Mike Ashley

[NG32]

It's disgusting but not the least bit surprising - by the result of intent or ineptitude - that this football club (Nah, f*** it, .com got it spot on with former football club) has sank to the depths it has, even now in 2015.

 

McClaren actually being linked and discussed as an upgrade? Being chronically short of defensive cover (and any proper defenders barring Janmaat) for years running (It wouldn't even be unfair to say this extends to the whole first team). The cloak and dagger approach and attitude to the support base as a whole. Transfers (the whole lot). Finances. Appointments (I'm tempted to say all of them at this point, too). Don't even get me started on the ShiteDirect and Wonga graffiti associated with the stadium and, most probably, the training complex that's in the pipeline. All this before you even lift the lid on the shady club shop operation, the attitude towards cups/european competitions and the cringeworthy ideas and events (School disco party sticks in my mind, that stupid f***ing screen also). They're just some of the ingredients that turns a sporting institution into a running joke and an unfolding disaster, and, unbelievably, it goes so much deeper than that.

 

What boggles my mind still is that there are a considerable number of people out there willing to not just put their own money into this (everybody has their own reasons, some of which can be understandable), but to actively defend it and even justify it? It's mind-blowing on so many levels that people who claim to support the club do so in such a blind and unquestionable fashion, to the point where it's turned slightly hostile (the Sack Pardew campaign last year in the stands sticks in my mind). Why do people put themselves out to be inevitably used, with such a low return of entertainment and enjoyment out of this?

 

By accident or design Ashleys approach still seems to work - water down the expectations, spin the truth, justify the lies, and when the right opportunity arises tell everybody what they want to hear to bring them back to the table and do the absolute bare minimum. Two steps backwards and one step forward every damn season is, whichever way you want to look at it, still heading backwards. In our current situation, replacing John f***ing Carver with an actual football manager / coach and making noises about clearing out the squad (Sorry, getting dat profit) is seemingly that one solitary step forward that some will be persuaded to believe is real progress and this fat b****** "learning from his mistakes". Madness. I've heard some absolute corkers along the way, too - "Don't wanna end up like Leeds / Portsmouth". "We're in the prem you know, could be worse". "We were s*** in the past too, so this isn't so bad compared to back then". "The players need our support / I support the team not the regime". "At least Carver knows the club/players/area, it could be worse".

 

This prick of an owner got rich one way or another in the business world, and it certainly hasn't been via the ethical and understanding route. We're probably going to post our biggest profit since he took over and he can still sit in the stands laughing and look towards a near full house to a team in mid table with scant worry. Unreal.

 

Big profits, rotten product.

 

Sports Direct - method.

 

Not interested in building a powerful brand, buy cheap, sell high.

 

 

[Colos Short and Curlies]

I wonder if releasing a big profit number might actually work against MA?

 

I know we have a lot of zombie sheep in SJP at the moment, but surely most people will finally put 2 and 2 together when a £60m profit plus £20m of player sales (assuming 2 of Janmaat, Sissoko, Perez, Cabella, Krul leave) should result in us not scrambling around the bargain basement of players this summer.

 

Or is this the slippiest and smallest of straws I'm clutching at?

[Guest axel]

If people still haven't figured it out, they never will.

[NG32]

I wonder if releasing a big profit number might actually work against MA?

 

I know we have a lot of zombie sheep in SJP at the moment, but surely most people will finally put 2 and 2 together when a £60m profit plus £20m of player sales (assuming 2 of Janmaat, Sissoko, Perez, Cabella, Krul leave) should result in us not scrambling around the bargain basement of players this summer.

 

Or is this the slippiest and smallest of straws I'm clutching at?

 

I wouldn't mind if the bargain basement was where we had to pick players up from, I mind when we only spend money on players in the knoweldge that we will sell them a season or two after for a profit.  There is absolutely no vision for building a team, I dont know how people can actually put up with it and attend games.

 

 

 

 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I think it goes beyond finance now really, people are just 'happy' with a much lower level of ambition and a much poorer squad.

 

I suffer from it to, I would be blown away by about 4 decent signings, no matter what the value. My expectations for our dealings are so low now.

[jdckelly]

I really don't give a shit about whats spent on the players if a) they're good enough b) the squad is fit for purpose. A has recently more often than not fine b has never been up to par.

[Interpolic]

It's the constant posturing with other clubs over a few quid then deciding to go without that pisses me off the most.  The club's such a waste of time.

[cp40]

If people still haven't figured it out, they never will.

 

 

they simply hide from the truth.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

If people still haven't figured it out, they never will.

 

they simply hide from the truth.

 

It's difficult for football fans TBF, they're not like any other type of consumer. We're programmed to stick with our club through good times and bad, and that's how a lot of people see it. And we're used to changing our expectations based on what happened in the recent past.

 

Obviously in this case we've stopped trying, that's what has done me in.

[The College Dropout]

I really don't give a s*** about whats spent on the players if a) they're good enough b) the squad is fit for purpose. A has recently more often than not fine b has never been up to par.

 

Keep buying cheap eventually you'll have a problem with point B. We are essentially trying to "beat the market" with our transfer policy. It's a gamble. And when we need to just buy a player to improve our team we'll buy the cheapest decent option we can find. That's how you end up with Riviere.

 

Cisse has finally returned to form but otherwise we would be relying on Perez to keep us up ffs.

[ToonTastic]

I really don't give a s*** about whats spent on the players if a) they're good enough b) the squad is fit for purpose. A has recently more often than not fine b has never been up to par.

 

Keep buying cheap eventually you'll have a problem with point B. We are essentially trying to "beat the market" with our transfer policy. It's a gamble. And when we need to just buy a player to improve our team we'll buy the cheapest decent option we can find. That's how you end up with Riviere.

 

Cisse has finally returned to form but otherwise we would be relying on Perez to keep us up ffs.

For his record Riviera wasn't that cheap. Pretty expensive to be fair.

[Colos Short and Curlies]

I've no real gripe with looking for bargains etc, it should be seen to be a good thing to be able to upgrade or at least replace like for like whilst spending less then you bring in (using the Carroll money on Tiote, Ben Arfa, Cabaye and ultimately Cisse was really good business all round).

 

The problem is that its very difficult to buy to maintain a position. when we bought Cabaye et al I genuinely think we had aspirations to compete (albeit trying to do this through exploiting contracts etc) and could sell that to players who were better than our finishing position of 1th/12th.

 

Now we are trying to buy players to keep us in 8th - 10th and you either (a) overpay for players at that level or (b) take a real gamble on the likes of Perez and Riviere who by rights are at a level lower than 8th - 10th in the premier league (remember Perez came from the Spanish second division and has performed far in excess of expectations) so as a collective will only keep you at your target at best. In reality half + of these will turn out worse than hoped and you then start looking to consolidate 12th - 10th, buy players to do this and end up looking at 14th - 12th etc.

 

Without real ambition its so easy to getting sucked into buying bottom half players and struggling, there's loads of teams in the Premier Leagues history who have slowly but surely dropped 1-2 places a year and then suddenly find themselves in huge trouble. Ashley doesn't see this

[NG32]

Its all a bout the quick buck and no long term plan.  "Fuckin hell we can get that much for him!"  No thinking about what said player could be worth in a seasons time when the club improves its league position and can demand even more for its assets.  Season to season short termism is the game.  How anyone can fund that ia veyond me.

[sempuki]

Its all a bout the quick buck and no long term plan.  "Fuckin hell we can get that much for him!"  No thinking about what said player could be worth in a seasons time when the club improves its league position and can demand even more for its assets.  Season to season short termism is the game.  How anyone can fund that ia veyond me.

Exactly - it is not as if he is short of a few quid either.

[Yorkie]

I really don't give a s*** about whats spent on the players if a) they're good enough b) the squad is fit for purpose. A has recently more often than not fine b has never been up to par.

 

Keep buying cheap eventually you'll have a problem with point B. We are essentially trying to "beat the market" with our transfer policy. It's a gamble. And when we need to just buy a player to improve our team we'll buy the cheapest decent option we can find. That's how you end up with Riviere.

 

Cisse has finally returned to form but otherwise we would be relying on Perez to keep us up ffs.

For his record Riviera wasn't that cheap. Pretty expensive to be fair.

 

Anichebe, just one off the top of my head, cost more.

[sempuki]

The fat twat is richer than Richard Branson. That doesn't seem right.

[Disco]

The pickle industry isn't as a strong as it once was

[Belfast Mags]

If people still haven't figured it out, they never will.

 

they simply hide from the truth.

 

It's difficult for football fans TBF, they're not like any other type of consumer. We're programmed to stick with our club through good times and bad, and that's how a lot of people see it. And we're used to changing our expectations based on what happened in the recent past.

 

Obviously in this case we've stopped trying, that's what has done me in.

 

[Peppe]

We (he) will make as much money from just staying in the Premier League as we (he again) will trying to compete. Trying to compete would cost more though, so why bother? Maximum amount of income for the fat pig with the least amount of money spent as possible is where it's at. Happy times for us NUFC supporters! *that suicide smiley*

[Happy Face]

I've no real gripe with looking for bargains etc, it should be seen to be a good thing to be able to upgrade or at least replace like for like whilst spending less then you bring in (using the Carroll money on Tiote, Ben Arfa, Cabaye and ultimately Cisse was really good business all round).

 

The problem is that its very difficult to buy to maintain a position. when we bought Cabaye et al I genuinely think we had aspirations to compete (albeit trying to do this through exploiting contracts etc) and could sell that to players who were better than our finishing position of 1th/12th.

 

Now we are trying to buy players to keep us in 8th - 10th and you either (a) overpay for players at that level or (b) take a real gamble on the likes of Perez and Riviere who by rights are at a level lower than 8th - 10th in the premier league (remember Perez came from the Spanish second division and has performed far in excess of expectations) so as a collective will only keep you at your target at best. In reality half + of these will turn out worse than hoped and you then start looking to consolidate 12th - 10th, buy players to do this and end up looking at 14th - 12th etc.

 

Without real ambition its so easy to getting sucked into buying bottom half players and struggling, there's loads of teams in the Premier Leagues history who have slowly but surely dropped 1-2 places a year and then suddenly find themselves in huge trouble. Ashley doesn't see this

 

I think he does, he's just sticking to the plan of slow, sustainable growth so he's not carrying the can for further investment.  Just wrote this over on TT, which is as I see it.....

 

What we had before Ashley and what we have with Ashley is a club that has to pay for itself.  No change.

 

With Ashley the club doesn't have to pay any dividends, board member salaries for 8 people in the same families and exorbitant rates of interest.  The previous owners got away with that level of waste by borrowing more money to spend and keep fans deluded that we were a strong club.  They were always happy that there would be another TV deal around the corner.  The problem came when we had to recalibrate our spending to pay the bills, even with the new TV deals.

 

For example, the 2 biggest net spends in the history of Newcastle United were in succesive years in 01/02 and 02/03.  Bellamy, Robert, Jenas, Viana, Bramble Woodgate and Ambrose were bought at a cost of £45m with literally nothing recouped whatsoever.  This was fine, because a new TV deal started soon (03/04), however because we spent big on borrowing it had to be repaid when that TV deal kicked in, so in 03/04 we bought no-one.  We sold Solano and Cort to turn a small profit, then we had to sell Speed and Woodgate to meet costs.  Every other club was rolling in cash and improving their squad while ours was worsening, so we finished 14th the following year.

 

Ashley is taking the opposite view.  He is not spending a single penny the club does not already have.  Even wages are accounted for up to the end of a contract when a player is bought, so the club are not caught short with expensive wage bills 3 years down the line on a player who wasn't good enough and is rotting in the reserves.  It's an infuriatingly risk averse strategy, but longer term it means ALL the money the club earns can pay for new players, facilities, managers, coaches etc, rather than going on debt (assuming the debt is now "clear").

 

What this has led to is (almost) a year on year increase on gross spending that need not necessarily end at any point....

 

 

I've left out 2014, where we bought no-one.  That was a gamble that paid off, we could have gone down, but without replacing Cabaye we stayed up, which meant we were closer to the break even point where the club can start progressing sooner.

 

None of this is to say we'll soon be challenging for Europe or that other clubs won't continue to outspend us.  We're just much less prone to Summers where we stagnate as we pay off the debts.

[Colos Short and Curlies]

I've no real gripe with looking for bargains etc, it should be seen to be a good thing to be able to upgrade or at least replace like for like whilst spending less then you bring in (using the Carroll money on Tiote, Ben Arfa, Cabaye and ultimately Cisse was really good business all round).

 

The problem is that its very difficult to buy to maintain a position. when we bought Cabaye et al I genuinely think we had aspirations to compete (albeit trying to do this through exploiting contracts etc) and could sell that to players who were better than our finishing position of 1th/12th.

 

Now we are trying to buy players to keep us in 8th - 10th and you either (a) overpay for players at that level or (b) take a real gamble on the likes of Perez and Riviere who by rights are at a level lower than 8th - 10th in the premier league (remember Perez came from the Spanish second division and has performed far in excess of expectations) so as a collective will only keep you at your target at best. In reality half + of these will turn out worse than hoped and you then start looking to consolidate 12th - 10th, buy players to do this and end up looking at 14th - 12th etc.

 

Without real ambition its so easy to getting sucked into buying bottom half players and struggling, there's loads of teams in the Premier Leagues history who have slowly but surely dropped 1-2 places a year and then suddenly find themselves in huge trouble. Ashley doesn't see this

 

I think he does, he's just sticking to the plan of slow, sustainable growth so he's not carrying the can for further investment.  Just wrote this over on TT, which is as I see it.....

 

What we had before Ashley and what we have with Ashley is a club that has to pay for itself.  No change.

 

With Ashley the club doesn't have to pay any dividends, board member salaries for 8 people in the same families and exorbitant rates of interest.  The previous owners got away with that level of waste by borrowing more money to spend and keep fans deluded that we were a strong club.  They were always happy that there would be another TV deal around the corner.  The problem came when we had to recalibrate our spending to pay the bills, even with the new TV deals.

 

For example, the 2 biggest net spends in the history of Newcastle United were in succesive years in 01/02 and 02/03.  Bellamy, Robert, Jenas, Viana, Bramble Woodgate and Ambrose were bought at a cost of £45m with literally nothing recouped whatsoever.  This was fine, because a new TV deal started soon (03/04), however because we spent big on borrowing it had to be repaid when that TV deal kicked in, so in 03/04 we bought no-one.  We sold Solano and Cort to turn a small profit, then we had to sell Speed and Woodgate to meet costs.  Every other club was rolling in cash and improving their squad while ours was worsening, so we finished 14th the following year.

 

Ashley is taking the opposite view.  He is not spending a single penny the club does not already have.  Even wages are accounted for up to the end of a contract when a player is bought, so the club are not caught short with expensive wage bills 3 years down the line on a player who wasn't good enough and is rotting in the reserves.  It's an infuriatingly risk averse strategy, but longer term it means ALL the money the club earns can pay for new players, facilities, managers, coaches etc, rather than going on debt (assuming the debt is now "clear").

 

What this has led to is (almost) a year on year increase on gross spending that need not necessarily end at any point....

 

 

I've left out 2014, where we bought no-one.  That was a gamble that paid off, we could have gone down, but without replacing Cabaye we stayed up, which meant we were closer to the break even point where the club can start progressing sooner.

 

None of this is to say we'll soon be challenging for Europe or that other clubs won't continue to outspend us.  We're just much less prone to Summers where we stagnate as we pay off the debts.

 

I really hope you're right and that the club will be able to reinvest profits rather than sit on cash. Of course it doesn't matter how much we spend if we have Carver in charge.

 

It will be interesting to see what calibre of player we are able to bring in - those that see us a team capable of more (Cabaye) or those that see us as the best they can get (Riviere).

[Interpolic]

It seems a bit misleading to say the gross spend is going up each year while leaving out 2014.  In summer 2014 we had to spend a certain chunk of money just to stand still (or arguably go backwards) due to a refusal to spend for 2 consecutive transfer windows.  If you split that gross spend over 2 years which would make far more logical sense then it equates to £18.7m per year.  Also I'm not sure why you're assuming Ashley will not pay back any of the debt owed to him and all spare cash can be spent from now on, it seems a bit of a leap as far as assumptions go.  In reality I think you're guessing like anyone else.

[Happy Face]

It seems a bit misleading to say the gross spend is going up each year while leaving out 2014.  In summer 2014 we had to spend a certain chunk of money just to stand still (or arguably go backwards) due to a refusal to spend for 2 consecutive transfer windows.  If you split that gross spend over 2 years which would make far more logical sense then it equates to £18.7m per year.  Also I'm not sure why you're assuming Ashley will not pay back any of the debt owed to him and all spare cash can be spent from now on, it seems a bit of a leap as far as assumptions go.  In reality I think you're guessing like anyone else.

 

I think the spending in 11/12 was higher than he'd have liked because we bought an "expensive" striker in Cisse.  £10m was beyond the level of what we were spending on players back then, but needed a striker as Carroll had gone and Ba had the release clause.

 

So in 12/13 we were supposed to cut back (only Anita in a frugal summer), but then we strugglesd in the league and spent in the winter, when we weren't going to.

 

That money was earmarked for summer 13/14, which is why there was no spend then.

 

In 14/15 the spend was at the affordable level the club would like to keep adding to.

 

So it's not right to split 14/15 into 13/14. i think of it more like £17m a season in 11/12, 12/13 and 13/14.

 

It's not an assumption that the club will stop re-paying Ashley debt.  It's as stated in the accounts....

 

http://i60.tinypic.com/2pu0t8o.png

 

£18m was repayable within 1 year, which everyone expects to have been covered off in the 13/14 accounts.  The rest....isn't.

[Unbelievable]

It's not an assumption that the club will stop re-paying Ashley debt.  It's as stated in the accounts....

 

http://i60.tinypic.com/2pu0t8o.png

 

£18m was repayable within 1 year, which everyone expects to have been covered off in the 13/14 accounts.  The rest....isn't.

 

It doesn't really say that though, does it? It says that 18m is repayable, not that the rest of the 129m isn't, unless I'm reading that wrong?

 

Also, from what I've read in the past (might be wrong), the debt is not actually non-interest bearing. Ashley has so far decided not to charge interest he is contractually entitled to, but he could if/when he wanted, even retrospectively. And even if he couldn't, there is nothing stopping him taking the profits out as dividend if he so desired, is there?

 

I want to believe you are right in being optimistic, but there is very little evidence that a change in approach for the better is upcoming, and plenty of evidence pointing to the contrary. Anyway, I'll believe it when I see it.

[Happy Face]

I find plenty to criticise Ashley for, without criticising him for what he might or might not do.

 

I always assume he's going to do what benefits him and sorts direct the most and Newcastle united second.

 

In terms of spending club earnings, Ashley, SD and NUFC all benefit greatest from the club investing all it can in players and coaching.