Thetownend.com

Could be their last game on Saturday according to various sites.

Would surely mean one less relegation spot rather than four down, five up and two from the Conference this year?

Could mean the difference to us between relegation and survival and in some twist of fate the downfall of Rotherham could assure our continued existence.

Reading through their various woes they are a shining example of how not to run a club.  Originally funded by a traditional style chairman a scrap metal merchant who ran the club at a small loss.  

The club flew up the leagues after the appointment of Ronnie Moore and found themselves battling away in the Championship.

At 83 the chairman wanted out and scouted for buyers to which a fans consortium paid a quid and put in just 100k towards operational costs (with a wage bill of three million).  In exchange for clearing their overdraft the consortium gave the previous chairman their one asset, the ground.

I hate to see it and empathise 100% with their fans but with better managed clubs cutting their cloth in league two and the conference chomping at the bit how much longer will the FA allow clubs to get into this sort of state and carry on trading?

I've been reading quite a bit about this recently as my dissertation is about the salary capping issue. Unfortunately the governance and board structure at football clubs is appalling, but there are so many underlying factors that need to be addressed within the structure of the game. Clubs are only just starting to realise the value of good governance unfortunately, and have only started to appoint non-executive directors (such as supporter trust appointed board members) which is what is recommended in the Combined Code for good corporate governance.

What sites did you garnish the info from dazza ?

On the official website they posted a statement which seems to be the start of a rift with the Supporters Trust, who have been doing all the fundraising.  Sounds like it is getting a bit desperate up there.  Liquidator has told the club to get donations paid straight to the club, Trust had been taking the donations up till now, to ensure the money gets used with proper checks etc.  If they are having problems with the fundraising effort then more trouble could easily follow.

I'm just reading the BBC website.

*Barnsley have written off all money owing to them over Barry Conlon's loan move to Rotherham in the autumn, and also sent a cheque for £5,000

*Sheffield United are paying the wages of loan players Stephen Quinn and Jonathan Forte during their loan spells at Millmoor, and are also donating all profits from their beam-back of this week's Sheffield derby to Save The Millers

*Sheffield Wednesday are to hold bucket collections at two games, including the derby with United Fair play to both of these teams

*Liverpool legend Phil Thompson has donated £500 to the Save The Millers campaign - and urged any Premiership player earning more than £100,000 a year to follow suit. Too fucking right - they should definitely put something back into the game


Personally I would hate to see a club go out of business in our league. I know this could help us survive relegation but I would rather survive on merit than for this to happen. Some may even say that this could be the beginning of the slow death of football.

despite everyone telling me I should care, I still dont :|

I wouldn't worry anyway. It's unlikely to make a difference. Football is big business now and that element is destroying the rest of the game.

If Rotherham do go bust it will be a sign of what's to come for many other teams. We weren't so far off that stage quite a few times. That's why you should care, because the more teams that drop out, then the less teams there will be to make a competition.

I'm sure at least one of the lower divisions will become part-time in the not so distant future.

There is no reason for a league to go part time, clubs just have to pay a full time wage they can afford, from top to bottom.  The one thing I will saddle at clubs own feet is that they keep paying the over inflated wages.  Nobody made Rotherham pay more than they could afford to players, same as here in the past.  it might take a bit of pain to start with (like we are experiencing) but if every club did it then we'd at least see less strain on clubs finances.

PLayers are only worth what people are willing to pay them.  If the demand isn't there to bring in the finances, then they get paid less.

Very true, but there will come a time where being a footballer does not pay very well due to the factors you mention. Hence going part time. Before the abolition of the maximum wage players got paid less than the national average, even though the maximum wage was above this.

one thing clubs do seem to have understood now is the concept of performnce related pay. I know our entire squad isnt paid particually well (by league 1 standards anyway, personally I'd be delerious!)  but if we achieve releative sucess ie the play offs then the players get rewarded.

It mysifies me as to why it took clubs so long to implement thins kind of thing along with relegation wage cuts etc.

see you've been working hard for your dissertation, sie!

In the Rugby Super League they have a merit pay system where you get paid a certain amount on your final league position. It works quite well, but of course has to be strictly enforced.

If we had the US systems in place we'd be snapping up some quality youngsters in the draft this summer whereas Chelsea would be left with the chaffe.

We'd also be getting a split of every Chelsea shirt sold, I'm sure we could flog a few in Swindon these days.

 :D  I'm a little shocked myself.

sounds like much more fun than my dissertation!

thats the good bits of the US System. sdaly the rest is bollocks though

But we've already bought into the Franchise system with the Milton Keynes Buccaneers.

Lets look at another bright side for STFC if we changed, owners in the US regularly get to hold the local authority hostage to get new stadiums built for them.

bbb

The FA have since removed the loophole that allowed the McDongs to relocate havn't they?

Sadly the local authority thing tends to work better when its a top level club (franchise!) that can draw in 50,000 for a home game

Football League have "guidelines" in place but there are still ways around it - if you are at risk of having no ground for example (so not really putting in the effort on lease negotiations, or maintaining the building etc).  It's certainly more difficult, but not impossible.

Couldn't agree more

Thankfully i didn't put any money in the bucket they brought round the other week,what a waste it would have been :wink:

good point. one of their creditors would have liked you though :wink:

I think the troubles we were in and Rotherham's current position show why the Premiership has ruined football. Players get paid too much which mean everybody wants to play there. Any decent lower league player will be bought for what is a petty amount of money as far as the big club is involved, then the lower league club is int the sh*t basically.

Whilst I'd agree that to a certain extent that the premiership has contributed to the struggles of lower league clubs, I think any pro worth his salt would have wanted to be in the top division regardless of the increased financial incentive these days.

The main problem with the premiership is that it gains the majority of football related revenue in this country. It's such big business that it's created this rich/poor divide (with a few exceptions).

The Bosman ruling has arguably contributed to inflated wages more than anything and as the pay goes up in the higher divisions the effect has proven to trickle down to the lower divisions.

It's true what you say about the petty amounts of money for players because clubs often get desperate for the cash. That said, longer contracts can help players leaving for little/noting and this technique has been employed by many.

I see a lot of it as the natural process of leagues balancing themselves out post digital collapse.

Look at this league this season it’s ridiculously open with two of the promoted clubs in Saarfend and Swansea vying for the top two places.

The poorly run clubs are slowly starting to filter back down the league without the cushion of  the ITV digital boom-era of being able to borrow and spend with little or no repercussions.  

League two clubs have been cutting their mustard for some time and with a combination of ambitious well run conference sides that have the advantage of a clean slate screaming at the door of the football league there should be no excuses for clubs not to cut their cloth accordingly.

The Championship certainly looks to have settled down but I won’t be surprised at all to see the relegated league one clubs seriously struggle next season in league two while those promoted I’d expect to possibly surprise a few people.

Well it would increase our chances of survival then :-))(

Aye it does short term but I’d see us possibly struggle quite badly if we were to get relegated.

Plus if we remain as crap as we have been this season with the possible addition of Carlisle, Northampton, Grimsby and Wycombe next season there’s every chance we’ll be squeezed out.

i feel sorry for them! poor people have to push trolleys round their local supermarket on saturdays from now on! it was nearly us a few years back too

You lot make me sick.

The death of a football club is massive thing that effects more people than just Rotherham fans .If it was some C list Tv star this would be a 5 page thread of 'RIP' and 'im shocked ,stunned and in tears ' bullshit.

I don't think anyone here wants to see them deliberately go bust Yeovil, steady on!

Yes you all do..

Especially you I can tell..


cunt :mrgreen:

Fuck it I'll sign the winding up order myself.  :twisted:

Anyone know why they haven't gone into admin?  Many of their sites seem to gleam over it as not an option as the club are running at a loss.  

But surely every business that goes into admin is being run at some sort of a loss!

Cynical Texas Pete may think they are attempting to restructure debts outside of administration and thus avoid a ten point deduction.

they need another million in close season as well so whats the point? and they will be docked 10 points and then they will be down

You can only go into admin if there is a reasonable chance that admin will sure up the company and they will come out of it better. Basically it has to be proven that administration is better than liquidation. Obviously it looks really bad at Rotherham.

tbh i can see this being us in 2 years time  :-))(

Frankly I'm more bothered about us... charity starts at home and all that.

If they go bust and that keeps us up then good fucking riddance.

Sorry.

Yeah. Good for the short term, but unless the underlying problems are sorted out in the game then we could be one of the next ones.

Cheers Si.

But if they are attempting to pay the debt anyway wouldn't a period of administration provide Rotherham with the protection and time to restructure debts without staring down the barrel of a winding up order and yet still meet the rules for admin?

Aside from the Inland Revenue I wonder who their creditors are.  Their previous chairman, a life long Rotherham fan, owns the ground and stadium so it would be interesting to see who and exactly how much they owe.

Don't know really it's up to the courts. I guess they might be thinking if they go into admin and come out of it then there's a good chance they could still go bust effectively any form of payment to creditors, because more than likely loads of the clubs assets would be sold.

Plus they've got to pay the administrator firstly and might not even have enough to do that.

The reason their chairman has given for not being able to go into admin is that having taken advice from insolvency practitioners, they would not be allowed to as they would be trading at a loss, which the administrator cannot legally permit. So liquidation is their only option.

I hope they sort it out. We know what it's like to be in a similar situation.

As soon as one league club goes bust I've got a feeling it will open the gates for more to follow suit. More of a selfish reason for hoping their survival but as soon as theres a modern precedent for league clubs dropping out of existence I could see us as as being a club that follows suit.