With all this 'takeover talk' surrounding the club it got me thinking.... Why would anyone buy a Premier League Football Club? From an investment point of view it seems like spend spend spend and hope after a number of years you get your money back plus profit. As we have proven and (WBA) before us, finishing in a mid table position means jack **** for the following season. It seems to me unless your in the top 6 and are in the gravy train ££££ buying a club from 7-20 is just a loss waiting to happen. Now i know people will turn round and say you get 90 million for finishing bottom of the PL but that is paid in lump sums. Relegation comes and as villa, norwich etc and others have proven... coming up isnt an easy task.
I was just thinking the same thing. SJH was quoted as saying about NUFC that you would need £800 million to make us anywhere near competitive again. £300 million to buy and £500 million to improve the squad etc. Your not going to make that back are you!
Dont agree. I think with the right infrastructure (good sized ground), a sensible youth and transfer policy, and a little bit of luck you could make a killing. A lot of it may be in added value rather than P/L but its still investment value. Take Brighton, Burnley and Bournemouth - they must each be worth significantly more than they were 5 years ago.
You can only sustain that for so long though. You start hitting brick walls.. fans get impatient and want to see improvement year on year or a better style of football. Take Stoke for example, im pretty sure they would have fallen into that category 5 years ago. Look where they are now.
I think there's money to be made, not earth shattering (to the rich and famous) but it needs to be run correctly. Using your stadium for free advertising for your other interests, using your club shop as a part of your chain and becoming a Yo-Yo club where by you have to invest heavily every few years are not the way to make money. Finding big, reputable corporations to sponsor you are a better way of generating money, slowly progressing up the league would also and getting the fans onside - I personally will not buy anything NUFC related and ask family not to get me anything to do with the club as I don't want money going to the FCB or ****e direct - helps as well. You think finishing 20th generates muchos money, imagine doing a Leicester and winning the league, qualifying for Europe etc. not just the prize and TV money but merchandise, increased sponsorship funds generated, global branding increase, new fans around the world etc.
People (aside from Ashley) don't buy clubs to make money. They have made and will make their money elsewhere. They buy clubs so that people all over the world read about them in the papers. Chelsea is a very minor part of Roman Abramovich's business dealings. Without looking it up, name me two things he has done in business in the last 10 years that aren't related to Chelsea.
I'd personally get more of a buzz out of buying Gateshead and getting them established in the league.
Sadly, it looks like my argument as to why anyone would buy a PL club outside the 'top six' is as strong as ever as our struggle for investment goes on.
So football for me is currently about capitalism and commercialisation. Advertising, and the like, growing a brand, gaining income from untapped markets, etc. Also looking at expansion into things like WPL, ESports, etc. - preparation for a EuroLeague, WorldLeague, or whatever. There's a very small number of clubs in it already and not much room left. It's about putting a foundation in place for continued growth and expansion. There's an opportunity to take on a club, do things right and make it good. Not "win the PL/CL" good, but have it punching. HOWEVER..... I think football is staring at the abyss. There's only so far you can take it - the problem is that football 100% relies on lower echelons and grass roots, it's not made in the clouds of riches. You can't keep abusing that and expect it to grow. The new money has come mainly from new audiences, which have now been reached - the last PL deal 'plateaud' and as such it's very unlikely that it's going to go up again. The FA are showing desperation with bad moves on things like VAR, and new eyes are looking at FIFA/Fortnite instead of actual "soccer".
Football has lost its soul and its identify, the stakes are too high now and no one has any time any more. A european super league will eventually come in and the rest of us will be left behind.
People talking about the death of football are well wide of the mark i reckon. Death of the Premiership? Possibly, in a generation I can see people not being keen to pay silly money to go and sit in the stadia and watch people who become ever more detached from reality. I don't mind if the Premiership dies off, if the top 6 or whatever go and be part of a "European Superleague". It will become the world league which armchair fans love and all the parts of the world who glory hunt will dote on it. Honestly, I think it will give actual football back to the 90%+ of football fans in this country, much money will be drained from the teams left in the domestic leagues and overall I'll feel much more positive about football and supporting my team. As for owning a club, given the revenue streams which come in annually versus the actual value of clubs you have to question the simple level of mismanagement that goes on to somehow not have teams producing profits. yes players are greedy and agents will push for everything but clubs paying more than they can afford on wages/fees is crippling the game and frankly they deserve to go bankrupt when they do.
My disillusionment with football is not necessarily the money coming into the game, its where it goes too that dismays me. As revenues go up so does players / agents wages and it is a disgrace to be honest. The outright greed that is just accepted as being perfectly fine is abhorrent .................... and i include our owner in this also. So much good could be done with the incredible sums of money that are sloshing about in football, so many peoples lives, young and old could be transformed with football clubs putting themselves right at the heart of the communities that are the very reason that the clubs exist in the first place. Just think how many deprived kids could be engaged and genuinely given a better start in life if more of that money was channelled into community projects and training schemes all sponsored by the local football club. ........................... and instead of that we have Franck Ribery buying a ****ing gold plated steak FFS.
It's the nature of the entertainment industry of which, while it seems hard to believe at times, we are part. Anyone who can put a bum on a seat or make someone switch on the telly will be paid amounts of money which on any sane measurement could not be justified. I always find it odd that people regularly complain about footballer's wages but rarely if ever go on about the wages of actors/singers etc. Working 48 weeks a year for £5 million looks cheap compared to what Tom Cruise makes for starring in a bad film. All that money could change young lives as well.
I think this is the struggle for our fans. They want someone to whizz in and make us competitive. They moan about Ashley and he certainly could do more. However I do wonder about these jokers supposedly trying to buy us. We have Kenyon trying to scrape the money together to buy us and Staveley haggling over the price. Given just to ensure we aren't in a relegation battle we'd need to spend anywhere between 50m-100m, you have to wonder what these guys bring to the table. I mean they could be better than Ashley by a very small amount. I mean they aren't Ashley for a start. Realistically though we need ownership that can genuinely invest and take this club forward. Ashley's malnourishment of the club has left it in a sorry state with a huge amount of infrastructure work needed, plus the playing and general staffing.
