RUMOUR - Robert Beric

[Sutekh]

No, as discussed above, the man in question was not Beric.

It was probably Bond, Jon Bond.....

[Platypuss]

No, as discussed above, the man in question was not Beric.

It was probably Bond, Jon Bond.....

Any particular reason he'd be flying in from Montenegro?

[P!ssed Off]

No, as discussed above, the man in question was not Beric.

It was probably Bond, Jon Bond.....

Actually, looking at him on google images, it might well have been him in the hotel.
Wish I'd taken a picture now.

[howser]

This one might have some legs in it, I think Clarke , with his pre incoming transfer activity media releases, has very much told the club what his ambitions were, and they seem to have, agreed with him or buckled down, to provide him with the amunition for next season. Just where this leaves Pog and Simon Cox I am not sure, as Clarke was pretty adamant that Samual would be given his chances in pre-season to see what he has aboit him.

Possibly if the HRK rumours to Wigan proved to be true that would save one of them ?

[paultheroyal]

If this turned out to not be bollox i think it would start waving massive flags that the Thais are mental and dodgy. There's no way on earth we should be paying multiple millions for a player given our circumstances.

What circumstances? I thought we were now quite stable and back on track. Off loaded a lot of players and ownership saga sorted

I find it difficult to believe we've halved our wage budget with Pog, Williams, Gunter, McCleary and HRK still here and we're losing ~£8m in parachute money having been making a big loss the previous year and squeeking through FFP.

Sorting out the problems we had in 12 months would be phenomenal.

Not to mention that we're currently a bottom half champ club and that'd be close to our record fee, if not above it.

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

[From Despair To Where?]

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

Bring in replacements on half the wages and you're looking at a reduction in the £18m wage bill of less than £3m. We've probably accounted for at least £1.5-2m with Sa, Quinn, McShane and Bond already.

Factor in the drop in parachute payments and that's hardly books well and truly balanced. Taylor and Akpan won't be on much and I'd be surprised if Cox is on more than £10-12,000 a week considering we were practically broke when we signed him.

I suspect that we have struck some cracking deals with Carabao and Thai Airways, 2 companies looking to break into the European market who probably see sponsoring a football team as a decent use of an advertising budget.

[yuomi]

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

Bring in replacements on half the wages and you're looking at a reduction in the £18m wage bill of less than £3m. We've probably accounted for at least £1.5-2m with Sa, Quinn, McShane and Bond already.

Factor in the drop in parachute payments and that's hardly books well and truly balanced. Taylor and Akpan won't be on much and I'd be surprised if Cox is on more than £10-12,000 a week considering we were practically broke when we signed him.

I suspect that we have struck some cracking deals with Carabao and Thai Airways, 2 companies looking to break into the European market who probably see sponsoring a football team as a decent use of an advertising budget.

We know the owners have vested interests in both companies so I suspect they've circumvented FFP by funneling the cash in through the sponsorship deals a la PSG. Lovely creative accounting.

[Royal Ginger]

No, as discussed above, the man in question was not Beric.

It was probably Bond, Jon Bond.....

Any particular reason he'd be flying in from Montenegro?

I heard he'd helped his cousin to foil a plot to blow up the world.

[From Despair To Where?]

We know the owners have vested interests in both companies so I suspect they've circumvented FFP by funneling the cash in through the sponsorship deals a la PSG. Lovely creative accounting.

Well, as long as it's money they actually have, it satisfies FFP and they don't go throwing crazy money about then you have to be cautiously optimistic.

Beric looks to be a decent player. Whether close to £4m is a realistic valuation that we should be meeting, I'm not so sure.

[Royal Ginger]

We know the owners have vested interests in both companies so I suspect they've circumvented FFP by funneling the cash in through the sponsorship deals a la PSG. Lovely creative accounting.

Well, as long as it's money they actually have, it satisfies FFP and they don't go throwing crazy money about then you have to be cautiously optimistic.

Beric looks to be a decent player. Whether close to £4m is a realistic valuation that we should be meeting, I'm not so sure.

Absolutely this. Cautious optimism with mild concerns about how the money is being supplied for this would seem to be the appropriate sentiment.

[SydenhamRoyal]

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

Bring in replacements on half the wages and you're looking at a reduction in the £18m wage bill of less than £3m. We've probably accounted for at least £1.5-2m with Sa, Quinn, McShane and Bond already.

Factor in the drop in parachute payments and that's hardly books well and truly balanced. Taylor and Akpan won't be on much and I'd be surprised if Cox is on more than £10-12,000 a week considering we were practically broke when we signed him.

I suspect that we have struck some cracking deals with Carabao and Thai Airways, 2 companies looking to break into the European market who probably see sponsoring a football team as a decent use of an advertising budget.

Either that, or the club are borrowing the money, perhaps from the Bank of Bangkok. So gambling our future on having a pop at the premier league in the next couple of seasons.

[West Stand Man]

We know the owners have vested interests in both companies so I suspect they've circumvented FFP by funneling the cash in through the sponsorship deals a la PSG. Lovely creative accounting.

Can we just clarify that this is the same set of owners who only 2 weeks ago:

Were Not worth a penny
Were Developers who only bought the club to run it down and use the land for other purposes
Would never put any money into the club
Etc
Etc etc

[RoyallyFcuked]

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

You missed out the worst one though which is of course Pog, the sooner him and his wages are moved on, the better.

I'm also not convinced our new Thai owners have even put any money in yet, other than buying the ownership itself. There is a very Madejski and Co feel to the way the club is doing business at the moment, just makes you wonder how much more money there would have been were it not for the whole AZ interference (which is why I made the point about Pog). Maybe as we could have been spending that much more on slightly better players we could have even broken our little £2.5m transfer record on someone actually worth having.

[bobby1413]

Guthrie £40k a week
Pearce £24k a week
Karacan £22k a week
Federici £22k a week

That is a sizeable sum of money to bring in alternatives on half the wage...

Move others off soon ie Akpan, Taylor, Kanu, Cox

And the books well and truly balanced

There is a very Madejski and Co feel to the way the club is doing business at the moment

Pre-signings that would concern me. However after seeing the business so far I think it's a good thing.

Agree regarding off loading the other high earners.

[Sutekh]

Hopefully this clarifies the position. The 5.4million Euros is Rapid's valuation not what RFC has bid. Whether we do to not is under consideration.

Reading FC have confirmed they are chasing the signature of Slovenian striker Robert Beric.

The Rapid Vienna striker had been linked to the Royals after an interview with Austrian website kurier.at in which Rapid's sporting director outlined a £3.5 million bid was expected from Reading.

Club sources have confirmed they are interested in the player, who scored 27 goals in the Austrian Bundesliga last season, but are concerned by the price tag - which would be a new club record.

Andreas Muller, sporting director at Rapid, said: "We have set a price of €5.4 million. That would be a record in the club's history. From there, we would need to talk about a sale. I would have no problem rejecting that bid but it's also about whether Beric would want to move. There's no point keeping an unhappy striker. If the €5.4 million bid comes in, we need to clarify the situation with Robert."

My guess is that that valuation will stop this move happening.

[linkenholtroyal]

2.5 mill plus add ons is not bad for a goalscorer (which is probably whatsit would end up being) If Derby can spend 4 million on Ince, I think if this did happen it would probably be our last signing off tieback of the thais, I think after that it will be 1 in 1 out after that. So 2 would have to go to fill lm and lb. Maybe pog if can be offloaded ( or that will give us something to look forward to next summer. Maybe Cox, hrk and blackman could find the money for the rest, it's a long window still left,

[From Despair To Where?]

I love the way people say "Oh, we'll fund it by selling Player X or Player Y"


Let's be honest, no-ones going to buy the players we want to shift because they're either shit, overpaid or shit and overpaid.

[linkenholtroyal]

I love the way people say "Oh, we'll fund it by selling Player X or Player Y"


Let's be honest, no-ones going to buy the players we want to shift because they're either shit, overpaid or shit and overpaid.

Well working on the philosophy we were stupidenough to buy them, someone else is stupid enough take them off of us, saying that I don't dislike Cox he does a shift but he may be forced out, for a league 1 side for 500k he would be an attractive option.

[From Despair To Where?]

...as long as he's prepared to take a 50% pay cut.

[Ian Royal]

Blackman and Akpan, as examples, were poor signings when we made them. They've since proved they aren't good enough for the Championship. There's a reason there's no interest in them. It's because they aren't good enough for anyone at this level and they're too expensive for anyone in League One or below (and not that great for that level either I expect).

Pog is never going to take a massive wage cut to go elsewhere. He's pretty much openly said it in the past.

HRK thinks he's good enough for the PL and is going to be on good wages. He's done nothing to show he can actually cut it regularly and be worth that.


It's a minor miracle we shifted Drenthe. We're not going to manage it with many, if any, or our remaining overpaid dross.