It's being reported that if we finish around 10th, we'll pick up about £120 million in TV money alone. That must be about £70 million more than last season. We've got ticket sales way above the average in this league - so this income must deliver a shedload of profit. I know Ashley rarely goes north of Shirebrook theses days but how could Ashley walk away from this? Mandy needs to get some overtime in and up her game.
There will be considerable funds available at the end of the season. We could quite possibly raise £40m in player sales too in restructuring. I expect "every penny" to be made available to Rafa as promised. As much as £100m.
Just another investment in Newcastle city centre. https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www....mike-ashleys-sports-direct-snaps-14501418.amp
I hope his plans involve demolishing the building and building something more attractive in its place.
Just got to hope they decide to be more flexible on wage budget as well as money available for upfront transfer costs.
No excuses now for us to not spend money on players. Try and get Kennedy permanently. Don't play silly either.
Don't let this rosy glow taint things too much, mate. We still have Lee 'Pound for Pound' Charnley in charge, with Justin Barnes perched on his shoulder like some horrid, treasure-stealing parrot. Ashley's buying buildings in the City yet still hasn't bothered to turn up at the ground. I'm certainly not counting any chickens yet - for all the feelgood we have of surviving, it's equally if not more likely we'll end the Summer with a small Dutch utility player and Alan Pardew in charge.
Ashley has been investing in a variety of property ventures for a while now so I wouldn't read too much into it.
We should get more than that too, as West Brom finished 10th last year but were only on TV 11 times. I suspect we'll have a higher number of televised games, which will increase our prize money.
I think we could have as much as £70m to spend if Ashley is still here. I can't see more than that as we'd have other things to pay for. I'm sure it was reported previously that we need to upgrade our youth facilities to retain Category 1 status. We should be investing in that. I thought there were further plans from Rafa around the training ground too. Its hard to know really. Fans have a habit of imagining we have more than we do. However if we could spend £70m then our team would receive a massive upgrade. If we spent that on fees and wages for 3 players, we'd move on significantly. Our problem is we need a striker and that is going to be very costly. To get someone decent here we will have to pay over the odds on transfer fee and wages.
We need to bring in 3 GOOD players just to stand still. Our current first eleven is good and playing like a top half team. The current first eleven includes three loan players* though, with two of them having been very important in our improved form. I think we'll get Dubravka as a formality. It is doubtful whether we will get Kenedy and Slimani, but I would gladly take both. If we did get those three then I think we'd still need another goalscorer and left back cover as a minimum. If we don't get them then we will need to replace them with quality at least as good if we are going to maintain our momentum. Edit: * That is assuming Slimani is first choice once he is fully match fit.
It is an issue. However I think we will have to have 3 major signings and then look at the loan market and free transfers to beef out the rest. It’s problematic but I can’t see where an endless pot has suddenly come from. I think people are putting 2 and 2 together and getting 5. Look at other clubs spend. How many having had this income for a number of years spent more than 100m last season? I think there are costs people simply don’t see.
I'm not saying we can afford it. Just saying what I think is the minimum to stand still, never mind move forward. The club (Ashley and Charnley) are going to need to do some serious thinking before the summer (actually they need to have done it already). Regardless of what you think about it, we know that Rafa doesn't want to stay to just stand still. They will need to offset what they can afford to spend in their model against how much we can afford to lose Rafa. None of us knows how that thought process will go.
To be honest I think we do. Ashley has already said we will not spend beyond our means. We won't spend on the never never and he won't put his own money in. It really depends what we generate and what our running costs are. That will leave a budget and Rafa will have to decide from there if we are the club for him. In the real world we don't generate enough to compete above those around us. We can compete in that 10th-20th brackets only in terms of money. I'm sure everyone would love to see us spending 100m-120m but I can't see how we are a special case to generate that kind of money? Everton and Leicester have people running them willing to spend their own money. Leicester's net spend was 18m. Evertons was 84m. I think that is the dose of reality for everyone getting carried away. Only 9 clubs had a net spend of 40m or more last season. Only 4 clubs had a net spend of 60m or more. The magical 100m net spend being bandied around? 2 clubs. Both reside in Manchester and currently occupy the top 2 positions and guaranteed CL football. I think his desire to stay in this country and a lack of viable options (bar maybe Arsenal, Everton and Leicester - all of which have merit but also issues) will see him remain here regardless. Obviously if Arsenal came in we could kiss goodbye as the funds are huge. Honestly though to get the 5 or 6 you'd like to see then we'd have to do some really smart business. It is tough and it shows just how true our owner has been to his word over the last few years. Since McClaren we are right up there with what we spend. Net spends we drop a lot further down. It is very tough to generate the sums required to compete with the top 7 or 8. You need a sugar daddy and we don't have one.
It does when you consider what you have to spend. Our problem will lie in us not having a great deal of individual value in the squad this time round. I don't see a Sissoko who will bring in 35m. Or a Gini at 25m. That allowed us to generate a huge amount of money and spend way above what our competitors could afford. We'd have to sell someone like Lascelles which I think most would find unpalatable. Whether you look at net spend over the last three years or simply spend, our numbers stack up. We've spent 170m and recouped 98m. Net spend of 24m per season. That would be 10th highest this season. I realise all this makes for very uncomfortable reading for some who just think we're going to have a budget of 120m. The reality is somewhat different looking at how all the clubs are operating. I can only assume running costs must be really high for a PL club but I'm sure I did read somewhere we do feature around mid table when it comes to what we can generate. So there is hope we can expect a net spend of around 40m-50m if that is the case.