Keegans Export

That's why the push back against Mitchell for being critical of our transfer activity surprised me. We got ourselves into a position where we were scrabbling about trying to sell, making daft deals with Forest to avoid what that club apparently thought could be a 10pt deduction. Despite running things that close, we still seem to have such a poorly balanced squad, lacking quality in key areas and seemingly devoid of any flexibility from a tactical point of view. If Mitchell pissed anyone at the club off by pointing that out then maybe they should have a look at themselves first.

I'm 99% sure they've released those before but they sold out pretty quickly

The original white paper did have a few bits and bobs about not discouraging investment and the possibility of using owner guarantees as a way of demonstrating financial sustainability. From what NDM is saying, they're basically going to leave the financial rules/controls to the Premier League/EFL which seems a contradiction so presumably something has changed since the original publication?

I only mentioned Ratcliffe because it's recent and I'd heard of him/Ineos. But you've got Everton going through a sale, Palace owned by a Private Equity fund, Bournemouth have an American Fortune 500 company behind them. Wolves, Ipswich, Fulham. They don't have the brand value, fanbase or revenue of any of the big boys (or us for that matter) but someone (or a group) with a lot of money decided to buy them. Why? Seeing as I don't think many of us could name the companies or individuals in question we can assume it isn't sportswashing so presumably people who are used to spending hundreds of millions of dollars on stuff have decided they could make money from those clubs?

Why didn't Ratcliffe do that with his £1bn rather than buy part of Man Utd? Perhaps the Friedkin Group would be better off sticking their £500m in stocks instead? I don't think any of them will make a profit day-to-day but I assume they're hoping to have a considerably more valuable asset than they bought once it comes time to sell up. Otherwise what are all these American companies doing? They can't be accused of sportswashing.

As a short-term investment you're absolutely right but why do you think so many American hedge funds are buying (or trying to buy) PL clubs? They're not in it for sportswashing, they're banking on the value of their investments ultimately going up well ahead of inflation. Flipping us now would be daft and as you say your ROI would be minimal, if anything at all. But in 10+ years?

I don't think it's silly to speculate, this is a football forum after all. We know what the decision makers at the club want - European qualification. Early days of course but as it stands we're outside of those places. It'd be incredibly head-in-the-sand to suggest that Howe isn't under a little bit of pressure now, certainly more than he has been previously.

If we think the solution to our creative problems is to push Bruno further forwards then, with what we have available, we could do worse than get Longstaff sitting and giving Bruno more licence. We had some success with Shelvey in there so lack of mobility shouldn't be an issue, although Shelvey's quality and range of passing was vastly superior.

This is where the "separation" argument is (and always was) flawed. The club is owned by the Saudi PIF. The Chair of the PIF is bin Salman. Of course he would have had a passing interest in the takeover, but how do you prove whether that is in his role as the Chair of the PIF or as the Crown Prince?

They didn't seem aggrieved at the time tbf, I don't think a single one of them even approached the ref.

Watching it back, Sa doesn't seem to consider that he might have been impeded. He just flops onto the ground, you'd assume he'd be straight in the refs face? I don't think a single Wolves player thought there was an infringement there.

Yeah going off Transfermarkt it's closer to £400m. In terms of "net spend" were the 5th biggest spenders from 21/22 to today, 7th if you just sort by expenditure.

Excellent post, but on this point - one thing we do know is that the aim is Europe, Darren Eales (Eddie's boss at the time) said that quite clearly. Whether we as individual fans think that is realistic or not doesn't really matter, that's the target set from above. Last season we missed out but I think there was an understanding that a combination of a punishing CL schedule, a pile-up of injuries and Man City getting turned over in the FA Cup Final played a major part in that. I've said this before but this summer we'll be selling a "purple". That should unlock the funds to build the Newcastle post-takeover 2.0 Squad, who do the owners trust to build that squad? If we miss out on Europe again, would they back Howe to have another go at it? Obviously I'm assuming we don't make the CL, if that happens we either don't sell a purple or if we do, Howe 100% stays on regardless.

I see what you're saying but that's still not indicative of a good season - play well for a half, go in 1-0 down then struggle throughout the second half. Our xG (yes I know, xG blah blah) was under two. It was only about 0.3 better than theirs. It's not as if we had one clear cut chance after another.

I'm just really disappointed with how this season is going. The problems of last season with the mass injuries and fixture pile-up haven’t been a factor. We've got Bruno, Tonali and Bruno fit and ready to go. Barnes, Isak, Gordon, the attacking full backs we all wanted. I hoped this could be a great, exciting season but aside from small spells here and there we've been poor. You can make the argument that it was "just one of those games" but you lose that right when you have put together a string of largely uninspiring performances.

That's right. I'd be; 1st - 5th Champions League 6th Europa League 7th Conference League Could drop down another place if one of the Top Five win the FA Cup I think.

So they artificially increased their income by €270m and got a €500k fine? An interesting test of UEFAs teeth. Whether we like it or not, the punishments handed down to Everton and Forest certainly brought the majority of PL clubs into line.

The Keegan Stand The Charlie's Stand The Greggs Stand The beat boxing Spiderman Stand Sorted.

Bainbridge's wasn't it?

Johan Bakayoko ticks a lot of boxes. 21yo left-footed RW and his contract expires next summer so if he doesn't sign a new one PSV could be open to offers. Another that will have a lot of interest but he'd get immediate minutes here.

I was going to make a hilarious joke around him travelling to watch Tbilisi play at SJP in the UEFA Cup but I've looked it up and it was before he was born so now I feel old and sad.

I'm not entirely sure why they think the club would feel the need to give away free tickets? I'm assuming the Foundation always get some, players friends/family maybe, but if the record to beat is 15k then they're not going to have to comp any to top that by 5-10k.

@High Five o is right, income from loans etc doesn't count as FFP income. Otherwise PIF could just "loan" us a billion quid and we'd never worry about FFP ever again.

Someone made the point in an Athletic article that, unlike the PL, UEFA already include shareholder loans in their FMV stuff, therefore you'd assume any of those clubs who have been playing in Europe are probably still (mostly) fine. Everton though...RIP...

That's what I assume they'll go for - a check/tartan pattern that is only really noticeable from fairly close. A bit like that Man Utd kit from 2007ish.