Unbelievable

I disagree. "Fair value" simply means you can have party related commercial deals in line with your current standing as a club. So Man U and Liverpool can have their 150m per year shirt sponsor because they have 800m revenue, but because Newcastle United only have 300m revenue we don't think a shirt sponsor from Saudi or in any way related to PIF or the Ruebens should bring Newcastle more than lets say 50m. Same for all other forms of sponsorship. We'd be chasing shadows forever more, because that is by its very definition a self sustaining handicapping of up and coming clubs with the funding behind them to bridge the gap. We'd be kept at arms length forever. I think it does make sense for PIF to move up a gear or two if these restrictions are lifted, because to them it is worth more to invest sponsorship money in their Saudi Arabia promotion vehicle than in other clubs, and ultimately they will see it as failure if by the time 2030 and especially 2034 come around, Newcastle United and their own league are still seen as also rans. Our chairman made clear last year the objective of PIF is to become "number one". There is no way if these restrictions were lifted they wouldn't then proceed to accelerate our development plans.

I was just watching a Man City fan podcast thingy on those APR and 115 hearings just now, and they're on about Newcastle going mad if APR gets scrapped and no other club has a chance of competing with us with surprisingly little self awareness :

From Man City's perspective I suppose the outcome of the first hearing will be of significant impact on their chances of winning the second one. If related party restrictions get lifted or relaxed for being anti-competitive, that undermines the PL's case against them massively.

Ok cheers, so the first one is of particular interest to us and the second one not so much..?

Late May from a quick google search. 21m fee mentioned. We'd probably snap their hand off.

So I'm a bit confused about the status of PL vs Man City. In recent days we got this Ziegler tweet suggesting Manchester City had achieved "some success" in the arbitration hearing. We're expecting some conclusions in the next two weeks, which may or may not become public. And two days ago we had Masters come out to to suggest the hearing will finally start next month with the process expecting to complete in 2025. What is the difference between the arbitration and the hearing Masters is on about, and how is each likely to affect other clubs including us?

This was a good post with many excellent points @80, but I was wondering about how you got to the 35m in the bit in bold, as that would indeed make it look quite appealing to those not well versed in the complexity of our PSR conundrum to sell Almiron and replace with let's say Madueke. If we assume Rich's numbers from his analysis on the previous page regarding Almiron's amortisation due to deal extension as correct we have "Almirón signed for £20M in January 2019 on an initial 5.5-year deal, re-signed on a 3.5-year deal in February 2023 after 4 years (so only ~3 months reflected in the accounts)" leading to "Almirón from £3.64M per year to £1.15M per year (-£2.49M)". Almiron's remaining book value would be around 4m, so a 10m sale fee would give a 6m PSR profit on the deal, just in this PSR year (2024/25). Capology have Almiron on a 60k/week wage, or let's say 3m per year. By selling Almiron for 10m we'd bank a 6m profit and save ourselves 3m in wages, so let's say for 2024/25 impact only that would give us 9m to spend on amortisation and wages of a replacement player. If we were to spend the 35m you mentioned, that would leave only 2m for wages, or 40k/week. If for example Madueke would be available for under 30m and willing to accept the same wage as at Chelsea (50k/week again according to Capology), it would just about work out for this PSR year (6m amortisation + 3m wages). However, for the first four years of the replacement's contract we'd also have that 9m per year cost compared to Almiron at 4m, so 5m added to annual player cost base. Having done the numbers I think that pair of deals, if they were available to us as presented, would have actually made sense from a sporting and probably financial perspective due to Madueke being a better player and probably growing in value as he is still young, hence a better long term investment. However to suggest a 10m sale allows 3,5 times the incoming money to be spend as a rule of thumb almost might lead people to believe selling Almiron, Wilson and the like for paltry fees is a no brainer and I don't think it is in our PSR situation sadly. The more I think about it, the more it is clear increasing commercial revenue is going to be the key for us. We need the exposure of CL football, and being seen as one of the top clubs in the PL, and then to transform that momentum into better commercial deals that will allow us to close the revenue gap. Alternatively we need related party rules scrapped. Here's hoping Man City tear the PL a new one in their hearing.

Fuck 'em, let's move on to the next target on the list. Guehi is not worth what they want for him.

Absolutely, but none of that is a reason to sell him without being able to replace with a similar quality player, let alone a better one. We’re better off keeping him than giving him away and only having Murphy available for that spot. Seems to me some of you don’t quite understand how delicate our PSR position is. We get Guehi and sell Almiron for a paltry 7-8m, we’re looking at a free transfer to replace him, or selling a star player to fund a replacement for both Almiron and said star player. It matters a LOT what we manage to squeeze out of buying clubs.

I think you’d be hard pressed to find anybody objecting to selling Almiron for a reasonable fee that would allow us to replace him with a better player

Or these people understand that if we are to replace these “Nokia’s” with the iPhones 16’s we need to fetch a decent fee or be left with landline phones.

Then there is the remaining amortisation on his contract and you’re basically giving away a player to get rid of his wages, which leaves pretty much no room to replace him with a better player who will command a decent fee and, presumably, similar or higher wages.

PL and Uefa would come down on us like a ton of bricks

What Brighton do is far from easy or everybody would be doing it. They progressed from being in the Championship in 2017 to reaching the last 16 in the Europa league last season, so I’d say they’re doing something right and this idea that they have a ceiling we don’t is madness really. What gives us the edge is our owners’ wealth, but we cannot use that due to FFP. There’s no reason Brighton can’t make CL instead of us if they continue to recruit well and have the right manager.

A touch defensive..? I just admire Brighton for continuously spotting and attracting talent, and yes, also for developing, selling at peak value while having the replacement already lined up. If you want to bring NUFC into it, we will need to be doing much the same to bridge the gap. The talent identification and development parts we’ve nailed, the rest not so much yet but I’m sure we’re getting there.

Close! He's a left back

Oh ffs, Brighton doing all the right moves

@LFEE I'll have a stab at answering here so as not to (further) antogonise the FFP/PSR police, and happy to be corrected by people far more knowledgable in here if I've misunderstood something: Based on timeEd32's latest estimation of our current 2024/25 profit/loss position of between 50-60m (see first post on this page). That is after bringing in Hall and Osula for a combined 38m-ish and no outgoings. If we sign Guehi for the reported 55m-ish and assuming he'd be one of our top earners, the yearly cost for him alone would be around 18m (11m amortisation and 7m wages). To remain PSR compliant by June 30 2025 we cannot report losses (far) in excess of the 70m dropped from the first year of the 3 year period just closed (2021/22). So based on where we think we currently stand and with Guehi added, we'd be pretty much at our max not including potential commercial deals that appear to be in the pipeline, or fees for players we manage to sell. That would see a net spend of around 93m. However, let's say hypothetically we sell Lewis Miley (youth product so no amortisation and low wages) to Real Madrid for 50m next week. That then would take our losses for the year back to 20m and allow us to spend all the way back up to a yearly 50m in amortisation and wages, so if you want another 3 "Guehi's" for 165m in transfer fees, adding 115m to our "net spend" (now over 200m). That just goes to show net spend is not a great way to look at while planning for PSR, as it discards that we would be mortgaging our future heavily in that scenario, seeing as we've not only added 50m cost to 2024/25, but also to the four years that follow for amortisation (and wages for the duration of their contract). We'd then need to find the additional income to cover those costs, be it through commercial, matchday, player trading or a combination of the above avenues, before we can even think about further strengthening in those future years. I think for 2024/25 our net spend looks like it will be around the 100m mark unless something unforeseen happens, but that in itself doesn't really tell us anything.

Imagine his surprise at us just moving the stadium away a few hundred yards

We haven't...?

I have opened a thread in which calculations were done based on the info we have available and the current view is that we can probably afford Guehi at around 60m and on wages of let's say 150k per week, but beyond that sales would be needed to fund further incomings in order to be PSR compliant. On the previous page it was suggested I should be renamed "piss on people's chips" for pointing out that we couldn't afford "more than a Madueke" to replace Almiron should he go. Another >50m player on massive wages adds another 15-20m cost, which is far more than Miggy costs us per year, so I pointed out that was highly unlikely. If you run the numbers you will find out for yourself that indeed it is. That's reality, not pessimism. Also people should be aware that should we spend to the max of our current PSR limit, let's say that net 100m for Hall, Osula and Guehi, then we may just about be PSR compliant for 2024/25 without sales, but our cost level would be such that there would hardly be any money available to strengthen the season after bar (again) siginificant new commercial revenue or player trading income. Again, that is just the reality of NUFC at the moment. We have a very good, but also very expensive squad and overall setup for the revenue we generate. So much so that should we qualify for CL it's going to be a pretty hard ask to comply with Uefa's FFP rules. We are sailing very close to the wind, as we should in order to close the gap with the established top clubs, and to keep sailing this course we may have to sell star players if the right offer comes in. Best be prepared for it and accept is as growing pains to get us to the very top.

I agree between Murphy and Almiron our RW is servicable and certainly not as bad as some would have you believe (especially considering Howe would want a player who can play a high press game), but I do wonder what better deal for what better player you think we'd be able to get than Madueke at the reported 30m Chelsea want for him, because that seems to me like a pretty damn good deal for a pretty damn good profile of player in our position?

I think much will depend on how much Eddie rates him. If he doesn’t want to lose Miggy a paltry offer won’t help to convince him.

Who would vote against it in this case..?

Wut