The "do they mean us?" thread pt 4

[coolhandfox]

@Ric Flair the real damage was done in the 21/22 accounts when the club lost 93m.

 

I think that summer after finishing 5th twice the club convinced themselves or were convinced by Rogers that they could finally crack the top 4, if we could keep the squad together and add some extra depth.

 

Keep in mind we had lost out by 1 point the season before and 4 point in 19/20, which was generally down to running out of legs and bodies.

 

With Champion League football we would have been fine, but by then Rodgers ability to get the most out of the squad had diminished and we finished 8th.

 

It was a calculated gamble, which back fired massively and we have been firefighting ever since.

 

We are the first and will not be the last club to over extend ourselves.

 

 

[Ric Flair]

3 minutes ago, coolhandfox said:

@Ric Flair the real damage was done in the 21/22 accounts when the club lost 93m.

 

I think that summer after finishing 5th twice the club convinced themselves or were convinced by Rogers that they could finally crack the top 4, if we could keep the squad together and add some extra depth.

 

Keep in mind we had lost out by 1 point the season before and 4 point in 19/20, which was generally down to running out of legs and bodies.

 

With Champion League football we would have been fine, but by then Rodgers ability to get the most out of the squad had diminished and we finished 8th.

 

It was a calculated gamble, which back fired massively and we have been firefighting ever since.

 

We are the first and will not be the last club to over extend ourselves.

 

 

It was beyond reckless IMO because it wasn't even the drop in revenue from failing to qualify for Europe (or the different European tournaments) but the massive increases in wages that were happening at the same time. It became essential we qualify for Europe and that is pretty unrealistic to project with little flexibility if we didn't.

[Ric Flair]

1 hour ago, coolhandfox said:

They didn't allow bigger loses, it was averaged out, to flatten the impact of COVID.

 

So the loses of 19/20, 20/21 were add together then divide by to 2. 

 

So you had a four year period, still split up into 3 periods against the 105m limit.

Yes sorry, not bigger and was largely done in part to offset the delay in TV income from when football was suspended, but it was reported at the time that the impact of covid was likely to lead to more licence of items being deducted from PSR and give clubs more leeway for the huge losses as a result of the pandemic.

 

 

[Ric Flair]

38 minutes ago, Lillehamring said:

The behaviour of the club financially since summer 2022 is that of an organisation that understands it is on the borderline (as most clubs probably are these days) and that took a drastic step (zero spending pre-fofana) to ensure that the situation wasn't, at the very least worsened;  we have seen them spend last summer but then effectively freeze spending in january.  These are the patterns of an organization that knows when it can and cannot spend, that hasn't just carried on spending like forest and everton did.

 

Only the club know what our financial position truly is.  If we have gone over the limit by spending in 2023, why did we freeze spending in 22 when the temptation and reward for doing so was much greater - if they were so dismissive of the impact of going over why didn't they just keep on spending?

 

So, yes, i believe they know what they are doing.

I'm not so sure our club does knows

when it can and cannot spend because we are being reported by many reputable outlets that we are expected to have breached 2022/23 and on course to do so for 2023/24. 

 

As I've said, we sold £110m worth of players (less of Fofana's book value and sell on to St Etienne and Maddison to Norwich - probably more like £80-85m profit in the accounts) in the 2022/23 accounting period if Maddison counts towards it and booked only an additional £11m in transfers in in the year. If we have still breached PSR for that year then we were always going to and the forecasts must have rejected this right back to the beginning of that year and well before Top's statement. 

 

The not signing anyone in January 2024 is quite possibly because it would incredibly remiss of us to know we had breached 2022/23 (if we have and simply waiting for the maximum deadline on which we publish the accounts) and have been in a battle with the EFL about their desire to see what our plan is for 2023/24 which they think we'll breach and we've not said we won't breach it but that we don't have to tell them yet.

[Mr Weller 2]

Of course it was a calculated gamble-it’ was the only way to grow the club. It didn’t depend on getting into the CL ,much as that would have helped, though it did depend on staying in the PL. Relegation was unexpected, given the squad we had, and definitely not part of the business plan.

 

However, the club have a long term growth plan to increase their revenue stream via the expansion, hotel, performance arena etc. and this will eventually reduce the chances of it happening again. 
 

No plan survives contact with the real world intact and we’ve certainly hit a bump in the road but the overall strategy seems sound enough.

Edited 12 March by Mr Weller 2

[CosbehFox]

It’s a calculated gamble until it hits January you need a centre back and you end up with ****ing Ryan Bennett 

[coolhandfox]

9 hours ago, Ric Flair said:

It was beyond reckless IMO because it wasn't even the drop in revenue from failing to qualify for Europe (or the different European tournaments) but the massive increases in wages that were happening at the same time. It became essential we qualify for Europe and that is pretty unrealistic to project with little flexibility if we didn't.

I agree! 

 

I think it was an over reaction to playing it far to safe in the two winter windows which cost us CL football.

 

Sometimes when you under play a hand you over play the next.

 

 

Edited 13 March by coolhandfox

[Ric Flair]

8 hours ago, Mr Weller 2 said:

Of course it was a calculated gamble-it’ was the only way to grow the club. It didn’t depend on getting into the CL ,much as that would have helped, though it did depend on staying in the PL. Relegation was unexpected, given the squad we had, and definitely not part of the business plan.

 

However, the club have a long term growth plan to increase their revenue stream via the expansion, hotel, performance arena etc. and this will eventually reduce the chances of it happening again. 
 

No plan survives contact with the real world intact and we’ve certainly hit a bump in the road but the overall strategy seems sound enough.

I'll repeat though, we're being told that we have likely breached 2022/23 and the 3 year period and the only impact from relegation for that period would have been the differential in prize money for finishing 18th as opposed to whatever the club modelled in to their strategy at £2m a place. This despite us selling Fofana and Maddison (he was sold before 30th June) for huge profits. 

 

So whilst I agree the business plan for sustained long term growth was dependent on expansion of the ground, commercial revenues and hotels etc it's quite clear that we'd gotten ourselves in to a huge short term financial problem with very little financial flexibility and I'm not convinced that would have been quickly resolved for the long term strategy to take effect.

[coolhandfox]

37 minutes ago, Ric Flair said:

I'll repeat though, we're being told that we have likely breached 2022/23 and the 3 year period and the only impact from relegation for that period would have been the differential in prize money for finishing 18th as opposed to whatever the club modelled in to their strategy at £2m a place. This despite us selling Fofana and Maddison (he was sold before 30th June) for huge profits. 

 

So whilst I agree the business plan for sustained long term growth was dependent on expansion of the ground, commercial revenues and hotels etc it's quite clear that we'd gotten ourselves in to a huge short term financial problem with very little financial flexibility and I'm not convinced that would have been quickly resolved for the long term strategy to take effect.

Everyone have to accept we reached to far to quickly especially on wages.

 

Break the glass ceiling into regularly competing for Europe football is very difficult. 

 

Brighton are held up as a model club but have managed 1 season European football and look like struggle to achieve it again. 

 

Newcastle similarly are struggle to do back to back qualification, West Ham also.

 

Rodgers time ended badly but I think we underplay how successful we were over those two seasons. 

Edited 13 March by coolhandfox

[ClaphamFox]

40 minutes ago, coolhandfox said:

Everyone have to accept we reached to far to quickly especially on wages.

 

Break the glass ceiling into regularly competing for Europe football is very difficult. 

 

Brighton are held up as a model club but have managed 1 season European football and look like struggle to achieve it again. 

 

Newcastle similarly are struggle to do back to back qualification, West Ham also.

 

Rodgers time ended badly but I think we underplay how successful we were over those two seasons. 

🍿

[honeybradger]

How did teams like Aston Villa, Fulham, Brighton, Leeds etc get away with spending 100s of millions soon after promotion. Aston Villa in particular have spent more than us and have higher wages.

[Oldblueyes]

Villa's ground holds 42,500,  that may help them. Leeds holds 38,000. Can't  answer for the rest though.

[Ric Flair]

11 minutes ago, honeybradger said:

How did teams like Aston Villa, Fulham, Brighton, Leeds etc get away with spending 100s of millions soon after promotion. Aston Villa in particular have spent more than us and have higher wages.

There'll be no magic formula, it'll be purely dependent on the starting point of their wages to what it grew to over a few years, the revenue generation and then the differential between booking sales in the year they are sold and the amortisation of incomings over the length of their contract.

 

Villa for example, they spent at least £250m in the first 2 seasons but that would be maximum £50m on the book across two years. In the third years they sold Grealish for £100m which is pure profit and probably bailed them out for perhaps going close to the maximum allowable losses of £105m.

 

It'll have caught up with them now, they need 1 or 2 huge sales and/or CL football.

[Ric Flair]

1 hour ago, coolhandfox said:

Everyone have to accept we reached to far to quickly especially on wages.

 

Break the glass ceiling into regularly competing for Europe football is very difficult. 

 

Brighton are held up as a model club but have managed 1 season European football and look like struggle to achieve it again. 

 

Newcastle similarly are struggle to do back to back qualification, West Ham also.

 

Rodgers time ended badly but I think we underplay how successful we were over those two seasons. 

100% we are the victims of our own success but unfortunately we are also the masters of our own downfall.

 

The irony is we achieved what we achieved by getting it right both financially and largely in recruitment and then we tried to build on that by making decisions that were perhaps a change to what we'd done previously and ultimately we didn't have the flexibility for it to go wrong.

 

I think that's the most frustrating thing. We were so close to CL football twice which may have given us the financial boost that could have kept us on track but we also were becoming blinkered in our grip on our progression. The effectiveness of Rodgers was massively sliding on a squad that were becoming disillusioned and wanted new challenges, whilst their value diminished and we seemingly had no answer to how we could refresh the squad to get them or other fringe players out and new assets in.

 

Also to think the sheer amount of transfer fees we did generate on the likes of Mahrez, Maguire, Chilwell, Fofana etc on top of the European football campaigns and major honours and we still seem to have breached PSR. 

 

 

[coolhandfox]

40 minutes ago, Ric Flair said:

100% we are the victims of our own success but unfortunately we are also the masters of our own downfall.

 

The irony is we achieved what we achieved by getting it right both financially and largely in recruitment and then we tried to build on that by making decisions that were perhaps a change to what we'd done previously and ultimately we didn't have the flexibility for it to go wrong.

Flexibility is important, you need to be able to adjust, we just went of the tipping point on amortisation and wages, which took that away from us.

40 minutes ago, Ric Flair said:

I think that's the most frustrating thing. We were so close to CL football twice which may have given us the financial boost that could have kept us on track but we also were becoming blinkered in our grip on our progression.

When things are going fo well you can become a little lazy and stop doing the hard yards.

40 minutes ago, Ric Flair said:

The effectiveness of Rodgers was massively sliding on a squad that were becoming disillusioned and wanted new challenges, whilst their value diminished and we seemingly had no answer to how we could refresh the squad to get them or other fringe players out and new assets in.

100%, Rodgers should have gone after finishing 8th and going 18 months without being able to sort our defensive and set pieces issues.

 

The likes of Tielemans, Soyuncu, Maddison and Ndidi should have been sold at the right time and the noney reinvested.

 

At some point that would have been 180m + worth of talent and we only recouped 38m. (The 4 cost us 97m to buy)

 

[st albans fox]

40 minutes ago, Ric Flair said:

100% we are the victims of our own success but unfortunately we are also the masters of our own downfall.

 

The irony is we achieved what we achieved by getting it right both financially and largely in recruitment and then we tried to build on that by making decisions that were perhaps a change to what we'd done previously and ultimately we didn't have the flexibility for it to go wrong.

 

I think that's the most frustrating thing. We were so close to CL football twice which may have given us the financial boost that could have kept us on track but we also were becoming blinkered in our grip on our progression. The effectiveness of Rodgers was massively sliding on a squad that were becoming disillusioned and wanted new challenges, whilst their value diminished and we seemingly had no answer to how we could refresh the squad to get them or other fringe players out and new assets in.

 

Also to think the sheer amount of transfer fees we did generate on the likes of Mahrez, Maguire, Chilwell, Fofana etc on top of the European football campaigns and major honours and we still seem to have breached PSR. 

 

 

We lacked the confidence and foresight to trade 

we made the error in thinking that our players were irreplaceable 

 

we should have sold players like wilf, youri, cags and madders whilst they were at the top of their game and with years left on their contracts. We should have been able to find replacements that would take lower salaries and obviously cost way less than we sold for. 

we failed to make the judgment that despite everything that was going on with European football and an fa cup win that we were still little old Leicester and our commercial/match day income were insufficient to have the budget we were running with.  in the cold light of day, selling two of cags, youri or wilf for £30m+ were surely achievable at some point and would probably have prevented this nonsense. 
 

that’s down to strategic planning by our board 

would vichai have seen this or would he have also been carried along on the ride 

[Babylon]

22 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

We lacked the confidence and foresight to trade 

we made the error in thinking that our players were irreplaceable 

 

we should have sold players like wilf, youri, cags and madders whilst they were at the top of their game and with years left on their contracts. We should have been able to find replacements that would take lower salaries and obviously cost way less than we sold for. 

we failed to make the judgment that despite everything that was going on with European football and an fa cup win that we were still little old Leicester and our commercial/match day income were insufficient to have the budget we were running with.  in the cold light of day, selling two of cags, youri or wilf for £30m+ were surely achievable at some point and would probably have prevented this nonsense. 
 

that’s down to strategic planning by our board 

would vichai have seen this or would he have also been carried along on the ride 

You can only trade if people are interested, let's not forget that when we probably would have wanted to sell, the drop in spending across Europe was a billion or two lower than normal due to covid. Then you had huge ups and down in form and injuries. 

 

Ideally I think we'd have loved a decent offer at the right time, doesn't always work like that though. 

[Babylon]

12 hours ago, Ric Flair said:

I'm not so sure our club does knows

when it can and cannot spend because we are being reported by many reputable outlets that we are expected to have breached 2022/23 and on course to do so for 2023/24. 

 

As I've said, we sold £110m worth of players (less of Fofana's book value and sell on to St Etienne and Maddison to Norwich - probably more like £80-85m profit in the accounts) in the 2022/23 accounting period if Maddison counts towards it and booked only an additional £11m in transfers in in the year. If we have still breached PSR for that year then we were always going to and the forecasts must have rejected this right back to the beginning of that year and well before Top's statement. 

 

The not signing anyone in January 2024 is quite possibly because it would incredibly remiss of us to know we had breached 2022/23 (if we have and simply waiting for the maximum deadline on which we publish the accounts) and have been in a battle with the EFL about their desire to see what our plan is for 2023/24 which they think we'll breach and we've not said we won't breach it but that we don't have to tell them yet.

We were probably forced to spend when we really didn't want to in the January, because of us struggling. I think they would have preferred to just bank the cash. 

 

They've said a lot of times that player trading was their MO. Injuries that has really dented some of our assets like Ndidi, Ricardo and Justin... oh and even Maddisons ongoing hip problems. Barnes has a bad injury it took some time to get over. Chuck in Tielemans and Soyuncu running down contracts. And a raft of saleable assets was no longer there. 

 

I have sympathy there, but you reap what you sow. And we've got rid of Rennie to reorganise the backroom medical team to, I presume, please, Rodger's, and it was a shambles. 

Edited 13 March by Babylon

[LVFox]

From a purely business budgeting point of view, not having awareness of the levers you have to pull to comply with FFP and the impact of not being able to pull all/some of those levers is horrificly naive and pretty close to a dereliction of duty for those with key financial decision responsibilities. 

 

It wouldn't be accepted at my place of work, and the fact it seems to have been at a PL side (at the time) is abysmal.

[HankMarvin]

1 hour ago, Ric Flair said:

100% we are the victims of our own success but unfortunately we are also the masters of our own downfall.

 

The irony is we achieved what we achieved by getting it right both financially and largely in recruitment and then we tried to build on that by making decisions that were perhaps a change to what we'd done previously and ultimately we didn't have the flexibility for it to go wrong.

 

I think that's the most frustrating thing. We were so close to CL football twice which may have given us the financial boost that could have kept us on track but we also were becoming blinkered in our grip on our progression. The effectiveness of Rodgers was massively sliding on a squad that were becoming disillusioned and wanted new challenges, whilst their value diminished and we seemingly had no answer to how we could refresh the squad to get them or other fringe players out and new assets in.

 

Also to think the sheer amount of transfer fees we did generate on the likes of Mahrez, Maguire, Chilwell, Fofana etc on top of the European football campaigns and major honours and we still seem to have breached PSR. 

 

 

I posted on another thread, they clearly thought that the well wouldn’t dry up with regards to selling top talent every season.

ultimately a club the size of ours majorly fcked up by losing out on a fee for Youri and Soyuncu, with the latter being frozen out by the midget clearly not helping balance the books.

 

“After Leicester sold Wesley Fofana, chief executive Susan Whelan. reassured “As we look to continue to compete with more established opponents, profits from player trading and continued successful recruitment will continue to feature prominently in our strategy,”

[st albans fox]

38 minutes ago, Babylon said:

You can only trade if people are interested, let's not forget that when we probably would have wanted to sell, the drop in spending across Europe was a billion or two lower than normal due to covid. Then you had huge ups and down in form and injuries. 

 

Ideally I think we'd have loved a decent offer at the right time, doesn't always work like that though. 

I reckon we could have sold wilf or cags in the covid transfer window of 2020 (although we sold Ben so not desperate)  or definitely post FA cup 2021.  The issue was the coach didn’t want to sell anyone and the club decided to go along with that. Wilf was on the decline by summer 2021 but whatever we got for him would have been all profit. I am certain that if we’d put feelers out then we’d have got takers for both players.  

[pmcla26]

Did we reject any bids in summer 2021? I don't remember anyone making offers for Cags, Ndidi or Tielemans. 

[Grebfromgrebland]

If only we didn't buy so many players not good enough for our first team and with no real resale value.

[HankMarvin]

4 hours ago, LVFox said:

From a purely business budgeting point of view, not having awareness of the levers you have to pull to comply with FFP and the impact of not being able to pull all/some of those levers is horrificly naive and pretty close to a dereliction of duty for those with key financial decision responsibilities. 

 

It wouldn't be accepted at my place of work, and the fact it seems to have been at a PL side (at the time) is abysmal.

I’m sure they were fully aware, and it was more of a case of taking a calculated punt, ie not spend in the final season and keep youri and a squad that was considered too good to go down after finishing 5th 5th and 8th. Then after such an appalling start they pulled the trigger in January in the hope there was an upturn in form to maintain their top flight status.

Edited 13 March by HankMarvin

[MPH]

I would say that what we have going  on now is a massive example as to why we need to increase our ground capacity. we will be able to fill 40k easily in the prem and it will increase our revenue to an extent  it could make a difference in paying wages for a player or 2 each year..