Owner Marcus Evans wrote a column in Saturdayâs matchday programme, which Town have given us permission to run in full. Evans discusses current developments at Portman Road, particularly focusing on the Financial Fair Play rules. Ipswich is one of the clubs in the Championship that, based upon historic figures, has been spending in excess of the soon-to-be-introduced FFP rules. If this were to continue, the result would be potential transfer embargos and financial penalties with the monies redistributed to other clubs that are meeting the FFP rules. The penalties associated with the FFP means we face challenges to reorganise the Club to ensure that we work within the new rules. I am committed to ensuring the Club is, from a business perspective, as efficient as it can be whilst operating within the financial constraints of FFP and reducing non-playing costs to provide the most competitive possible playing budget for our manager to develop and strengthen the team. We have a new manager, and with that comes different player requirements. Mick will need time to mould the team in his vision and I will be supporting him, as I have every other manager, to achieve eventual promotion to the Premier League. FFP does not necessarily change our competitive position financially relative to other clubs or prevent us ensuring that we can support the managerâs requirements and there are a number of reasons why we will continue to be as competitive as most other clubs in attempting to secure promotion to the Premiership: 1. We have an Academy stronger than many and we will be aiming to bring talent through to the first team. Our Academy advantage over others will remain. 2. Clubs with historic smaller budgets than Ipswich will probably continue to have smaller budgets as many clubs are currently within the FFP requirements. Our reductions will still leave us in a better financial position than those clubs. 3. Over the last few years, each season there has been a new club or clubs spending hugely in a push for promotion. These clubs will no longer be able to do this without incurring significant penalties. It is therefore likely that these clubs will move their budgets more towards our levels. 4. Parachute clubs [relegated from the Premier League] will have the same financial advantage that comes with the parachute payments as they do now. However, they will also receive significant penalties should they overspend outside of those budgets. Overall, if we ensure we meet the FFP rules, it should be to our advantage. For certain, all clubâs player budgets and wages will be affected â though many fans will see reduced player wages across the board as a good thing, particularly if it creates a more secure financial standing for clubs throughout the country. Securing promotion now is a harder task than it was five years ago. We currently have five clubs playing this season in the Championship with the benefit of a £48 million parachute payment which runs over four years. In 2009, the parachute payment was only £16 million over two years. However, a quick look at the top eight and bottom eight clubs in this weekâs Championship table shows that parachute money is no guarantee of success. We have all seen clubs on similar and lower budgets to that of Ipswich making a serious promotion challenge so the financial status of our Club compared to others cannot be used as any excuse for our failings of the past four seasons. Going forwards, as we look to succeed where in the past we havenât, the Club will continue to leave its managers free to manage without interference from the owner or the club board. Our manager will continue to dictate football policy, he chooses the players and when new or existing players can be secured within budget, we will seek to reach agreement. Itâs worth noting that in the past, the only players we have not agreed terms with have tended to be those that did not make financial sense, either in terms of the annual wage or in the length of contractual commitments. FFP will not change our position on this and I will continue to communicate closely with the manager as to what the Club can afford so his efforts and that of his team are not wasted on unrealistic targets. In Mick, we are fortunate enough to have a highly experienced manager and someone whose skills and experience encompass all the roles a top manager needs to undertake, ie being a manager, a coach and a director of football all wrapped up into one. We are certainly lucky to have an individual who can and wants to take on these broad responsibilities. Moving on to some management issues on the non-football side, Simon Cleggâs departure will enable me to work more closely with our loyal and hard-working team at Portman Road and along with Ian Milne and Jonathan Symonds I will be doing everything I can to ensure that the admin team provides the necessary support to ensure the most efficient environment for our manager and playing staff. At the top of my list when making any decision is âwill this change enable the manager to be more focused on football matters and not drawn into other areas?â I am also fully committed to working closely with the community and ensuring that we keep an open line of communication with our fans. The Clubâs work with the community through the ITFC Charitable Trust will continue as it always has done. I will also ensure that our commitment to the Ipswich Academy remains. I realise that Ipswich Town has a special place in the community, which differs from many other clubs and that Simon, and David [Sheepshanks] before him, were an important link with fans in receiving and taking account of their views. Whilst I will not be undertaking similar commitments myself on a day-to-day basis, I will be assessing any void that has appeared through Simonâs departure over the course of the next few months, and should it be the case that this needs to be filled, I will be addressing that over the summer. That said, our manager will always have a lot to say! There is still a long way to go before the end of this season and despite the fact that Mickâs record since he joined the Club, if multiplied over the course of a season would put us within the play-off places, there is still a lot to be done to ensure that we remain in this division and build over the summer to mount a strong promotion challenge next season. As always, I am amazed and grateful at the ongoing support from the supporters of this fantastic club and I can assure all fans that I will be doing everything I can to ensure our success in the years ahead.
You seem to like that copy and paste from TWTD I think it is well written and can certainly be construed as a very positive and considered piece to put the fans at ease. Whether it is sincere and whether there are any underlying tones in the message is up for debate as I think some parts could be twisted to mean something else, personally I'm continuing to believe that he is committed to this club (how I read his article) and that he has our best interests at heart (as well as his wallets) when he makes his decisions... He's just make a couple of clangers when appointing managers and is acting accordingly to rectify them. I'm sure others will read it and find something else written but that's my assumption from what I've read
I also agree with TB, although my reply would've been slightly more substantial. This is generally just a load of corporate bullshit. He's telling us what we already think. We know we aren't going to compete financially with the likes of Chelski and Manchester "Kent" Utd, but, if we play by the rules, will be better off financially than the likes of Barnsley et al. After 5 years, or so, my judgement is still reserved on ME, although there is no doubting his backing, albeit he's looking at us as a business.
It needs to be looked at as a business with FFP being all about the way you spend your revenue. We are not the only ones scaling back on costs but I do feel we will still have more financial clout than others in the league when all is said and done. Parachute payments will continue to give the advantage to the clubs that have it so we just need to make sure we get promoted sooner rather than later. Even if we got relegated in the first year it would put us in a much stronger financial position to continue building the team.
I think MEs statement is quite positive although somewhat predictable But if this is the start of more frequent And open communication with the fans Then I think we should encourage and welcome This statement rather than criticize it too much
Probably not your fault. The site is going through a server update and has a few kinks still to be ironed out, double posts being one of them.
I reckon we will need to organise a protest if its not up by the weekend Our board is one of the busiest on the site and yet we can't get a simple banner put up! If you go on most of the other busy sites like Millwall, Hull, Charlton, Budgies etc they all have their own banner! Another reason to blame Cleggy... he could have organised a banner when he was painting the turnstiles.
I think that is a good statement from ME, although it doesn't really say much. It is good that we are preparing for the ffp. What do the people who this its sh*t want to hear?
"although it doesn't say much" ...........Precisely And to answer your question....... a little less rabbit
Clearly a very thoughtful statement from ME as they usually are, in which he talks alot of sense (perhaps I've been taken in by it). Shame he didn't do this when he first came to the club. To me the only real clanger he's made is appointing Keane, although most people were enthusiastic about it when he was first appointed but other than that it's been a case to me of the wrong plan at the worst possible time. The talk still continued after Keane left of PL at the first opportunity which IMO in part is why PJ adopted the transfer policy he did, further more he gave Jim too much money too soon and Keane too much money too soon when the squad didn't need it. Then when the squad needed it most particularly over the summer he completely tightened his belt IMO due to FFP but also due to previous managerial mistakes. Rather than taking a long term view and kept to that policy he's reacted to situations due to previous failures
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