Don't blame Rogers blame Madejski

[Wycombe Royal]

But why do people keep harping on about a return to the Premiership this season when quite clearly this is not going to happen because the aforementioned league is far too expensive for RFC and JM's wallet.

IIRC the two seasons we had in the Prem were the first two seasons we have turned a profit in recent history. £7mill each season I think compared to a £6/7 mill loss each year whilst in the Championship the years before.

Now how can turning a profit be too expensive?

Because in order to regularly compete it would have cost more than spending that £6/7 million profit.

[Ryn]

Sorry Wycombe I'm a mechanic not an accountant, the sums don't add up to me. Doesn't that mean that we made £14mill more money in our seasons in the Prem compared to the Championship?

I understand we would be spending more money on wages and transfers in the Prem, but we'd be selling out the stadium every week, wouldn't we? Maybe even the expanded stadium?

I know this seems overly simplistic, but it's like running a restaurant and finding out that your busiest and most profitable day is Saturday, then shutting down every Saturday because it costs you more in staff wages.

But then i'm just a nuts and bolts man

[Wycombe Royal]

Sorry Wycombe I'm a mechanic not an accountant, the sums don't add up to me. Doesn't that mean that we made £14mill more money in our seasons in the Prem compared to the Championship?

I understand we would be spending more money on wages and transfers in the Prem, but we'd be selling out the stadium every week, wouldn't we? Maybe even the expanded stadium?

I know this seems overly simplistic, but it's like running a restaurant and finding out that your busiest and most profitable day is Saturday, then shutting down every Saturday because it costs you more in staff wages.

But then i'm just a nuts and bolts man

We made say a £6m profit. We would have had to spend far more than that each season to keep competing in the Premiership - just look at the sums that clubs up there are spending. So say we needed to spend a further £15m on transfer to keep competing (and that still doesn't guarantee you avoiding relegation) than that £6m profit has become a £9m loss and that is before taking into account the higher signing on fees and wages.

Revenue from tickets isn't that big - say we sold an extra 5,000 tickets per match at £30 each - that is still only an additional £2.85m in revenue. And in our second season we weren't selling out every match.

Why do you think alot of the clubs in the Premier League make losses?

[Ryn]

Thanks Wycombe, I'd do a picture of a thumbs up for you if one was available.

Of course to expand the stadium costs a lot of money, so that would wipe out profits for years as well.

Do you think our losses would be as bad though, really, if we were in the Premiership for a few years?

[ZacNaloen]

Just look at the amount a club like Sunderland has had to spend, and they are hardly assured safety.

[Wycombe Royal]

Thanks Wycombe, I'd do a picture of a thumbs up for you if one was available.

Of course to expand the stadium costs a lot of money, so that would wipe out profits for years as well.

Do you think our losses would be as bad though, really, if we were in the Premiership for a few years?

If we wanted to compete on a level playing field with other teams then yes I think our losses would be that bad. It will be interesting to see what Stoke's financials report for this current season as they have upped their spend considerably in order to keep competing in the Premiership.

THen you look at a higher level and a team like Leeds who tried to keep competing at the Champions League level by spending more and more. They failed to make it one year and the rest is history.

[Northern Git]

Speaking of money......when are those finance reports we were promised.

You weren't promised a financial report. You were promised an explanation of where the money has gone, in due course.

That could easily be, once the accounts are actually done.

Ian, every company has management accounts. They are the day to day accounts that let you know how the company is doing over a much more upto date period than waiting untill the full published, audited, accounts are published and released thro' Companies House.

If JM had wanted to let everyone know 'where the money has gone' he could have done this within days of the clubs statement. When I ask for these accounts from companies when considering financing capital equipment I normally have a meaningful response in about a week, sometimes two weeks max.

[Wycombe Royal]

Speaking of money......when are those finance reports we were promised.

You weren't promised a financial report. You were promised an explanation of where the money has gone, in due course.

That could easily be, once the accounts are actually done.

Ian, every company has management accounts. They are the day to day accounts that let you know how the company is doing over a much more upto date period than waiting untill the full published, audited, accounts are published and released thro' Companies House.

If JM had wanted to let everyone know 'where the money has gone' he could have done this within days of the clubs statement. When I ask for these accounts from companies when considering financing capital equipment I normally have a meaningful response in about a week, sometimes two weeks max.

He is not going to publish "management accounts" for the public to see. He did promise an explanation however and we haven't had that yet.

[Hoop Blah]

Who's fault? Obviously it's a bit of everyon's, from Madejski, to Rodgers, to the players, to Coppell and to the fans.

At the end of the relegation season I said how we'd be better off starting the rebuilding process there and then and not prolonging the agony by forcing Coppell to stay, against his better judgement, through emotional blackmail.

We had an aging squad full of players who wanted to be back in the Premiership and a wage bill we're told wasn't sustainable on a long term basis. We took a gamble on keeping some of those 'Premiership quality' players hoping that they'd take us back up. When it didn't happen, presumably because a few of them knew they'd probably be better off not going up and being able to move onto a new contract elsewhere, we then had the heart ripped out of the squad and we were a year closer to losing the parachute money which was capable of helping a new manager rebuild his squad.

I think the effect of keeping Coppell and a few of those 'Premiership' players on is kicking in now.

I can't blame Madejski for running the club sensibly. I can't even blame the likes of Doyle, Hunt, Bikey etc for leaving after giving us a year to bounce back. It doesn't mean those things are contributing to our current plight though.

I don't blame Rodgers for the fact his squad needs massive rebuilding. As ever I think he could've done things slightly differently with his transfers, but I like the shift in style of play, and I like the fact we're making a bit more use of the youngsters.

Hopefully things will improve, but the worry thing is that we seem to be developing a set of fans who's expectations far outweigh the realities of this season.

What we're living at the moment is the culmination of 18 months to 2 years of decline. It's daft to expect Rodger to be able to turn that round with a few signings and just a handful of games.

[Royal Lady]

I think there might have been less moaning about Rodgers if he hadn't given the impression we were going to be so fantastic - he'd have done himself far more favours to have been a bit more humble and saying, from the very start, that it would be a difficult season and possibly a long journey, but his EVENTUAL aim was to get us back into the Prem. All this 3 year plan malarkey and the bigging up of Smith wanting to play for Rodgers etc etc gave fans the opinion that we were going to be a lot better than we actually are - still, at least now none of us are in any doubt that it's going to be a struggle from this point forward.

[RoyalBlue]

On the subject of all these players we shipped out:

Doyle, Hunt, Bikey, Lita wanted to leave.

Murty had become injury prone ( which he's proved again )

Duberry would never have got into a team that wants to pass the ball.

Hanneman could maybe have been offered a years extension but is passed his best.

Would Harper and Rosenior have resigned contracts in the summer for another year in the championship.

OK the bottom line was a wage cutting exercise but other factors played their part.

Valid point but it doesn't alter the fact that whatever the reason was for shipping them out, our wages bill from last season to this must have been very dramatically reduced. It's a shame the Chairman saw fit to keep so much of those savings rather than reinvesting a bit more of it in some quality replacements. Still, it looks like he's getting what he paid for.

Ian, every company has management accounts. They are the day to day accounts that let you know how the company is doing over a much more upto date period than waiting untill the full published, audited, accounts are published and released thro' Companies House.

If JM had wanted to let everyone know 'where the money has gone' he could have done this within days of the clubs statement. When I ask for these accounts from companies when considering financing capital equipment I normally have a meaningful response in about a week, sometimes two weeks max.

He is not going to publish "management accounts" for the public to see. He did promise an explanation however and we haven't had that yet.

Quelle surprise!

Was it him or one of his minnions who actually promised the explanation? If the latter, I could quite imagine him saying 'Sod them! Why the hell should I have to account to the supporters'.

[Northern Git]

He is not going to publish "management accounts" for the public to see. He did promise an explanation however and we haven't had that yet.

Never said he was. But the figures that he needs for the promised explanation are readily available from those management accounts. Was just pointing out to Ian that you do not have to wait for the availabilty of full, year end, accounts to be in a position to present an accurate and meaningful financial overview.

Not holding my breath waiting for the explanation.

[PEARCEY]

Who's fault? Obviously it's a bit of everyon's, from Madejski, to Rodgers, to the players, to Coppell and to the fans.

At the end of the relegation season I said how we'd be better off starting the rebuilding process there and then and not prolonging the agony by forcing Coppell to stay, against his better judgement, through emotional blackmail.

We had an aging squad full of players who wanted to be back in the Premiership and a wage bill we're told wasn't sustainable on a long term basis. We took a gamble on keeping some of those 'Premiership quality' players hoping that they'd take us back up. When it didn't happen, presumably because a few of them knew they'd probably be better off not going up and being able to move onto a new contract elsewhere, we then had the heart ripped out of the squad and we were a year closer to losing the parachute money which was capable of helping a new manager rebuild his squad.

I think the effect of keeping Coppell and a few of those 'Premiership' players on is kicking in now.

I can't blame Madejski for running the club sensibly. I can't even blame the likes of Doyle, Hunt, Bikey etc for leaving after giving us a year to bounce back. It doesn't mean those things are contributing to our current plight though.

I don't blame Rodgers for the fact his squad needs massive rebuilding. As ever I think he could've done things slightly differently with his transfers, but I like the shift in style of play, and I like the fact we're making a bit more use of the youngsters.

Hopefully things will improve, but the worry thing is that we seem to be developing a set of fans who's expectations far outweigh the realities of this season.

What we're living at the moment is the culmination of 18 months to 2 years of decline. It's daft to expect Rodger to be able to turn that round with a few signings and just a handful of games.

We did not have an ageing squad and in fact two of the oldest players in Ivar and Gunnarsson are still at the club anyway. Besides who raised fans expectations? Rodgers with his rambling about making the club a world class model and Madejski with his comments about how ambitious the club was after the signing of Mills.
In terms of the fans I think the support for the players has been incredibly good because in case you had forgotten(like some of the players) we haven't won at home for eight months. That is an astonishing statistic whichever way you look at it.
Rodgers and the club chose to get rid of Harper and Rosenior. Hahnemann was deemed surplus to requirements presumably by NH and or JM. Either way there was no need for such a massive re-building task as it was self-inflicted. Anybody with half a brain can see there has been far too much change far too quickly.
The style of play may be more pretty on the eye but will mean precious little if we find ourselves back in the lower divisions.

[westendgirl]

Doesn't matter - I posted a summary of the last 4 or 5 years accounts up on a previous thread and they were removed from here in minutes! HNA doesn't want to annoy Mr Mad for fear of reprisals.

-What are you on about - I've just gone to club policies and they are still there on the first page of RFC finances