Our Awful Profit and Loss On Players

[Tom Bott]

What a negative thing to say that we will never again establish ourselves in the Premier League

Sometimes reality can appear to be negative. Though I was thinking that 'established' was considerably longer than 5 years.

Might take 10 years, 20 years, 30 years.....but it will happen at some point.

So probably not in my lifetime then, my bet expires when I do

most of our history has been spent in the top flight.

Not during my lifetime though, and I've been watching since the late 1960's.
Maybe during my GG grandfathers tenure.
62 out of 124 seasons according to this site, so not quite most.

League - My Football Facts

www.myfootballfacts.com

 

[PeterNdlovu081]

The only biggish clubs who have an equal or worse PL consecutive season record than us are
Hull City 2 seasons
Bradford City 2 seasons
Cardiff City 1 season
Bristol City 0 season
Plymouth Argyle 0 season

Plymouth?

 

[Champagneblade]

Even if he scores 10/15 goals for us this season ?

His tenacity in digging the ball back off the goal line against Blackurn leading to Ndiaye's 1st goal was as good as an assist in my book.
Though you seem to have already fixed your opinion on him.

We’re all prone to recency bias. I hope this is the start of something good and he also manages to clear his head off the field and mature. He’s clearly a popular lad with his teammates.

That said, he was bought for 20m as a PL team member. Having an encouraging cameo vs Sunderland, a pre-assist vs Blackburn and a goal at Luton is something to gain encouragement, but it doesn’t wipe out 40+ matches of no goals for a striker, 1 goal the last PL season and umpteen skirmishes he should have avoided away from the pitch.

It’s down to him to dilute this on field and off field shortfall in delivery and behaviour.

I sincerely hope he does. It’s been hard to believe the player we bought from Swansea who got 24 goals could have become so bad. Right now, he’s been a poor investment. But he has time to turn it around, he’ll get support from fans and teammates and I hope we have an extension so we don’t see him through hard times only for someone else to benefit.

 

[Charlieblade]

Having read the opinions of those who care enough to comment, I have arrived at a few basic conclusions, so thank you for that.
1. Wilder got us out of the pub league and eventually up to the PL.
2. Our fist season back was a success.
3. Our second season was not.

As a self funding club, the spending could be justified based on PL income.

That income was reduced due to Covid-19, just the same for all clubs. Except our wage policy defined our purchases, and that made things less sustainable for us. How could we be expected to pay more in wages, when our self funding policy and lesser income during Covid-19 made us more vulnerable than other clubs?
Clubs in a similar position, with better backing, were able to weather Covid-19 losses better than we could.
The only reason we get loan players is in part based on our coaching success with players like MGW, and even then, some clubs can pay part of their wages, knowing their lads will get well looked after.

Wilder and plenty of other PL managers had bought players based on PL income that subsequently had to be repaid when tv support funding was cut back. We mostly had players who were more of a gamble because the players would come to a PL club, expecting greater exposure for less money i.e.
lesser ability.
I have no axe to grind with Wilder. Perhaps a bit old school, insisting on British players mostly, without looking at euro clubs and players. His system still got us success, but the cubs policy on wages and sustainability probably held us back, or kept losses more manageable, whichever suits your favour.
My view is that our policies meant that Covid had a greater impact on us than other clubs.

All we really need is a profligate billionaire owner, and a tight fisted, miserly manager, and be able to have fans pay to watch. (No Covid).