Jackie Broon

I think it's more that our form has dropped off a cliff since we made the final, just like it did last time, and in the post match interviews after the second semi Burn and Tripper pretty much confirmed that was down to the players being distracted by approaching final and everything around it.

To be fair, it took months of them underperforming to finally lose their automatic place in the team.

I agree with a lot of that too but there are always going to be one or two of the big 6 who underperform and one or two clubs outside of the big 6 that overperform. It happens pretty much every season. We have every chance of getting 5th from our position, I still think Forest will drop off and we'll finish ahead of them. If they don't drop off, good on them, they'll deserve it. If we finish 5th it will be a good achievement but the expectation for this season shouldn't be more than just qualifying for Europe imo.

I've been disappointed with aspects of Eddie's management this season, how slow he is to make changes when things obviously need changing and our lack of consistency and intensity against teams we should be beating. But, top 5 is an unrealistic and unfair expectation given the financial gulf between us and the big 6. European qualification is a realistic expectation, and we are on course for that. We will probably have more money to spend to refresh the squad in the summer and push on, he has more than earned the chance to do that, if we don't push on from that with Eddie then that's the time to say he's not the man to do it.

Sick of him just looking to draw free kicks in unthreatening areas every time he gets the ball. It just breaks up our play and puts us in danger when he doesn't get them

Eddie's game management is shocking against anyone but Arsenal. Just so slow to make changes.

You'd think they'd know better than anyone.

Assuming it is supported by the planners there are three main things that could potentially significantly slow down the planning process: 1: It isn't supported by councilors. This seems unlikely, even if there were another similar Friends of Leazes Park campaign against an application, councilors are still likely to support it, as they reportedly did in 97. 2: It gets called-in by the Secretary of State. Possible, because it was in 97, but seems less likely given this government's pro-development stance. 3: It gets approved but that is legally challenged. This seems fairly unlikely. Firstly, to bring a legal challenge there need to be grounds, a challenge can only be brought on a point of law, not just because someone disagrees with a decision. Secondly, it is very expensive to legally challenge a planning permission, tens of thousands of pounds, the Friends of Leazes Park probably don't have that kind of money.

I said to be seen to be playing by the rules, I don't think they were ever going to come in a throw in a £100m stadium sponsor deal through some company that they could say wasn't a related party, even if they could have at the time, and possibly could now. But, what the PL tried to prevent with the unlawful amendments last year was the gradual inflation of associated party deals. The rules as they stand now give us more room to do that.

I don't thimk there was ever an intention to put in massive sponsorships deals, Staveley talked about working within FFP in hrr day one interview. I think they have always wanted to be seen to be playing by the rules.

Space is the issue more than traffic, that is generally less of an issue in city centres given the established public transport links to them. There just isn't the amount of developable space within or close to city centres usually. Newcastle is pretty unique in that with the moors.

It is (although that describes most of Liverpool outside of the centre) and about a half hour walk to anything.

Yeah, really the PL's rules should just exactly align with UEFA's rather than tying themselves in knots desperately trying to restrict us when we would be restricted enough to stop us running away with everything by the UEFA rules anyway.

The public interest test would be something to be argued out in court / tribunals though, and has to an extent in Man City's APT case with the tribunal finding that in principle it is in the public interest for their to be such controls over football clubs finances.

It can be if it's deemed to be in the public interest.

I think the only way will be to start over with a new PSR cycle from scratch. But even then they will run into fairness arguments, like what about clubs who made big profits on players in the previous seasons that would no longer count positively towards their PSR calculation? I might be wrong because the full details of what was proposed are not public but I doubt the would have squad cost as the only control. That's because without some control over losses clubs like us could just probably increase our turnover with loss making activities to benefit the squad cost ratio. I think, like UEFA, the proposal would be to have both squad cost and PSR together.

Before our takeover the definition of a RPT in the PL's rules was this: “Related Party Transaction” means a transaction disclosed in a Club’s Annual Accounts as a related party transaction or which would have been disclosed as such except for an exemption under the accounting standards under which the Annual Accounts were prepared; Following our takeover they changed the term to Associated Party Transaction and this is the current definition: An “Associated Party” is a Person that is associated with the Club. In considering each possible Associated Party relationship, the League will direct its attention to the substance of the relationship and not merely the legal form. 1. A Person is associated with a Club if that Person or, where that Person is an individual, a close member of that individual’s family (i.e. those family members who may be expected to influence, or be influenced by, that individual in his dealings with the entity, including that individual’s parents, children, siblings and spouse or domestic partner, children of that individual’s spouse or domestic partner, and dependents of that individual or that individual’s spouse or domestic partner): (a) has Control or joint control over the Club; (b) holds a Holding in excess of 5% of Shares; (c) holds a loan interest or other debt or security interest of any kind in the Club or an entity in the same group of companies as the Club, with the exception of any such interest held: (i) as part of regulated banking services provided by a Financial Institution; (ii) in the form of bonds, notes or other securities held by professional investors; or (iii) pursuant to a debenture providing the holder with access to tickets to events at the Club’s Stadium; (d) has Material Influence over the Club or an entity in the same group of companies as the Club; or (e) is a Director or member of the key management personnel of the Club or of a Parent Undertaking of the Club. 2. A Person is also associated with a Club if any of the following conditions apply: (a) the Person and the Club are members of the same group of companies; (b) the Person and the Club are directly or indirectly controlled, jointly controlled, or Materially Influenced by the same government, public or state-funded body or by the same party; (c) the Person (or a Director or member of the key management personnel of the Person) has Material Influence over the Club (or vice versa); (d) the Person is an associate or joint venture of the Club (or an associate or joint venture of a member of a group of companies of which the Club is a member) (or vice versa); (e) both the Person and Club are joint ventures in which the same third party is a shareholder; (f) the Person is a joint venture in which a third party is a shareholder and the Club is an associate of the third party (or vice versa); (g) the Person is controlled or jointly controlled by a Person identified in paragraph 1; (h) an individual identified in paragraph 1(a) has Material Influence over the Person or is a member of the key management personnel of the Person (or of a parent of the Person); or (i) the Person, or any member of a group of which it is a part, provides key management personnel services to the Club; “Associated Party Transaction” means, in respect of any Club, a Transaction that is, whether directly or indirectly, between: (a) a Club and an Associated Party; (b) a Player registered to the Club and an Associated Party of that Club; or (c) a Manager or Senior Official of the Club and an Associated Party of that Club, with the exception of any Transaction pursuant to which the Club, Player, Manager or any Senior Official of the Club is exclusively a purchaser of goods or services (and does not receive any payment, fee or monetary equivalent) and the total value of any consideration either paid or to be paid by the Club or individual (as applicable), when added to any consideration paid or to be paid by the Club or individual (as applicable) in respect of other Transactions with the same party agreed in the preceding three years, is less than £500,000 (and subject to Rules E.70 to E.71). In considering whether a Transaction is an Associated Party Transaction, the League will direct its attention to the substance of the Transaction and not merely the legal form;

The fundamental principle of the PL controlling APTs and limiting them to fair market value was found to be lawful by the tribunal, it was only the exclusion of shareholder loans and some procedural stuff that was found to be unlawful.

The players can't cope with the stress of people asking them for cup final tickets, apparently.

Their rules do also require that related party transactions are at fair market value and have a process set out in the rules for assessing that. Although what constitutes a related party isn't as stringently definitely as the PL's associated party definition.

If we had put in a deal for sign-off before the current rules were in place there would possibly be nothing the PL could do to stop us going ahead with it now. If we were to put one in now we'd have to wait and see what happens with APT2. But, it would fall foul of UEFA's APT test if/when we get into Europe.

Called it.

Yes and no. We were definitely up against it last season and probably right on the limit the season before. But I don't think we are as hampered by PSR this season as has been made out. People in the club clearly felt that a 'Newcastle tax' was being applied when we tried to sign anyone because it was assumed that we had unlimited money to spend. I think they have been playing up the hampered by PSR message this season because of that.

If it is we're likely to be around break-even for this season and last.

I get that he is speculating from a place of knowledge, but if anyone else had posted speculative inferences like that he'd be the first to say they were reading too much into it and that no one really knows what the outcome will be.