Stoke show RFC how to run a Real Football Club

[Sir Dodger Royal]

Not so long ago Stoke City were viewed as second rate to RFC. How things have changed. It just shows what a well run club can achieve. Even negotiating for the likes of Crouch & Palacios. If only RFC had some ambition then maybe Stoke would still be second rate.

No doubt the RTGs believe the boll**ks spouted by our deranged Chairman but then they all tend to be braindead so little hope on that front.

I am surprised the Madman wasn't up in the smoke looking for bargains over last few days. How he has the aldacity to come out on the pitch with his stupid monkey claps prior to kick off god only knows. Still the RFC fans have no bal** so sit there like dummies lapping it all up.

I wonder whether they will have the same view when we floundering later in the season. They will probably say how well we are playing in view of the fact that all the best players have been sold.

Praise the Lord. If only he could helppppppppppppp

[tomrfcurz]

It's true. Perhaps Sunderland and Bolton may be two other examples. 2nd tier sides who've gone up, slowly invested, then more then see the benefits in staying as a solid PL team

[MmmMonsterMunch]

It's true. Perhaps Sunderland and Bolton may be two other examples. 2nd tier sides who've gone up, slowly invested, then more then see the benefits in staying as a solid PL team

Err....I'm no JM fan but weren't Bolton about £90m in debt at last count??!! That 'slow' investment is just an accumulation of more debt & nothing else. Both the clubs you mention are clearly just servicing the debt they owe with high interest payments with no thought at all as to how it will ever be paid off.

At some point, someone will want their money back & then they'll go into administration.

Mind you.....the laws are so corrupt some other dodgy bastard can come along buy the club for £1 & start racking up the debt all over again so it does make you think why bother sticking to the rules?!

[Tilehurst End]

Paid us around £8million for Kitson and Sonko, shrewd purchases they proved to be.

[rhroyal]

Sunderland different kettle of fish with financial backing and resources we can only dream of, partly down to crowd sizes. Bolton and Stoke granted though.

We dropped the ball at the end of 06/07; apparently it was Coppell's choice and not JM. We needed to strengthen then, when we were in a decent position and probably attractive to potential players. The transfer window in January 2008 too.

It's not like we can do much differently now. The financial constraints on this club have been documented. When the financial records were posted up on Floyd's thread people still chose to ignore or rubbish them (with no shred of evidence to challenge them) so I give up arguing.

Suffice to say, Coppell had the opportunity to strengthen and chose not to. That's the main difference between us and the clubs mentioned.

EDIT: Here are the aforementioned statements. Disagree with them? Please find some evidence to back up your opinion or stop expending energy voicing your pointless opinion. http://star-reading.org/index.php/downl ... ew/165/74/

[Ian Royal]

It's true. Perhaps Sunderland and Bolton may be two other examples. 2nd tier sides who've gone up, slowly invested, then more then see the benefits in staying as a solid PL team

Stoke have spent big.

Bolton maybe. Sunderland have always been bigger than us. Wigan are an example of a club which has successfully done it from smaller than us, but by spending unsustainably.

In this it's useful to look at the success stories, but also at the failures. Look at what's happened to the teams that made it and failed to make it stick or those who didn't get there in the first place. We're by no means the most successful, but I think if you look at it closely how we've done would still be towards the top end of most clubs.

[Gordons Cumming]

It's nice to read SDR's well crafted comments.

I've missed them.

[manny96]

'audacity' perhaps?

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

How much do you believe Coppell had to play with, and do you think any signings at that price might have made the difference. It has also been shown that many of the players sold after relegation were not really up to Prem standard, so why would they have continued to improve with RFC?

[manny96]

and I didn't know that Stoke had been endorsed by the king of Spain

[manny96]

and you're tedious

[Gordons Cumming]

and you're tedious

SDR TEDIUOS???

I won't have it! I just won't have it!!!!

[Simon's Church]

CROFLouch and PaLOLacios?

I'd rather keep the players we've got and win just as much as them over the next few years thanks.

[rhroyal]

How much do you believe Coppell had to play with, and do you think any signings at that price might have made the difference. It has also been shown that many of the players sold after relegation were not really up to Prem standard, so why would they have continued to improve with RFC?

I can't say how much. How much would a right winger have cost? How much would Gary Cahill, for example, have cost? We were relegated by 3 goals in the end, so arguably all we needed was one player to improve the squad in a weak position. That would have surely been CB or RM. All I do know is that 06/07 and 07/08 were to the only 2 years in recent history where we have been comfortably profitable. More than £6m so, with no player sales needed to keep us in the black.

You could pay £4-5m in a transfer fee and have change left over for 20K a week in wages with that. For 2 players (1 for each season), leaving the club profitable. It was offered to Coppell (I remember the headline: "Coppell promised January war-chest") with figures of £10m available quoted. Rumours on figures are unlikely to be accurate, but we can be confident that it was Coppell's choice not to spend the money. He said time and time again that he was happy with what we had.

I hear STGs asking "What happened with these profits after relegation?" Simple. SJM has said many times he wants an appropriate buyer to come in for this club. This became less likely upon relegation, but improving the balance sheet helps. The profits carried from those years still didn't wipe out all the debts from the first 15 years of his reign, but we are more liquid and safe for using these profits to wipe out some of the debts.

I'd also say that missing out on promotion in 08/09 was nothing to do with the quality of the squad or "ambition". We operated at a huge loss that year, making the sales of Doyle, Hunt and Bikey absolutely necessary. We didn't go up because of a huge bottle job from players and management that year; the squad had the potential to walk the league. Would ploughing an extra £6m or so in from the previous 2 years profits have solved this? Can't be sure, but I doubt it would have helped the morale and team ethic which fell apart in 2009. If it had failed, we'd have been in even bigger trouble at the end of the season, with a higher wage bill and weaker balance sheet.

And so we are where we are now. We still hold debt, but it is manageable sustainable debt. We operate in the black year on year to keep it this way. The club is solvent and potentially attractive to the correct buyer. I'd actually say we're a very attractive proposition for a buyer. Wealthy, large catchment area for fans. Modern facilities and planning permission approved for stadium expansion. All we really lack to be one of the top 15 clubs in England is success on the pitch, but we already have a squad that is competing for promotion.

Any potential buyer will just have to invest a little to all this, like JM did initially, and we're potentially at the next level. Do we want to undermine this position by running at a deficit and accruing debts? I'd argue a definite no.

[Terminal Boardom]

I thoroughly enjoy SDR's musings and they brighten up the Team Board when they appear. And for once, some reasoned discussion from some. It is true that the club is in a far better shape in all manners of speaking compared to the mess that SJM bought into. But this talk of war chest in 2008 is interesting. So much rumour and speculation. Is it not possible that SJM did not make money available and SSC, beiing the honourable man that he is, would not speak out against him? Is that not remotely possible?

[rhroyal]

I thoroughly enjoy SDR's musings and they brighten up the Team Board when they appear. And for once, some reasoned discussion from some. It is true that the club is in a far better shape in all manners of speaking compared to the mess that SJM bought into. But this talk of war chest in 2008 is interesting. So much rumour and speculation. Is it not possible that SJM did not make money available and SSC, beiing the honourable man that he is, would not speak out against him? Is that not remotely possible?

Possible, but not probable. SJM is a businessman; he knows that the best thing to do with profit is to reinvest it and turn it into greater profit. He would not be the man he is today is he had not followed that principle as a young, aspiring entrepreneur.

I find it hard to believe a man who has become a multi-millionaire based upon this principle would then turn his back on it when the club was running a £6m+ surplus, as shown in the accounts uploaded earlier on this thread. Coppell's unwillingness to spend then put him in a catch-22 situation, as his success as a football chairman has been to stay out of footballing affairs and leave the manager in charge. He chose to stick by this principle and not put too much pressure on SSC to mix things up when he was unwilling.

Not saying that's fact, just saying it sounds most likely to me.

[Toon Toon Blue army]

I can't say how much. How much would a right winger have cost? How much would Gary Cahill, for example, have cost? We were relegated by 3 goals in the end, so arguably all we needed was one player to improve the squad in a weak position. That would have surely been CB or RM. All I do know is that 06/07 and 07/08 were to the only 2 years in recent history where we have been comfortably profitable. More than £6m so, with no player sales needed to keep us in the black.

You could pay £4-5m in a transfer fee and have change left over for 20K a week in wages with that. For 2 players (1 for each season), leaving the club profitable. It was offered to Coppell (I remember the headline: "Coppell promised January war-chest") with figures of £10m available quoted. Rumours on figures are unlikely to be accurate, but we can be confident that it was Coppell's choice not to spend the money. He said time and time again that he was happy with what we had.

I hear STGs asking "What happened with these profits after relegation?" Simple. SJM has said many times he wants an appropriate buyer to come in for this club. This became less likely upon relegation, but improving the balance sheet helps. The profits carried from those years still didn't wipe out all the debts from the first 15 years of his reign, but we are more liquid and safe for using these profits to wipe out some of the debts.

I'd also say that missing out on promotion in 08/09 was nothing to do with the quality of the squad or "ambition". We operated at a huge loss that year, making the sales of Doyle, Hunt and Bikey absolutely necessary. We didn't go up because of a huge bottle job from players and management that year; the squad had the potential to walk the league. Would ploughing an extra £6m or so in from the previous 2 years profits have solved this? Can't be sure, but I doubt it would have helped the morale and team ethic which fell apart in 2009. If it had failed, we'd have been in even bigger trouble at the end of the season, with a higher wage bill and weaker balance sheet.

And so we are where we are now. We still hold debt, but it is manageable sustainable debt. We operate in the black year on year to keep it this way. The club is solvent and potentially attractive to the correct buyer. I'd actually say we're in a very attractive proposition for a buyer. Wealthy, large catchment area for fans. Modern facilities and planning permission approved for stadium expansion. All we really lack to be one of the top 15 clubs in England is success on the pitch, but we already have a squad that is competing for promotion.

Any potential buyer will just have to invest a little to all this, like JM did initially, and we're potentially at the next level. Do we want to undermine this position by running at a deficit and accruing debts? I'd argue a definite no.

Best post I have read in a long time.

I still firmly believe if we had signed a right winger in 07/08 we would have stayed up and who knows where we would be now. Remember we had Oster at RM for the entire season, the likes of Routledge and Gary O'Neill who were both available then would have improved us significantly. We could have gone for Gary Cahill too.

But thats in the past and thats the only time I have been annoyed at the club for showing a 'lack of ambition'. People need to realise how much of a gamble 08/09 was, keeping the majority of our 'stars'. And it can be argued we have been paying for that over the last few seasons. That being said, I will be quite annoyed if a reasonably significant amount of the Long/Mills money is not re-invested into the team over the next year or so.

[Pseud O'Nym]

In this it's useful to look at the success stories, but also at the failures. Look at what's happened to the teams that made it and failed to make it stick or those who didn't get there in the first place. We're by no means the most successful, but I think if you look at it closely how we've done would still be towards the top end of most clubs.

Hull are a great example of a failure. During their 2 years in the Prem they racked up losses of around £25 million without ever getting out of the bottom half of the table. The new owner, having paid the obligatory £1 for the club, had to put in £30 million cash and underwrite a further £10 million of debt just to avoid liquidation.

[Terminal Boardom]

I will be quite annoyed if a reasonably significant amount of the Long/Mills money is not re-invested into the team over the next year or so.

Reasonably significant can mean many things. But what if the money goes into the club to cover the known budgetary deficit which will allow the club to keep the current players on the sort of money they already are on? Isn't that investment of sorts?

[Plymouth_Royal]

Sunderland different kettle of fish with financial backing and resources we can only dream of, partly down to crowd sizes. Bolton and Stoke granted though.

We dropped the ball at the end of 06/07; apparently it was Coppell's choice and not JM. We needed to strengthen then, when we were in a decent position and probably attractive to potential players. The transfer window in January 2008 too.

It's not like we can do much differently now. The financial constraints on this club have been documented. When the financial records were posted up on Floyd's thread people still chose to ignore or rubbish them (with no shred of evidence to challenge them) so I give up arguing.

Suffice to say, Coppell had the opportunity to strengthen and chose not to. That's the main difference between us and the clubs mentioned.

EDIT: Here are the aforementioned statements. Disagree with them? Please find some evidence to back up your opinion or stop expending energy voicing your pointless opinion. http://star-reading.org/index.php/downl ... ew/165/74/

Great link. I feel quite humbled reading that and I strongly suggest others read it too.