Fair Play!

[melonhead]

More pandering to the crowd by Anton.

The transfer window closed and then he announces we have cash to burn and will spend in the summer.

Two days later the league votes on restrictions in investment, he see's there is going to be a majority and allows himself to abstain knowing the measures will be passed

Summer comes and Anton says that he didn't vote for the restrictions but as they're in place he can't invest his huge wad of cash like he said he would.

Jesus.

oh oxf*rd shut up and concentra8 on dating will ya

[melonhead]

£105m cumulative losses over 3 years. Clubs whose wage bill exceeds £52m will only be allowed to increase that by £4m per year....

hardly very tough is it.

105 million losses over 3 years is an immense sum of money



and how does th wage bill work. if your wage bill is 120 million. can you still increase it by 4 million a year?

how does that stop anyone doing anything. what a waste of time

[cmonurz]

I read that only City (surprised?), Chelsea (surprised?) and Liverpool (one summer of reckless spending) made losses greater than £105m over the last three years. Utterly pointless - as is the rule on wage growth, which as I understand it is capped increases over £52m a year, but that cap can be increased by club merchandising and ticketing revenues and so on. So the big clubs can still grow their wages the fastest.

[Wimb]

I read that only City (surprised?), Chelsea (surprised?) and Liverpool (one summer of reckless spending) made losses greater than £105m over the last three years. Utterly pointless - as is the rule on wage growth, which as I understand it is capped increases over £52m a year, but that cap can be increased by club merchandising and ticketing revenues and so on. So the big clubs can still grow their wages the fastest.

Exactly. This is merely designed to stop upstarts like Blackburn, Chelsea and Manchester City breaking into the monopoly of the top five. £105m losses are more than enough to cripple any smaller team so this does little to stop that.

[Alexander Litvinenko]

Perhaps because this is all pointless window dressing.

In what possible world could a business that loses £105M over 3 years be deemed to be successful, sustainable or well-run? But in the world of PL finance this is somehow deemed to be perfectly acceptable?????

[cmonurz]

Perhaps because this is all pointless window dressing.

In what possible world could a business that loses £105M over 3 years be deemed to be successful, sustainable or well-run? But in the world of PL finance this is somehow deemed to be perfectly acceptable?????

The impression I have got, may be totally wrong, is that that is the only level of losses that the likes of Gold, who appears to have driven the process a little, could get the majority of chairmen to agree on. Pathetic.

[The Rouge]

Agreed. I think the abstention was almost definitely a comment on the measures being almost pointless/not doing enough.

[Alexander Litvinenko]

Perhaps because this is all pointless window dressing.

In what possible world could a business that loses £105M over 3 years be deemed to be successful, sustainable or well-run? But in the world of PL finance this is somehow deemed to be perfectly acceptable?????

The impression I have got, may be totally wrong, is that that is the only level of losses that the likes of Gold, who appears to have driven the process a little, could get the majority of chairmen to agree on. Pathetic.

Exactly, and as such a arbitrary figure. Losses like that will still guarantee a club will go bust if they get relegated or the owner leaves, so what's the point apart from a PL public-relations exercise.

[The Royal]

£105m cumulative losses over 3 years. Clubs whose wage bill exceeds £52m will only be allowed to increase that by £4m per year....

hardly very tough is it.

105 million losses over 3 years is an immense sum of money



and how does th wage bill work. if your wage bill is 120 million. can you still increase it by 4 million a year?

how does that stop anyone doing anything. what a waste of time

It's pointless, when the new FIFA fair play comes in losses are capped at 38mil instead. This will make a huge difference

[MouldyRoyal]

Surely with talk of upgrading the stadium and other aspects of the club, we could expect to see some losses. Or does this not count?



Then again it's not like we break the bank on transfers

Stadium and academy investments are excluded from the loss calculations.

And here's why the rules are a waste of time. As long as you're not capping bottom line spends, the gate is left wide open for the crooks in the game will hide money in such investments and pay wages under the table. Overrunning, over-budget developments have been used for money laundering for decades outside of the game. There'll always be ways round any rules, but it's just too easy.

It's not hiding anything under the table, it's the difference between capital and revenue expenditure.

[RoyaltyInMyBlood]

So from the looks of it the new regulations are a publicity stunt to make it look like they are actually doing something, hence why we abstained probably.

Is it just me or does it just look like they are just giving the top clubs a couple of years practice fiddleing the books so we dont embarress ourselves when Fifas fair play rules come in?

[Silver Fox]

£105m cumulative losses over 3 years. Clubs whose wage bill exceeds £52m will only be allowed to increase that by £4m per year....

hardly very tough is it.

105 million losses over 3 years is an immense sum of money



and how does th wage bill work. if your wage bill is 120 million. can you still increase it by 4 million a year?

how does that stop anyone doing anything. what a waste of time

It's pointless, when the new FIFA fair play comes in losses are capped at 38mil instead. This will make a huge difference

38million pa? Because that's 3m more than the prem are proposing

[melonhead]

must mean wage bill

[The Royal]

38mil over the same period I heard

[Z175]

The main driver of this is the new tv deal and the FFP introduced by UEFA and the football league..

Clearly theres no point in the increased tv money if it jsut doubles players salaries. Therefore having a cap on increasing the wagebill means clubs will have a balancing act, rather than just an unlimited pot.

Secondly, with the CL clubs abiding by FFP, Southampton and QPR, if they stay up, could easily spend say £100m each this summer, whereas Man City, Chelsea and Liverpool will have to make money if anything.

This could make the league look ridiculous where clubs spend big sums to get in the top 10, but would be banned from Europe if finishing top 4. Similarly, clubs coming up have to abide by fair play, so the wagebill gap between the PL and Championship, already massive, would become an unbridgable chasm where any promoted team would have to not just treble its wagebill like at present, but probably increase it by a factor of 6 or 7 times to compete, which would be impractible in 1 summer, and also unsustainable, with every relegated club being a firesale or being banned from the FL.

So they had to do something, and this miserable little comprimise is it. I agree with the comments re our abstention, but its intriguing to think we could have had the casting vote. Unless we were confident it would go through anyway, which would be unlikely given the number of clubs agasint and the 2/3rds majority required, it seems odd to abstain. Even if we dont like the detail, isn't it better than nothing? Or are we intending a £105m spending spree over the next 3 years?!

[ZacNaloen]

We think it's bullshit and not strong enough, but voting against it makes us look like we are one of them *yuck* don't blame them abstaining. Wouldn't want to be associated with Southampton on this one.

[maffff]

Excuse my ignorance...

We have teh 105m over 3 years spend for the PL - as has been ratified. Does the FIFA restriction to 38m over 3 years mean that there will essentially be the top 4-6 teams having to abide by that criteria whilst the rest of the league tries to catch up?

[ZacNaloen]

As the whole point of doing well in the premier league is the champions league cash cow I don't really get why we haven't matched the terms UEFA laid down.
There's no point finishing fourth if you are banned from the Champions League so only a particularly stupid owner would spend that sort of money anyway.

[2.8 lita injection]

Good move by Reading, the whole thing just protects the elite clubs and for certain ticket prices will rise steeply.

[RFCSPACE]

Oh dear gentlemen, we appear to have lost £104M over the past 2 years... Anton would you like to buy 100,000 Reading FC replica shirts, 250,000 Reading FC ties and half a million Reading FC branded mugs? Phew.