Jackie Broon

Yes, even against Villa.

He'll be gone if we don't qualify for Europe.

I agree, if we don't have the players to play how we are we need to find a different way. Bruno is becoming a liability, we need to find a way to allow him to do what he does best without leaving a huge space behind him.

If it were just this season then I don't think people would be so concerned, but there have been glaring tactical issues since the beginning of last season. We're just too easy to play through and lack creativity in midfield.

Mitchell needs to bring in a set piece coach, whether Eddie likes it ot not.

He did take a while to get going at Chelsea iirc.

433. The evidence revealed that Nielsen has a very high profile in the field of football club sponsorship deals. Indeed, MCFC has itself instructed Nielsen to provide advice on valuation. It must also have been known to the clubs that Nielsen had a confidential proprietary database. The evidence revealed that it is called SponsorGlobe and that clubs may, by the payment of a fee, obtain access to SponsorGlobe, as MCFC apparently did. 437. We are persuaded that the system as a whole is fair. In particular the club will have received a copy of Nielsen’s report with the Board’s Provisional Determination and have had an opportunity to comment on it. Thus, in the particular circumstances of this case, it is not unfair that a club is deprived of access to, and therefore the ability to comment upon, the detail of the transactions assessed by Nielsen to be relevant and comparable.

I get where you're coming from, but the PL would say that they're an established company with a wealth of experience and knowledge in that field and that's likely to be accepted without much question by any court, as it was by the arbitration tribunal in relation to their assessment of sponsorship deals from UAE businesses.

They don't, they outsource the assessments to Nielsen.

And that's one instance where there is a distinct whiff of us playing the system, with an Adidas / Sela 'partnership' announced alongside us getting a deal double that of Aston Villa.

What about the theory of the sunk cost fallacy?

The takeover was September 2008, the Etihad Campus planning application was submitted September 2011.

Also, you can't compare when Ashley bought to now. That's like buying bitcoin now and expecting it to increase in value like it did in the past. Unless PSR disappears I can't see any way our value significantly increases without massive front and back door investment, likely well beyond any increase in value.

It's not something that would be likely to be made public, we'd be daft not to be throwing in as many sponsorship deals as possible for approval right now.

It would probably be more sensible for us to submit them to the PL for approval, which would put the PL in a very difficult situation of being potentially liable to pay us damages if they refuse or delay them.

The Bloomberg 'valuation' is just what was paid by PIF for Staveley's shares multiplied by the percentage she owned, it's not a true valuation of the club. No one is paying £1bn for us as things stand. They could just about break even on the £700m so far. We make absolutely no sense as a financial investment.

Al-Rumayyan said the plan was for us to be No.1, Staveley suggested that we would be challenging for the league in 5 years. Them buying us just to be a sustainable club makes no sense. Firstly, we're never going to be sustainable, they've officially put in £400m already, we run at a massive loss. Secondly, what would that offer Saudi Arabia? They almost certainly want a top club that will win things and everything that comes with that.

They tried and failed to buy Liverpool before moving on to us because Staveley persuaded them it was a good investment to buy us and build us into a top club. It's naive to think that, with it looking a much more difficult and long term task than they originally envisaged (or possibly impossible) to turn us into a top club, there is no chance they could recalculate if a top 6 club were to be avalible. To be realistic, we haven't been able to push-on on or off the pitch in the way they probably expected and it doesn't seem we've really caught on in Saudi the way they probably hoped. I'm not saying that they're going to move on but it's naive to think that it's not a possibility.

@ECP123

It wasn't just Staveley, it was in the PL's letter to the club that was released in the High Court decision. It was the state of Saudi Arabia not MBS that they said should be a director.

It wasn't actually MBS who the PL regarded as a director, it was the state of Saudi Arabia. In the letter released in the court case it was actually the state of Saudi Arabia they were saying should be subject to the owners and directors test, not MBS. And it wasn't that there was a rule against states owning clubs, the state of Saudi Arabia refused to make themselves subject to the owners and directors test so there was a stand-off over that. In the end, the PL dropped that subject to unknown "legally binding assurances". It's a non-story as you say because MBS in his role as chairman of PIF is bound to have input into PIF's decision making around Newcastle.

Bainbridge's

Nothing compared to Daley Thompson's Decathlon on rubber spectrum keys.

It doesn't make any difference, owners can only put £105m over 3 years in to cover losses on the PSR balance sheet, loans aren't a way around FFP. Our owners have been putting in money by issuing shares, around £400m so far. This is effectively giving the club money that can only be got back if they sell the club for £400m more than they bought it. Other owners have done the same by giving interest free loas to the club. Which the club could be made to pay back at some point, like what happened to Portsmouth.

In that case I think we could argue that we paid above FMV interest on his loans in kind through free sponsorships, worth possibly £100m+.