New beginnings - 25% Truth, 80% Bollocks

[The Artist Formerly Known as Audrey]

It was clear to see that the club is currently financially unsustainable with the club's expenses exacerbated by many high costs over the course of a year, including but not limited to player, management and staff salaries, players nutrition, away game travel and accommodation, agent fees, medical care, legal fees for numerous ongoing cases, property and pitch maintenance, technology, energy, retail, online ticketing, security and policing, administrative and medical costs. The club are actively working to reduce these costs where possible, but some are unavoidable and part and parcel of running a professional football club.

Translation, they don't want to feed the players or provide away transport/ accommodation..... starting to sound like the Sheridan season !

But take out the legal fees everything else must be pretty much like it was last season - OK a bit more for inflation - it certainly isn’t £2m more. The increase in Ticket prices this season would cover all inflationary increases I reckon, but every other cost is the same season after season

[Hyabb17]

It’s just lots of words on a page without any real evidence. So they were allowed to see the figures but not share them, pointless!

[Bob's Orange]

It's not really the main point here, but had the Trust's earlier statement said - "a statement on the finances is being prepared and will be distributed within 'add timeframe' " then I imagine they wouldn't have lost a number of members yesterday. They may still have gone but for me this seems like pretty basic 'customer care' and are shooting themselves in the foot.

Unless this statement was made off the back of all the criticism they received yesterday, but I doubt it.

[Nemo]

Will need to read this one a few more times and think about it. We asked for more and we got more within a day, that's good. My first impression is that this is wordy and vague and crucially doesn't seem to talk about specific areas where the costs have increased.

What I would say is that a significant year on year increase in costs doesn't seem impossible - inflation has been running rampant across the country, and I'd be surprised if the football club was completely insulated from that. That said, those sorts of costs would seem uncontroversial to be specific about - if they said 'last year the energy bill was 200k, this year it's 600k' then that's hardly sensitive information and it's also in line with how energy bills have been for everyone (no price cap for business energy either).

[tans]

Unless there’s an explanation of what specific costs have increased by £2m YoY the whole exercise is pointless

Indeed

[Hyabb17]

I did forget to mention something on the topic of season
Tickets, have you seen the Accrington owners tweet from yesterday with their pricing & in brackets the cost per game….no freeloading 8 game comment

[lambourn red]

One thing that hasn't been addressed is our cost of sales for 21/22 is less than our current revenue, so what has significantly changed in our outgoings since 21/22 concluded that all of a sudden means we are spending an extra £2mn a season? It's certainly not the playing budget. All commercial arrangements at the club have been completed on Clem's time bar the Puma deal. Clem ripped up the catering contract. This is all so baffling.

I would imagine the whole Jody Morris and his sidekick debacle would have cost the club a lot but not 2m

Sent from my SM-S918B

[Mooneyraker]

Unless there’s an explanation of what specific costs have increased by £2m YoY the whole exercise is pointless

Absolutely this

[Mooneyraker]

I would imagine the whole Jody Morris and his sidekick debacle would have cost the club a lot but not 2m

Sent from my SM-S918B

If the reasons were legitimate like this, why wouldn’t they just say?

The smoke and mirrors leads to one conclusion alone.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Audrey]

Reading it again, it does say that when the accounts are published at Companies House, fans will get to know the nitty gritty - or granular as the Trust put it - of how the expenses break down. That should include any and all ‘admin’ costs.

[Bob's Orange]

It was clear to see that the club is currently financially unsustainable with the club's expenses exacerbated by many high costs over the course of a year, including but not limited to player, management and staff salaries, players nutrition, away game travel and accommodation, agent fees, medical care, legal fees for numerous ongoing cases, property and pitch maintenance, technology, energy, retail, online ticketing, security and policing, administrative and medical costs. The club are actively working to reduce these costs where possible, but some are unavoidable and part and parcel of running a professional football club.




Translation, they don't want to feed the players or provide away transport/ accommodation..... starting to sound like the Sheridan season !

So basically our income - ticket sales/merchandise sales/sponsorship does not cover these costs that they have listed?

Is there anyway of roughly extrapolating what these annual costs may be broken down. PaulD loves this sort of shit for example take Tranmere or Carlisle's accounts and do a 'compare' no idea if that's even feasible but.

[Bob's Orange]

I did forget to mention something on the topic of season
Tickets, have you seen the Accrington owners tweet from yesterday with their pricing & in brackets the cost per game….no freeloading 8 game comment

Their prices are going up next season broadly, I saw the tweet.

[The Artist Formerly Known as Audrey]

The problem is that if money is leeching out of the club nefariously you just inflate various costs to cover it up.

You want to extract £100,000 you just tag it on to security costs, for example. That goes to a ‘happy helper’ and then distributed.

People may question why security costs appear high, but a shrug and a ‘that’s the cost’ and you’re home and hosed.

[Oaksey Moonraker]

I found this as another example of a lower league club fully disclosing their accounts and where playing budget is shown vs other costs.

https://www.shrewsburytown.com/news/2023/march/shrewsbury-town-accounts-july-2021---june-2022/

Again turnover around £6M but able to be competitive in League 1 on lower gates without huge losses.

[Bob's Orange]

The problem is that if money is leeching out of the club nefariously you just inflate various costs to cover it up.

You want to extract £100,000 you just tag it on to security costs, for example. That goes to a ‘happy helper’ and then distributed.

People may question why security costs appear high, but a shrug and a ‘that’s the cost’ and you’re home and hosed.

Indeed.