TheBrownBottle

Nothing wrong with that, but the biggest shitter of all re the Ashley deals is that they were commercially shite

Yeah, I always had a soft spot for them. Big club with a grand history who’ve been ludicrously underperforming (club-wise not team-wise) for over two decades. They overreacted to the criticisms of ground safety, but that’s hardly vendetta-worthy.

It’s not about brands, it’s about money. The Castore deal will be worth pennies - with kit deals you make the money upfront; the clubs make very little from actual shirt sales.

Yep, this what I was trying to say - you’ve expressed it much better

Sorry, you’re right. PIF, Staveley and Reuben must be absolutely fucking useless at business, then: there must be loads of sponsors out there queuing to give us more than what Spurs get, yet somehow they’re missing those deals. After all, if the market offers us those deals - with no strings attached - then it passes the fair market value test. And of course online followers isn’t proof of everything; it’s just one element. Spurs must have bought the 6m more Twitter followers and 20m more Facebook followers. Makes sense to me. Same way that we must have bought the 2.5m followers more we have than Blackpool. Given that we’re now more attractive to the international markets than Spurs on the basis of being on the verge of CL qualification - a competition they were in the final of just a few years back - does that mean Villa are bigger than Liverpool and Brentford bigger than Chelsea on the basis of league placing this season? I’m being deliberately daft with those later examples, but we’ll surpass these clubs soon enough - but we’re deluding ourselves if we think we’re there just yet. It’ll come - no doubt about it

I’ve worked with plenty of lads from all over the world doing what I do - Man Utd, Chelsea and Liverpool are the only clubs those from Asia and Africa I’ve worked with (and they’ll be above 150 people) have supported; I’ve never met a Man City fan. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t have visibility, nor that they don’t have followers around the world. I don’t doubt that soon enough the numbers will follow - though that will require trophies and years at the top end, not a single good season. We’ll be there soon enough

But you’re both talking about anecdotal experience. You’re NUFC fans so you’ll notice every time you see an NUFC top. Spurs’ sponsorship deals are not arrived at because of the relationships their owners hold to those parties - they don’t need to worry about ‘fair market value’ at present. If it was true that we have similar visibility then the market would be offering £40m deals left right and centre without a leg up from PIF. Have a look at the social media following Spurs has. Then look at ours. Last I checked we’re still behind Leicester, West Ham and Everton. This isn’t about how big we are relative to each other in England - I don’t see Spurs as bigger than us, Villa or Everton. But the idea that we have - at the moment - greater visibility just isn’t borne out by any tangible evidence.

‘Seyzun’ = season, if those not able to comprehend Mackem are watching it

Yep, that’s the thing. Nowt wrong with liking a player at that level who’s a trier - we’ve had a few over the years. The difference is that we weren’t daft enough to compare said trier to some of the best midfielders in the PL (Teddy hasn’t done this on here - but there are Mackems who’ve said what he’d do vs Bruno, Joe, Willock etc. As if he’s anywhere near that level).

You couldn’t argue at present that the club has the same stature internationally as Spurs - so the sponsorship deal was always going to be in the £20m+ bracket. This was the number touted last summer too, until Fun88 negotiated the extra year before agreeing a break clause.

Because NUFC is an investment, not a sportswashing vehicle a la Man City or PSG. It’s not a vanity purchase. The funniest part about watching the Delaneys of the world in the press losing their minds is that they clearly haven’t a fucking clue about what they’re looking at. NUFC isn’t a vehicle to promote KSA, and wouldn’t be unless they become a super club. And even if NUFC became KSA’s favourite club, it’s a tiny market audience. I always thought we’d end up with someone like Qatar Airways or similar on the shirt. They’ll use their political and economic connections to get sponsorship from other ME states for realpolitik purposes. It makes perfect sense - why would you throw your own money at this? Besides, other than Aramco (which is PIF-linked and would immediately cause issues while the club is being grown) how many genuinely international firms are KSA-owned? Abu Dhabi and Qatar’s wealth is like a personal bank account for their leadership. While KSA is a dictatorship, it’s still a country of tens of millions and the sovereign wealth fund is for investments which one day pay off, not as a slush fund to hoy at vanity projects. Though of course the House of Saud aren’t exactly without personal cash.

It very much was … but we can’t do what Man City did (I’m not convinced we would have even if it was. KSA isn’t a city state personal fiefdom like Abu Dhabi - anyone expecting a Man City / PSG style approach was always going to be disappointed) https://amp.theguardian.com/football/2008/dec/10/manchester-city-sponsorship

Yeah, this is what I’ve been expecting - a series of short term deals which keep jumping up in value by significant amounts. The next one in 2025 will no doubt be in the Spurs / Arsenal / Chelsea category; the one after that in Man City territory. This is why this will take 5-10 years, as the owners said from the off. Howe and the players have hit the accelerator on the plans with what they’ve achieved - I reckon we’ve shaved a year or so off what we thought we’d need. The PIF money will likely be used for infrastructure and loss absorption. Their contacts will be used for getting big sponsorship bucks - which is why I was always puzzled by the assumptions that the sponsors would be Aramco etc at this point. Why draw down more criticism and more eyes when you can easily get the same money elsewhere during the building process? Once we get where we’re going though, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Saudi sponsorship all over the shop - like Man City, whose deals are similar to but just a bit bigger than Man Utd and Liverpool.

Another bump and you mean to tell me that this cunt is still not dead?

Yeah, I loved it when he would get genuinely excited by what he’d seen. He rarely exclaimed loudly in less what he’d seen was absolutely top drawer sensational. Obligatory NUFC example: https://twitter.com/tfNUFC/status/1082227403458531329/mediaViewer?currentTweet=1082227403458531329&currentTweetUser=tfNUFC

Roger Tames is still the voice of NUFC commentaries from that era, unfortunately, with unconvincing dub-over of recorded highlights.

Yeah Mick Lowes for most of the 90s. Before he went crackers on Twitter.

Barry Davies remains my all time favourite - shame he sacked it off to just commentate on tennis, I seem to remember due to Motson being given prime billing despite being incredibly irritating. Can’t say I notice many today - I try to ignore it mostly, given that (unlike Davies) they won’t shut up for a nanosecond. Raisbeck is good mind.

Just me in the ‘never convinced by Pedro’ camp then?

If any young’uns are wondering what the differences between being a NUFC fan in the mid-‘90s and now are - looking at Southampton and thinking ‘shit, zero points again off this lot’ is one of them. 4-0 I reckon.

It’s 8:15am here in Sydney and I’m meant to be starting work - instead I’ve got about six pages open on internet explorer talking about NUFC and switching between them. NUFC being class again is having a massive impact on my professional standing

Jeffrey Dahmer being berated by Mickey Rooney’s racist Japanese impression - happy days

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kljDGdnhqo8

Isak is a genius.

Marriner is one of those refs who gives you absolutely nowt then from nothing gives a soft pen