royalp-weSnowflake Royalroyalp-we How long have we had Cat 1 status, 10 years? If it costs £5m pa to apply for Cat 1 status, Have we seen a positive ROI from it?
.
Iirc it was about £2m a few years ago. And yes, we've easily seen a return on investment. £8m + goals and assists from Olise. Fees / compensation for some of Richards, Stacey, Hyam, Dickie, Fosu etc.
Many appearances from Holmes, McIntyre, Richards, Rinomhota, Hector, Cooper, Taylor, Southwood and many others.
It's the one part of the club that consistently delivers, and the cost can be largely excluded from financial fair play.
I’m fairly confident it’s closer to £5m Ian.
Most of the players you have listed left for nothing and had no impact on our first team whatsoever. Did we really get much in return from developing Taylor, Dickie, Hyam, Fosu, Stacey etc?
I wouldn’t say there’s ‘easily’ been a return on investment at all and there’s clearly a reason why they aren’t choosing to reapply this year.
Like I said, at least they haven’t scrapped it altogether.
Edit: a quick google search throws up it was £2.4-£4.8m in 2012 and some clubs claiming it’s now costing £8m-£10m per year for elite Cat 1 status. I guess thats one of the reasons why only 4/5/6 clubs outside the top flight go for it each season?
So I was right about the ~£2m. As Nameless said it's running costs, not a permit fee.
And if you only count transfer fees against the cost you're ignoring the vast majority of the benefit.
Every appearance by an academy player is one a signing would have to make without the academy. Signings tend to start on higher wages and often cost a fee.
The Academy is one of the few parts of the club thats easily cost effective. And it can largely be funded direct from the owner's pocket.