Where has £3.95 million gone?

[super darren caskey]

Madejski and McDermott out.

sarcastic comments are welcome views from an asshole are not!! cock!!

[andrew1957]

Have just got up after my sleep and no longer feel like killing Brendy as much - so thought I would make another post.

The point to me is that in the last 5 seasons we have generated PL payments in the region of £70M, parachute payments (plus Championship/TV in last two seasons) in the region of £30M, player sale profits in the region of £20M (I know we might have paid some agent fees etc Snowball - but VAT if any would have been offset) plus all the income from ticket sales, merchandising and entertainment. We now have a playing squad that cost about the same to put together as the 2005/6 promotion squad - so not one penny of all that money has been reinvested in players.

I suspect that no club before us has managed to get promoted to the PL and then relegated and yet make a profit on player sales in the region of £20M. Most clubs use the PL payments to buy new players to strengthen. We spent all but nothing in year one and very little in year two and have since recouped everything we did lay out - many times over. We do have a better training ground (although the club could not afford the fridge) and a better press suite, but that is about it in terms of infrastructure.

So either a/ we wasted a huge amount of money paying excessive wages to very average players. - in that case we can hardly say we are a well run club or b/ the money has gone elsewhere.

No doubt stating these obvious facts will excite Brendy and others (who cannot see past the end of their noses) to abuse me again but I just thought it was worth pointing out.

[Snowball]

TBF, Austin hasn't had a chance to player higher yet. Mooney has been with us for two and a half seasons so has had plenty of chance to if he were considered good enough.

By the same token, nobody in the CCC or Prem bought Austin, so they therefore didn't think he was good enough?

[Victor Meldrew]

What strikes me here is how terribly reasonable many of you are on this board-a bit typical Home Counties I suppose.
I remember when Andrew was tremendously supportive of the club including the chairman and different managers and it appears that he feels rather let down because of the rubbish that comes from the club about ambition.
When I first started watching Reading over 50 years ago people always said that the club didn't want promotion presumably because of extra costs etc.

After the rocky ride including these last few tremendous years I hear people saying exactly the same thing-the club (now people usually speak more of the chairman whereas 50 years ago people didn't know who the chairman was) doesn't want promotion.
Now that I have become one of these cynical old gits I genuinely do feel that it is true-the chairman doesn't want promotion for many reasons and is not prepared to gamble a small portion of his personal fortune to get up again which is his prerogative as owner and of course it is not OUR club.

Fans always want their club to be signing new players and that is something for most of the chairman's time (other than in 1995 and to some extent over the past 3 years)the club has done with the excitement that comes with those signings but we are now very much a selling club and fans don't like it.
This is how it has always been for clubs like Bournemouth,Southampton,Crewe,Oxford etc where fans have stood by and seen their better players be sold on a regular basis.

I'm not saying what is right or wrong but most of you are a pretty dreary and boring lot by laying into Andrew who posts with the passion of the young-you are not alone Andrew and there is nothing wrong with questioning what is said from the club as most of it is hype,rubbish and rather too often lies,it is the way with the horrible world of modern professional football and I think you just have to accept the fact that this club will be a Championship or Div 1 club for most of your football-watching life.
It was a fluke for us to get to the top level as it was with Swindon,Oxford,Barnsley and Northampton when everything falls right for a year or two by luck and some good management but there was never any will to stay at that level and it hit home to me from a Reading perspective when the club did that massive U-turn on extending the stadium having said previously that it would definitely happpen (lies).

Having had those 2 years at the top level I now have to remind myself that it was just an accident because little old Reading didn't really want to be there-it was great while it lasted but with a fairly small stadium and a core support that has quickly fallen to about 14,000 and may well fall further I see us just poodling along in and around the 2nd and 3rd tiers.
Once you accept that then the next thing is to wish for plenty of goals and more exciting stuff like the Burnley game and to keep your sanity Andrew don't even think about promotion because the club doesn't want it.

[Skin]

106 points a fluke? Not in my book.

[Snowball]

If a club gets promotion to the Prem on a shoestring, and doesn't spend a lot
and comes straight back down, and then doesn't spend a lot, they become MUCH richer
because their budgets haven't increased much but they've got a season of Prem money
followed by now a few years of parachute payments.

IMO the richest model is to spend enough to be top eight in the CCC and hope you
get into the P-Os and get lucky over one two-legged tie followed by a Cup Final


Then spend a bit for appearance's sake, but make sure you make profit from the single-season
in the Prem and profit from the years of parachute payments.

Each time you "boing" you get a tad richer.

What tends to happen is clubs go into debt TRYING to go up, the debts accumulate, then they
think "We have to stay up" (to clear debts) so spend spend spend. Then when they are relegated
the parachute payments are eaten up by higher wages, even if there is a relegation pay-cut
in players' contracts.

It's a very delicate juggling act and most clubs get into SERIOUS financial difficulties at some time.

[FiNeRaIn]

If a club gets promotion to the Prem on a shoestring, and doesn't spend a lot
and comes straight back down, and then doesn't spend a lot, they become MUCH richer
because their budgets haven't increased much but they've got a season of Prem money
followed by now a few years of parachute payments.

Everyone thought thats exactly what we did. Now its coming out that we are years worth in debt ffs. It doesn't make sense. We spent minimal amounts in the prem and yet we are in this woeful position.

[Arnie_Pie]

we are in this woeful position.

What woeful position?

i would say 8th in the table is pretty much where I would hope us to be.

[Royal Monk]

Shhhhh FiNeRaIn dont say things like that because the Madjeski brown nosers will slag you down for daring to suggest things are not what they seem ( or we have been told )

[FiNeRaIn]

The league is the poorest its been for years and we are 8th, its also not even the end of the season. We sold our best player for 7 million, we should be able to bring in 1/2 serious signings to push us for an automatic place and stamp our ambition on the league, not hope everyone else sucks and we scrape through to 6th in the play-offs on the last day which is essentially the only realistic target with this team.

[prostak]

Props to OP for starting this important thread addressing the number one concern for Reading FC. I had wondered when we'd get round to discussing this - it's heartening to see somebody take a proactive stance.

[SpaceCruiser]

we are in this woeful position.

What woeful position?

i would say 8th in the table is pretty much where I would hope us to be.

How can we currently be in a woeful position? Ten years ago, we were in a far worse position. Since then we have never finished below 9th in this division after we got promoted out of the third tier.

[RG30]

Wages, wages, wages

[Pseud O'Nym]

What strikes me here is how terribly reasonable many of you are on this board-a bit typical Home Counties I suppose.
I remember when Andrew was tremendously supportive of the club including the chairman and different managers and it appears that he feels rather let down because of the rubbish that comes from the club about ambition.
When I first started watching Reading over 50 years ago people always said that the club didn't want promotion presumably because of extra costs etc.

After the rocky ride including these last few tremendous years I hear people saying exactly the same thing-the club (now people usually speak more of the chairman whereas 50 years ago people didn't know who the chairman was) doesn't want promotion.
Now that I have become one of these cynical old gits I genuinely do feel that it is true-the chairman doesn't want promotion for many reasons and is not prepared to gamble a small portion of his personal fortune to get up again which is his prerogative as owner and of course it is not OUR club.

Fans always want their club to be signing new players and that is something for most of the chairman's time (other than in 1995 and to some extent over the past 3 years)the club has done with the excitement that comes with those signings but we are now very much a selling club and fans don't like it.
This is how it has always been for clubs like Bournemouth,Southampton,Crewe,Oxford etc where fans have stood by and seen their better players be sold on a regular basis.

I'm not saying what is right or wrong but most of you are a pretty dreary and boring lot by laying into Andrew who posts with the passion of the young-you are not alone Andrew and there is nothing wrong with questioning what is said from the club as most of it is hype,rubbish and rather too often lies,it is the way with the horrible world of modern professional football and I think you just have to accept the fact that this club will be a Championship or Div 1 club for most of your football-watching life.
It was a fluke for us to get to the top level as it was with Swindon,Oxford,Barnsley and Northampton when everything falls right for a year or two by luck and some good management but there was never any will to stay at that level and it hit home to me from a Reading perspective when the club did that massive U-turn on extending the stadium having said previously that it would definitely happpen (lies).

Having had those 2 years at the top level I now have to remind myself that it was just an accident because little old Reading didn't really want to be there-it was great while it lasted but with a fairly small stadium and a core support that has quickly fallen to about 14,000 and may well fall further I see us just poodling along in and around the 2nd and 3rd tiers.
Once you accept that then the next thing is to wish for plenty of goals and more exciting stuff like the Burnley game and to keep your sanity Andrew don't even think about promotion because the club doesn't want it.

Not reading all that TBF.

But having followed RFC for 45 years I have to say that the first 25 were shit - rubbish football in rubbish divisions, staggering from crisis to crisis. The first 10 years of Mr Mad brought at least financial stability and the last 10 have been mostly enjoyable. Can't say I find the man, his politics, his public utterances or indeed his hair particularly attractive but "speak as you find" he's not done anything I can see to provoke the vitriol some are now slinging at him.

As Alan Sugar said "The only good football chairmen are the ones who got out before the fans turned on them".

[blueroyals]

While I'm annoyed that once again the club have pocketed more of our transfer outgoings I'd prefer that to having to watch third division football every Saturday. I probably won't be renewing my season ticket next season, why should I invest money into a club that doesn't invest in itself?

I also wouldn't be half as annoyed as I am if Madejski didn't come out with his ambition bollocks every 6 months. The sensible thing to do would be to just come out and say 'look, we have debts, we are selling players to pay off this debt. we are happy solidifying our position in the championship for the foreseeable future' but instead rambles on about Premier League ambition etc. then sells half our squad off and doesn't give a penny to the manager. It's oxf*rd annoying.

[Arch]

don't even think about promotion because the club doesn't want it.

That's what they were saying in 2005. It's excruciating reading this stuff.

[Rex]

I kind of find it fun myself. There are a few fickle opinions on here i suppose.

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

Were we not told at some point that the Gylfi deal was money up front?

Of course there should be about £4m extra in the kitty, however no one from the club is saying that there isn't.

As for the money for Leigertwood and Harte etc, that would surely be within the seasons budget, allowing BM to spend over the budget, would mean that at the end of the season the budget for next season would need to be higher, not something I think that JM would want.

What we really need is even more success from the Academy, we need players like Antonio to step up and show that they can play at this level.

We have an obvious gap in the striking department, however, sign Austin for £1.5m on a 3 year deal, add wages £500k a year?
and you are looking at a big risk, an outlay of about £1m a year, with no promise of any return, RFC cannot afford to make mistakes in the transfer market, players hold all the cards, and seem to bleed clubs of money, at all levels.

One thing that JM does right is to resist paying big money, after all the couple of times he relented it did cause some hassle between players.

[Wimb]

If a club gets promotion to the Prem on a shoestring, and doesn't spend a lot
and comes straight back down, and then doesn't spend a lot, they become MUCH richer
because their budgets haven't increased much but they've got a season of Prem money
followed by now a few years of parachute payments.

IMO the richest model is to spend enough to be top eight in the CCC and hope you
get into the P-Os and get lucky over one two-legged tie followed by a Cup Final


Then spend a bit for appearance's sake, but make sure you make profit from the single-season
in the Prem and profit from the years of parachute payments.

Each time you "boing" you get a tad richer.

What tends to happen is clubs go into debt TRYING to go up, the debts accumulate, then they
think "We have to stay up" (to clear debts) so spend spend spend. Then when they are relegated
the parachute payments are eaten up by higher wages, even if there is a relegation pay-cut
in players' contracts.

It's a very delicate juggling act and most clubs get into SERIOUS financial difficulties at some time.

Top post Snowball ^^

[Agent Balti]

After the rocky ride including these last few tremendous years I hear people saying exactly the same thing-the club (now people usually speak more of the chairman whereas 50 years ago people didn't know who the chairman was) doesn't want promotion.
Now that I have become one of these cynical old gits I genuinely do feel that it is true-the chairman doesn't want promotion for many reasons and is not prepared to gamble a small portion of his personal fortune to get up again which is his prerogative as owner and of course it is not OUR club.

I'm not saying what is right or wrong but most of you are a pretty dreary and boring lot by laying into Andrew who posts with the passion of the young-you are not alone Andrew and there is nothing wrong with questioning what is said from the club as most of it is hype,rubbish and rather too often lies,it is the way with the horrible world of modern professional football and I think you just have to accept the fact that this club will be a Championship or Div 1 club for most of your football-watching life.
It was a fluke for us to get to the top level as it was with Swindon,Oxford,Barnsley and Northampton when everything falls right for a year or two by luck and some good management but there was never any will to stay at that level and it hit home to me from a Reading perspective when the club did that massive U-turn on extending the stadium having said previously that it would definitely happpen (lies).

Having had those 2 years at the top level I now have to remind myself that it was just an accident because little old Reading didn't really want to be there-it was great while it lasted but with a fairly small stadium and a core support that has quickly fallen to about 14,000 and may well fall further I see us just poodling along in and around the 2nd and 3rd tiers.

Can't say I disagree. It pretty much matches my own view...and my actual viewing of the matches pretty much ended after we were relegated (yeah, yeah, not a proper fan, boo hoo, yada yada.) It was pretty clear to me even way back then that SJM wanted RFC to be at the top table but only in a world where every other club was run 'as Reading FC were'. We did get lucky, 106 points or not, we had the players, we had the drive, the stars were aligned. Unfortunately, SJM wasn't prepared to push us in the direction of being run 'like other clubs' so we now are where we are.

Whilst selling Sigurdsson was absolutely necessary, even a sceptic like me could see that - not spending a single bean of it on a player/players does beg the question 'how well are we run as a club?' We are told that we are well run time and time again, but not many other clubs actually needed a £7m sale of a player to actually stay on an even keel. (Maybe we are well run, in a non-financial sense, we do seem to have a squeaky clean reputation, I'll agree on that, however.)

My firm belief is now that SJM will sell RFC if/when we get to the Premiership (when RFC's stock will be highest), but he's not going stretch us in any way at all for us to get there. He gave it one go and did not like the fallout of paying 'inflated' wages and sorting out the parachute payments. It was way, way too much for him - and I can see where he's coming from. I am now one of the 'old folk' who are completely disillusioned with modern football. I will watch a good game, because it will be a good game...but beyond that, I'm not that bothered. It is too much about money whether that be club or player.

Even from my sofa, I know how RFC will generally get on. Swansea away, we'll lose that. Bristol at home, we'll score heavy. Burnley at home, we'll win that. We're that predictable. On and off the field. We've lost that joie de vivre (or I have) and it's just 'business' now. There's little to love as I used to (then oxf*rd off, you're not a proper faaaaaaan!) Whatever. Seen too much of this since 1988 not to think otherwise or pay attention to anyone who couldn't converse like this face to face.

I would love Reading to get promoted, don't get me wrong. I just can't see it, even in this super-average division. I can't remember the last league game where we actually did anything other than what I expect of Reading. It's all very bland. Once you filter out all the ramblings and marketing spin from SJM, the bluster from Hammond and the Yes Sir, No Sir, Three Bags Full Sir from McDermott - love the guy, but jeez, we thought Coppell was a Yes Man! I wish it was still all about skill, characters, and heart...but it's all very 'identikit' and players who just go anywhere for the better pay cheque. Prove me wrong anyone, McDermott, Madejski...but nothing has changed since 2007 and I seriously doubt it will.