream for 6k people, moreover maybe the ticket price will come down to be closer to the £14 charged at Bescot normally.

If we assume 400k of other add-ons over the season (sponsorship et al) we have a turnover of 3.4mm. 60% of this is 2.04mm.

What does this mean? IMO:

- The high wage earners will go. The only reason they are still around now is that SISU is hoping they will find a club and we won't have to pay severance.

- I don't think we'll be bringing in many new players as Presser keeps saying. Umbongo will be here for months. And even if we do, we'll be outbid for salary if they are in demand.

- So we'll pretty much have what remains + kids all season.

- You take out the Robbins and McGoldrick factor from last year and we were a poor League 1 side. Sure, the kids will be older and better, but are they really that much better than the players that have gone? I don't think so - otherwise they'd have been playing each week.

In conclusion, if the bookies really are quoting 6/1 for relegation I'd say fill your boots, because I think that's the most likely outcome. Where is the downside for SISU to do anything else? The 6k diehards who will travel to Warsaw to see us in League 1 will continue in League 2.

Another thought here - SISU keep saying that we must increase turnover. IMO turnover will decrease and force the 2mm wage cap as a direct result of their policy to take the club away for 3 years. If we were to stay at the Ricoh and keep attendances at 11k average, the wage cap moves to 3.5mm.

 

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[stupot07]

The bbc survey last season showed that our tickets are among the cheapest in the league. And when you consider concessions and season tickets, JSB rates and the free tickets they give away, you're looking more at an average of £15 not £20 per person.

 

[stupot07]

And ffp relates to all player spend - wages, total remuneration, transfer fees, agents fees and bonus.

 

[RPHunt]

So of course the logical thing is to boycott the club's games and merchandise, that'll get us out of this mess! Why didn't I think of this? :facepalm:

If we know this could happen then why are we trying to intensify the problem!?

Because while SISU are in it "for the long haul" things are not going to get any better and are likely to get worse wherever we are playing. In another five years, we could have slid down another division and halved the gates again.

Will you still have this attitude when we are playing in the 4th division in front of 4-5k fans?

 

[Jack Griffin]

A 6K crowd away from home, surely you jest, more like 3K or even less.

Let me say it once again, SISU are content for another relegation, it suits their long haul plans, anything that cuts the budget does.

 

[SkyblueBazza]

Nothing new whatsoever. Although given their comments on other threads I think there may still be a hardcore who cannot work it out for themselves.
On transfers & being "out-bid" on salary....these rules apply to all of us so not necessarily true. The NOPM plan might yet be completely ignored...& even playing at Wolves or Similar distance away may yield 10k attendance - unknown quantity until it happens.
Robins/McG...it is rare that new managers/players come in & make such instant impact as they did - so SP needs to be judged much later than the last few games of last season. Even then - don't compare with Robins as the squad will have a different look to it.
And finally "mm" is a measure of distance £*m is what you're looking for ;-)
(* Insert number of millions here)

 

[stupot07]

Plus 12 sides averaging 5k or less in our league last season.

And Yeovil went up with a wage bill of £800k, £2m should be in the top 6-8 wage bills in the league

 

[shy_tall_knight]

6,000 diehards travelling to Warsaw, not a chance. There is not a single ST holder that I know who will going, I live in Coventry and a fan of many years and do not know of a single fan who will get a ST for the season. I know of a few fans who will pick and choose their games. If it is Walsall, 2,000-3,000 max plus away fans. We have a home game on a Tuesday night against Orient in October 2013. If we are middle to bottom of the league which is most likely once we have offloaded our good players that other clubs actually want, I would expect 200-300 Orient fans and maybe 1,000 a crowd of 1200 - 1500.

The inconvenience of the travell to Walsall or Nene Park, the extra time will be close to 2 hours a game and around £10 in fuel costs. 6,000 is far too optimistic, the hard core includes many over 50 who just won't be prepared to break their matchday routine, or parents with young children there are only 4 night games but that means won't be home until after 11.00 at night. JPT early round game may be less than a 1,000.

"the high wage earners will go" - well not really those that other clubs want like Christie Cody Baker Leon & Blair will go, Sheffers and Bell will remain eating into our wage budget.

Not a penny more campaign will derive the club of money but moving it to Walsall will deny the club far more money and lead to a good risk of relegation.

 

[lifelongcityfan]

My ST worked out at about £8 per game, that wasn't even early bird prices either, I got mine the day before Sheff U at home!

Ticket prices can't be knocked really, that's something SISU ought to be credited for, especially when you compare with most FL teams, our STs are cheap even in L2 terms! Well, cheapest ST anyway.

what season tickets!

 

[YamYam]

... moreover maybe the ticket price will come down to be closer to the £14 charged at Bescot normally.

Walsall charge £20 a seat for all stands except the Plebs area, which is £16.

 

[shy_tall_knight]

"You also have to consider that SISU will obviously want CCFC to get promoted" - not sure they are that bothered, two years ago they allowed loads of players to leave, signed 2 goalies and a forward got 1 midfielder on loan - condemning us to relegation - moving to Walsall is their choice.

NOPM hopefully will deter them from moving out of Cov, in a game of bluff that's all us fans have left. As I said earlier NOPM will deny the club of some money, moving to Walsall will deny it far more. Stay in cov and we have a good chance of promotion move away we will be relegation candidates regardless of the affect of NOPM. NOPM is a fans message to a club than knows the value of nothing but the cost of everything.

 

[RPHunt]

Forget the NOPM campaign - another five years of SISU will have exactly the same effect on income and FFP.

 

[Jack Griffin]

The playing budget was £4.25m last season. What did that achieve..

 

[Jack Griffin]

Hang on, if this NOPM campaign is popular and successful, would it not 'starve the club of income', yes? That will directly effect FFP, so we cold be at a massive disadvantage in FFP terms, so that could mean no players signed etc. maybe even admin again, and that in itself could condemn us to relegation!

You also have to consider that SISU will obviously want CCFC to get promoted because it's in their interests! Players will be signed when the embargo is lifted and despite the wage bill being halved, quality players who can compete amongst the best in the league can be signed, like Stupot pointed out, Yeovil got promoted on a 800k wage budget, I also can't imagine Bournemouth or Brentford to have too large a wage bill either! So 2m isn't too shabby, especially after some of the 8 players are released/sold.

Comparison is key, too many people on here jump to conclusions without comparing to other scenarios, e.g. ST prices and wage bill to be relevant to this thread.



Last season's obviously.

No, exactly the opposite in the medium term. You really don't understand the game being played out here.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Bear in mind folks that the embargo is unlikely to end by late July at the earliest. This means that we will have wasted a pre season and start the season at a big disadvantage and should we get it removed in time to sign anyone, who'd want to join?

If the groundshare proceeds suggestions of a £2m wage bill are pure fantasy. You can point to teams like Yeovil on similar budgets of £800k but they have worked on such money and smaller for years. We are downsizing faster than Wernham Hogg-and David Brent Jr is at the helm.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

The playing budget was £4.25m last season. What did that achieve..

It was placed in the hands of Andy Thorn.

 

[italiahorse]

The NOPM campaign will hopefully make SISU reconsider moving away from the Ricoh.
Take the current deal offered this season, continue to negotiate a mutually satisfactory long term deal and get this club a decent income which should lead to promotion.
SISU and ACL need to understand the mutual benefits and get over their "little upset"

 

[Macca]

Jeez OPs fingers could have been saved. Reason? Shit squad, shit owners

 

[Jack Griffin]

It was placed in the hands of Andy Thorn.

No it wasn't he was only in charge 3 games & Robins made a lot of signings.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

No it wasn't he was only in charge 3 games & Robins made a lot of signings.

So last summer's wave of signings never happened? He blew most of that budget there and then.

 

[Sick Boy]

No it wasn't he was only in charge 3 games & Robins made a lot of signings.

Laughable. A conspiracy theorist and a Thorn/SISU apologist.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Why don't you enlighten us all then?

Explain how getting relegated and everything bad with it is in SISU's interests? If they care about profit, breaking even, or minimising losses, they need to get promoted, and I think we aren't that many players off having a squad to achieve that.

You are right to say that it's in SISU's interests to get us promoted, 100%. However I think you're underestimating that their vendetta against ACL is predominating over all other interests and seeing them go under seems to be more important than the club.

As for your assessment of the squad-laughable. Assuming that Edge and Malaga are forced out as Pressley intends then we will have no defenders over the age of 25 and our only senior striker is Clarke (again, if Pressley gets his way on McDonald). It is going to be a very weak squad indeed topped up with youth players.

 

[JesusOnAir]

And finally "mm" is a measure of distance £*m is what you're looking for ;-)
(* Insert number of millions here)

Bazza you are wrong, mm = millions in financial contexts. Google it yourself.

 

[SkyBlueBlood]

We will struggle this season because we have crap owners who have no clue about football and don't give a shit about the club or the fans.

 

[SkyblueBazza]

Bazza you are wrong, mm = millions in financial contexts. Google it yourself.

Best used only in financial cliques/circles then. If you want the masses to understand properly - best to talk in language they will understand. Or perhaps I'm a bit thick & the masses already knew that?

 

[SkyBlue_Bear83]

In terms of depth out squad assuming Pressley gets rid of the 8 he doesn't want is probably the weakest it ha ever been in terms of depth. However assuming he keeps the ones he wants we will still have a decent spine of a team in Murphy, Adams, Christie, Fleck, Moussa, Baker and L Clarke. It's a good base to start from in this league.

 

[SkyBlueSwiss]

In terms of depth out squad assuming Pressley gets rid of the 8 he doesn't want is probably the weakest it ha ever been in terms of depth. However assuming he keeps the ones he wants we will still have a decent spine of a team in Murphy, Adams, Christie, Fleck, Moussa, Baker and L Clarke. It's a good base to start from in this league.

No, it is not.
Even without the 10 point deduction we would have finished last season in the bottom half of the table.
Now deduct all the points we earned thanks to McGoldrick's scoring, take away the effect that Robins had on our team, then take away all the contract players and loan players that will not be playing this season, add to that the potential that other teams might make offers for Clarke and Baker (and you KNOW that SISU are incapable of turning down an offer of money) and you do not have a good spine, you have relegation fodder.
Add to that scenario the likelihood that we will be in embargo for a long time yet so there will in reality be no new players coming in, plus the possibility of playing our so-called "home" games outside of Coventry in front of very small crowds, then would you not rather say we have a recipe for absolute disaster?

 

[SkyBlueSwiss]

Actually, we would've finished 12th, top half. When you consider that administration MAY have had a detrimental effect on the team's performances (3 points off top 6 at time of deduction) as we had nothing to play for, and also factor in Clarke's injury, he is easily one of the best ST in the league, that impacts performances, if you watched the games, it was obvious that all we were missing was an end product, we were goal reliant on McG, Clarke and Baker last season and if I had to to stick my neck out and say who was most important, it would be Clarke, his goals were in closer games, whereas McG's came in 3-5 goal hauls, same with Baker, however McG is clearly the best of the 3.

Now, it annoys me when people make statements like 'if it weren't for 'insert name' we/they would be screwed', now, that is flawed, because we did have that player, and who is to say that some else wouldn't have done as well? For example, Clarke did a similar job to McG. We can't hypothetically take out a team's best player to suit our argument, e.g. Suarez, Ronaldo, Messi, RVP for their clubs, it's madness.

Btw, take McG's goals away and we only lose 9 points, do the math yourself.

No, really, it would have been bottom half. We would still have been 13th based on goal difference. Please check more carefully.
I think it was far more than a mere 9 points. Are you deliberately ignoring the fact that McG was a far better all round player than Clarke. You seem to forget that the team was scoring for fun when McG was in the team. He made us a better team all round. This is why he went to a Championship club and Clarke is still with us. So no, it was far more than just 9 points.
As for injuries - they can and do happen at any time to any team. This is why a club needs depth in the squad, something we have even less of this season than we had last season, and as you quite correctly point out, when Clarke got injured we had no-one to replace him because we had no depth in strength in the club.

As for your second paragraph, I find I am having difficulty even understanding what you are trying to say, so I cannot really answer it, except to say that imho Clarke did nowhere near a similar job to McG; there was a vast difference in contribution to the team, therefore I think that it is quite clear that he did not do as well and that we were "screwed" (to use your terminology) when he left. And removing McG from the equation is not hypothetical, it is a fact. He is no longer here!

 

[SkyblueBazza]

No, really, it would have been bottom half. We would still have been 13th based on goal difference. Please check more carefully.
I think it was far more than a mere 9 points. Are you deliberately ignoring the fact that McG was a far better all round player than Clarke. You seem to forget that the team was scoring for fun when McG was in the team. He made us a better team all round. This is why he went to a Championship club and Clarke is still with us. So no, it was far more than just 9 points.
As for injuries - they can and do happen at any time to any team. This is why a club needs depth in the squad, something we have even less of this season than we had last season, and as you quite correctly point out, when Clarke got injured we had no-one to replace him because we had no depth in strength in the club.

As for your second paragraph, I find I am having difficulty even understanding what you are trying to say, so I cannot really answer it, except to say that imho Clarke did nowhere near a similar job to McG; there was a vast difference in contribution to the team, therefore I think that it is quite clear that he did not do as well and that we were "screwed" (to use your terminology) when he left. And removing McG from the equation is not hypothetical, it is a fact. He is no longer here!

But the impact of Robins/McG leaving & admin? How can you gauge what effect they had upon our run-in? I would tend to thin a pretty severe one. To know your season is over, snuffed out so much earlier than otherwise - when the momentum was with us...must've been devastating.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

We threw away over 30 points from winning positions-which says a hell of a lot more than any other statistic people can throw out there.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

You are so patronising it is unreal.

You're telling everyone on here you're going to be pedantic over 5 goals, ok.

I never said Clarke was better than McG, in fact, I explicitly said McG was better than both Baker and Clarke - I suggest you read it properly (to use your patronising tone).

The guys on the Nii Lamptey show worked out that minus McG's goals, we lose 9 points, because as you said, we were scoring for fun, that's why it's only 9 points because there were games where he scored but we scored 5 as a team, for example, take McG's goals away from Donny (a), Hartlepool (a), Walsall (h), we still win those games, but take his goals away from Leyton Orient (a), we lose 2 points (all of those examples are off the top of my head so I don't have all the games he scored in etc.), whereas Clarke scored in games where we won by 1 goal, e.g. Tranmere (h), Sheff U (a), or we would've lost a game had not been for his goal e.g. PNE (a). I think Clarke has saved more points than McG purely because we scored less when he played for us compared to McG.

Yes, I know injuries happen, it's part and parcel of any sport, but to say our team isn't good enough based on what you've said whilst ignoring that the best striker in the league was injured, whilst on a streak of scoring, is wrong, because I think our form would've been considerably better had Clarke not got injured, and obviously, SP will have to sign a striker who is hopefully better (albeit that is v unlikely). MR got lucky because head it happened to him, we would've been fucked.

You live in Switzerland right? So I assume you don't get the chance to go to many games? Well, I went to the majority of games last season (this is not getting high-handed, I'm just saying what I saw), and in SP's rein, I felt that we played well in most of his games, but I felt that all we missed was an end-product, which is what Clarke gave us.

I think that we aren't that many players off having a squad that is good enough to push playoffs at a minimum.

Read the rest of your post.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

I think that if some decent defenders are brought in, this would be neutralised.

The most worrying stat of last season, but I suppose the good news is, is that it proves we have a good enough enough team to get into winning positions, same as the 11/12 season, a good manager would've kept us up (I don't wish to start a war on that point).

It takes more than good individual players-when it comes to solid defending, especially at our level, it's all about discipline and organisation. The times I saw us last season (admittedly not many but was north of the border) we looked like rabbits in the headlights every time we were put under pressure at the back. I agree, it shows how much of a wasted opportunity last season was however to fix it this season we just can't afford to fill the back 4 with kids and we especially can't afford an idiot to be manager over pre-season. Is Pressley that idiot? Time will tell.

 

[stupot07]

It takes more than good individual players-when it comes to solid defending, especially at our level, it's all about discipline and organisation. The times I saw us last season (admittedly not many but was north of the border) we looked like rabbits in the headlights every time we were put under pressure at the back. I agree, it shows how much of a wasted opportunity last season was however to fix it this season we just can't afford to fill the back 4 with kids and we especially can't afford an idiot to be manager over pre-season. Is Pressley that idiot? Time will tell.

Yep agreed, we will also be defensively weaker in the central midfield area compared to bailey and Jennings when they were on form during that good run.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Yep agreed, we will also be defensively weaker in the central midfield area compared to bailey and Jennings when they were on form during that good run.

Our major saving grace at the back is Murphy who is again in for one busy season. Defence is one area of the pitch you can't completely rely on kids to step up for and right now it looks like we're going to be doing just that. Total suicide.

 

[wingy]

We threw away over 30 points from winning positions-which says a hell of a lot more than any other statistic people can throw out there.

Massive mistake in selling Turner ,Cranie was the obvious.