bealios

Ha, didn’t realise this until later in draw. honestly didn’t think it would be this blatant. Good draw obviously, but fuck me - let’s try and destroy as much as possible magic of a cup in favour of making big clubs a bit bigger. Clearly driven by “top 6” threatening to withdraw if they don’t get what they want.

Man U, City, Arsenal and City out first at home. They’re not even hiding it. Don’t stay up late lads, go to bed - we’ve got this.

Meh. Defence looked flaky - but with 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice CB out, can’t be too harsh. Thought Tino and Kelly were poor, better with Hall and Tripps - although appreciate Hall was poor last week. Despite the goal, thought Gordon was average - alright, but he could do with a rest. Tonali for Longstaff will make a huge difference. Didn’t think Murphy was that bad to be honest - he’s rarely going to be the best player on the pitch; but equally far from the worst. Bruno/Isak still looked class in my eyes, and Joey Linton just had one to forget. Also encouraging that our bench options with Willock and Barnes looked good. Think we’re looking like a decent top 6 side after two games - that’s the difference between top 6 and top 4 - top 4 look good most of the time - top 6 can look pretty poor at times - see Chelsea last year:

If this all a bit of a PSR ruse to create a pure profit on Minteh, then I wonder if fans view of this transfer (Minteh out and DCL in) would change if it meant that it was the only way of keeping both Bruno and Isak? In pure footballing terms I don’t think it makes sense, but if we were expecting a £100m windfall from Isak or Bruno then I doubt we would do it/need to do it. Maybe that’s what Eales was getting at - unless the rules change we’re going to need to keep finding young promising players and letting some of them go at a profit to keep more established stars at the club. As such, if this transfer means that Bruno and Isak start the season as Newcastle players, I’m ok with this - and as much as I love him, I think next years 28 year old DCL might be a slight upgrade on next years 33 year old Callum Wilson.

I sent a similar message to the Council, plan is to keep them distracted whilst we secretly add another tier and hopefully we get by via the 4 year rule and nobody notices by the time they finish reading it.

Ignoring the fan sentiment for a bit, any redevelopment/new ground is going to be dead in the water on another site far away from SJP. There are so many local businesses in the City centre which only survive due to the location of the ground, and if the ground moves elsewhere, the City centre dies on its arse a bit. Not completely, obviously, but you will lose a lot of pubs/restaurants and probably retail without the footfall that a City centre ground brings. So it is basically current site or slightly shifted to Leazes Park - anything else is just not going to get past the many planning/local objections/politics. It is also this which makes it pretty inconceivable that the Council won't extend the lease - there will be a bit of bartering over the premium, and the fact it is PIF and this should fall outside of PSR means that Council will likely start high, but just the threat of the fallout if NUFC even suggest moving far from current location means that it should happen. Boarded up pubs are not a good look, particularly if there are leaks to the media about the Council being unreasonable etc., and elections to be won. Personally I'd love to just have a new stadium on Leazes, and that mock up I saw with the slight overlap of the ground with current SJP ticks all boxes - the corner flag of a new stadium might still technically be the old site, a bit of a link to the past. But with the Euros etc. - and without knowing whether we could sustain 65K/70K long term once the novelty wears off, I can see just extending the Gallowgate as the most pragmatic business sensible answer. I'd just offer some caution on anyone thinking this makes it significantly more accessible - I don't think it will. One of the reasons why our commercial income is so low compared to others is that the non-football side can generate so much - corporate/general hospitality etc. - just look at Arsenal/Spurs matchday revenue compared to ours, and the multiply that by 19+. It makes a difference. There is a myth that NUFC could never match that because of the London factor etc. - but I think that is bollocks - London grounds compete with many other clubs, NUFC do not - the nearest big club is in Manchester. If you make the options gradual, so there is a price point for everyone, they will sell out the corporate easily enough. It's not right, I don't like it, but it ends up being the price we have to pay to be in with a shout of joining the "Big Six". It wasn't that long ago that NUFC were 8th in the Deloitte list of income generating clubs in Europe. I think that is still feasible. What I don't think is feasible is that many many millions are spent on increasing the capacity of the ground by 8,000 - just to sell those 8,000 extra tickets at £40 a pop. £240,000 per game, £5m a season with cup games. Just cannot see it happening.

That's not as daft as it sounds. It wouldn't really be a fee "not to sign him". It's basically a loan deal, a transfer fee at the end if you keep him, a loan fee at the end if you don't. I don't know enough about it, but it is perfectly possible that the "loan fee" at the end could just be based on minutes used. But in the scheme of things, that isn't going to be huge money to make you tell Eddie Howe how to pick a team. Logic suggests it is either (a) he genuinely doesn't think he is ready, or (b) the implications of playing Hall are so financially massive that the board need to tell Eddie who he needs to pick. That second one if you think about it is quite a big deal, it would really need to be something major for the board to interfere in who the manager picks, particularly when we have been down to bare bones.

Have to admit, read that and thought it was a bit of a spoof. Has he really said that? Quite depressing if so, always had a bit of a soft spot for him as a bit of a chav trying to be intellectual, but he's now literally auditioning for a GB News talk show via twitter.

FMV is a complete red herring, it’s meaningless. It’s only relevant because of flawed FFP rules. It it literally expressed to stop an owner funding a team so that they might get anywhere close to an established team.

Is that right? I ask because I am interested not because I am doubting you by the way. I always thought what you said below was right based upon it being "football based" for FFP, but then the comments in the press about Everton messing up because they had accounted for the stadium loan interest in the wrong way doesn't seem to support that. Surely stadium/infrastructure spend is outside of FFP however you structure the financing?

Wage caps or transfer fee caps will get equally mired in legal challenges - with the added difficulty that none of the actual players/agents would support it. The only way to have a decent stab at real sustainability rules without being completely anti-competitive is to keep the current rules (certain percentage of income) but supplement them with an exclusion of any transfer fees paid up front (it won't harm future sustainability if transfer fees are paid in cash up front without the instalment basis when current (rich) owners are long gone, and with a similar bond/security for contracted wages. It's really not that difficult to implement. You just keep the current model but with a forward looking basis - a club can only operate if their current revenue matches a certain percentage of the next (5) years cost amortised cost. If a transfer fee has been paid in full up front, it doesn't count. If the future wages have been secured by way of bond/security, it is excluded from the calculation. If any club for cash flow purposes decided that they just want to work with the current model, with deferred transfer fees and wages coming down the line for the next 3 - 8 years, it needs to be a certain percentage of revenue.

Meh. Relegation fighting club makes Europe next season. Struggles year after. This has been happening for years. Only difference in the past is that rather than relegation threatened it was relegation certainties in our case, and rather than “Europe” it was Champions League. Also; when we say struggling, we go into 2024 top 7 - 10. Over reaction again.

Don't think I have been as confident going into a game against Man U in 40 years. 0 - 1 (McTominay)

End result: Actual Result: Absolute shitter, would have taken it before the game, and if you look at what they missed, if we did win it would have been the perfect definition of "hit and run". We didn't out play them, so we can't be disappointed with a draw. Eddie Howe - Majestic in his post-match interview and our perfect manager. Milan Game: Doesn't change much - we draw, we are in UEFA in later stages. Win and we have an outside chance of qualifying. Although it is not that much an outside chance, if I have my maths right PSG need to win away in Dortmund otherwise we qualify if we beat Milan. Game 6 is still meaningful So in the "group of death", we have performed, fucked over by a clearly wrong decision, and we are well placed. With a skeleton squad hampered by injuries. I am seeing progress here.

Isn't it just because we're successful and we're expected to win all of our home games now, no matter the opposition? I haven't been to the Etihad, but I have been to a fair few games at Chelsea during peak-Abramhovic era, and the atmosphere was shite. Same at Arsenal. Wasn't impressed at Old Trafford either. We just have less games now where the expected result is anything other than win. Not a massive coincidence that the best atmospheres in last year and a half have been Arsenal, PSG, Man Utd etc.? All with supporting reasons - PSG, champions league, Man Utd - revenge, Arsenal - final game of season after staying up/they were a bunch of twats this year. I haven't done as many home games as I would like this year, but not sure what other games have had great atmospheres and which have been particularly bad? I do admit thought that watching the game yesterday on the TV/stream - it sounded pretty quiet. I would say that from a personal point of view, having been going to 35 years or so, I have had more games stick in the mind for atmosphere since takeover than any others. But that might be recency bias, it might just be relief. PSG was the best atmosphere I have experienced, Arsenal on the last day of season was great. Man Utd at home after the Cup Final. Spurs the week after the take-over (for the first 20 mins or so). The other Spurs game obviously. Brighton at home last year. But I thought Leicester on the last day was dreadful given the circumstances (but probably because of the circumstances). I really think we're being a bit harsh on the atmosphere thing - are we any worse than Arsenal, Man U, City, Chelsea, Spurs, Liverpool etc.? And I don't mean comparing it against when they play Newcastle (where it seems recently the crowd would be fired up because nobody likes us now). Is the Etihad a cauldron when they play Burnley at home? I just think so many things contribute to it - a lot of it comes from perceived injustice - and being an underdog. I randomly remember a game during the Keegan years when we drew with Millwall 1 - 1, losing for most of the game, it was either near Christmas or New Year, and we equalised reasonably late on after having a bad run from the ref. - still remember it now, but probably because of what mood I was in that day, how much I had had to drink and what was going on in life at the time!