Starting 11 as it stands

How are we falling apart. Our owners have introduced a new model to rebuild and sustain a club whose business plan relied totally and utterly on having cup runs every two years.

Falling apart would be where we were under lawn and Rhodes with no cup income in year three.

 

I think the positives are he was their under 23 captain and he was there for a while, wasn't released as an 18 year old kid, all the way there until he is 21 when it was clear he wasn't getting a shot at first team football - Valencia, Darmian and 1 or 2 others in front of him at right back.

Van Gaal had him on the fringes, and Wilder took him on loan at Sheffield United (ended very early after a bad injury) so I will take positives in that.

He should be capable for L1 football.

 

And we were aware of that situation season on season, if we didn't get extra revenue in from other souces cup games and add ons then they would sell an asset or cut back on player buget, most of us understood that and were happy to go along eith it, so hardly falling apart.

 

We don't have to rely on cup runs now or sell an asset. While the second half of last season was an absolute disaster, I don't think it was purely down to poor recruitment. The squad started off really well, something happened, nobody knows for sure and to be honest, we did have a lot of injuries last term and the squad couldn't cope.

 

You may be right and, as I put in my reply to Fordy, he’s an unknown and none of us will know how he will do.

I will add that the likes of Valencia and Darmian keeping him out of their 1st team is fair enough. But he wasn’t even in front of the likes of Donald Love (been at Sunderland for nearly 2yrs) or Guillermo Varela who ended up back at his 1st club side in Uruguay.

 

We dont have to reley on cup runs, yet Edin made the point of lossing to Yeovil a very big deal at the time in projected income ETC, as many quoted at the time, if we had lost to Yeovil and drawn Rochdale would he have made similar comnents, I very much doubt it.

 

Donald Love was 2 years older and was sold to Sunderland with McNair for £5.5m.
Guillermo Varela is featuring at the World Cup for Uruguay.

Let's remember we are a L1 side.

 

The extra income helps, but our model doesn't rely heavily on it.

 

How much of that extra income went into servicing or repaying debt is also a factor.

 

Very much so. Although no longer 'damaging' to our finances ......... any potential 'lost revenue' will be missed. But that's business in any format.

 

Very much so. Extra income in future would help us kick on not just help us tread water, which in truth is all we were doing at best. Can't remember the post or poster but one said 'we depended on cup runs every couple of years to keep going but what happens in the third year with no cup run?'.

Like you say it's no longer unduly worrying but every little helps.

 

Disagree Dennis. They expect to invest but were not satisfied in just emptying their wallets into a money pit that's just propping up unsound foundations. They are building a platform and Rome etc etc.

 

But the fans of these other teams pay £300-£400 for their season tickets. Portsmouth, Charlton, Plymouth, Bristol Rovers will have a higher season ticket income than ours.

Our fans seem very happy to be pay the £149-£169 in order to get larger crowds and expect the owners to put in the money for the shortfall.

 

Must admit since they took over my head is full of 'he said she said' per the supporters arguments so perhaps that is just my understanding of the idea.

 

That depends on how many they have sold. If they have only sold 8000 @£300 I'd say 14000 @ our price might be about the same if not a little more.

 

While true, got to look at the breakdown as well. Not many clubs offer tickets at £5 for kids, or £19 as it is now!

Plymouth had 10,000 average attendances last season and their adult season tickets are £419. Pompey and Charlton will also definitely have brought more in.

 

Which league 1 clubs this year are really pushing the boat out in terms of signings and playing budgets? I know it has happened in the past but there seems to be a lot more caution this year, so far at least.