Finance

[Nameless]

- It would probably be got around using other forms of payment such as performance bonuses, image rights payments, and so forth. You could see players simultaneously employed as “football consultants” or some such.
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This wouldn’t happen.
Take a look at the rules for the rugby cap. It covers a wide range of ways of trying to get round the cap. Payments or benefits to spouses, children, family members, agents etc etc are all counted. You can’t loan money to players unless it’s paid back in the same year, you can’t make payments through third parties or through second jobs.

That’s good to know. I would still be concerned about clubs getting around it. I think abolishing the whole concept of second jobs or employing family members potentially has undesirable knock-on effects but maybe if you do really want to pay players less for some reason then that’s a price worth paying.

It is perfectly fine for players to have second jobs at clubs, and for family members to be employed. It just has to be included in the assessment of ‘salary’. There is also scope for common sense. If a player married a person employed by the club then that wouldn’t impact the salary calculation as long as the partner had a genuine job. If partners of all players were appointed ‘match day ambassadors’ but there were no responsibilities or requirements attached then their salary would be included.
The penalties for getting round it need to be severe and the policing needs to be effective. Sarries have been hit very heavily for their attempts to get round it.

[SCIAG]

Programmes - as someone who likes to collect them, especially for grounds ive not been to before. Reduce the size by half and cut the cost to £2 if that. Don’t need 80 pages of detailed content like previous games reviews.

For some without the internet that's their only way of reading that information..... maybe ditch some of the photos/make it black and white to reduce cost, but don't remove actual content?

I stopped buying programmes years ago, stopped buying food at the stadium and for a while stopped buying anything in the megastore - I did get a shirt a while back when ST Holders got a 50% off voucher... it does help reduce the cost of attending a game significantly making it possible to attend more games on the same budget.

I barely buy stuff apart from programmes either - and if I was a ST holder I don’t think I’d fork out £3 for one every time. Not convinced there’s many if any without internet nowadays.

It’s a minor aspect of football but I know a while back the EFL made publishing programmes as non-mandatory due to it not being profitable for many clubs. I just see it as another aspect of football that has multiplied perhaps unnecessarily- they used to be a lot smaller and weren’t necessarily any worse

About 10% of the population do not use the internet, which is quite incredible really. About 80% of those are elderly. Suspect it’s lower among Reading fans given that Reading is a wealthy, urban area, but always important to remember that the internet isn’t as ubiquitous as it feels.

[Forbury Lion]

- It would probably be got around using other forms of payment such as performance bonuses, image rights payments, and so forth. You could see players simultaneously employed as “football consultants” or some such.
.

This wouldn’t happen.
Take a look at the rules for the rugby cap. It covers a wide range of ways of trying to get round the cap. Payments or benefits to spouses, children, family members, agents etc etc are all counted. You can’t loan money to players unless it’s paid back in the same year, you can’t make payments through third parties or through second jobs.

If this is an English league thing only, it'll certainly reduce the number of foreign players coming over here but might see the better English players who can't get into the premier league move abroad for the bigger payout.

Player salaries should be based on what the club can afford

[Nameless]

- It would probably be got around using other forms of payment such as performance bonuses, image rights payments, and so forth. You could see players simultaneously employed as “football consultants” or some such.
.

This wouldn’t happen.
Take a look at the rules for the rugby cap. It covers a wide range of ways of trying to get round the cap. Payments or benefits to spouses, children, family members, agents etc etc are all counted. You can’t loan money to players unless it’s paid back in the same year, you can’t make payments through third parties or through second jobs.

If this is an English league thing only, it'll certainly reduce the number of foreign players coming over here but might see the better English players who can't get into the premier league move abroad for the bigger payout.

Player salaries should be based on what the club can afford

Major issue there is defining ‘what the club can afford’.

[Notts Royal]

So following Howe’s recent comments, he’s pretty much said some of the players signed last summer were signed on what he described as Premier League wages. The previous assumption on here was that last summers recruitment was on more manageable wages than the Gourlay era, which doesn’t stack up to Howe’s comments.

Fair to assume Puscas will be one of them and a player we’ll likely try and move on whenever the transfer window opens. It is worrying that Howe’s saying one thing but the Dais are doing the complete opposite. Reminds me of when he said he was told by Anton to sign players on ridiculous wages. At least this time the players signed seemed to have fitted the club a bit better than players in the Anton era.
But shifting them again is going to be an issue, as it will be for every club following this crisis. And the league position is still poor considering the outlay. More happy times ahead for us then by the looks of it!

[Hound]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

[Snowflake Royal]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

Problem solved by xn lowest salary cap. Everywhere.

Try x 15. Want to pay someone £5m a year? Minimum salary is £333k


We all add value. Nothing works without all of us. A more equal society is a happier one.

[Hound]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

Problem solved by xn lowest salary cap. Everywhere.

Try x 15. Want to pay someone £5m a year? Minimum salary is £333k


We all add value. Nothing works without all of us. A more equal society is a happier one.

a much wider solution of course - not one I'd disagree with

[Forbury Lion]

This wouldn’t happen.
Take a look at the rules for the rugby cap. It covers a wide range of ways of trying to get round the cap. Payments or benefits to spouses, children, family members, agents etc etc are all counted. You can’t loan money to players unless it’s paid back in the same year, you can’t make payments through third parties or through second jobs.

If this is an English league thing only, it'll certainly reduce the number of foreign players coming over here but might see the better English players who can't get into the premier league move abroad for the bigger payout.

Player salaries should be based on what the club can afford

Major issue there is defining ‘what the club can afford’.

Especially given that footballer contracts are unlike regular employee contracts where you can get rid of employees if they fail to meet certain performance requirements or if their role is no longer required due to downsizing of operations.... plus the transfer fees paid and received, You may have a player on £10k a week you don't need but you may choose not to make them redundant because they have a perceived transfer value of £5m.

We really need a Nicky Hammond or even the Nicky Hammond here to shift players for double their market worth.

[Forbury Lion]

Other things to consider:

Maximum contract length of 2 seasons, this can be extended after each passing season by another season - This will prevent clubs being stuck with players on long term contracts eating up their salary budgets.... maybe apply the same rule to managers, especially useful for teams like us who manager every 18 months!

Transfer fee caps - I expect the contract length cap above will impact this anyway, Cap will be on buying, not selling.

There should also be some investigation into distributing revenue more evenly - top 3 teams get promoted to the money league, so shouldn't get any prize money. TV revenue should be distributed more evenly, perhaps even gate receipts and sponsorship revenues should be looked at?

Football agents - cap the fees, The best way to bring these down is to make the players pay the fees.

Centralisation - Are there services that all clubs provide which could be merged into one big contract at a cheaper cost per club than all having individual contracts and maybe done better as a result? - Maybe Stewarding, Ticket sales, merchandise, Online stores, that sort of thing. In fact, even if two clubs pooled their services they would both likely reduce overheads. Take merchandise, you order 1,000 mugs with a Reading logo on for one unit price, but if 20 clubs combine and order 20,000 mugs with different logos on you get a cheaper cost per unit.

[Wycombe Royal]

Centralisation - Are there services that all clubs provide which could be merged into one big contract at a cheaper cost per club than all having individual contracts and maybe done better as a result? - Maybe Stewarding, Ticket sales, merchandise, Online stores, that sort of thing. In fact, even if two clubs pooled their services they would both likely reduce overheads. Take merchandise, you order 1,000 mugs with a Reading logo on for one unit price, but if 20 clubs combine and order 20,000 mugs with different logos on you get a cheaper cost per unit.

A shared service for football clubs.....a bit like Jereny Corbin's politics. Sounds great in theory but would never work in the real world.

Most companies who all have the same parent can struggle with shared services, so how would 20 football clubs, all with different owners, make it work.

[Ascotexgunner]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

Problem solved by xn lowest salary cap. Everywhere.

Try x 15. Want to pay someone £5m a year? Minimum salary is £333k


We all add value. Nothing works without all of us. A more equal society is a happier one.

But there will always be a Derby, Wolves and Villa though who look (and succeed) in breaking or exploiting the system. Football accounting is a sham and hidden novelties like image rights/shirt sales and other hidden payments can easily be used as a get around salary caps......I believe german clubs are professionally audited before the season starts (and in their case clubs can be stopped from competing or penalised if their books are not in order), nothing will change.

[Snowflake Royal]

National Player Union

All wages go through that.

Transfer Body

All transfer fees go through that (as recommended by Coppell and Co when George Graham got done)

Etc.

[SCIAG]

Every time a club wants to buy or sell something, they have to flip a coin. If they call it right then the item is free. They can then choose to go double or nothing.

[Hendo]

Every time a club wants to buy or sell something, they have to flip a coin. If they call it right then the item is free. They can then choose to go double or nothing.

All coin flips conducted by:

[Greatwesternline]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

Problem solved by xn lowest salary cap. Everywhere.

Try x 15. Want to pay someone £5m a year? Minimum salary is £333k


We all add value. Nothing works without all of us. A more equal society is a happier one.

But there will always be a Derby, Wolves and Villa though who look (and succeed) in breaking or exploiting the system. Football accounting is a sham and hidden novelties like image rights/shirt sales and other hidden payments can easily be used as a get around salary caps......I believe german clubs are professionally audited before the season starts (and in their case clubs can be stopped from competing or penalised if their books are not in order), nothing will change.

You do realise that Reading are one of the clubs which are exploiting the system, we've just wasted the money.

[Nameless]

Problem solved by xn lowest salary cap. Everywhere.

Try x 15. Want to pay someone £5m a year? Minimum salary is £333k


We all add value. Nothing works without all of us. A more equal society is a happier one.

But there will always be a Derby, Wolves and Villa though who look (and succeed) in breaking or exploiting the system. Football accounting is a sham and hidden novelties like image rights/shirt sales and other hidden payments can easily be used as a get around salary caps......I believe german clubs are professionally audited before the season starts (and in their case clubs can be stopped from competing or penalised if their books are not in order), nothing will change.

You do realise that Reading are one of the clubs which are exploiting the system, we've just wasted the money.

EVery club ‘exploits’ the system and it would be shocking if they didn’t. There is a difference between making sure you run your business to maximise what the rules allow you to do and actually being fraudulent....

[Snowflake Royal]

I must have imagined the word "ethics". Or is it just about some shitty reality TV show.

[Greatwesternline]

But there will always be a Derby, Wolves and Villa though who look (and succeed) in breaking or exploiting the system. Football accounting is a sham and hidden novelties like image rights/shirt sales and other hidden payments can easily be used as a get around salary caps......I believe german clubs are professionally audited before the season starts (and in their case clubs can be stopped from competing or penalised if their books are not in order), nothing will change.

You do realise that Reading are one of the clubs which are exploiting the system, we've just wasted the money.

EVery club ‘exploits’ the system and it would be shocking if they didn’t. There is a difference between making sure you run your business to maximise what the rules allow you to do and actually being fraudulent....

Not every club has sold their ground and training ground to a related party to generate a bit of bogus one off revenue. If the football authorities were smarter they would have based FFP on football trading revenue rather than capital sales. Maybe they'll tighten up those rules next time.

[Forbury Lion]

Not sure why’d you want to stop people who have worked their backsides off since they were kids to get to (nearly) the top of their profession earning a decent wage. 100k isn’t an especially large amount nowadays, esp when their career is limited in length, prone to injury and the whims of their manager at any time

It would have to be considerably higher than that if they did implement and even then I wouldn’t be in favour. Maybe an overall salary cap for the club rather than individuals

Worth noting that higher tax rates apply to higher earners, so just because someone is on twice as much basic salary it doesn't mean they take home twice as much post tax pay.