Kid Icarus

Think we're all programmed to think of any reports that aren't literally about a player signing really soon as being a waiting game for another club to come in aren't we?

Imagine showing that to someone who stormed the beaches of Normandy.

If you meant you'd have complied with the 2013 rules had they existed, fair enough, but would you have been able to right off your stadium depreciation into your calculation with the upcoming rules? Levy did lobby for those FFP rules based around his own running of Spurs as well, not for the good of the game but because it gave them a strategic advantage - not just because they'd already used their model to financial success, but because it removed other methods for financial success and put other clubs in a straight jackets that said that this is how it's done, ignoring that Spurs appear to be a pre-PSR exception to the rule who while balancing the books, getting Champions League, and being a financial success, are still seen as the junior member of the big 6 because it hasn't really resulted in honours - something that further undermines any notion of meritocracy or "pull" when you're looking at players.

Wash your mouth out, it's fantastic.

He was so good on loan like, such a shame that that was the end of it.

Wish I'd been wrong on this one but always thought he wasn't just overrated but objectively shite and all I saw when he was here was that confirmed in detail.

Don't think the bloke whose agent has been clearly telling everyone he's been 'hoping for Liverpool' while they had a manager and he was already Bournemouth manager is going to turn into a dickhead tbqh, he already was one.

Appreciate the detail, but the original incarnation of Premier League FFP started in 2013...whatever else you did to increase revenue is all still crucially prior to the start of that, you were an established CL/Europa regular by then. You saying that Spurs have become the club they are now by working within those rules (never mind the stricter ones we have now) just isn't true. And - I shied away from saying this earlier because it sounds like I'm being a dick - but your success has been mostly financial. Spurs are a bit of a 'junior partner' in the big 6 and haven't actually really been successful in terms of honours.

Look on the brightside, now that Villa and Emery want him, everyone in out fanbase will rate him now.

Lovely stuff

I'm sure it very often is the case but I refute that

I'm not sure what you mean by making the point that we had it? I don't think anyone's denying that we did, but I also don’t see what that changes about rules put in place decades later that makes it artificially extremely difficult for any club except a select few from reaching the top. I disagree that Brentford or Bournemouth have done anything tbh. We've seen too many of these clubs come, have a fleeting run at success, be seen as darling upstarts in the media, and ultimately fail because they have one bad window, one bad appointment, one bad season, or when they're anywhere near successful their talent gets snapped off them by the clubs they're attempting to compete with. The post PSR 'model' club knocking on that ceiling have been Southampton, Swansea, Leicester, Wolves, Everton, West Ham. Of those it's only Everton who didn't end up relegated, having failed for the reasons above, while pushing their faces on the glass ceiling. Now that group is Villa, us, and potentially Brighton, Brentford, Bournemouth. Let's see any in that group have sustained opportunities at CL finishes without huge fall offs and/or the top 6 taking their talent by throwing their completely fair game and not at all unfair financial weight about. Spurs breaking into the top 6 as a regular predates PSR as well so I don't think you did anything in that respect, other than box clever with player trading pre-PSR. If you'd got to where you are now by means of investment you'd have been able to at the time too, you wouldn't now and I'd argue you couldn't by boxing clever now either. The patience you speak of is based on something that I think many understandably believe is a false premise - that success is just a matter of waiting, as opposed to something that will forever be deliberately and artificially placed beyond our grasp.

That's an extension that I don't think is true. I was making a point to Froggy about why PSR restricts us in all situations when brought to its logical end, but that doesn't mean that it's what's desirable or at the crux of every Newcastle fans' argument for why PSR should be loosened.

I don't think it does tbh. It can still be true and I can still say I don't want it.

No I get that you're saying the use of the cartel line is what's embarrassing, that's what I meant. It's a perfectly accurate description of the set up in the league, the term hasn't been come to on a whim, it's because those clubs are acting in the way a cartel, or in more accurate terms imo, as any oligopoly does and protecting their shared interests while also competing with each other. Every time we miss out on a player it is technically because of PSR. With no PSR we could blow every other club out of the water with fees and wages, that's the reality of it. We can agree and disagree on whether that's a good or bad thing, or the rules are too strict, but you can't deny as a basic principle that PSR is the main reason we miss out on players. And that also comes onto another point you're making: the appeal. Money is appeal, success, honours, history etc are all appeal. Again, it's about how we create appeal in the first place, and about how that's restricted. Buzzing about Woltemade over Sesko isn't a disqualifying thing either. He was probably about our 8th choice - money, appeal, ability to create appeal all factors - and at that point we were all about to be incredibly happy just that we were able to get Strand-Larsen for 70 odd million. A huge overspend. Totally understand wanting Ratcliffe, bit with hindsight has it not shown you that these things have no race or nationality? Him being from where he is has had seemingly no bearing on his ruthlessness on the proles at Man United. He's no less at Man United to make a huge mountain of cash than anyone else would be. I'd argue spiralling out of control is what already happened years ago tbh. At best it's stable door after the horse has bolted, but really it's pulling the ladder up. What we need isn't viable, the game would need to die (and prefer to) before it brought in what I would propose.