Search Results
Whelan and Wigan
Posted on May 4, 2010
With reform of football being part of the current zeitgeist, and political parties showing some interest in the topic at least until Thursday evening (see The Times They Are A-Changin’ 3, it does not come as a complete surprise that the Premier League, in the form of certain of its club Chairmen, should begin to […]
Posted in Benefactors, Debts, Governance, Premier League, UEFA, Wages | Leave a Comment »
Why I shall be especially grumpy this Saturday afternoon
Posted on April 3, 2012
“Football clubs ‘in poor financial health’” a headline on the BBC News website has just screamed (1). Apparently “many clubs are continuing to spend too much, principally on players’ wages, as they always have done”. What? Surely not? Well, OK, the said headline was in the Business section of the BBC website rather than their […]
Posted in Benefactors, Community, Debts, Financial doping, Governance, Insolvency, Ownership, Wages | 5 Comments »
The Magic of Football – still there in the Cups?
Posted on January 27, 2012
It’s increasingly difficult to see any magic in the beautiful game other than black magic, especially when you look at it from a financial perspective. You only need to think of the narrow escapes at Plymouth and Wrexham recently, and both Portsmouth and Darlington are standing on the edge of the precipice. The Cups may […]
Posted in Community, Fans | Leave a Comment »
The ins and outs of the transfer window
Posted on September 3, 2011
So, the transfer window finally slammed shut, to use the mandatory cliché, amid the predictable hype. In one respect this was hardly surprising – of the 289 August deals reported by the BBC (1), no fewer than 93, or 32%, had taken place on the final day. In total 141 (49%) had taken place in […]
Posted in Costs, Globetrotterisation, Premier League, Transfers, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
The Big 1, 2, 3 or is it still 4? Or more?
Posted on June 9, 2011
Currently I’m working on a joint research project on various European football leagues with colleagues in Austria. One set of data which we have produced so far casts some light on this perenial debate. The latest version of the date centres of course on whether Liverpool ‘have fallen out of the Top 4′, and/or whether […]
Posted in Governance, History, Premier League, Pyramid movement | 3 Comments »
Manchester City following in Pompey’s footsteps
Posted on October 2, 2010
Manchester City’s financial results, published earlier this week (1), were generally reported uncritically earlier this week, notwithstanding the key loss of £121m, with the exception at least of The Sun (2), where there was some attempt to look beyond the positive headlining provided by the club. According to the club, the financial highlights could be […]
Posted in Benefactors, Costs, Debts, Ownership | 10 Comments »
The trouble with new stadiums 4 (and final)
Posted on August 10, 2010
[See also The trouble with new stadiums 1, which looked at the argument that "We’re a club with ambition and we need more seats to reflect that ambition", The trouble with new stadiums 2, which looked at the argument that "We’ve got the wrong sort of stadium. We need one better suited to maximising our […]
Posted in Assets, Costs, Debts, Stadium | 13 Comments »
The trouble with new stadiums 1
Posted on June 27, 2010
You may have noticed – I am not a fan of the new stadium. At the Supporters Direct Conference I spoke briefly about ‘the myth of the new stadium’, and over a couple of postings I’ll elaborate on why I don’t, in general, rate them. Broadly, there are three lines of argument that are trotted […]
Posted in Stadium | 7 Comments »
A Political Football
Posted on May 20, 2010
In the lead up to the general election (and running alongside a large number of local council elections), I blogged on how I thought it significant that the political parties were wooing the fan vote, but did not hold out much prospect for major new initiatives actually happening after polling day. Well, as many a […]
Posted in 2018, Governance, Politics, Premier League | Leave a Comment »
A funny old week in football governance
Posted on March 26, 2010
The week started badly enough with the surprise resignation of Ian Watmore as Chief Executive of the FA (1), swiftly followed by a typically decisive FA reaction, to appoint current chief operating officer Alex Horne on a temporary basis until December in his place (2). This has been followed by a major round of conspiracy […]
Posted in Football Association, Governance, Premier League | 1 Comment »
Kettering Town and the enigmatic Imraan Ladak
Posted on January 18, 2010
Trying to find the single adjective to describe someone in a headline is often difficult, but in the case of Kettering Town’s Imraan Ladak ‘enigmatic’ readily springs to mind. The club has a long history and, for many years, slowly but surely, clawed their way up the pyramid. In 1974 they applied to the Football […]
Posted in Benefactors, Football Association, Governance, Ownership, Stadium | 5 Comments »
Statements of the bleeding obvious, the ironic, or just the plain surreal
Posted on November 23, 2009
Headlines can be oddly misleading. I clicked through just now to ‘Boro collapse stuns France’, wondering how the French had failed to notice Middlesbrough’s relegation for so long (1), only to find that I had forgotten the name of the manager of one of our leading resurrectionist club. They can also be very amusing. I’m […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
Half Premier League ‘technically insolvent’
Posted on August 15, 2009
The latest report from Equifax on the financial state of the clubs in the Premier League (as reported at 1) makes extremely depressing reading. Details are shown below. The Equifax score is based on accounts data, age of accounts, trading stability, profitability, working capital, gearing, and legal and court information. Club Score out of 100 […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
Liverpool and the Auditors
Posted on June 11, 2009
KPMG, the auditors of Liverpool, have warned of a “material uncertainty which may cast significant doubt upon the group’s ability to continue as a going concern” (1). So, what does the qualification of a company’s accounts by its auditors imply? With a conventional business it would certainly be a cause for concern, and an indicator […]
Posted in Debts | Leave a Comment »
Premier League wages
Posted on June 6, 2009
Deloitte’s Annual Review of Football Finance is eagerly awaited by fans of the football business, and this week’s appearance was no exception (1). Their view that, all in all, the Premier League garden is rosy, was repeated in reports such as that of the BBC, which is headlined “Premier League ‘defies downturn’” (2). Over recent […]
Posted in Costs, Revenues, Wages | Leave a Comment »
