New beginnings - 25% Truth, 80% Bollocks

[Robinz]

Tails... I appreciate your comments however Season ticket holders have paid their dues in advance (money in the bank)
Having attended matches at the County ground this season where I purchased  a matchday program, very average Cornish pasty, a beer and 10 pound for a car park. And the 21 pound entry ticket. Could have paid less due to age !!!
So the revenue on the day is definitely not 15 pound per attendee
That said... really enjoyed the football and will visit everytime I am in the UK.
Yes I will be watching today's game at 3am Sunday morning COYRS

[Power to people]

Aren't they pretty much one and the same, albeit I suppose it would avoid Kiely and the lawyer guy being partially liable I suppose.

Yep, but I think I was making the point that it should not be done to the FC to pay back Clem - it should be a personal cheque - but equally we wont know as it would just be rolled into the £x000's that Clem says he has put into the club.

[RobertT]

I raised this point previously.  I reckon Clem is confusing cash and profit/loss.  He is equating the constant need to pay down debt as what he calls making a loss.  He is right on the cash front - he will need to pay money from his own pocket, even if we are at break even, to pay down debt.

Now, there are two ways I can see this - it's tough on him, it does burn his cash reserves.  I feel sorry for him having to pick that up.

But, he purchased the club and when you do that you assume the Balance Sheet as well as the P&L.  He said he had enough to cover 7m, so he has not even reached that number yet.  If he was telling us the truth, he could have paid it all down on day one.  It's another case of bullshit.  He clearly did not have that money to hand, but thought he could spread it (which is actually a sensible thing to do, I'm not knocking that).  But doing so means you accept you will likely be paying out of pocket for a few years because there is no way the club makes a profit sufficient to give cash reserves to do so.

So, Clem is either economical with the truth, or a bit shit a running a football club (or somewhere in-between them).

[Posh Red]

We were £7.4m in debt, and thats now down to £600k.

On the basis that we (like pretty much all football clubs) are not generally making profits where do we think the £6.8m came from?

Then add on top the stadium maintenance that had been neglected by our mate Lee for the last few years

[RobertT]

We were £7.4m in debt, and thats now down to £600k.

On the basis that we (like pretty much all football clubs) are not generally making profits where do we think the £6.8m came from?

Then add on top the stadium maintenance that had been neglected by our mate Lee for the last few years

But that is my point - it was known, and it is not impacting the ability of the club to make a profit or loss.  Debt being paid down is not an Operating Loss - we already made the loss in past years which is why we have so much debt.  He should have known that when he purchased the club - so I think he is confusing his debt payments as a loss.  If we are break even, he still has to dip his hand in his pocket to pay off the "bad" debt.  There is no surplus.

He keeps saying losing a million a year - more likely, debt repayments are about that on top of the Operating position.  We made a profit in Year One, it's possible we made a small loss in Year two given some of the likely cost increases on the playing/management side.

[Posh Red]

But, he purchased the club and when you do that you assume the Balance Sheet as well as the P&L.  He said he had enough to cover 7m, so he has not even reached that number yet.  If he was telling us the truth, he could have paid it all down on day one.  It's another case of bullshit. 

He’s paid off £6.8m of debt, as well as picking up other costs. Would suggest that he’s got “near” the £7m number.

To be fair to him, I’ve heard that Power hadn’t produced any accurate accounts for some time so the actual debt position wasn’t obvious. In normal circumstances I’m sure anyone buying the club would have wanted to see a more accurate financial picture, however as we all know the takeover was all very last minute. I guess he could (and probably should) have walked away once he got an accurate picture, but fuck knows where we’d have been now if he did.

As I mentioned earlier we are probably taking about £2m a year more in gate receipts than FGR, yet Vince is having to put in £4m a year to cover the costs, so surely it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that we are losing £500k (without having to pay historic debt)

[RobertT]

We already know our position on P&L - we have an audited set of accounts from Clem, we made a profit.

It's not unlikely that we made a loss second season, but that is not "losing a million a year".

He may well have put what he said he had into the club, but that was the expectation when he purchased the club - he said he could cover 7m.  I just think he has confused some of that with P&L, it has nothing to do with P&L now.  It is not an operating loss now, it's not even a hit to EBITDA.

[Posh Red]

We already know our position on P&L - we have an audited set of accounts from Clem, we made a profit.

We do now, but what was the position 3 years ago when Power was forced to sell?


I’m assuming like any business they project expected income & expenditure for the year/season.

Presumably based on their projections they expect to lose that amount this year/season, hopefully based on losing in the first round of the cup so that progress & a Man City type draw or a playoff final or better still promotion would mean we have a better financial result.

[STFC_Manc]

We already know our position on P&L - we have an audited set of accounts from Clem, we made a profit.

It's not unlikely that we made a loss second season, but that is not "losing a million a year".

He may well have put what he said he had into the club, but that was the expectation when he purchased the club - he said he could cover 7m.  I just think he has confused some of that with P&L, it has nothing to do with P&L now.  It is not an operating loss now, it's not even a hit to EBITDA.

I think you are kind of missing the mark with the profit we made that year and then the likely loss.  We had a great cup run and we had a salary cap In place, which kept player wages artificial lower than normal and I'm sure we had a lot more stadium maintenance to do, as we did this year. We could easily be losing between £0.5-£1m a year.

We will have to wait and see for the next audited accounts.

[RobertT]

I am not missing the point - I am just stating that the factual evidence does not support a statement of we are losing between 500k and 1m per year.  We only have one full years accounts, and we made a profit.  We haven't completed this financial year, so we can't use it to make a statement of fact about performance (we could still sell a player for money in January for example, we did sell Wakeling for money and so on).  We have one other season not yet accounted for, we may have lost 500k on that one, but it doesn't support a statement of we are losing that A year - that suggests continual performance.

It's simple Accounting - Loss does not equal Cash drain.  It can do, but they are not the same thing.  A business can go into Liquidation while making a profit and a business can continue trading for years while making Losses on paper.

I am, not doubting any of the claims about debt values and money put into the club, not at all.

I also do not doubt that to be a top three team in this league we have to probably lose money doing it.

Clem has not stated whether we are going to cut costs or he is willing to chuck more cash in - Batch's point.  He has thrown a number out, with little evidence (none to support it that he has produced by the way) and no context, or description of what the plan is because of it.

As an example - the Debenture cost, based on statements made, 2.9m to pay off.  Not a penny of that is going to show up in the P&L account, but it is certainly painful for someone.  We could end up this season making a profit, but it costs Clem several million to support the club for that same year.

Football, as a business, is all about making what you can when the good times roll - so you can't just say, "Oh, the Man City game was a one off".  It is all part of trading as a football club - nobody made us spend the money we made, we could bank it if we think it's a one off, or use it against debt.  Same goes for the Wakeling sale - more profit (we would bank the profit of his sale vs the cost to acquire him, assuming he was counted as an Asset in the Balance Sheet).  Another one off - see the theme, they are not one off's, they are precisely the operating model we said we were using.  Get young players and sell for profit, make some money on cup runs.

[RobertT]

Also, in Accounting terms, we made a few profits in financial years under Power - usually because we sold players for profits.  He "accidently" forgot to include the Ritchie one (Standing later forcing that one into the books) and we may have made more profits if he wasn't also charging the club for services!

[STFC_Manc]

I am not missing the point - I am just stating that the factual evidence does not support a statement of we are losing between 500k and 1m per year.  We only have one full years accounts, and we made a profit.  We haven't completed this financial year, so we can't use it to make a statement of fact about performance (we could still sell a player for money in January for example, we did sell Wakeling for money and so on).  We have one other season not yet accounted for, we may have lost 500k on that one, but it doesn't support a statement of we are losing that A year - that suggests continual performance.

It's simple Accounting - Loss does not equal Cash drain.  It can do, but they are not the same thing.  A business can go into Liquidation while making a profit and a business can continue trading for years while making Losses on paper.

I am, not doubting any of the claims about debt values and money put into the club, not at all.

I also do not doubt that to be a top three team in this league we have to probably lose money doing it.

Clem has not stated whether we are going to cut costs or he is willing to chuck more cash in - Batch's point.  He has thrown a number out, with little evidence (none to support it that he has produced by the way) and no context, or description of what the plan is because of it.

As an example - the Debenture cost, based on statements made, 2.9m to pay off.  Not a penny of that is going to show up in the P&L account, but it is certainly painful for someone.  We could end up this season making a profit, but it costs Clem several million to support the club for that same year.

Football, as a business, is all about making what you can when the good times roll - so you can't just say, "Oh, the Man City game was a one off".  It is all part of trading as a football club - nobody made us spend the money we made, we could bank it if we think it's a one off, or use it against debt.  Same goes for the Wakeling sale - more profit (we would bank the profit of his sale vs the cost to acquire him, assuming he was counted as an Asset in the Balance Sheet).  Another one off - see the theme, they are not one off's, they are precisely the operating model we said we were using.  Get young players and sell for profit, make some money on cup runs.

So you are arguing that we have no way to know that the figure is correct - shock horrow no we don't.  I made several points that suggest it was a one off  profit and referenced that they may come back this year but they weren't around last year, so I would expect a loss for last year.

You keep making the same point about debt, yet the debenture was £2.95m, so if Clem was confused on that the loss would be much larger?

I can see Batch's point of will he continue to fund this but my response is that he would lose all his money if he let the club go into admin, so for now I can't see the sense of him not continiung to fund any losses.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Audrey]

Which is precisely why Power was keen to put us in admin - it wasn’t his money to lose by doing so.

[Legends-Lounge]

Which is precisely why Power was keen to put us in admin - it wasn’t his money to lose by doing so.

How that cunt sleeps at night is a mystery to me.

[Posh Red]

How that cunt sleeps at night is a mystery to me.

Because like every other criminal he doesn’t give a shit about his victims.