Attention: Please take a moment to consider our terms and conditions before posting.
Bolton, Ebbsfleet now Bury (Clubs in trouble thread)
Comments
-
If owners want to pump more money into a club then let them. Selling the stadium is a short term wheeze for an owner as it can only be done once and would mean making a loss over a 3 year rolling period more likely if, like Derby, they constantly fail to get promotion to the PL.Redrobo said:
But you have clubs like Derby “selling” the stadium to the owner to cover the cost of players and their wages. Rich owners will find other ways of getting around the rules. Cheating.letthegoodtimesroll said:The EFL could make a start on getting clubs to sort their finances out by making relegation the penalty for going into administration; and an automatic 10 point deduction for any team that makes a loss over a rolling 3 year period. Both those measures could be monitored and enforced.
Wage caps would make it even easier for clubs from the Premiership, Scottish clubs etc to pick off players with lower transfer fees as players will want to leave.
Roland was right only once. FFP was the way forward, but they bottled it. Derby should even now be told that money raised from selling the stadium doesn’t count. But for anything like that to happen now or in the future the governing body would have to be independent.0 -
League one i think is fine to keep national, but i see no reason why league 2 and the National league can't be made into a league 2 north/south league.johnny73 said:Think I'm correct in saying the EFL are essentially just the administrative arm of all the football League clubs. So when we lay blame at the door of the EFL it's actually each individual club. The majority of them choose to compete within the current skewed finances of football. Solutions exist but they all create as many if not more casualties than the current set up.
Personally I'd be moving in the direction of a league that can exist without the premier League money.
A gradual move towards a franchise structure. A fairer distribution of monies between not only divisions but also players and owners.
The total amount of money available would be much lower. Player salaries would be based on proposed income from the league as a whole.
A mass exodus of players would occur. EFL are not just competing against wage inflation from the Premier but also around the world.
I'd let that happen.
If it meant leagues 1 and 2 went part time with North and South divisions, then to me that is acceptable.
If it meant no automatic promotion to the Premier League. So be it.
Teams would not be tied into selling their players on the cheap to Premier League sides.
Of course it can't happen. So many clubs are loaded with debt they have no choice but to chase Premier money. In for a penny in for a million.
For every Bury that goes under another club turns up willing to give it a go.
I'd have 5 teams relegated from league 1, then top 2 from each of the league 2 north & south go up. For the play offs have a north final and a south final with the overall final at Wembley to decide the 5th promotion place.
For me it's silly when you have sides like Carlisle going to Plymouth and Dover trekking to places like Fylde and Hartlepool. Just regionalise those leagues and have more local derbies, bigger crowds and more money.6 -
Is it sold forever or a sponsor?letthegoodtimesroll said:
If owners want to pump more money into a club then let them. Selling the stadium is a short term wheeze for an owner as it can only be done once and would mean making a loss over a 3 year rolling period more likely if, like Derby, they constantly fail to get promotion to the PL.Redrobo said:
But you have clubs like Derby “selling” the stadium to the owner to cover the cost of players and their wages. Rich owners will find other ways of getting around the rules. Cheating.letthegoodtimesroll said:The EFL could make a start on getting clubs to sort their finances out by making relegation the penalty for going into administration; and an automatic 10 point deduction for any team that makes a loss over a rolling 3 year period. Both those measures could be monitored and enforced.
Wage caps would make it even easier for clubs from the Premiership, Scottish clubs etc to pick off players with lower transfer fees as players will want to leave.
Roland was right only once. FFP was the way forward, but they bottled it. Derby should even now be told that money raised from selling the stadium doesn’t count. But for anything like that to happen now or in the future the governing body would have to be independent.
in theory they can do it every few years like shirt sponsorship0 -
10k each for a parking space?ForeverAddickted said:
Says too that Car Parking spaces were sold off for £10k each!!Rothko said:Andy Holt lays out the issues here, a loan of £3.7m on the stadium is pretty awful
https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/1166612123503538179
Bury have debts of around £10m in total, madness!!
Were Bury nicking ideas from the NHS?0 -
I read the book about 15 years ago. From memory It claimed football was about to go pop imminently.PragueAddick said:
It's jaw dropping, not least the complete chapter devoted to Harry Redknapp. I'm not sure how much he has updated it.charltonkeston said:
I just bought that book, looks like a good read.PragueAddick said:The roots of this are the FA's appalling decision in 1991 to buckle to a few gobby, venal club owners like Dein, Bates and Sugar and let the FAPL be formed as a separate entity and let it negotiate with Sky and keep all the money. While Sky certainly fostered its relationship with those arseholes, at the end of the day all they wanted was the right to show live first division football. If the FA had stuck to their remit and negotiated those rights, and decided how to distribute those rights down through football, Sky would not have been concerned. And where would we be now? A football country like Germany IMO, where maybe we wouldn't have quite so many foreign superstars in our League, or certainly quite so many crap players in the Second Division earning £40k per week, but also without the dreadful fate awaiting Bury and Bolton.
That's where it started, folks, and anyone who wants to argue that point with me better make sure they at least read Tom Bower's "Broken Dreams" first; where in passing you will also read an interesting couple of references to Richard Murray...
To further answer @Covered End very reasonable point about the clubs that were lost pre -Sky, that's where another noted author in the early 90s had some very good answers. His name is Alex Fynn, I am not sure if he is still with us. He was an advertising executive working for Saatchi & Saatchi, and a devoted Spurs fan. He wrote several books about the business of football which made enough sense for the FA to at least give him some consultancy work, but they never implemented anything he recommended, far too radical to them.
He pointed to one unique fact about the English League. It was by far the biggest fully professional league in the world (and I think that is still true now). He argued that this structure was no longer sustainable. You could see the relationship with wider history, so many of the lost clubs such as Barrow, Workington and Bradford PA were from the industrial North, towns which had lost their self sustaining economy (which btw has not happened in western Germany, you have small towns dominated by an old- established family company which still thrives and employs the population). Fynn argued that perennial lower league clubs (such as Bury) might still have a future if the League were regionalised and adopted part-time status. He illustrated his argument in a way which caused me to fling the book down in disgust, until I realised he was right. He talked about the "event- like nature" of games which capture local imagination and attract bigger crowds. For example, he wrote, Peterborough v Cambridge Utd is an event up there (local derby) whereas Liverpool vs Charlton Athletic is not.
Don't forget he wrote this in the early 90s. While I think this point is still valid, TV has made it a bit less so. If you take Bury, his valid argument was that a regional league would give them more local derbies, with bigger attendances and less debilitating trips to Plymouth on a Tuesday night. But the revenue boost would be relatively less important because so much revenue now in the game is external, from the TV money.
It also praised Crewe and Dario Grady for its youth policy.0 -
Debbie Jevans and her cronies did everything they could so what are the Bury fans moaning about?
https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11719/11791001/efl-executive-chair-debbie-jevans-issues-message-to-bury-and-bolton-fans
The EFL are a disgrace. Money talks though. Clubs and communities can do one.1 -
To offer a bit of hope, here is a link to the 1913 football league
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1913–14_Football_League
All the teams that competed are still in business today.
They have survived ww1, the great depression, ww2, post war austerity, hooliganism, The premiership, ITV digital, the banking crisis and all seater stadiums.
No other business in any other industry wwould be so resilient and adaptable to a changing society.
Football clubs are born survivors.1 -
They'd have to make the National League part time first! To me it's crazy that the NL is basically a full time league now, which gives us FIVE national and professional divisions.johnny73 said:Think I'm correct in saying the EFL are essentially just the administrative arm of all the football League clubs. So when we lay blame at the door of the EFL it's actually each individual club. The majority of them choose to compete within the current skewed finances of football. Solutions exist but they all create as many if not more casualties than the current set up.
Personally I'd be moving in the direction of a league that can exist without the premier League money.
A gradual move towards a franchise structure. A fairer distribution of monies between not only divisions but also players and owners.
The total amount of money available would be much lower. Player salaries would be based on proposed income from the league as a whole.
A mass exodus of players would occur. EFL are not just competing against wage inflation from the Premier but also around the world.
I'd let that happen.
If it meant leagues 1 and 2 went part time with North and South divisions, then to me that is acceptable.
If it meant no automatic promotion to the Premier League. So be it.
Teams would not be tied into selling their players on the cheap to Premier League sides.
Of course it can't happen. So many clubs are loaded with debt they have no choice but to chase Premier money. In for a penny in for a million.
For every Bury that goes under another club turns up willing to give it a go.
1 -
On a purely selfish note, I'm so glad we're not in L1 as this season will be horribly tarnished.
One club kicked out, one club teetering on the brink and being cannon fodder every week, and at least 1 club having a blank weekend every week including the final day - looking at the fixture list, Fleetwood will finish a week earlier than everyone else, which will surely affect things if they are fighting for say a playoff place and their rivals know what they need to do to overtake them.
2 - Sponsored links:
-
Can anyone tell me why Bolton have been allowed to play games but Bury weren't.
Obviously the EFL were right with Bury, but how exactly does Bolton differ? They also have no money, haven't paid players etc0 -
I will try and retrieve a detailed article, one of which I read and informs this answer, the main points were that they firstly resurrected a moribund club, and secondly - and this seems outrageous to me - they do actually have a 50 +1 structure, but there are only about 40 members, all of whom doubtless have some kind of professional role in Red Bull. It is also of course called RB which allegedly stands for Rasenball. Laughable really.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
How did Red bull get round the issue with Leipzig as the 50+1 thing doesn't seem to have affected them?Rothko said:There's a lot to like about the German model, but clubs have still had financial problems, and the Bundersliga is dominated by 1 club, because the ownership model is now a block to anyone being able to compete with Bayern Munich
German fans dont take this lying down; they give RBL the sort of shit that MKD get when they play AFCW. Union Berlin are particularly good at this. But to no avail. One political problem is that RBL are easily the most successful post-reunion club from East Germany, and can easily portray themselves as bringing the dream back for East German fans.
There is one other 50+1 anomaly club, TSG Hoffenheim, basically a village team bought up by a software magnet. Then you have Bayer Leverkusen and VFL Wolfsburg, supported by Bayer and VW respectively, but they can be seen as the living survivors of the "works" clubs which also flourished in the early days of the English League.3 -
The Fleetwood chairman is talking sense re organisation planning and there are many fan groups,,the PFA,etc etc who could and should be involved.
Start now or a slow death for many clubs and some are looking into the barrel now1 -
I would not give relegated sides leeway, they come down and they are subject to the same maximum spend on wages as every one else. To cope iwth this then players would have to accept relegation clauses in their contracts, which is not unreasonable as they are part responsible for relegation. Two clubs would have to off load players who cost more than can fit into the cap. The whole idea is that there is an upper limit on wages for the who division, so teams will be able to afford to go to the upper limit others not. But it would reduce the disparity between clubs and help bring all clubs budgets into more manageable limits.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
How would that realistically work though?msomerton said:The EFL should look at the salary cap system used by the ECB for county clubs. For example I am a Surrey county cricket supporter and though it is the wealthiest club in county cricket the cap limits us to spending no more than £2.5 million on players and coaching staff, much the same for every club.
For example you can't expect sides relegated from the premier league to have the same salary outgoings as us and Luton just promoted from league one.
And if you gave relegated sides some leeway for a couple of seasons, they'd just spend big in an attempt to get straight back up (admittedly some sides do this anyway), which would lead to huge problems if they didn't.0 -
If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.4
-
Redrobo said:
But you have clubs like Derby “selling” the stadium to the owner to cover the cost of players and their wages. Rich owners will find other ways of getting around the rules. Cheating.letthegoodtimesroll said:The EFL could make a start on getting clubs to sort their finances out by making relegation the penalty for going into administration; and an automatic 10 point deduction for any team that makes a loss over a rolling 3 year period. Both those measures could be monitored and enforced.
Wage caps would make it even easier for clubs from the Premiership, Scottish clubs etc to pick off players with lower transfer fees as players will want to leave.
Roland was right only once. FFP was the way forward, but they bottled it. Derby should even now be told that money raised from selling the stadium doesn’t count. But for anything like that to happen now or in the future the governing body would have to be independent.Any salary cap would have to be UEFA wide. It could work but would take time...it'll never happen. Greed rules.There's a lot wrong with the NFL but they have it spot on with ownership rules and salary caps.3 -
Exactly, and how ironic that even the home of Uber-capitalism gets it, specifically that without a healthy competition to be part of, a club on its own is a business without a purpose.The Red Robin said:Redrobo said:
But you have clubs like Derby “selling” the stadium to the owner to cover the cost of players and their wages. Rich owners will find other ways of getting around the rules. Cheating.letthegoodtimesroll said:The EFL could make a start on getting clubs to sort their finances out by making relegation the penalty for going into administration; and an automatic 10 point deduction for any team that makes a loss over a rolling 3 year period. Both those measures could be monitored and enforced.
Wage caps would make it even easier for clubs from the Premiership, Scottish clubs etc to pick off players with lower transfer fees as players will want to leave.
Roland was right only once. FFP was the way forward, but they bottled it. Derby should even now be told that money raised from selling the stadium doesn’t count. But for anything like that to happen now or in the future the governing body would have to be independent.Any salary cap would have to be UEFA wide. It could work but would take time...it'll never happen. Greed rules.There's a lot wrong with the NFL but they have it spot on with ownership rules and salary caps.3 -
I haven’t read on to the end of this thread, so apologies if it’s already been said, but over the past 18 months isn’t this how Charlton have done it. By our owner wanting out and getting hugely lucky with the people who run the club, have we stumbled on an effective way to run a football league club?ForeverAddickted said:Clubs certainly need to re-think their strategies now to potentially adapt to whats gone on and not just rely on the EFL to safe guard!!
Almost needs to be an agreement amongst all EFL club that they follow a particular model e.g. a few crazy thoughts:
- More emphasis on clubs producing their own talent through their Youth Teams, stop spending crazy amounts (both transfer fees and wages) on over-rated players who seem happy to drift around each year
- Salary Caps... Not based on a teams budget like what we've seen with FFP to an extent. But a cap across the whole Division, means that there is a level playing field regardless if Team A have an owner who is far significantly wealthier than Team B
- Loans signed from Premier Leagues on the sole condition that no fees get paid; Premier League teams want their kids to get experience, well they pay for it, they can bloody well afford it... A little less income by charging clubs X amount for a loan deal might make them a little more reluctant to hoover up talent, especially if the kids are rotting in the reserves
- Should transfers be made then the club should have to prove to the EFL / Regulator that they can afford the players wages over the term of the contract and arent putting themselves at financial risk (Okay I've stolen that one from Colin Murray who mentioned it on Quest last week)
I'm not stupid and I know its laughable that I'm even making these suggestions as the Football League / Premier League would never agree to them... the difficulty would certainly be trying to ensure that all 72-clubs in the former adhered to them and didnt try to circumvent the rules to their advantage like what we already see with FFP...
Something has to be done though, the current system isnt working and its a matter of time before it happens on a regular basis (I've said for years that Football cant sustain itself because it'll get to the point where we'll run out of Billionaires who can either afford to buy these clubs or even want to!!) - Think the best option regardless is for all clubs to just band together, acting individually and I think a lot of sides are doomed!!0 -
If Charlton disappeared Id hope that a Phoenix club was born - If so then I'd support the new version of the teamDazzler21 said:If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.
Dont think I'd bother attending games if not4 -
I don't think it would be entirely fair to have a blanket salary cap, surely a club like Sunderland getting 30000 spectators should be allowed to spend more than a Wimbledon getting 5000? Indeed you would have a situation where a L1 club likes Sunderland is bringing in more gate revenue than many Championship clubs yet is allowed to spend less.msomerton said:
I would not give relegated sides leeway, they come down and they are subject to the same maximum spend on wages as every one else. To cope iwth this then players would have to accept relegation clauses in their contracts, which is not unreasonable as they are part responsible for relegation. Two clubs would have to off load players who cost more than can fit into the cap. The whole idea is that there is an upper limit on wages for the who division, so teams will be able to afford to go to the upper limit others not. But it would reduce the disparity between clubs and help bring all clubs budgets into more manageable limits.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
How would that realistically work though?msomerton said:The EFL should look at the salary cap system used by the ECB for county clubs. For example I am a Surrey county cricket supporter and though it is the wealthiest club in county cricket the cap limits us to spending no more than £2.5 million on players and coaching staff, much the same for every club.
For example you can't expect sides relegated from the premier league to have the same salary outgoings as us and Luton just promoted from league one.
And if you gave relegated sides some leeway for a couple of seasons, they'd just spend big in an attempt to get straight back up (admittedly some sides do this anyway), which would lead to huge problems if they didn't.
One of the problems with most attempts at financial control like FFP is that the hard facts don't come out until such a long time after the event. If we'd been taken over in May and our new owner (ha ha) had decided in the summer to splash the cash and get us promoted, the financial accounts for 2019/20 showing the massive losses wouldn't be published until the end of 2020, i.e. in the next season by which time we could either be in the PL or broke.2 - Sponsored links:
-
A fair shout, but if not I'd definitely still follow Horsham FC or someone of the same level.ForeverAddickted said:
If Charlton disappeared Id hope that a Phoenix club was born - If so then I'd support the new version of the teamDazzler21 said:If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.
Dont think I'd bother attending games if not0 -
That would be one of the posistives from a cap, it would make the leagues more competative, for example in county cricket Surrey for example will account for about 20% of all revenue raised in the T20 competition but they can not just buy successes because the vast financial difference between us and say Northamptonshire CC. I would see the caps being adjusted to which division a club finds its self in, another consequence would be that the amount of parachute payment to relegated clubs from the Prem could be reduced and maybe some of that money directed into the Premierships solidaratory payment to the EFL so increasing the amount all EFL clubs recieve.killerandflash said:
I don't think it would be entirely fair to have a blanket salary cap, surely a club like Sunderland getting 30000 spectators should be allowed to spend more than a Wimbledon getting 5000? Indeed you would have a situation where a L1 club likes Sunderland is bringing in more gate revenue than many Championship clubs yet is allowed to spend less.msomerton said:
I would not give relegated sides leeway, they come down and they are subject to the same maximum spend on wages as every one else. To cope iwth this then players would have to accept relegation clauses in their contracts, which is not unreasonable as they are part responsible for relegation. Two clubs would have to off load players who cost more than can fit into the cap. The whole idea is that there is an upper limit on wages for the who division, so teams will be able to afford to go to the upper limit others not. But it would reduce the disparity between clubs and help bring all clubs budgets into more manageable limits.Chris_from_Sidcup said:
How would that realistically work though?msomerton said:The EFL should look at the salary cap system used by the ECB for county clubs. For example I am a Surrey county cricket supporter and though it is the wealthiest club in county cricket the cap limits us to spending no more than £2.5 million on players and coaching staff, much the same for every club.
For example you can't expect sides relegated from the premier league to have the same salary outgoings as us and Luton just promoted from league one.
And if you gave relegated sides some leeway for a couple of seasons, they'd just spend big in an attempt to get straight back up (admittedly some sides do this anyway), which would lead to huge problems if they didn't.
One of the problems with most attempts at financial control like FFP is that the hard facts don't come out until such a long time after the event. If we'd been taken over in May and our new owner (ha ha) had decided in the summer to splash the cash and get us promoted, the financial accounts for 2019/20 showing the massive losses wouldn't be published until the end of 2020, i.e. in the next season by which time we could either be in the PL or broke.0 -
Does this mean that Bury have disappeared as a club completely? Or will they be able to work their way up the leagues again? I don't really understand the ins and outs of it.0
-
Expelled so to me that means no way back and would need to re-form as a new entity... someone else would need to confirm though.tom- k said:Does this mean that Bury have disappeared as a club completely? Or will they be able to work their way up the leagues again? I don't really understand the ins and outs of it.1 -
Dont think they've disappeared completely as havent gone into liquidationtom- k said:Does this mean that Bury have disappeared as a club completely? Or will they be able to work their way up the leagues again? I don't really understand the ins and outs of it.
At the moment they've just been expelled from the Football League
If they can get their finances in order they'll be allowed to apply for re-entry into the Football System as Bury FC from next season (reckon this'll be either the Northern Premier League or or the Northern Premier Division One which is either one level or two levels below Welling)
Should they be liquidated then I imagine a Phoenix club will have to be setup, yet will start much further down
To put it into context; AFC Wimbledon started four levels below Welling... So the equivalent for AFC Bury (or whatever they call themselves) would be the North West Counties Football League which'll see them playing against the likes of Northwich Victoria3 -
ForeverAddickted said:
If Charlton disappeared Id hope that a Phoenix club was born - If so then I'd support the new version of the teamDazzler21 said:If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.
Dont think I'd bother attending games if notForeverAddickted said:
If Charlton disappeared Id hope that a Phoenix club was born - If so then I'd support the new version of the teamDazzler21 said:If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.
Dont think I'd bother attending games if notItIt wouldn't be the club I previously supported and more likely not be located at the Valley. I would end my lifetime of football right there and then.
Then cancel more Sky subscription.
1 -
Oh no, did you have to bring them up. I still have nightmares of that Sunday a few years ago! :-)ForeverAddickted said:
Dont think they've disappeared completely as havent gone into liquidationtom- k said:Does this mean that Bury have disappeared as a club completely? Or will they be able to work their way up the leagues again? I don't really understand the ins and outs of it.
At the moment they've just been expelled from the Football League
If they can get their finances in order they'll be allowed to apply for re-entry into the Football System as Bury FC from next season (reckon this'll be either the Northern Premier League or or the Northern Premier Division One which is either one level or two levels below Welling)
Should they be liquidated then I imagine a Phoenix club will have to be setup, yet will start much further down
To put it into context; AFC Wimbledon started four levels below Welling... So the equivalent for AFC Bury (or whatever they call themselves) would be the North West Counties Football League which'll see them playing against the likes of Northwich Victoria5 -
Same for me although i live abroad so don't attend many games anyway.ForeverAddickted said:
If Charlton disappeared Id hope that a Phoenix club was born - If so then I'd support the new version of the teamDazzler21 said:If Charlton went, I wouldn't be able to be a fan of another club. I might follow a closer to grass roots club, but I'd be done with league clubs.
Dont think I'd bother attending games if not
If i moved back and no Phoenix side was formed, i think i'd just support Welling.1 -
Thanks for explaining @Dazzler21 @ForeverAddickted2
-
It is possible to sort out football finances if the will to do so is there.
The will to do so is not there and the EFL clubs (certainly the Championship clubs), voted out the previous FFP rules, because the Premier League threatened to pay less to them.
If they had gone through as RD expected when he bought CAFC, Championship clubs would have been working towards, having to break even.
Apart from all the changes required such as possible salary caps, the EFL also need to somehow prevent rogue owners.
Broadly speaking they need to prevent an owner taking unreasonable remuneration.
Is there anything that can be done to prevent an owner paying himself (taking) whatever he wants ?
It can be dressed up a salary, fees for advice or anything.1
