Leicester at risk of another Premier League PSR charge over latest accounts

[Dahnsouff]

3 minutes ago, splinterdream said:

Yes, on looking up the definition, perhaps that's right. Just always saw it being aimed at us as a put down. I think when we were aiming that top 6 status, part of it is about perception 

Yeah, it somehow sounds negative, but we should be proud we broke our mould, and showed everyone else what’s possible.

[Dahnsouff]

9 minutes ago, KFS said:

Yup - it’s the same old ‘we were in league one once’ rebuttal. This club can be bigger and better if run properly. Simply saying we overachieved is massively defeatist and small minded imo. It’s the typical talksport response I wouldn’t expect from a Leicester fan 

Don’t view it that way personally, as if we overachieved, we broke our own ceiling, we went where we had not gone before. I mean who has taken this next step during the lifetime of the EPL? Man City, that’s it and it is clear how they did it. Do agree we can be bigger as a club with better management, but I do not believe we would grow in terms of positioning within the EPL.

 

[Lionator]

14 minutes ago, Dahnsouff said:

Do not believe this is true at all. Yes we had a system that was working. Yes, Rodgers helped screw it up. But so did the financial crisis, the pandemic, etc.
Overachievement must be compared to something, and we did compared to our historic performance, this is beyond dispute, it’s evidential.

(Why do people find this so insulting? It should be a point of pride to rise beyond our previous standing)

 

Bournemouth is not a good example as they have done nothing. Clubs at this level are one incident away from demise, it’s just where this trigger comes from that varies.

It’s more the pissing it away that annoys people. If there was an ounce of competence and we had rotten luck then people would be less angry. Yes we’re in the upper % of teams that have ‘overachieved’ but generally I don’t believe in that in this current age. The best clubs are also the most sustainable 

[The Doctor]

20 minutes ago, Lionator said:

You literally have Bournemouth floating in the top half of the Prem. By size alone they’re League One/Two. But nobody overachieves at this level, you’re as good as the system you create. We had a system and we dismantled it all, for what? To stroke Brendan Rodgers ego? 

while I agree that ultimately the system was torn apart during the Rodgers era, I wouldn't say it was necessarily to stroke his ego so much as he played Top and Rudkin for the pair of utter chumps they are. We gave him a massive contract extension and payrise just 9 months into a 39 month contract and at the first good run of form, making him better paid than the real Madrid manager at the time. Utterly stupid and should never have been signed off on as it was obviously a bad idea in the first place.

[nnfox]

20 minutes ago, Lionator said:

You literally have Bournemouth floating in the top half of the Prem. By size alone they’re League One/Two. But nobody overachieves at this level, you’re as good as the system you create. We had a system and we dismantled it all, for what? To stroke Brendan Rodgers ego? 

The issue is that there's a ceiling to all this.  In theory, I'd suggest that a well run club of reasonable stature could come from anywhere in the football league and with enough time, good strategy and a little luck become an established mid table premier league team.  With the TV money, the right sponsorship deals and clever recruitment, there's probably enough revenue available to have a business model that can sustain multiple uneventful premier league campaigns.  From that foundation, all you can do is hope that you can have the odd good season, maybe a good cup run or two and maybe a European adventure mixed in.  As soon as you try to regularly push for top 6 or top 4, the revenue cannot sustain it.  If you want your players to stay, you have to pay them top 4 or top 6 wages, or they'll be off and you'll drop back down.  Or, like we did, fund those massive wages gambling on future success and European competition.

 

To really compete at the very top of the richest league in the world, you need globally generated revenues.  Outside of the big 6, it's impossible to sustain it.

 

The likes of Bournemouth, Brighton, Fulham, Forest and others are having their time in the sun, but it won't last.  How badly they crash is another debate, maybe they'll have a soft landing to mid to bottom half, or maybe they'll suffer from the same busted flush that we did and find themselves on a cliff edge.  Time will tell.

[Master Fox]

On 01/01/2025 at 22:00, sdb said:

Bloody hell. It's never easy is it. I'm longing for the Puel days tbh.

I miss the Puel days 

 

 

[Vestan Pance]

1 hour ago, pkonline said:

Leicester is not a big club and we cannot generate the revenues as any of the big clubs. Yes some of it has been mismanagement both on and off the field, but the bottom line is this is not a fair playing field and the odds are increasingly stacked against clubs like Leicester. Just look at clubs like Brighton and Villa - yes they have had the odd 4/5th place finish, but reality is they won't be competing for trophies, now matter how "well run" they are - and each of those clubs just need one bad transfer window, and they'll fall. 

We've massively overachieved the past decade. Part of me has to accept that the club gave it a go, but we now enter a new phase of seeing the club where we have always been.

Loosing nearly £90m per season is not anywhere near where we have always been. We have to play by the rules, and with the current setup we have zero chance of doing that and remaining competive.

[DLH]

12 minutes ago, nnfox said:

The issue is that there's a ceiling to all this.  In theory, I'd suggest that a well run club of reasonable stature could come from anywhere in the football league and with enough time, good strategy and a little luck become an established mid table premier league team.  With the TV money, the right sponsorship deals and clever recruitment, there's probably enough revenue available to have a business model that can sustain multiple uneventful premier league campaigns.  From that foundation, all you can do is hope that you can have the odd good season, maybe a good cup run or two and maybe a European adventure mixed in.  As soon as you try to regularly push for top 6 or top 4, the revenue cannot sustain it.  If you want your players to stay, you have to pay them top 4 or top 6 wages, or they'll be off and you'll drop back down.  Or, like we did, fund those massive wages gambling on future success and European competition.

 

To really compete at the very top of the richest league in the world, you need globally generated revenues.  Outside of the big 6, it's impossible to sustain it.

 

The likes of Bournemouth, Brighton, Fulham, Forest and others are having their time in the sun, but it won't last.  How badly they crash is another debate, maybe they'll have a soft landing to mid to bottom half, or maybe they'll suffer from the same busted flush that we did and find themselves on a cliff edge.  Time will tell.

Bolton, Portsmouth and Wigan still haven’t recovered from their time in the sun

[Lionator]

18 minutes ago, The Doctor said:

while I agree that ultimately the system was torn apart during the Rodgers era, I wouldn't say it was necessarily to stroke his ego so much as he played Top and Rudkin for the pair of utter chumps they are. We gave him a massive contract extension and payrise just 9 months into a 39 month contract and at the first good run of form, making him better paid than the real Madrid manager at the time. Utterly stupid and should never have been signed off on as it was obviously a bad idea in the first place.

The problem was, and where I have a little sympathy, is that you had everyone in the media saying that he should take the arsenal and Tottenham job, I distinctly remember 606 after the Everton 94th minute winner home game and Savage saying that those teams should pay whatever for Rodgers. A week later he signed a massive contract. 

[Dahnsouff]

12 minutes ago, Lionator said:

It’s more the pissing it away that annoys people. If there was an ounce of competence and we had rotten luck then people would be less angry. Yes we’re in the upper % of teams that have ‘overachieved’ but generally I don’t believe in that in this current age. The best clubs are also the most sustainable 

I totally hear what you are saying, we have a board that has been negligent, complacent even, and that is rightfully causing anger.

At the same time, I would be reticent to say we should be doing too much better or even maintaining our higher historic positions.
 

You can easily see the challenges for Villa, Forest, that once they get in Europe, once the wages rise, will face. As those without historical revenues, will cause performances to wilt and return to lower standings unless they get every single thing perfect, which is not really possible longer term.

 

The whole model is corrupt and rotten, it is a sham meritocracy, only really open to the select few.

[jayfox26]

1 hour ago, pkonline said:

Leicester is not a big club and we cannot generate the revenues as any of the big clubs. Yes some of it has been mismanagement both on and off the field, but the bottom line is this is not a fair playing field and the odds are increasingly stacked against clubs like Leicester. Just look at clubs like Brighton and Villa - yes they have had the odd 4/5th place finish, but reality is they won't be competing for trophies, now matter how "well run" they are - and each of those clubs just need one bad transfer window, and they'll fall. 

We've massively overachieved the past decade. Part of me has to accept that the club gave it a go, but we now enter a new phase of seeing the club where we have always been.

Just don't accept this at all. Nobody is or ever has suggested we are as big or can compete financially with the "cartel 6", but that doesn't mean we couldn't have remained an established premier league club. Finishing top 6 every season would be unrealistic but after the league win and then the later success with the fa Cup and community shield, plus the top half finishes, we should have built on this to ensure we remained an established premier league club. Finishing in the top 10 every season should have been our aim. That may not have been possible every season but the fact is, only 3-4 years ago, we were miles ahead of the likes of Brentford, Brighton, Fulham, Bournemouth etc in every single aspect, and now we are miles behind these clubs and also the likes of Forest, not to mention the obvious of Newcastle and Villa, but I accept that these clubs are bigger than us and have more financial muscle than we do. Even with the "big 6" plus Villa, Newcastle and West Ham (bigger clubs, more money) that would have still put us within the top 10 clubs in the country had the club been run properly. We should never have allowed all these other clubs to catch us up, never mind over take us and leave us miles behind.  Ultimately, all the good work that was put in whilst Vichai was here has been undone because people at the club took their eye off the ball and allowed the club to spiral into trouble both on and off the pitch with poor leadership and poor decision making. 

[CosbehFox]

8 minutes ago, DLH said:

Bolton, Portsmouth and Wigan still haven’t recovered from their time in the sun

All smaller clubs to ours in my opinion. Wigan and Bolton’s attendances are wildly inconsistent. Pompey a solid second tier club but at best pull in 20k

 

your point is valid tho 

Edited 7 January by CosbehFox

[nnfox]

10 minutes ago, DLH said:

Bolton, Portsmouth and Wigan still haven’t recovered from their time in the sun

True, people forget that there's been more than 50 teams to have competed in the Premier League, it's about half of all the current EFL teams.  

 

It's noteworthy too, that it's pretty rare to have more than 10 consecutive years in the prem, unless you are in the big 6 (or Everton). In fact, I think it's only West Ham and Palace outside of those 7 that are currently enjoying a run of 10+ years.  Maybe they've got it right?

[DLH]

Just now, nnfox said:

True, people forget that there's been more than 50 teams to have competed in the Premier League, it's about half of all the current EFL teams.  

 

It's noteworthy too, that it's pretty rare to have more than 10 consecutive years in the prem, unless you are in the big 6 (or Everton). In fact, I think it's only West Ham and Palace outside of those 7 that are currently enjoying a run of 10+ years.  Maybe they've got it right?

Definitely. And West Ham and Palace are not without their problems.

 

Also until recently, in West Ham’s case, neither have won a meaningful trophy. (Certainly not in my lifetime, born 80’s)

[splinterdream]

23 minutes ago, Lionator said:

The problem was, and where I have a little sympathy, is that you had everyone in the media saying that he should take the arsenal and Tottenham job, I distinctly remember 606 after the Everton 94th minute winner home game and Savage saying that those teams should pay whatever for Rodgers. A week later he signed a massive contract. 

Pay Rodgers the wage.....fine. Give him a long contract......fine, but it was utterly ridiculous not having conditions attached which i assume it didn't, such as the amount is conditional on Europe otherwise its drops 25%, bottom half table another 25%, relegation places contract can be terminated without recompence

[Claudio Fannieri]

1 hour ago, Dahnsouff said:

Yeah, it somehow sounds negative, but we should be proud we broke our mould, and showed everyone else what’s possible.

Agreed however there was a lot of hard work and innovative thinking aligned with  clever recruitment, analytics and sports science, what is proves is no matter the size or stature of your club, if you recruit well, have a defined strategy that everyone buys into and you are constantly improving and ensuring continuity then whatever division you are in, you can be competitive however get lazy or complacent and no matter how big a club you are or how much recent success you have enjoyed it will come crashing down. 
 

All our previous success has shown me is what can be achieved with good organisation, structure, a philosophy and continuity, unfortunately we took our eye off the ball and veered away from what had made us successful and now we are floundering around with a scattergun approach and desperation to find a short cut back to where our owners want to belong. 
 

Some times you have to take two steps back, rebuild and start again we had that chance with Enzo and it seemed to be bearing fruit, clever recruitment and the progression of academy prospects, then in the summer we lose Enzo and all of a sudden the blue print is ripped up and we are back to paying extortionate fees, wages and saddling the club with long term contracts for rank average and aging players who are barely good enough to warm the bench, with a failed manager who was the complete opposite to the style of play we have employed and who was allowed to dismantle the hard work from last season and have a significant influence in our recruitment strategy which largely focused on players who don’t really fit our profile. 
 

Yes the PSR rules are crap 💩but the majority of our issues are down to us and our piss poor decision making and ripping up everything good. 

Edited 7 January by Claudio Fannieri

[kingfox]

25 minutes ago, DLH said:

Bolton, Portsmouth and Wigan still haven’t recovered from their time in the sun

Those three clubs were severely mismanaged though which contributed to their downfall. 
 

Luckily we haven’t hit that stage yet, despite the ability to list numerous incompetent errors that this board has made since 21/22. Are we in the early stages of a decline though? Possible but of course time will tell. 
 

Regarding @nnfox post, the likes of Brighton, Bournemouth, Fulham, Forest may hit a brick wall at some point, but take Brighton’s model for example, it’s been so consistent since they got promoted, even if they produce some mid table finishes, a complete collapse seems highly unlikely as of now. I’ve been envious of how Bournemouth have operated recently, the appointment of Iraola was a surprising but intriguing gamble, but so far it’s working, while their recruitment recently has been absolutely spot on, reminiscent of how we used to be. Once Iraola and their best players get picked off though, it would be of no surprise if they end up like us right now. 

[Muzzy_no7]

28 minutes ago, nnfox said:

True, people forget that there's been more than 50 teams to have competed in the Premier League, it's about half of all the current EFL teams.  

 

It's noteworthy too, that it's pretty rare to have more than 10 consecutive years in the prem, unless you are in the big 6 (or Everton). In fact, I think it's only West Ham and Palace outside of those 7 that are currently enjoying a run of 10+ years.  Maybe they've got it right?

Notice where all the clubs are from?

 

If you aren’t in Liverpool, Manchester or London then you are massively up against it.

 

Just look at Fulham and their amount of PL years. Palace too and likely now Brentford as well.

 

Absolutely nothing London boroughs but the authorities, Sky and league love them because they are in London. 
 

No other league in the world has such a concentration of clubs in its inflated capital. So unhealthy for our game. 

[izzymuzzet]

3 minutes ago, Muzzy_no7 said:

Notice where all the clubs are from?

 

If you aren’t in Liverpool, Manchester or London then you are massively up against it.

 

Just look at Fulham and their amount of PL years. Palace too and likely now Brentford as well.

 

Absolutely nothing London boroughs but the authorities, Sky and league love them because they are in London. 
 

No other league in the world has such a concentration of clubs in its inflated capital. So unhealthy for our game. 

For most young, wealthy, non-British men, living in or around London is much more appealing than living in e.g. Lancashire or the North East. So Fulham, Brentford, Palace etc have a significant advantage over Burnley, Middlesbrough, Sunderland etc. 

[Pliskin]

1 hour ago, Lionator said:

You literally have Bournemouth floating in the top half of the Prem. By size alone they’re League One/Two. But nobody overachieves at this level, you’re as good as the system you create. We had a system and we dismantled it all, for what? To stroke Brendan Rodgers ego? 

Spot on.

[john ridley]

34 minutes ago, Vestan Pance said:

Loosing nearly £90m per season is not anywhere near where we have always been. We have to play by the rules, and with the current setup we have zero chance of doing that and remaining competive.

One day the penny will drop that they're  not cut out to run a football club ,and by then we'll be light years away from ever  being a established  premiership team.Its a shame but that's where we are .

[st albans fox]

1 hour ago, The Doctor said:

while I agree that ultimately the system was torn apart during the Rodgers era, I wouldn't say it was necessarily to stroke his ego so much as he played Top and Rudkin for the pair of utter chumps they are. We gave him a massive contract extension and payrise just 9 months into a 39 month contract and at the first good run of form, making him better paid than the real Madrid manager at the time. Utterly stupid and should never have been signed off on as it was obviously a bad idea in the first place.

Ideas above our station 

if arsenal wanted him then we should have let him go and taken the comp.   We should have been able to recruit a very capable replacement given where we were in the league and our squad.. Coaches would have been falling over themselves to come here. 
 

the fact we gave Rodgers such a huge deal to try and change the rules of the food chain (at that time) came from the top. And whilst we’d never give up the fa cup win, the mess we find ourselves in now is traceable back to that decision on Rodger’s contract and the idea that we could break the big six into a seven. (Even though we were commercially miles and miles away from them). 

[Winstonthedog]

On 06/01/2025 at 17:32, Chelmofox said:

ffs - its going to be us isn't. 

Yep ... we can only dodge the bullet for so long ... and if it is us and as a result the club does the right thing and restructures and ditches all the crap we have within the club ..... long term it might be a good thing 

[Ric Flair]

1 hour ago, nnfox said:

The issue is that there's a ceiling to all this.  In theory, I'd suggest that a well run club of reasonable stature could come from anywhere in the football league and with enough time, good strategy and a little luck become an established mid table premier league team.  With the TV money, the right sponsorship deals and clever recruitment, there's probably enough revenue available to have a business model that can sustain multiple uneventful premier league campaigns.  From that foundation, all you can do is hope that you can have the odd good season, maybe a good cup run or two and maybe a European adventure mixed in.  As soon as you try to regularly push for top 6 or top 4, the revenue cannot sustain it.  If you want your players to stay, you have to pay them top 4 or top 6 wages, or they'll be off and you'll drop back down.  Or, like we did, fund those massive wages gambling on future success and European competition.

 

To really compete at the very top of the richest league in the world, you need globally generated revenues.  Outside of the big 6, it's impossible to sustain it.

 

The likes of Bournemouth, Brighton, Fulham, Forest and others are having their time in the sun, but it won't last.  How badly they crash is another debate, maybe they'll have a soft landing to mid to bottom half, or maybe they'll suffer from the same busted flush that we did and find themselves on a cliff edge.  Time will tell.

Whilst you raise many good points, I can't help but think about the wages the likes of Atalanta, Frankfurt, Leverkusen, Villareal pay. It's far far less than even a low to mid PL team and yet PL teams get swept up in the gamesmanship that invariably seems them overpaying on transfer fees and most definitely wages.

 

This is where a strong strategy has to be in place to move those on to other PL clubs willing to pay them more or European clubs where they fancy a new challenge. We stopped selling players, didn't build enough financial flexibility to make a loss on players that weren't contributing and no resource pool to sign unpolished players with the high risk high reward that comes with them.

 

We to an extent are victims of our own success for thinking we could compete with the top 6 by doing things differently to what got us there 3 times beforehand and that's the problem. Although I do dispute we had the excellence off the field to maintain an effective strategy with sound recruitment year in, year out so our only hope was trying to striker lucky with multiple seasons finishing top 6.

 

We're toast now, this is likely to be the last year we'll be within touching distance of the wealth of the PL and we'll bow out with a horrible set of assets to show for the £80m or so we spent this season. Makes me so nauseous to see our recruitment methodology compared to some of the teams above I've mentioned.

[Winstonthedog]

3 minutes ago, john ridley said:

One day the penny will drop that they're  not cut out to run a football club ,and by then we'll be light years away from ever  being a established  premiership team.Its a shame but that's where we are .

We had the chance to establish ourselves after we won the Premier league... in Europe ... cash was rolling in ... but it was invested in poor to average players instead of good up and coming youth and coaches and management to match ... the ship has sailed is now sinking