The Wage Bill

[Parky]

Well, I think our wage bill is actually what's to be expected of a struggling mid-table Premiership team (i.e. one who's looking to punch above this level) atm. Sure, we do have a few underachieving players who aren't obviously worth what we're paying, but the way to fix this problem is not to decrease the wage bill, but actually to increase our turnover.

 

The only way we can significantly reduce our wage bill is if we get rid of all these high-earners. But, we already have a tiny squad as it is and I don't think we can afford an even smaller one if we hope to be challenging for 5th place next season. Who's going to take Viduka, Emre, Duff and Smith anyway?

 

The way Mort should be thinking is that we spend big this summer, bring in top class players who'll want good money, and we take a loss for the year. Fuck it, we might lose £20m in a year but we're speculating to accumulate. If things work out, we'll have Europe for the season after that and it'll be a massive boost to our coffers (£20m iirc). And then we push on from there.

 

If we trim our squad even further this season, we'll only have unproven youngsters as backups and there's no chance we're going to get into Europe with them.

 

I personally would go in heavy this summer and give us a strong chance of qualifying for Europe etc, so I agree with your 3rd para. Profit and income has to be increased and that isn't going to happen with treading water.

 

Why the chuff didn't you say that originally then, you gonk!

 

That way would undoubtedly be a lot more exciting, like, as I've said.

 

I thought you knew I was a slash and burn merchant. 

 

Should have bolded the bit I meant in particular, I was gagging for someone to state the alternate route.

 

I'd go as far as to say we in all reality have no choice but to compete. For falling further behind or standing still is going to hinder and sacrifice future income and branding goals. It's a tricky one though as we don't really know what all this gradual building lark really means...Is it a 5yr plan or a 10yr plan? When will our breakout year come? Wether it happens now or in 3 years time, speculative investment on the pitch has to happen.

[Taylor Swift]

Well, I think our wage bill is actually what's to be expected of a struggling mid-table Premiership team (i.e. one who's looking to punch above this level) atm. Sure, we do have a few underachieving players who aren't obviously worth what we're paying, but the way to fix this problem is not to decrease the wage bill, but actually to increase our turnover.

 

The only way we can significantly reduce our wage bill is if we get rid of all these high-earners. But, we already have a tiny squad as it is and I don't think we can afford an even smaller one if we hope to be challenging for 5th place next season. Who's going to take Viduka, Emre, Duff and Smith anyway?

 

The way Mort should be thinking is that we spend big this summer, bring in top class players who'll want good money, and we take a loss for the year. Fuck it, we might lose £20m in a year but we're speculating to accumulate. If things work out, we'll have Europe for the season after that and it'll be a massive boost to our coffers (£20m iirc). And then we push on from there.

 

If we trim our squad even further this season, we'll only have unproven youngsters as backups and there's no chance we're going to get into Europe with them.

 

I personally would go in heavy this summer and give us a strong chance of qualifying for Europe etc, so I agree with your 3rd para. Profit and income has to be increased and that isn't going to happen with treading water.

 

Why the chuff didn't you say that originally then, you gonk!

 

That way would undoubtedly be a lot more exciting, like, as I've said.

 

I thought you knew I was a slash and burn merchant. 

 

Should have bolded the bit I meant in particular, I was gagging for someone to state the alternate route.

 

I'd go as far as to say we in all reality have no choice but to compete. For falling further behind or standing still is going to hinder and sacrifice future income and branding goals. It's a tricky one though as we don't really know what all this gradual building lark really means...Is it a 5yr plan or a 10yr plan? When will our breakout year come? Wether it happens now or in 3 years time, speculative investment on the pitch has to happen.

 

 

We do have to go for it, sooner rather than later as well. In the end, we'll have to acquire top class players and they'll be pricey and command hefty wages. It HAS to happen, if we want to end up back in the Champions League on a regular basis.

 

Tbf, I agree with the initial premise of trimming the squad etc. but our squad is freaking small. We already lack cover in quite a few positions (up front, full backs and CM) so I don't think it's feasible to expect another negative turnover of players this summer.

 

It'd be interesting to see our wages (net) in comparison with the other teams who we'll be competing with. I think we won't be that far ahead of the clubs around us, which would suggest that our financial problems lie with turnover, and not wages.

 

We really do have to increase our turnover, though. Look at Spurs, who have a turnover of over £100m and aren't even in the Champions League, and compared to the £90m-ish turnover that we had when we WERE in the CL.

 

I don't think we, as a club, brand and company, is even near maximising our potential off the field. Of course, to the traditional football fan, this smacks of consumerism/suits etc. and all the negative connotations that come with it. But, we either have to step up or we're going to get left behind.

 

You (Rich) started off comparing us to Spurs, but how is it even possible that they've got a turnover (from last year's irrc, which does not include the tv money yet) higher than what we've ever recorded? If we have a high turnover, we'll be able to pay Owen £100k/week without worrying about it, and we'll be able to pay clubs £20m in one go to make sure they actually sign for us. The only we're going to be able to do that is if we can compete on the field, and the only way to do that is to sign quality players, and quality players cost lots of money.

[Taylor Swift]

The more I think about this, the more Parky's right. We're going to have to spend £100m in a year or two on about 4 quality players if we want to compete.

[Baggio]

Well, I think our wage bill is actually what's to be expected of a struggling mid-table Premiership team (i.e. one who's looking to punch above this level) atm. Sure, we do have a few underachieving players who aren't obviously worth what we're paying, but the way to fix this problem is not to decrease the wage bill, but actually to increase our turnover.

 

The only way we can significantly reduce our wage bill is if we get rid of all these high-earners. But, we already have a tiny squad as it is and I don't think we can afford an even smaller one if we hope to be challenging for 5th place next season. Who's going to take Viduka, Emre, Duff and Smith anyway?

 

The way Mort should be thinking is that we spend big this summer, bring in top class players who'll want good money, and we take a loss for the year. Fuck it, we might lose £20m in a year but we're speculating to accumulate. If things work out, we'll have Europe for the season after that and it'll be a massive boost to our coffers (£20m iirc). And then we push on from there.

 

If we trim our squad even further this season, we'll only have unproven youngsters as backups and there's no chance we're going to get into Europe with them.

 

I personally would go in heavy this summer and give us a strong chance of qualifying for Europe etc, so I agree with your 3rd para. Profit and income has to be increased and that isn't going to happen with treading water.

 

Why the chuff didn't you say that originally then, you gonk!

 

That way would undoubtedly be a lot more exciting, like, as I've said.

 

I thought you knew I was a slash and burn merchant. 

 

Should have bolded the bit I meant in particular, I was gagging for someone to state the alternate route.

 

I'd go as far as to say we in all reality have no choice but to compete. For falling further behind or standing still is going to hinder and sacrifice future income and branding goals. It's a tricky one though as we don't really know what all this gradual building lark really means...Is it a 5yr plan or a 10yr plan? When will our breakout year come? Wether it happens now or in 3 years time, speculative investment on the pitch has to happen.

 

 

We do have to go for it, sooner rather than later as well. In the end, we'll have to acquire top class players and they'll be pricey and command hefty wages. It HAS to happen, if we want to end up back in the Champions League on a regular basis.

 

Tbf, I agree with the initial premise of trimming the squad etc. but our squad is freaking small. We already lack cover in quite a few positions (up front, full backs and CM) so I don't think it's feasible to expect another negative turnover of players this summer.

 

It'd be interesting to see our wages (net) in comparison with the other teams who we'll be competing with. I think we won't be that far ahead of the clubs around us, which would suggest that our financial problems lie with turnover, and not wages.

 

We really do have to increase our turnover, though. Look at Spurs, who have a turnover of over £100m and aren't even in the Champions League, and compared to the £90m-ish turnover that we had when we WERE in the CL.

 

I don't think we, as a club, brand and company, is even near maximising our potential off the field. Of course, to the traditional football fan, this smacks of consumerism/suits etc. and all the negative connotations that come with it. But, we either have to step up or we're going to get left behind.

 

You (Rich) started off comparing us to Spurs, but how is it even possible that they've got a turnover (from last year's irrc, which does not include the tv money yet) higher than what we've ever recorded? If we have a high turnover, we'll be able to pay Owen £100k/week without worrying about it, and we'll be able to pay clubs £20m in one go to make sure they actually sign for us. The only we're going to be able to do that is if we can compete on the field, and the only way to do that is to sign quality players, and quality players cost lots of money.

 

Ticket prices are higher including Uefa cup games being catagory A tickets and a big sponsorship deal with Mansion being the main one's, they seem to bring out 3 new kits every season too.

[Rich]

Apisith, about Spurs: last season they got to the quarters of the UEFA, quarters of the FA, semis of the League Cup and finished 5th in the Premiership. They also had that massive deal with Mansion in place as well.

 

We, on the other hand, didn't make the quarters of the UEFA (and got a hell of a lot less TV money for each game than Spurs did, if I remember rightly), went out in the 3rd round of the FA, the quarters of the League Cup and finished 13th in the Premiership.

 

Ticket prices at Spurs also far exceed our own, considerably narrowing that gap of 15,000 seats.

[Guest Alan Shearer 9]

We have no time to fuck about, if we aren't going to spend then we should cut adrift the wasters on big wages. Smith, Duff, Emre; if Owen won't take a pay cut for a new contract, let him go. Taylor wants more than he's worth? Fuck off to another club matey. We could build slowly from there. As has been said treading water with the current set up is unsustainable and will lead to us falling further backwards in years to come.

 

The other side of this coin is to buy; however selling some of the wasters still makes sense if this were to be the case.

[Rich]

We have no time to fuck about, if we aren't going to spend then we should cut adrift the wasters on big wages. Smith, Duff, Emre; if Owen won't take a pay cut for a new contract, let him go. Taylor wants more than he's worth? Fuck off to another club matey. We could build slowly from there. As has been said treading water with the current set up is unsustainable and will lead to us falling further backwards in years to come.

 

The other side of this coin is to buy; however selling some of the wasters still makes sense if this were to be the case.

 

Fucking hell. That's a great post! From AS9!

[Guest Alan Shearer 9]

It's an obvious point. It really pains me that we have a lot of expense going on players who add little to novalue to the squad other than in terms of size. We seriously need to stop getting players like this and cut the ones that are here already. We seem to take the brunt in the trnasfer market and are held to ransom frequently, it sucks.

[Cronky]

Owen's wages are a real problem and a potential flash point between Keegan and his employers - if that hasn't happened already, of course. As everyone knows, we over-paid him because he didn't want to come here and we had to offer him a very lucrative package to compensate. It was the last of Freddy's great mistakes, which still hasn't been sorted.

 

I don't think you can offer him a pay cut, so it comes down to either renewing the contract on the same level, or letting the contract run out. Personally, I'm with AS9 on this one.

[Guest rebel_yell12]

Owen's wages are a real problem and a potential flash point between Keegan and his employers - if that hasn't happened already, of course. As everyone knows, we over-paid him because he didn't want to come here and we had to offer him a very lucrative package to compensate. It was the last of Freddy's great mistakes, which still hasn't been sorted.

 

I don't think you can offer him a pay cut, so it comes down to either renewing the contract on the same level, or letting the contract run out. Personally, I'm with AS9 on this one.

 

I agree with the point in bold, wholeheartedly.  Essentially, offering him a pay cut is "letting the contract run out" because Owen can get 60k/week elsewhere, at clubs higher up the table and he'd likely know that.  Looking up his Actim numbers, he averages 13 points per match:  IF he maintains his current run of fitness (to say, playing in 36 per season), that average would put him in the Top 20 players in the league.  He's paid with the top 20 players, shockingly.  Owen's problem is fitness, not class, imo.  If he's sorted that, he's worth renewing on current terms (minus the get-out clauses).  An increase would be out of order, if the wage bill is so much a problem.  In my mind, the club makes up a good portion of Owen's "overpayment" in marketing.  Newcastle got on PES2008 not because they're a top team (never been in before) but because PES put Owen on the cover -- had to have his team then didn't it?  Every team involved gets royalties from that, as I understand it.  Owen moves a lot of kit in Asia especially (they still sell Liverpool "Owen 10" kits there, I'm told) and is better known and more popular internationally than the club itself.  I don't want to belabour the point, but he's a gold-mine of marketing. There's also the fact that ALL of Owen's wages whilst he was out with injuries received on England duty have been covered by the FA.  So last season, Owen cost the club approximately 300k in total (last three weeks of the season).  I don't think Owen's wages are the problem because he brings money, coverage, etc. IN as well (plus there's the whole, actually playing well and is club captain issue). 

 

If I were the owner, my issue would be more with approx. 55-65k/week for the likes of Duff and Smith.  Together, a far far bigger waste than Owen's wages, imo.  Viduka on 70k seems a bit overpaid, imo -- his fitness record and age are both worse than Owen's, and he doesn't balance the scales of income off the pitch nearly so well as Owen, either.  How much is Barton on, 50k?  He certainly doesn't recover the outgoing funds nearly as well (unless you count negative publicity as good for the club...it does add a bit notoreity).  Emre? N'Zogbia? There may be a trend here.  I think Newcastle has overpaid wages for a few seasons now:  but offering cuts isn't particularly feasible for most cases.  Only option then is to sell, or bite the bullet and continue to pay.  With Owen, I say, continue to pay.  With Smith and Duff, sell.  Still undecided on the rest (I don't think anyone would touch Viduka, Emre or Barton, tbh). 

 

But isn't all this a noticeable turnaround from a few weeks back, when Oba was supposedly set to sign a 90k per week new contract?  So...Owen takes a 40k/week cut, whilst Martins gets a 40k/week rise?  That wouldn't exactly alter the balance of the books, would it?  Gotta love the media. 

[Rich]

More good stuff, it's been cracking on here today. Far better than writing 5,000 words about fitness training.

 

Less productive, granted, but much more fun.

 

Owen is worth his wages if he stays fit like, I've no problem with that. It's a fucking bugger when he's crocked though and we all know he's still raking in £100k a week, give or take some.

 

Club captain now as well = more responsibility. He's hardly in a weak bargaining position, is he?

[Wullie]

Rich, when you're good... you're good. 

[Rich]

Aw, shucks.

[Guest Knightrider]

I'm not surprised wages are such a big issue as year on year they keep growing, yet for the past few seasons our income has been in decline, and as we all know, that trend can't continue as that's the way to go bust. It's a tricky one, because if you do slash wages in football that usually means losing your better players, or trimming the squad of squad players leaving you short in depth, or even missing out on top targets due to a tightened wage structure. It's a catch 22 situation in many ways because to sustain those type of wage payouts you have to increase turnover. You won't do that with a team of nobodies though. A careful balancing act is needed. Pragmatism mixed with a dose of speculate to accumulate kind of thinking. What I will say however, is that top top players will always pay for themselves. Look at Shearer, he cost £15m and god knows what else in wages during those 10 years but would I be stretching it to say he brought in £100m or so into the club via his performances, goals, 10 year service and of course brand name? I once read an article that claimed Beckham paid Real Madrid back the cost of his transfer fee in months. Top players do that or can do.

[Guest johnnyappleseed]

2006-07 wage bill for the top 4:

 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/article3889968.ece

Manchester United (figures to end of 2007)

 

Turnover £210m Wages £91.56m Ratio 43.6 per cent

 

Chelsea (figures to end of 2007)

 

Turnover £190.5m Wages £135m Ratio 71 per cent (down from 76 a year earlier)

 

Arsenal (figures to end of 2007)

 

Turnover £177m (excluding £23m from property investment) Wages £89.7m Ratio 50.6

 

Liverpool (figures to end 2006)

 

Turnover £119.5m Wages £68.87m Ratio 57.63

[Martin Lol]

We have no time to f*** about, if we aren't going to spend then we should cut adrift the wasters on big wages. Smith, Duff, Emre; if Owen won't take a pay cut for a new contract, let him go. Taylor wants more than he's worth? f*** off to another club matey. We could build slowly from there. As has been said treading water with the current set up is unsustainable and will lead to us falling further backwards in years to come.

 

The other side of this coin is to buy; however selling some of the wasters still makes sense if this were to be the case.

 

I don't really see the relevance of whether NUFC are going to spend or whether the relevant players are on big wages.  If KK/DW et al think that Smith, Duff, Emre (the ones you mentioned) are a drain on the club's resources then they should be sold/released/paid up and shown the exit door.  But what of the ones who don't get so much in wages but have little or no chance of making the squad, let alone making the team?  They are still a drain on resources, just not as a bigger drain as others and I would say they should suffer the same fate.  Of course this doesn't relate to the youngsters who are still developing but if a player isn't going to be a meaningful member of the squad, what is the point in keeping him?

[Teasy]

You (Rich) started off comparing us to Spurs, but how is it even possible that they've got a turnover (from last year's irrc, which does not include the tv money yet) higher than what we've ever recorded?

 

Because Football finances constantly move on.. clubs all make more money now then they would of even a couple of years ago.  You only have to compare past revenue's from our own club to see that.  You just can't compare past revenue's with current revenue's.  If we had a reasonably successful season in the current financial climate (for instance 5 or 6th and Europe) I have little doubt we'd set a new club record for revenue.

[Guest shaun11177]

The wages are not a problem if Ashley is prepared to pay for the transfer fees himself, if on the other hand he is looking for the club to stand on its own 2 feet then clearly the wages are too high-i believe they were 57m on a turnover of 87m-if you then add the 19m to run the club it leaves 11m for transfers which is basically what we spent net this season.

The turnover will go up this year with the tv deal but that just fuels higher transfer fees and wage demands, but certainly the club is not getting value for money,if you pay the 5th or 6th highest wages in the league you expect to finish somewhere higher than 12th.

i dont blame the players or agents only those who negotiate stupid deals-Sheppard-Luque and why Mort should get away with it i dont know he negotiated for Smith presumably.

 

[Guest neesy111]

The wage bill is down to fat freddy and souness when they went on their spending spree, before that they we're fine

 

we need to get rid of

 

a goalkeeper (got too many)

 

cacapa, rozehnal and taylor (if he is asking for 60k a week) around 60k saved their

 

duff, emre, geremi and charlie (around 190k in total)

 

smith, viduka, ameobi (around 130k in total)

 

around 350k a week saved x 52 = up to 18 million saved and would the first 11 be any worse probably not

[LoveItIfWeBeatU]

The disadvantage of getting players like Viduka and Geremi on free transfers is free transfers tend to get bigger wages than they would have if they'd cost a fee.

[Martin Lol]

The disadvantage of getting players like Viduka and Geremi on free transfers is free transfers tend to get bigger wages than they would have if they'd cost a fee.

 

Not forgetting that the player also gets a signing fee usually around 50% of what his transfer fee would have been.

[Guest Thomo]

Another reduction on the wage bill, Diatta has been released according to the Chronicle.

[Rich]

No surprise there, but he won't have been on much to begin with.

[Dave]

Good news. Not saying he wasn't any good - didn't see enough of him - but if Keegan doesn't want him then it's good he's not just sat here taking the money.

[Guest icemanblue]

By the way, Baggio, is this why you're not exactly enamoured with us signing the likes of Campbell, Dunne, Riise, etc.?

 

I can see the logic, if that's the case.

 

I just don't see how signing players who are at their peak/on their way down is the way forward, it seems Keegan see's this way as pushing on now but the problem is that all of these players around this age will need to all be replaced again in 3 years or so, the club can't afford to go out and buy the best part of a new team every 3 years, on top of that players of this age will want the bigger wages because as far as they're concerned they've learned what there is and now they're the finished article.

 

I made this post yesterday so I won't bother typing it out again...

 

The difference being Wenger set out a long term view of what he could achieve at Arsenal, Keegan on the other hand would be happy to spend big money on players at their peak because he's only interested in the next 3 years and isn't interested that the squad he'd leave us with would resemble Bolton's 'dads army' a few years back.

 

If you look at man Utd for example, they've spent big money in the past but a large part of their success was because Fergie put together a talented group of youngsters and let them grow as a team together - Giggs, Beckham, Scholes, Butt and the Neville's all came through the youth system to form part of their first team for the best part of a decade, Fergie also spent big money on Roy Keane, Rio Ferdinand and Andy Cole who were all 24 or under when they signed.

 

Time has gone by and most of them have needed replacing, he's set about building another team which is built around Ronaldo, Rooney, Tevez, Anderson, Nani, Evra and Vidic, all players signed when they were 24 or under because he wants them to grow as a team together, not only that but if you've got a quality player like Evra at left back you don't have to worry about spending big money on a left back for the next 8 years unless he goes down hill dramatically, the same way they didn't need to spend big money on a right back for a decade when they had Neville, or on a left wing when they had Giggs, it meant they could spend big on filling the places they needed as there wasn't as many to fill.

 

That seems to be what this club wants to do and the reason they went to the trouble of setting up our scouting network, I don't mean they just want to sign young lads for a few hundred thousand and see how they develop, I'm talking about the likes of Modric who is not only quality now but could of been a part of our first team for the next 10 years, that is the quality (and age) of player the chairman spoke of the other day as what they're looking for, if the club could bring in 4 or 5 players of his age and quality then we could be sorted in those positions for the next 10 years, not only that we would benefit from them growing as a unit together.

 

Comments from Keegan suggests he's got other idea's, the likes of Henry, Cambell, Riise, Bridge and Dunne seem to be the sort of players he's after going from the rumour mill, turning his nose up at possible young South Americans is a stupid thing to do too, I'd take the Modric's, Veloso, Gomis, Nelson, Lennon etc over Keegan's big four rejects anyday.

 

This is what we need to do, we need to build a stable of quality players under the age of 25 that we can build the team around and add to here and there over the next 5-10 years, I'd take Dunne btw because we're crying out for some leadership at the back, I'd also take Deco if we could get him for around the £8 million mark because I think we could get another 3 or 4 years out of him and for me he was excellent in both games against Man Utd, apart from that I think we've got enough experience in and around the squad without going out and buying 5 or 6 more players in their late 20's/early 30's.

 

Great post.