UV

i honestly think putting the club up then was a publicity exercise and he deliberatly put a ridiculous price so either, he sells at a stupid price or he ends up keeping it which he wanted. as has been said a few times on here i think his plan was to stop up with minimum investment till he could get shot of the high wage earners then invest through the clubs earnings and sustainable debt. Nah, that theory doesn't hold water at all. He'd have got a full time manager in (until the end of the season at least) from the start. The only reason we ended up with Kinnear is because noone else would take the job for only a month. If he never intended to sell he wouldn't have limited himself like that, nor would he have abandoned his DoF structure. Edit: To clarify, I do think his price last time was too high, I just don't think that was intentional so he could keep the club.

I have to say, it's starting to look like the only real possibilities are either Ashley staying on for another year, or a Shepherd consortium which will be struggling for cash. Out of those two options, and considering the fact I think it's highly unlikely we'll be promoted next season no matter who the new owner is, I think I'd have to go with the best option being Ashley staying simply so he has to shoulder the burden of next year's wage bill. The Shepherds can wait until next season to be our saviours again when the club has less liabilities.

Suddenly everyone's an expert on non disclosure agreements. Do we know for a fact what it entails? Personally I would have thought it would simply be that anyone looking at the accounts in the "data room" cannot reveal those details; and on the other side, SP cannot reveal the names of the bidders. It doesn't necessarily mean that they themselves can't say they are interested in the club if they want to. Having said that, I agree that empty vessels make the most noise. Seriously? After considering how well the sale of the club went last time with 7 bidders fighting it out? After considering the methods Ashley uses in his other business (70% off sales which never end, shops which are closing down but never close)? The new season's less than a month away and we've done NOTHING yet to prepare for it when this off season requires double the work it normally would. How can anyone not be anxious? I can only think your lack of anxiety is down to the fact you wouldn't mind him staying on and are happy with Kinnear as manager. I find it hard to believe Ashley won't sell now, but he's already done so many things that even I couldn't believe he would do, that I just wouldn't put anything past him now.

I'm saying Fulham were in a far worse state than us, so if he'd taken them over I'm not sure how he was going to do any better there on half our turnover. There isn't a club in the Premiership without problems of some sort, and I don't think ours were even remotely the worst. What money Ashley did put in was spent poorly - on paying for players up front and on an increased wage bill for example. Saying this increased expenditure was the fault of the previous owners is misrepresentative of the situation.

Was just going to say this, he thought of a football club as a rich man's toy and amusement for the weekends. His naivety was staggering. So no one thinks that his business model could have worked for other clubs? What was Ashley's single biggest mistake? The Keegan debacle? or was it the fact that he let the club play out more than half the season with Hughton and Kinnear in charge? These weren't business mistakes. What hurt Ashley the most as owner of the club was when he started to piss on the fans from a great height thinking he could do whatever he wanted and get away with it. I think that's what we were saying... they weren't business mistakes, they were 'running a football club' mistakes. He should never have bought a football club. Obviously if he had bought a club that didn't have any problems to start with, he might have done alright. Which clubs don't have any problems? Is this the same Fulham which at the last count had a debt of around £200m, and a wage bill of £39m with a turnover of £54m? I'm sure he'd have done a great job there too.

did i say it was ? whos fault was it that we hocked everything we had and still made losses. do you think in that situation the banks would fall over themselves to loan us more to invest ? Yet still Fat Fred managed to sell the club for a tidy sum taking the banks out of the equation. Was that his fault as well? and what position were we in when he left ? what position had we been headed for 2 or 3 years priior ? This is the question you really need to ask Mike Ashley as he thought it was a good buy at the time. and he got it wrong ? still doesn't mean fred didn't leave us in a financial shitheap. So do you think after Ashley bought the club, he should blame the problems on Shepherd? some. if the halls/fred had the club at heart they would have warned ashley as to the hidden stuff they knew he didn't check (which he only has himself to blame for)...they found a sucker, very,very lucky for them. You know very well the deal was done behind Shepherd's back (or hospital bed). More bullshit Madras? do you think fred would have come clean for thew sake of the club ?....now thats bullshit. I think he most certainly would have as he didn't want to sell. Probably why Hall did it behind his back. so you think fred spelled out all the hidden stuff to ashley (again his fault that he didn't get it checked) ? He didn't have a chance to before Ashley was already committed. It would have been in his interest to try and put Ashley off. Do you think he would have intentionally tried to hide stuff from Ashley that he could find out just by reading the published accounts? To what purpose?

did i say it was ? whos fault was it that we hocked everything we had and still made losses. do you think in that situation the banks would fall over themselves to loan us more to invest ? Yet still Fat Fred managed to sell the club for a tidy sum taking the banks out of the equation. Was that his fault as well? and what position were we in when he left ? what position had we been headed for 2 or 3 years priior ? This is the question you really need to ask Mike Ashley as he thought it was a good buy at the time. and he got it wrong ? still doesn't mean fred didn't leave us in a financial shitheap. So do you think after Ashley bought the club, he should blame the problems on Shepherd? some. if the halls/fred had the club at heart they would have warned ashley as to the hidden stuff they knew he didn't check (which he only has himself to blame for)...they found a sucker, very,very lucky for them. You know very well the deal was done behind Shepherd's back (or hospital bed). More bullshit Madras? do you think fred would have come clean for thew sake of the club ?....now thats bullshit. I think he most certainly would have as he didn't want to sell. Probably why Hall did it behind his back.

did i say it was ? whos fault was it that we hocked everything we had and still made losses. do you think in that situation the banks would fall over themselves to loan us more to invest ? Yet still Fat Fred managed to sell the club for a tidy sum taking the banks out of the equation. Was that his fault as well? and what position were we in when he left ? what position had we been headed for 2 or 3 years priior ? This is the question you really need to ask Mike Ashley as he thought it was a good buy at the time. and he got it wrong ? still doesn't mean fred didn't leave us in a financial shitheap. So do you think after Ashley bought the club, he should blame the problems on Shepherd? some. if the halls/fred had the club at heart they would have warned ashley as to the hidden stuff they knew he didn't check (which he only has himself to blame for)...they found a sucker, very,very lucky for them. You know very well the deal was done behind Shepherd's back (or hospital bed). More bullshit Madras?

The correct answer is.... he loses credibilty by stating Ashley has us on a stable footing. Christ, I miss out the word 'financial' and look what happens...the Shepherd apologists out in force (not aimed at you Cp40, I know you're just a Keegan fan) Does thinking MA is a clueless c*** immediately make one a Shep apologist? Explain...... Ashley can’t be defended on his record, so comparing him to his predecessor is the only way of avoiding saying “I got it wrong. I was blaming Keegan and Shepherd and people with cockney mafia out banners for our problems, when it was down to Ashley all along”. so where was the money going to come from when we had everything hocked and were having to find 30mill to make ends meet ? ashley fucked up on many things. doesn't mean fred didn't end upo being shit for us aswell. Except during the stadium expansion when did we ever spend £30m more in a year than we brought in under Shepherd? Or is that just more bullshit?

Classic The club's never been in better shape.

We were in Europe that year. Not good enough for some though. So 2 months into next season if Villa have a shed load of injuries and get off to a bad start will you be agreeing with any Villa fans who want to start campaigns and protests to get Learner out when an unknown hedge fund wants to buy him out like 89% on here wanted in October 06?

I'd certainly be happy with the way Villa have done things. Yes, they've still spent decent money but it's seemed much more respectable IMO - buying a number of young and/or English players for example. Didn't Villa run up £70m worth of debt in Learner's first 2 years?. It will be more now, and what do they have to show for it? 11th, 6th, 6th. When we ran up £70m of debt after 15 years, most of which was spent on expanding the stadium not just on the team, we were one of the worst run football teams ever according to most. A few months into the season after we finished one place lower than the best Villa have achieved so far under Learner, there were people on here staring campaigns and advocating protesting and boycotting games to get rid of the old board. And people wonder why other supporters see us as unrealistic and too demanding. People keep saying how well Villa are being run, and I don't disagree that from the outside it looks like they're doing okay and going about things the right way, but I don't see how the same people who criticised how we were run financially under the old board can hold that view just because the money is owed to a rich owner instead of to a bank. Why isn't Learner being heavily criticised for running his club way beyond it's self-sustaining means?

Has anybody mentioned how Milner would still have been on half what Gutierrez gets even if he'd received the pay rise he was promised when he signed a contract extension in good faith when Ashley took over.

http://www.live.org.uk/whatson/index.php?viewAll=1#90

FYP for the accepted wisdom of 2007 I agree though, it's a different situation now, we're pretty much guaranteed to lose £30-£50m this coming year IMO, with a very low chance of bouncing straight back up without substantial investment next year on top of what would be paid to Ashley. There are 2 options for the coming season as I see it, whoever the owner is : 1) Maintain the majority of the current squad and hope that though they are inadequate for the PL they are still good enough to do well in the Championship. This gives some chance of promotion (50/50 maybe), but is high risk financially as it's costly not only next season, but for several seasons after if we don't get promoted. 2) Decimate the squad and replace with cheaper players. Will still be an expensive season (with the paying up of contracts, loyalty bonuses, paying part of loanee's wages, etc) and will have absolutely no chance of promotion (the disruption could easily be so severe we might see another relegation, I think it would be touch and go). This is high risk for the success of the club, but lower financial risk. If I was looking at buying a club as a toy or a status symbol, I wouldn't care less about the ground or it's potential support in the region, and I'd just buy a ready made Premiership club, and spend money on the team to expand it's global popularity. If I was looking at buying a club as an investment, there's no way I'd buy NUFC now unless it was going for peanuts. I'd wait for at least another year, probably 2, until the outgoings from wages had stabilised, taking the risk that we wont be promoted (and thus miss my chance to buy cheaply) and that no other mug will buy it off Ashley in this mess. Just let Ashley absorb the losses for the next couple of years, then when the average crowd is down to around 30k and everyone hates Ashley even more than they do now, buy the club for under £50m all-in if we're still in the Championship, or even less if we've gone down to League 1.

to be fair he only really worked the magic here. at fulham and citeh he was given spending power far in advance of the competition. (i think) He convinced the owners that if they gave him the money he'd deliver the results. That's half the battle, and he delivered his end of the bargain. Unfortunately, he met his match with Ashley who expected results with spending power far below the competition.

What I wouldn't give now for a manager with a 3 out of 3 success rate for getting a team promoted as champions in his first full season in charge.

All that typing and you didn't even read it? He never does. yes i read it, the main point that stood out for me was "before player trading" did you catch that bit...almost as if it doesn't count and we don't have to pay for the paying staff. if you'd notice the club hasn't been able to break even,even with the extra 18mill....how come ? or are you saying the old board would have been able to ship out the high earners and brought players in on lowetr wages. just that with the players brought in by the club before fred left that didn't seem to be the plan. Did you read the sentence after it? The one which includes all cash in and cash out? I said that there was a loss of around £10m, it's not like I'm trying to hide it. Most of that came from the debt repayments, player trading actually amounted to about £2m of the loss. That Summer we shipped out high earners like Parker, Dyer, Emre, Luque, Carr, Babayaro and Solano. There was certainly plenty of scope for at least maintaining the wage bill at a similar level. The reason the club hasn't been able to break even in the last few years is due to how Ashley has "sorted out the finances" since he took over. The 2 main ones being the fact that the wage bill has gone up around 22% in 2 years, and that the club has been paying upfront for transfers in while transfers out are being paid for in instalments (not necessarily a bad thing per se, but it doesn't look good on the books until you've been running it like that for a few years).

All that typing and you didn't even read it?

The club may have been balance sheet insolvent (as are half the premiership) but it was not cash flow insolvent. "Many large companies operate permanently in this state." - Wiki. The net debt repayments were around £7m per year. This is not an unsustainable amount. The majority of the debt was the £45m remaining on the stadium loan which was a long term contract that couldn't be foreclosed on unless the ownership changed, so your doomsday scenario of all the debtors wanting their money NOW could not in fact have happened under the old board with the financial arrangements they had in place. In 06-07, the operational loss before player trading & amortisation was £0.3m. The actual cash flow loss was < £10m more out than in. Not great, however this was in the knowledge that we were going to get a £18m boost in turnover the following year from TV revenue alone. Running the club in the same way (that includes having a £10m transfer budget), with anything less than a 14% increase in expenditure (due to wages say) would have seen us break even or make a profit. Are you telling me that would have been impossible to do under the old board? That they were inevitably going to let costs run away even more? It's possible they would have increased the debt slightly if they could get the finance, but it was certainly not a necessary inevitability as some are making out. I know I keep mentioning it, but I think it's an important point when the old board is being accused of financial mismanagement based on the amount of the debt, but the majority of the debt was due to the stadium expansion which was paying for itself over time and bringing in extra revenue. I don't know about you, but I don't call this financial mismanagement, I call it a shrewd investment. Only the remainder of the debt, around £25m, was due to "wasting money on trophy players", to get us into Europe on average 1 year in 2. This level of operational debt is less than most clubs in the premiership (all but Blackburn and the the 3 promoted teams in 07-08). Again, I fail to see how anyone can call this level of debt financial mismanagement,. Finally, in response to you're implication that we were in debt up to our absolute limit in another thread, I apologise for the lack of credibility and the location of the link, but I couldn't find a better source. I have no reason to think the Man U fan made it up : http://www.joinmust.org/forum/showthread.php?t=24381 I guess a lot must have changed in a year. The idea that we were days away from administration before Ashley came along and saved us (Ashley himself being the biggest proponent of this myth) is about as ridiculous as the idea of Ashley putting the club into administration now.

I disagree, we need to start confronting this kind of casual abuse of people based on their sexuality. It's not on. This. I'm sorry, that's inexcusable and not want I want to see on this board. Agreed tbh. Just uncalled for. I'd rather be dull than a disgrace. Hope you get bummed tbh. [move]Credits: All homophobic stereotypes in this post were kindly provided by your local mods and admins[/move]

I think this was the problem. By 2007 the club had borrowed against every asset it had and there was nowhere else to go. Given the precarious financial position at that time I doubt any bank would have lent further funds unless there was security. I still can't work out how Shepherd thought he was going to get out of that mess, he didn't want to sell up like Hall did, so he must have thought he could carry on. Either he had a cunning plan or he was deluded about the financial status of the club. In 2007? Banks were still lending money hand over fist to anyone who could lie on an application form then weren't they? Regardless, what makes you think the club needed significant extra borrowing anyway? In 06-07 IIRC the club had around £10m more going out than coming in, which is around the same amount as was spent on transfers. In the 07-08 season the TV revenues increased and brought in £18m more revenue than in the previous year. In actual fact the total revenue increased by £12m (we weren't in Europe that season). If we'd had another £10m transfer budget, and maintained the same wage level (a number of high earners were removed from the wage bill in Summer 07 - Parker, Dyer, Emre, Luque, Carr, Babayaro, Solano) we'd have broken even or made a profit. The club had a large enough turnover to make it self-sustaining. We could afford to spend more than most other clubs in the league. We didn't need a billionaire to support us. The debt was £70m of which £45m was a fixed long term loan for the stadium expansion which easily paid for it's own interest repayments. That leaves £25m attributable to the running of the club over the previous 15 years. Look at the debt of other clubs from their 07-08 accounts. Only Blackburn and the newly promoted teams had a debt less than £25m. Only 7 had a debt less than £60m, and we had a far bigger turnover than those clubs. We were the 12th/13th richest club in the world, and we couldn't afford the repayments on a £70m loan? Give me a break. The only reason the debt has spiralled in the last couple of years is due to the increase in wages from £62m to £76m, and because of Ashley's pay up front for incoming transfers policy. Neither of which was necessary or inevitable. Did we go bankrupt in 2001 when the debt was £67m and turnover was £55m? No. Unmanageable debt? Financial disaster? Inevitable bankruptcy? Don't make me laugh.

The point is that the money from any players sold now is not going into some jar labelled "Al's transfer kitty", it's money we wont see again if the club is sold this Summer. If the assumption is correct that Ashley is writing off the debt as part of the sale of the club (I think it has to be for the £100m price tag to be at all realistic) then reducing that debt by selling off the club's assets is simply reducing the worth of the club to the new owners if the price is fixed at £100m, and reducing the money they will be able to generate to spend on new players.

Every little think he does is tragic, Every little think just takes us down, Being in the Premier League was magic, Now I know Mike Ashley is a clown

Any money received from selling players now will go straight off the debt the club owes Ashley. You can be sure he won't be doing any buy now pay later deals in this transfer window, it will be cut price deals for cash upfront. If we sell a bunch of players now and then sell the club, then the money we get for those players will not be sitting in some transfer kitty given to the new owners, it will just lower the club's assets for the eventual buyer. Obviously the buyer should take that into account in the purchase price, but it's like buying a house while the current owner is stripping out the fixtures and fittings.