Going Under ?

[blunther]

1 hour ago, Rob182 said:

I may be a dreamer (I know I'm a dreamer), but I don't think Administration is the only option if Xia stays.

We have assets. As much as it will pain us to sell them, I'd rather we sold players and land in order to keep Aston Villa alive. Our debt issues aren't everlasting. Players contracts will run down, putting us back onto an even footing.

Selling Grealish should bring in £20-£30m, plus the saving on his 20-30k wages. Selling Chester should bring in £10m, plus the saving on his 30k wages. Selling Elphick should bring in £500k, saving 30k p/w wages. Maybe we'll try to sell Elmo for £1m, Lansbury for £1m, Gardner for £300k, Tshibola for £300k or even Kodjia for £5-8m. Saving wages along the way.

Terry cut his contract short by a month, so we're not paying his wages anymore. At the end of June, we'll no longer be paying Bunn (£20k?), Samba (15k?), Hutton (30k?) and Gabby (30k?), as their contracts will have officially ended.

We'll still be lumbered with some high-paid players that we'll unlikely be able to shift (Jedinak, Whelan, McCormack, Richards), but then we do have a number of players capable of keeping a team in the Championship that will be on relatively low, or 'manageable', wages (Steer, Bree, Green, Davis, Hourihane, Bjarnason, Adomah).

If we can plug the holes in the short-term, then by the end of next season, we'll be another year into paying off the remaining transfer fees that we owe, and we can finally bid farewell to Richards, Jedinak and Whelan, who are probably on more than £100k p/w combined. That's one year away. By which point, I would hope that we have a much more respectable set of accounts.

That’s all well and good but we have Samba and Jedinak as our only centre halves. Not the most mobile duo...

[stewiek2]

31 minutes ago, richp999 said:

Could be a problem then.. But I don't think we are looking at administration anyway... hopefully..

But there are ways around this also.. What if 'old' AVFC had already sold their ground, training ground and other assets to another company before they entered administration....and the 'pot' left couldn't afford to pay out the contracts ?

Its more about using the threat to try and wiggle out of these long expensive contracts that provide us no benefit, and are dragging us down. Of course we will most likely end up stuck paying them.

 

Ken Bates did a similar thing with Chelsea. He formed a new company, shifted all the assets to it, left the debts in the old company and put the old comay into administration so he didn't have to pay anyone.

[Nigel]

12 minutes ago, richp999 said:

Yes but that would come into the 'running of the club'.  We surely can't be spending £60Million on administration? Are the secretaries on £20,000 a week contracts ?

We have around 1000-1500 staff. And their wages wont be under 'running of the club'.

Simple maths says problems

Edited June 7, 2018 by Nigel

[HeyAnty]

5 minutes ago, John said:

Surely Fulham could do the decent thing and write of the £6m the above says we still owe them for the Fencegate forward that we signed from them given their win at Wembley has had such a big impact on our current mess.   

Unfortunately i think McCormick will be a big player for us next season.  We will have to play to his strengths and build the team around him because we will have nobody else.

[Straggler]

9 minutes ago, richp999 said:

Yes but that would come into the 'running of the club'.  We surely can't be spending £60Million on administration? Are the secretaries on £20,000 a week contracts ?

It will include transfer fees and interest on loans and other such things though.  That is the bit I'm really not sure about.  I suppose the point I'm at is that I don't trust the source of the information on numbers as it appears to come from Wyness with a narrative wrapped round it of how he is only trying to do the right thing and is being a responsible professional.  It does not pass a simple smell test for me. His history with Everton, his associations with people like Samuelson encourages at least a healthy dose of skepticism and any evidence presented by him is worthy of fact checking.  It's the fact checking that I'm struggling with though.  I have little to no experience with understanding the accounts of any business, let alone a football club, I've no idea where to look for the skeletons, what the tell tale signs are of buried problems.  I just know that the evidence on it's face does not seem logical, the bits I'm happy to evaluate (the journalistic work) I don't trust, the rest I'm not the right person to evaluate.  I suppose the question I'm asking you guys is that is there a person here who is capable / willing to sense check the numbers against what is being banded around in the press at the moment so we can call BS or not?

[WaccoeOnline]

Alright lads.  Come over from Waccoe - the main Leeds forum.  We've suffered pretty much everything a club could. Admin, crooked owners, relegation, points deductions, more crooked owners, vultures, overseas owners ruining us, Trevor Birch, celebrity dwarves, the entire lot.  For some of us its overwhelmed the (admittedly often very poor) football for much of the last fifteen-twenty years.

If you've got any questions about how bad it can get, the amount you learn about finances very quickly as a fan of a broken club, warning signs, the usual, feel free to come onto waccoe, take the abuse and ask us.  Or alternatively, happy to pop by this forum occasionally to offer sympathy.  

Supporting a football team wrecked by a succession of reckless, evil and incompetent owners has ruined most of my adult life.  All I can say is brace yourselves lads.  Its **** horrible.

Just pray Ken Bates is too sick to fly over from Monte Carlo to "save you".  That would be the worst

[PussEKatt]

1 minute ago, HeyAnty said:

Unfortunately i think McCormick will be a big player for us next season.  We will have to play to his strengths and build the team around him because we will have nobody else.

In that case we are in real trouble because he is another Nzogbia

[A'Villan]

1 hour ago, cb_82 said:

Lets be clear, O'hare is miles off where Grealish is - Talk of him being the replacement is laughable

I didn't intend to suggest that O'Hare was anywhere near Grealish's ability and influence.

Of the players we have available though I would put O'Hare down as our next best AM, and capable of competing at championship level.

You wouldn't?

[hippo]

23 minutes ago, HeyAnty said:

Think this is the report on 300mill

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/tony-xia-aston-villa-chinese-14749006

An expert on Chinese investment in football says the landscape has changed - and Far Eastern money has slowed.

This comes amid reports of cash flow problems at Aston Villa, linked to owner Tony Xia's ability to pump money into the club, have surfaced.

However, expert Simon Chadwick believes Dr Xia CAN get cash across - because he is not that big a spender.

He believes the Villa chairman is likely conflicted - one one hand, he is a proud Chinese businessman desperate to save face, on the other, he is spending close to £5 million a month to keep Villa going.

Prof Chadwick, professor of Sports Enterprise at Salford University, and is an expert in Chinese investment in football and says the likes of Athletico Madrid, Inter Milan and Slavia Prague have seen income dry up after Far Eastern authorities warned investors to stop taking so much money out of the country.

On a positive note, he does not believe Aston Villa's finances are so bad the club is headed for administration.

He explained: "Last July, the Chinese authorities felt they were suffering from lots of people moving money off shore so they Government clamped down on it .

"As a consequence, money flowing away from China has slowed down.

"And other football owners have felt this, like Wang Jianlin, who sold part of his 20 per cent ownership stake in Spanish team Atletico Madrid.

"He was forced to do that. And Tony Xia may well be in the same position.

"However, Tony Xia isn't a particularly high-profile Chinese investor, and comparatively he hasn't spent a lot of money.

"The regulations came in in July and kick in at around $300 million, so it seems it wouldn't effect him at the moment.

"I don't think Tony Xia has spent that, so to some extent that may be being used as an excuse.

"There is also the issue of saving face in Chinese society. That is huge for Chinese people.

"For Tony Xia to exit Aston Villa would be losing face for him at home. He would not want to leave without making a profit."

I will give him a tenner for it.

But he can tell the media if its £300m if he wants !

[Nigel]

2 minutes ago, hippo said:

I will give him a tenner for it.

But he can tell the media if its £300m if he wants !

All joking aside this is the only way out without crippling us!

[DCJonah]

"The regulations came in in July and kick in at around $300 million, so it seems it wouldn't effect him at the moment.

"I don't think Tony Xia has spent that, so to some extent that may be being used as an excuse.

 

Interesting. 

[A'Villan]

7 minutes ago, WaccoeOnline said:

Alright lads.  Come over from Waccoe - the main Leeds forum.  We've suffered pretty much everything a club could. Admin, crooked owners, relegation, points deductions, more crooked owners, vultures, overseas owners ruining us, Trevor Birch, celebrity dwarves, the entire lot.  For some of us its overwhelmed the (admittedly often very poor) football for much of the last fifteen-twenty years.

If you've got any questions about how bad it can get, the amount you learn about finances very quickly as a fan of a broken club, warning signs, the usual, feel free to come onto waccoe, take the abuse and ask us.  Or alternatively, happy to pop by this forum occasionally to offer sympathy.  

Supporting a football team wrecked by a succession of reckless, evil and incompetent owners has ruined most of my adult life.  All I can say is brace yourselves lads.  Its **** horrible.

Just pray Ken Bates is too sick to fly over from Monte Carlo to "save you".  That would be the worst

Thanks for the offer of sympathy, your message doesn't inspire much hope, so condolences right back at you for what's evidently been tough times.

[PussEKatt]

The best thing we can do is forget about bieng a football club and be a soap opera instead.What with McStupid.Lerner.Nzogbia,Mc Cormack and now this we will make squillions in the soap opera buisness.

[villa89]

4 minutes ago, hippo said:

He would not want to leave without making a profit.

Well that's never going to happen. He's going to lose a fortune and saving face will be least of his worries.

[hippo]

So as many have feared the inevitable conclusion must be Xia doesn't have the money to bankroll us.

Recon appears to be little more than a web page.

 

[hippo]

18 minutes ago, WaccoeOnline said:

Alright lads.  Come over from Waccoe - the main Leeds forum.  We've suffered pretty much everything a club could. Admin, crooked owners, relegation, points deductions, more crooked owners, vultures, overseas owners ruining us, Trevor Birch, celebrity dwarves, the entire lot.  For some of us its overwhelmed the (admittedly often very poor) football for much of the last fifteen-twenty years.

If you've got any questions about how bad it can get, the amount you learn about finances very quickly as a fan of a broken club, warning signs, the usual, feel free to come onto waccoe, take the abuse and ask us.  Or alternatively, happy to pop by this forum occasionally to offer sympathy.  

Supporting a football team wrecked by a succession of reckless, evil and incompetent owners has ruined most of my adult life.  All I can say is brace yourselves lads.  Its **** horrible.

Just pray Ken Bates is too sick to fly over from Monte Carlo to "save you".  That would be the worst

But apart from that - do you reckon we will be ok ? 

[HeyAnty]

11 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

"The regulations came in in July and kick in at around $300 million, so it seems it wouldn't effect him at the moment.

"I don't think Tony Xia has spent that, so to some extent that may be being used as an excuse.

 

Interesting. 

My take on it - He did say in his statement after the final that he is a business man and things have to change.  i.e. we have be self sufficient.  I do think he underestimated the severity of the  tax bill.  He may have been trying to get a point across to Wyness.  

At the sametime he cant go cold turkey and will have to support to its finally turned around as this mess has continued under his watch as well as Lerners.

[ViewFromT2]

Reads like a goodbye to me.....

 

[Spoony]

8 minutes ago, hippo said:

So as many have feared the inevitable conclusion must be Xia doesn't have the money to bankroll us.

Recon appears to be little more than a web page.

 

I think if this “£300m” thing is true, it won’t be  that Xia can’t bankroll us more that he isn’t willing to. He may have got his fingers burned and will presumably just put the club into a position where it can be sold.

[WaccoeOnline]

6 minutes ago, A'Villan said:

Thanks for the offer of sympathy, your message doesn't inspire much hope, so condolences right back at you for what's evidently been tough times.

There are lots of lessons, none of them hopeful.

One bit of advice - looking on here, you see lads taking sides, suggesting more time should be given to the owners; cheering on or jeering the bloke who was your CEO.

Our experience is that if you think the worst of all of those ****s you will always be closer to the truth.  The sorts of evil, incompetent or exploitative ****ers who are doing to your club what they did to ours think nothing of splitting and dividing the fan base to their own ends.  All of them are different sorts of evil and in it for themselves.  Particularly when you are right up against it.  Don’t believe anything they tell you and when stuff is leaked focus less on why it is true and more on why it has been leaked.

Also (and this is tough) recognise that the strength of the fan base is what makes you vulnerable to these people.  If you (or Leeds) didn’t have a fan base who would stick with the club thick and thin there would be no cash flow to leech off as you die a slow death.  And find value in engineering solutions that enable them to profit from your corpse.  If we’d had less fans we’d have been wiped out and reemerged as a phoenix club and probably made it back to the premiership faster and in better shape than through the endless attempts by crooks and incompetents and crooked incompetents to “save” Leeds United.

 

Hopefully your nightmare will be shorter than ours.  We lost our ground, all our decent players, our training ground, our dignity, everything.  We’re only now starting to rebuild.  It’s been shit for us one way or another since 2004 give or take. Kids have grown up in Leeds - their entire childhood without a successful local team to support.  Damage and a lost potential fan base that will never be mended.  If you haven’t been there you can’t understand.  But maybe you soon will...