We will not survive in this division,unless we compete,we are mid table crowd wise,we need to wise up and realise the championship is a different level. We had all the play,yet two headers,two chances and we lost.
Crowd-wise means nothing. Income from gate receipts is dwarfed by parachute payments and other sources. Maybe our turnover will be boosted enough by the new stadium to compete a bit better next season. At the moment - as has been said before - we are bottom six on total income which in reality is where we should be shopping. Above relegation but below mid-table would be expected and above that I think we should see as over-achieving. We need a reality check after last season's heroics.
Many of you seem to have the opinion that Bristol City cannot compete at any level, other than effort and words, in the Championship and cidered has hit it squarely on the head. Until the entire league wakes up to the fact that they are destroying the sport from within there is very little hope of the vast majority of teams achieving much of anything. Parachute payments make one of the most unequal playing fields known to all sport and until parity rules the roost over financial greed then we are doomed to listen to the ludicrous sums of money bandied around in the transfer market by the wrongly wealthy. Steve Lansdown has told us for years that the stadium rebuild is part of a personal desire to see us in the Premiership. Seeing that we are now struggling in the budget department and can't afford to support up our rise back to the Championship how on earth can we expect to go further. I know the prophetic words coming from the boardrooms of clubs like ours may sound calming and exciting to the supporters but can we believe a single word coming from those sources? I have often wondered why my club has never reached the promised and now, being so much older and wiser, I am starting to realise that it will never happen in my lifetime. We have heard many words and phrases to describe our club over the years, few complimentary might I add, and although they are all regrettably starting to ring true I can't remember hearing the words "progressive and forward thinking" We are a muddle through kind of club that doesn't exactly plan for success and when it does arrive, like last season, we don't have a single clue as to how we are going to benefit from our success and move on upwards. Could that be a reason why so many players are looking the other way when Bristol City come calling, or is it my imagination? Having an extremely wealthy and intelligent man as our benefactor is all very well and good, but if the governing bodies of the sport that he has invested lot's of his time and money in don't allow him to spend it in the way he feels is necessary to grow his football business then please tell me why he should want to invest in this insanity any longer? Imagine if you went to the bank and said I have 50 million pounds to invest in a business and they welcomed you aboard and then told you that out of the 50 million you could only use 2 million as an operating line of credit, despite your pleas that without using 25 million you won't be able to compete. Mad isn't it, and why the owners don't gang up on this insanity rather than sit idly by and let others roll all over you without a murmur beggars belief. Fools will fail and planners will survive. Sounds somewhat similar to the EU - EH?
Thing is - even if it was allowed I am not sure SL would want to pile in his money to make us more competitive on wages. That seems to be the area where we are left behind. He will agree to pay £6m fees, for example, for a young player who can be expected to hold\increase that value. But he won't fork out £25k/week of his own money in wages that he will never recoup. That money has to be funded by club revenue and we just haven't got it - yet. That is my feeling - not a fact obviously as I know nothing - but it seems a reasonable guess and I don't blame him at all if he does see it that way.
Good business and life practices dictate that you don't spend more than you earn and the FFP rules do just that don't they? I understand SL's reluctance to spend more than the incomings but you have to speculate to accumulate, so why is it that the governing bodies of football don't allow you to do the latter? I don't suppose it has anything to do with the ridiculous amounts spent by the so called giants which might affect the small clubs with delusions of grandeur? The world has gone crazy and football has followed like lost sheep to the slaughter. Baaah humbug.
How do you speculate to accumulate when you're restricted to what you can pay in wages? You can get round FFP on transfers, but wages you need to demonstrate that you're about 70-75% of your turnover. So unless we all sit down and agree to pay double admission prices, we are up against it. All this crap that we ain't doing enough is immaterial if the income ain't there. We want SL to finance the ground, to buy us these players and then pay their wage demands. If he don't we say he's crap and just not up to the job. Can't win can he?
