January 2025 Transfer Window

I didn't make the game on tuesday because of a naff day at work, but Raynor at one point did list Benn as one of the names that cant make the bench these days. I read the Lincoln forum like a month or 6 weeks ago ish and Benn was talked about on there as a certain to get released in the summer, they were hoping we would offer him a deal this window.

I think the recall clause date has been and gone now. Usually the recall clauses have a certain date to the triggered by so the loaning club have time to asses and send out somewhere else and the loaner club have time to find a replacement. I think its around the middle of the month if its added to the deal.

 

They might not want him back if we are paying his wages .Just seen a headline , they lost nearly £4m last season, not cheap in L1 just to stand still?

 

That's a scary figure. If/ when we get there, I'd hope we have more advertising pulling power than Lincoln. Can't see Rupp footing that kind of a bill...

 

I re read, they lost approaching £3m ( depends which article one reads) with the £4m figure I quoted coming from directors input to cover this and future losses ( I suppose? ) . Yes scary , but let’s worry about that if/ when it happens?

 

You look at Sheffield United a few years ago, they bought James Hanson to do a job purely to get them out of the league they were in (league one). He only played 14 games for them.

I think you worry about league one when you get to league one.

 

Kieran Maguire the football financial expert was saying the other week on a YouTube video for Overlap that at the minute the average losses in the Championship this minute is £400k a week, in L1 the average losses are about £6m a year. The gulf between L1 and the Champ is huge and everyone is spending to try be ready for it. Same with Champ to Prem these days.

 

It's fairly impossible to run a club above the sort of aspirational L1 level club with a profit these days, unless you have frequent assets to sell, for a good amount of money. I think he said Stoke since they were relegated in 2018 have lost on average £676k per week, and they'll have had parachute payments (which don't really touch the sides these days with the revenue drops from PL to CH).

 

I imagine if we do go up the remit will revert to 'stay in the league and don't go bust'.

 

i am sue if l there was anybody out there willing to part with sufficient funds they would be able to negotiate a sale with the present owner.

 

When you say take the club forward you mean spend lots of money. Football is f****d, if you have to operate at a loss

 

That’s what Sky has caused ….like it or not. The high wage demands start at the top and filter down to the rest of the EFL, you don’t compete on the wage front, you don’t compete on the grass . There are very minor exceptions however they usually are one or two season wonders. Unless you have huge financial backing clubs end up yo yo ing or stagnant ?

 

TV money is one of the main culprits. The problem for these clubs is that the TV rights money has kinda stagnated over the past few seasons, or certainly isn't growing at the rate it did for a good 5-10 year spell which made English Football the financial juggernaut it has been. Clubs were spending over the last 3 or 4 years thinking the money will rise and it hasn't really to the extent that a lot have spent up to. I think Maguire said that this season there were 10 PL clubs at risk of PSR failure, one is very very close and the rest should be OK. But teams in the prem now aren't spending and still make a loss. Leicester look doomed and are trying to stay up with their championship squad. If it doesn't work for Ipswich and the money they have spent, they will be financially worried too and might well be seeing L1 again before the Prem. The gamble these days to get up isn't one even multi millionaires can pay for anymore.

 

I think we are a much better fit for L1 than we are L2. L2 penalises us with the TV agreement we signed but I am pretty sure Sparks said in L1 it would benefit us so he voted in favour with a longer term view.

We can potentially sell 2700 match day tickets in away end but we have tinpot shite bringing a few hundred most home games. There would be some big away followings in L1 - Town, Barnsley, Bolton etc.

Season tickets should see a nice increase. What we are we currently at? 14,000? You would think 17,000 achieveable in L1. Maybe more.

 

Hopefully he sells to someone who will.

 

TV rights won't change much 'til 2027 as the big 5 leagues are all in the middle of the 5 year cycle. What the Top 20 are doing is managing to squeeze more from commercial deals and match day revenue.
https://www.deloitte.com/uk/en/services/financial-advisory/analysis/deloitte-football-money-league.html

 

But didn't Lawn sell to Rupp because he couldn't take us forward himself but thought Rupp could..... And we're in a lower division now than we were then even.