madras

FANTASTIC? Remember Toon Gate? he should never ever had been allowed back!, that scenario almost got the club relegated that season more than made up for that with subsequent achievements while robson was in charge. at our height under robson he was just abotu the best chairman you could wish for.however the biig decision was always going to be replacing robson and he completely and utterly f***ed it up and our decline since then can all be traced to that one decision. he tried to claw us back by giving souness 36m for transfers but it simply compounded the situation. had he timed the robson replacement correctly, brought in a top manager (after all we were a top club back then) and gave him the money souness had spent instead, then theres a good chance we would still be up there fighting for 4th spot in the table. doesn't that make you wonder if doing well in the first place was more by fluke than design ?

If you consider interest not earned/inflation, you are anyhoo nacional are winning and i laid them as soon as they scored to guarntee a profit as they were playing crap.

simply put ,he gambled and after winning to start with ended up losing and spare me the heart bit. no-one has ever made so much money out of the club.

Feel for the fans, but all to happy to take their undeserved place in the premierleague. how is it undeserved ? Arguably it's undeserved because they've spent far beyond their means on the players that has kept them in the league. Not saying I agree with the sentiment mind. not a kick in the arse off what we done then.

Feel for the fans, but all to happy to take their undeserved place in the premierleague. how is it undeserved ?

In a nutshell, the buyer would pay Ashley £80m as a settlement on the £110m+ loans outstanding (£30m loss)...and £1 for the club (£134m loss). Again, i don't buy it, but if it is the case, it's a horrible indictment of his purchase and his running of the club. He's every bit as much to blame as anyone that preceded him at the helm, probably moreso. He increased the wage bill at the club by over 10% in his first year, paid out large redundancy packages to two managers in his first 18 months and got us relegated within two years. putting it like that is like saying that as shearer was manager when we got relegated then it is solely his fault. Don't be silly. I don't think I said anyone has been solely to blame for anything. Shearer was in charge for 8 games. He took us from being 2 points from safety to a finish 1 point from safety (closer to survival). We'd taken 6 points from the last eight games before he came in and he won 5 points from the last 8 games (only slightly worse). He spent nothing. He didin't have the time or the power to make the situation any worse. Completely different to spending 18 months following the policy of your predecessor (badly), then blaming your predecessor and his policy for all the ills that have befallen the club. are you telling me that "He increased the wage bill at the club by over 10% in his first year, paid out large redundancy packages to two managers in his first 18 months and got us relegated within two years." wasn't meant to intimate that you held him responsible ? did he spend 18months following the policy of fred. seems more like one summer to me. I said it above..."He's every bit as much to blame as anyone that preceded " It was about 15 months after buying the club he gave Coloccini his current contract used as a prime example of the crippling wage bill. i'd like to actually know how much coloccini's on. i've heard everywhere from £45,000 to £80,000. like yourself i blame him in part, my apologies as i thought you were, like many, attempting to make out it was all his fault.

In a nutshell, the buyer would pay Ashley £80m as a settlement on the £110m+ loans outstanding (£30m loss)...and £1 for the club (£134m loss). Again, i don't buy it, but if it is the case, it's a horrible indictment of his purchase and his running of the club. He's every bit as much to blame as anyone that preceded him at the helm, probably moreso. He increased the wage bill at the club by over 10% in his first year, paid out large redundancy packages to two managers in his first 18 months and got us relegated within two years. putting it like that is like saying that as shearer was manager when we got relegated then it is solely his fault. Don't be silly. I don't think I said anyone has been solely to blame for anything. Shearer was in charge for 8 games. He took us from being 2 points from safety to a finish 1 point from safety (closer to survival). We'd taken 6 points from the last eight games before he came in and he won 5 points from the last 8 games (only slightly worse). He spent nothing. He didin't have the time or the power to make the situation any worse. Completely different to spending 18 months following the policy of your predecessor (badly), then blaming your predecessor and his policy for all the ills that have befallen the club. are you telling me that "He increased the wage bill at the club by over 10% in his first year, paid out large redundancy packages to two managers in his first 18 months and got us relegated within two years." wasn't meant to intimate that you held him responsible ? did he spend 18months following the policy of fred. seems more like one summer to me.

20th is still pretty poor for us though, and shows what a mess we are in now. The likes of 'Tottenham' have a higher turnover than us now!!! For years and years, until very recently, there were only FOUR really rich clubs in England MANCHESTER UNITED LIVERPOOL ARSENAL NEWCASTLE UNITED The turnover of the 'permanent rich four' was a long way ahead of the chasing bunch (there was a big gap) which was the likes of Tottenham and Chelsea, etc. THEN, of course, along came the "Abramovich/Chelski" situation, and we were joined by them, in a (seemingly) permanent financial BIG FIVE . . a LONG way ahead of the chasing pack. With our huge ground and large support around the world, even if we (amazingly, with ALL that) 'still' failed to WIN things, our future as one of the 'permanent financial BIG FIVE' (now with Chelsea) was assured . . . I mean, we weren't going to stop filling the ground / buying the merchandise / getting TV money, etc, were we?? SO, the 'permanent financial big five' were . . . MANCHESTER UNITED LIVERPOOL ARSENAL NEWCASTLE UNITED CHELSEA (artificially, as they were making BIG BIG BIG 'losses' every year). THEN . . along came Mike Ashley . . . NOW, we are all "trained" to (like him) T H I N K S M A L L . . . and be "pleased" we are in the 'top 20', and compare oursevles in thought and word, to "Portsmouth". You know . . we have LOST so much . . . we are probably never going to be what we have been for most of the last 15 years. We have lost SO much! At last some sense. It's always pleasing to read a post of someone who actually fully understands our long term past, our recent past and our present. Thank you. People get so caught up in certain opinions that they actually are blinded by things. Freddy Shepherd is one thing, that is either black or white for most people, and they're so consumed by being on one side of the fence or other they can't give a balanced view. There are two extremes, there used to be a guy who had his own forum, an older chap who was blinded by his love of FFS, and at the same time there are those who are consumed by biased non-sense that everything he did during his time at the club was bad. He was good and bad, and definitively people who can't see that are idiots. Thanks. Common sense, and a 'real appreciation' of where we actually ARE in relation to where we SHOULD BE (in the 'bigger picture') is not very fashionable, in the apologist days. ACCEPTED MEDIOCRITY, is the seeming 'norm' these days. That viewpoint, when expressed, is well supported!! WHY, I do not know (never will know!) (Waits to be attacked or ignored by the "we know our place next to Portsmouth" crowd!) as opposed to the" just spend money we haven't got and if we don't get into the champs league then we'll worry about it then" crowd ?

my last 3 bets have all resulted in the games being postponed. le mans/boredeaux....nacional/belenenses which is about to kick off after being postponed last night and berwick/livingston. at least i'm not losing.

In a nutshell, the buyer would pay Ashley £80m as a settlement on the £110m+ loans outstanding (£30m loss)...and £1 for the club (£134m loss). Again, i don't buy it, but if it is the case, it's a horrible indictment of his purchase and his running of the club. He's every bit as much to blame as anyone that preceded him at the helm, probably moreso. He increased the wage bill at the club by over 10% in his first year, paid out large redundancy packages to two managers in his first 18 months and got us relegated within two years. putting it like that is like saying that as shearer was manager when we got relegated then it is solely his fault.

at least they are a premiership club eh ?

many would argue we weren't ran particularly well then but the gambles paid off for a while. They could argue that, but financially they'd be wrong, up to the point of Souness appointment. Shepherd's running of the club up to the Souness appointment was certainly commercially and financially was excellent. It may not have been a popular move with the fans, but we hardly spent a penny from 1999 to 2001 on players, he was vilified for it, but he got the club on an even footing with a genuine spring board to bring the likes of Bellamy in, and more importantly afford to bring them in. commercially and financially excellent ? .........share dividends above the going rate,executive payscales above the going rate,warehouse rentals above the going rate. they done well in building the turnover, their use of it left a bit to be desired. That's all you needed to say. Financially we were unbelievably stable in 2004, and you have to bare in mind he'd been chairman for 6 years at that point. Of the biggest clubs in Europe we had the lowest wages/turnover ratio. We were operating at 44% which was also the lowest in the Premiership, from that point onwards obviously it was down hill. I'm not here to support FFS, but he knew how to make Newcastle in to a profitable business, and demonstrated infinitely more business nous to that point than this regime has. I don't see how it can even be argued with. there wasn't much profit by the time dividends and executive pay was taken off. list the end of term profits if you want. At the end of the day the club could turnover £300m a year, but its no use if you're losing £500m a year. We were making a good turnover under Shepherd and you can't argue with those facts, the only issue is we owed far too much, and thats shown by the events of the last 5 years. Like it or not if it weren't for Ashley buying Hall's shares without doing his homework, we would be where Pompey are now. A Premier League club? they may be premier league club but we are in a much better position than them wouldn't you say ?

so fredwas an economic guru because he boosted our turnover (whilst racking up debts and on pitch performance went backwards). the straws to which some will grasp ! no one denies fred done some good aswell as bad, but don't try and make out that upping turnover is such a great thing when we could have been better off by having a lower turnover but being better ran.

20th is still pretty poor for us though, and shows what a mess we are in now. The likes of 'Tottenham' have a higher turnover than us now!!! For years and years, until very recently, there were only FOUR really rich clubs in England MANCHESTER UNITED LIVERPOOL ARSENAL NEWCASTLE UNITED The turnover of the 'permanent rich four' was a long way ahead of the chasing bunch (there was a big gap) which was the likes of Tottenham and Chelsea, etc. THEN, of course, along came the "Abramovich/Chelski" situation, and we were joined by them, in a (seemingly) permanent financial BIG FIVE . . a LONG way ahead of the chasing pack. With our huge ground and large support around the world, even if we (amazingly, with ALL that) 'still' failed to WIN things, our future as one of the 'permanent financial BIG FIVE' (now with Chelsea) was assured . . . I mean, we weren't going to stop filling the ground / buying the merchandise / getting TV money, etc, were we?? SO, the 'permanent financial big five' were . . . MANCHESTER UNITED LIVERPOOL ARSENAL NEWCASTLE UNITED CHELSEA (artificially, as they were making BIG BIG BIG 'losses' every year). THEN . . along came Mike Ashley . . . NOW, we are all "trained" to (like him) T H I N K S M A L L . . . and be "pleased" we are in the 'top 20', and compare oursevles in thought and word, to "Portsmouth". You know . . we have LOST so much . . . we are probably never going to be what we have been for most of the last 15 years. We have lost SO much! it's like freds last 3 or 4 years never happened.

hows it bollocks. yes they had a very healthy wages/turnover ratio. and they spent the leftover on over the top pay and dividends for themselves. and why gloss over the last few years of his tenure ? Christ What will take for you to grasp what I'm saying. As a commercial business we were far more succesful than we are now, our ability to generate money, and the commercial aspects of the club put us in the big league. because then we weren't attempting to recover from the position he left us in (and which ashley continued for a while)

hows it bollocks. yes they had a very healthy wages/turnover ratio. and they spent the leftover on over the top pay and dividends for themselves. and why gloss over the last few years of his tenure ?

Why do you say that? You got evidence of that? yes,over the top dividends and over the top executive pay. (and that warehouse) So not one penny of profit was put back in to the club? Not one bit. As with most things propaganda gets in the way of the truth to satisfy arguments. profit can't really be put back into the club as then it is int the accounts as something else. ie transfers,ground improvements etc.

Why do you say that? You got evidence of that? yes,over the top dividends and over the top executive pay. (and that warehouse)

4.2 milion i think, barely broke even after dividends. now let me clarify this. if the club does well on the pitch i don't mind running at a manageable loss but the plan was ultimately built on success with no plan for when things turned bad. One of the seasons it was £11m. http://www.nufc-finances.org.uk/ i realise there is an anti fred bias to the site but i'm pretty sure they'd have their arses sued off if the figures were wrong. look under 2006 comments then "profits". it details net profit from 1998 through to 2004.

4.2 milion i think, barely broke even after dividends. now let me clarify this. if the club does well on the pitch i don't mind running at a manageable loss but the plan was ultimately built on expecting success with no plan for when things turned bad. the analogy is to go to the casino, using one tactic being £1000 in profit by 1am but having all your credit cards empty be kicking out time....because it was succesgul for a bit it doesn't mean it was a good plan.

many would argue we weren't ran particularly well then but the gambles paid off for a while. They could argue that, but financially they'd be wrong, up to the point of Souness appointment. Shepherd's running of the club up to the Souness appointment was certainly commercially and financially was excellent. It may not have been a popular move with the fans, but we hardly spent a penny from 1999 to 2001 on players, he was vilified for it, but he got the club on an even footing with a genuine spring board to bring the likes of Bellamy in, and more importantly afford to bring them in. commercially and financially excellent ? .........share dividends above the going rate,executive payscales above the going rate,warehouse rentals above the going rate. they done well in building the turnover, their use of it left a bit to be desired. That's all you needed to say. Financially we were unbelievably stable in 2004, and you have to bare in mind he'd been chairman for 6 years at that point. Of the biggest clubs in Europe we had the lowest wages/turnover ratio. We were operating at 44% which was also the lowest in the Premiership, from that point onwards obviously it was down hill. I'm not here to support FFS, but he knew how to make Newcastle in to a profitable business, and demonstrated infinitely more business nous to that point than this regime has. I don't see how it can even be argued with. there wasn't much profit by the time dividends and executive pay was taken off. list the end of term profits if you want.

many would argue we weren't ran particularly well then but the gambles paid off for a while. They could argue that, but financially they'd be wrong, up to the point of Souness appointment. Shepherd's running of the club up to the Souness appointment was certainly commercially and financially was excellent. It may not have been a popular move with the fans, but we hardly spent a penny from 1999 to 2001 on players, he was vilified for it, but he got the club on an even footing with a genuine spring board to bring the likes of Bellamy in, and more importantly afford to bring them in. commercially and financially excellent ? .........share dividends above the going rate,executive payscales above the going rate,warehouse rentals above the going rate. they done well in building the turnover, their use of it left a bit to be desired.

many would argue we weren't ran particularly well then but the gambles paid off for a while.

thats not a lion rampant, thats a lion running away.

we weren't the 20th richest club, we were the club with the 20th highest turnover. a subtle difference that many often forget.