NFFC Financial Talk

[Simon]

just read online about the lewis o brien deal to blackburn collapsing- that would have been around 12m into the kitty i guess we were expecting?

[Sausage Roll]

We're *not* happy with the Premier League judging by our statement.

[Username]

Absolute shambles of our own making.

[Madforit]

Absolute shambles of our own making.

 Spot on

[RyanR]

We haven’t really learned at all. We went up in spite of the horrendous scattergun recruitment approach once Cooper managed to get a settled side. Then we JUST stayed up, despite yet more poor recruitment. Now we’re languishing in the bottom 3 due to a lack of results and financial punishments. We’ve waited for so long to be promoted and this could be our undoing. Very disappointing.

[Salvatore Matrecano]

That the club has made some very big errors is for definite. However:

It was always going to be a gamble to stay up, to do so we tried to bend the rules. It worked at the time but its come back to bite us on the backside now. Worst case it got us another year in the PL.

Also.

Every single one of us who was waving scarves, bouncing up and down singing 30 signings who gives a f**k is complicit.

[wassy04]

Just read the entire thing, gets a bit boring after a while. The initial history of what happened is really interesting. My reading of it suggests there probably is grounds for an appeal as most of our mitigation was rejected.

I think the big takeaways:

- 10m on covid losses we weren't aware of until Jun 23, would've just lowered the loss.
- 20 promotion bonuses, they suggest that they are comparable to survival bonuses therefore they shouldn't be excluded. I think that misses the point though as if you survive you are budgeting for the extra PL income. Plus, if that is a factor worthy of 20m then why are there also parachute payments?
- Budgeted for 12th in March - really?!

The errors from our end really surround Brennan. Why didn't we just accept Atletico's offer? Even though it was conditional that was enough to prove we could've sold him and then if it fell through we still could've got more. The biggest mistake we made in all of this though is playing Brennan in those first four games, if we'd just taken him out, I think this would've stood up. How annoying.

The commission also argued we should've taken Brentford's offer in July as it was closer to the June deadline than the eventual sale. I think we could legitimately argue at that point there was no precedent for this so it made no sense for us to sell at that point once we'd missed the 30th June deadline.

Ultimately, I do also think there's a mitigation in general, in that the Everton case didn't exist at that point, they referred to that a lot in the case but we couldn't have known at that point that is how the rules would be applied. I think this partially offsets the mistakes made even if it doesn't work in the actual legal case. It's such complex stuff too and we needed to run close to the line to have a chance of staying up.

Just frustrating that they knew that we'd failed by June 30th yet we still played Brennan in those matches in August, that is a disappointing mistake that has sadly cost us 4 points (currently).

I hope it's clear from this overall though that I am largely defending the club aside from that one mistake as I suspect they are getting slaughtered online right now!

[wassy04]

That the club has made some very big errors is for definite. However:

It was always going to be a gamble to stay up, to do so we tried to bend the rules. It worked at the time but its come back to bite us on the backside now. Worst case it got us another year in the PL.

Also.

Every single one of us who was waving scarves, bouncing up and down singing 30 signings who gives a f**k is complicit.

I do disagree on the complicity, in my view the chant referred to the fact we'd been criticised for the quantity of signings rather than the fact that we'd knowingly breeched PSR. I think we all assumed that we'd stayed in the rules and even if we didn't could've sold a player or players up until 30th June. 

The first part is a summation of what I just posted though.

[ozzyten10]

That last gasp equaliser at Luton has really pissed me off twice now!
I think 3 points would have been fairer but the timing really pisses me off and seems to have been done to ensure we are in the relegation zone. I wonder if we had of won it would have been 6 (8-2).
How many points did we have playing Jonno?

[DeesideRed]

I hope this gives the team a clear and obvious cause to fight for now and we roll our sleeves up to show the prem what we are capable of. 2 huge home games and a great chance to bounce straight back out of the drop zone.

Palace, Fulham and wolves at home all offer chances to pick up maximum points. Do that and the worry becomes less. No way do Luton pick anything up at spurs arsenal or city in the same period.

I wouldnt trust Spurs

[wassy04]

Just read the entire thing, gets a bit boring after a while. The initial history of what happened is really interesting. My reading of it suggests there probably is grounds for an appeal as most of our mitigation was rejected.

I think the big takeaways:

- 10m on covid losses we weren't aware of until Jun 23, would've just lowered the loss.
- 20 promotion bonuses, they suggest that they are comparable to survival bonuses therefore they shouldn't be excluded. I think that misses the point though as if you survive you are budgeting for the extra PL income. Plus, if that is a factor worthy of 20m then why are there also parachute payments?
- Budgeted for 12th in March - really?!

The errors from our end really surround Brennan. Why didn't we just accept Atletico's offer? Even though it was conditional that was enough to prove we could've sold him and then if it fell through we still could've got more. The biggest mistake we made in all of this though is playing Brennan in those first four games, if we'd just taken him out, I think this would've stood up. How annoying.

The commission also argued we should've taken Brentford's offer in July as it was closer to the June deadline than the eventual sale. I think we could legitimately argue at that point there was no precedent for this so it made no sense for us to sell at that point once we'd missed the 30th June deadline.

Ultimately, I do also think there's a mitigation in general, in that the Everton case didn't exist at that point, they referred to that a lot in the case but we couldn't have known at that point that is how the rules would be applied. I think this partially offsets the mistakes made even if it doesn't work in the actual legal case. It's such complex stuff too and we needed to run close to the line to have a chance of staying up.

Just frustrating that they knew that we'd failed by June 30th yet we still played Brennan in those matches in August, that is a disappointing mistake that has sadly cost us 4 points (currently).

I hope it's clear from this overall though that I am largely defending the club aside from that one mistake as I suspect they are getting slaughtered online right now!

I just wanted to add the club deserves praise for the efforts made to work with the PL and respond quickly and not complain like Everton. It literally saved us two points!

[Salvatore Matrecano]

That last gasp equaliser at Luton has really pissed me off twice now!
I think 3 points would have been fairer but the timing really pisses me off and seems to have been done to ensure we are in the relegation zone. I wonder if we had of won it would have been 6 (8-2).
How many points did we have playing Jonno?

We got 3 points playing Johnson. As Wassy says would have had a stronger case by not playing him. Stronger still had we actually omitted him from the squad although that would potentially have weakened our selling position. Think it would have been more sensible in hindsight had he conveniently had an injury start of the season.