Absofuckinglutely. You know I've been thinking about this more. The win on Saturday put me in such a good mood. I've enjoyed rewatching the highlights, watched the club behind the scenes stuff, allsorts. Whereas going to St Mary’s the last few seasons has genuinely felt like a chore. I was miserable, the kids were miserable and it was a long old journey home. Not now. I've kind of been pining and whining about players leaving. The same players who downed ****ing tools last season and genuinely looked like they couldn't be remotely arsed. Our esteemed leader ****ed off as soon as he could for the odd international friendly (because thats all he'll get), Lavia, Tino none of them cared about the club or its fans. If Che wants to go- go. If Alcaraz thinks he's too good, toodle pip. As far as I'm concerned you're either with Russ or against Russ (like what I did there? ) Not one player is our beloved SFC. Russ is building something here, more than just his reputation, and I'm on ****ing board.* *Before anyone is concerned I'm in the grip of some sort of mental health crisis. I still think Sports Republic are utter ****s
Yeah, I'm starting to feel that we are in for some good times, and that's with the transfer window looming! Testament to Russ and the new identity thank ****. I'm looking forward to sorting out some games to take my 11 year old too. Might even take him to an away game! I'm still happy to keep an open mind with SR, and will see how the season goes. It's certainly set up better than last year.
I had to double check who had written this. Agree with everything bar the SR position - I’m still of the view that they are well intentioned, but made some bad calls. Time will tell.
Nah mate, don't tell me you're using our club purely as a vehicle to make money, **** it up and get us relegated and expect me to like it. Bollocks to them. Anyway, no more negativity from me (for now anyway) I'm enjoying football again
Mate, I thoroughly recommend getting an away game in with your son. My lad is the same age and we pick an away game at the start of the season, usually around his birthday. We'll book a hotel for the night to make it a proper lads weekend away. I basically feed him all the crap his mum doesn't let him eat, I'll have a couple of beers and we generally have an awesome away day. Its quality father son time that I look forward to all season, a proper treat and makes the hours of overtime worth it.
Anyone who thinks a football club is a vehicle to make money is seriously deluded. You do not make money owning a football club.
Did they ever actually say that? Or did they talk about making big returns on selling young players and people have assumed that meant “that the owners will then extract and put in their pockets” rather than reinvest in the team ? You only make money on football if you get a cheap championship club and someone cheaply turn it into a premier league club and then flip it pretty much straight away before you need to start spending and before you get relegated. Or maybe someone scrape staying up. I’m not aware this has ever happened Liverpool fans crow about how apparently their club is worth 10 times what FSG spent (I think). But I do wonder if that theoretical gain is still a profit once you deduct losses the club has made. I think it might in their case but this is one of the biggest clubs in the world. And notably they are still not selling. But i think in their case it is a profile thing rather than a money making thing. So that is another thing to think on - even one of the biggest and most popular clubs in the world doesn’t seem to have been bought with the idea to make money
Any rumours this morning? (Apart from the ones about the motives and desires of people buying football clubs)
Owning a top-level football club can be quite profitable, but you generally don't extract that money from day-to-day operations...you just treat the club as a plaything in the short term, and then sell because sports teams in general are appreciating in value over the long term. Abramovich turned a profit on Chelsea, including the money he wrote off, and despite selling for less than he could have if not under time pressure. But there's a very simple tip-off that SR wasn't doing that in any instance: the way they handled the purchase and the club's debt. They did not leverage any of the club's assets in the purchase (as the Glazers did with Man Utd, as an example), and the debt that came with the club when purchased is no longer assigned to it, either...in our last annual books, we had zero debt assigned to the club. It appears that ownership assumed it. Those aren't the actions of someone trying to make a quick buck, because using the club's money for those things is the only realistic way to make a quick buck. Yeah, we're going to sell far more than we're going to buy here. That's a necessity in the Championship, because our revenues have cratered and we probably entered this season with 50m+ in past transfers still to pay off. That's much different than 'putting money in their pockets', we have rules to comply with and they are far more stringent at this level than the comedy of loopholes that is the PL's FFP.
I’m thinking QPR or Watford. Though I wonder if tickets could be problem, as we didn’t renew membership. Will that help?
Im not sure. I always recall the story of how to become a millionaire football team owner. You start off as a billionaire.
Tickets for London games have been traditionally quite difficult, try further afield and sample the delights of Middlesbrough. Easier tickets = bigger weekend
Sorry pal, you have no chance of those games unless you know a ST holder who's willing to buy for you.
Only someone who has never been to Middlesbrough talks about the ‘delights’ of the town. The only delight is driving home from the Boro.
Well Markus would have too. His investment was far less than our worth in the PL. I get your point but I think it's more common than it used to be. Sports Republic hasn't been set up by its owners to bring no benefit to them.