It’s a subject that comes up continually – at least in some quarters – and usually when the brown stuff is hovering near the fan. But not always. Even in the good times, it’s one that simmers away.
It’s normally though when darkness has descended upon the Canary Nation that the words ‘ownership’ and ‘ambition’ score highly in a key-word search of this site’s comments. When a perceived lack of funding from boardroom level aligns itself with poor results (and sometimes performances) on the pitch, it rumbles on.
Some loathe the subject. Some are just tired of talking about it. Some will tell me to stop writing about things that aren’t sugar and spice and all things nice. But it’s not about to go away.
If City are in the second tier, the issue is one of funding a promotion push when up against clubs whose owners have backed their managers, usually to the tune of multi-millions.
When in the Premier League, the issue is slightly different: how to fund a survival campaign by supplementing the ginormous sums of TV income – which tend to get swallowed up by horrible things like improved contracts and infrastructure – to the point where we can be financially competitive.
That City’s financial clout, at least from boardroom level, is the most modest in the Premier League is not in doubt. A table published before Christmas, supposedly showed our owners’ wealth to be, unsurprisingly, a mere fraction of the Abu Dhabi Group (if nothing else this reminds us what a monumental effort it was for City to beat Sheihk Mansour’s finest back in September).
Said table was based on a piece in The S*n, so the figures are to be taken with a pinch of salt, but for what it’s worth…
What the article ignored was what proportion of said wealth was spent by the respective owners on their clubs. There was almost an underlying assumption – a ridiculous one – that every dirham, ruble, yuan, dollar or pound of their fortunes are spent on financing their club. But it does give an idea at least of the depth of pocket and, indeed, if it was based on the proportion of owners’ wealth spent on their club, I have a sneaking suspicion we may be top of the pile.
But it also emphasised the need, under this club’s current structure, for it to be self-funding. It’s not a choice.
Others have multi-millions or billions to fall back on to go in search of the dream (FFP notwithstanding). City don’t have that luxury. Every single pound has to work blo0dy hard. Infinitely harder than at any other Premier League club and, in truth, harder than at least half the Championship.
But that’s our current path: financial stability based on our own version of austerity. And fair play. No-one wants to see this club’s existence ever come into question. We’ve been there and it’s scary. And we’ve watched while some teeter on the brink and others, tragically, go off the cliff edge.
That those in the corridors of power have the club’s stability and future at heart with every decision they make is to be applauded. And the nonsense spoken of it being a platform for the owners to line their own pockets is just that. Complete BS. As is the suggestion that funds are somehow going elsewhere – absolute rubbish. And don’t get me started on “social club”.
But we sighed with relief when Neil Doncaster departed and took with him prudence with ambition. I’d argue we’re now in an era of prudence with limited ambition.
And for many that’s fine. I get that. Totally.
Jon Punt argued it perfectly in ACN’s Delia piece, our Stewart Lewis wrote an MFW piece extolling the virtues of having a long-term plan and sticking to it and a couple of weeks ago Martin MacBlain wrote a fine piece highlighting the qualities of this club and its owners. Even yesterday, Robin Sainty’s EDP column told perfectly the tale of this club’s current finances.
I too love the idea of bucking the trend; of doing it our way; of kicking back against the footballing establishment. Those who know me, know only too well how I love to see the little guy rise up against the elite, go toe-to-toe and, hopefully, give it a blo0dy nose.
I applaud Delia and Michael’s footballing vision of The Good Life (google it, kids) and as the only exponents of self-sufficiency in the top flight – possibly the top two divisions – we have indeed blazed a trail. As our own Mick Dennis tweeted recently, the long-term future of football itself may rely on clubs taking a similar approach.
But – and this is the bit where the grown-ups will tell me off again – in the here and now, whether we like it or not, this approach puts this club at a disadvantage. A massive disadvantage. We’re punching above our weight yet we’re still six points adrift at the bottom of the Premier League.
A medium/long term plan is a rarity in 21st-century top-flight football – the here and now trumps it every time – and that we actually have one sets us apart from the majority, but I remain unconvinced a plan that includes relegation and then promotion is better than a plan that does its best to resist relegation in the first place.
I get that three teams have to go down, and I understand that ‘lots of money = survival’ isn’t a thing, but we have taken it to the extreme.
To have accepted, almost from minute one, that this will probably be a brief stopover en route to, hopefully, doing it all again a season or two’s time, is a little too close to preparing to fail for comfort.
Before anyone reminds me though, I’m acutely aware that failure isn’t part of the plan – quite the opposite – but the one-step-back-two-steps-forward theory is riddled with risk where football is concerned. As I wrote last week… so many variables. Too many variables.
There are obviously too many examples of ‘spend, spend, spend’ ending in disaster for cold hard cash to be the only answer but to have armed Stuart Webber with the smallest Premier League budget known to Man was effectively asking him and Daniel Farke to perform an even bigger miracle than the one they pulled off in 2018/19.
And if Webber and Farke can achieve what they have so far on a wing a prayer, just imagine what they could do with a few quid. Or, put another way, with a budget fit for a Premier League club. A modest budget; a Sheffield United type budget; one that would have enabled the club to bring in three or four players who would have made us better.
I appreciate that money wasn’t there under the existing structure – Robin explained why – but I also think, given the trees Farke and Webber have pulled up over the last eighteen months in the name of Norwich City Football Club, the board owed it to them to pull up a few trees of their own. Even if it did involve having uncomfortable conversations with folk they wouldn’t regard as natural bedfellows.
That Delia and Michael have gone over and above in terms of their generosity is without question, and no-one expects (or should expect) them to blow their hard-earned fortune on keeping this football club afloat. But as custodians, is it not also their duty to ensure this club is the best it can possibly be? And if that ultimately means relinquishing some control in order to help this club grow, should that not at least be on the table?
I don’t want us to be Aston Villa, I don’t want us to be Fulham and I don’t want us to be beholden to a Marcus Evans because that’s really grim, but I would like us to be really competitive and to have explored all avenues that could make that happen.
We are all aware of the potential consequences of selling your soul to the devil and then getting relegated. Again, no-one wants that. And if the only other option is to be self-funded then it’s a no-brainer.
But does it have to be a binary choice?
Those who are about to remind me that Farke and Webber knew the financial score when they signed up to the project are right. They knew, in footballing terms, this would be a hand-to-mouth existence and that there are no magic money trees in NR1 (they only grow in the fertile lands of Westminster) but, as alluded to earlier, if offered the choice of transfer Pot A £5 million, or transfer Pot B £30 million, which would they have preferred?
I refuse to believe Delia and Michael don’t squirm just a little every time either Farke or Webber make reference, when questioned, of the extreme financial limitations they are operating under. They must. I do.
I understand that being Norwich City FC, in the middle of nowhere, doesn’t, on paper, make you a sexy proposition for any would-be investors and there are no NCFC-loving billionaires drifting around the northern part of East Anglia looking for somewhere to spend their piles of used notes. But, equally, I’m not sure Michael and Delia are the only folk out there capable of stewarding this football club.
To paraphrase an MFW colleague, there comes a time when if you love something enough and the best option for that thing (or club) it is for you to move aside then you should do so. Or if not step aside, allow someone (or something) else to come in alongside and play a part.
Right now it feels like the plan is being driven by the owners’ desire not to have to seek external funding, and not necessarily because it’s the best and/or only way.
But I still admire the plan. I also think the plan would work better if it didn’t put the club at such a disadvantage compared to every single competitor. And I’m not comfortable with us being so comfortable at the prospect of relegation.
As much as I detest a lot of what the Premier League stands for, it’s the only place to be. Otherwise… why? And I don’t think it’s unreasonable to debate why we took austerity to a new level last summer.
Sorry.
Now, that crash helmet…
The best article I’ve read on the whole ownership/ambition debate Gary.
But I think you’ll find it was Neil and not ‘Jeremy’ Doncaster 😉
8
Ha! My speedway knowledge overtaking my football ramblings 🙂
1
An excellent article summing up the situation nicely.. I believe Delia and Mixhael have said in the past they would welcome outside investment but obviously it has to be the “right sort of investment” whatever that means. Stepping aside is going to be incredibly hard for them
16
One of my favourite lyrics is “to have ambition was my ambition” and although that’s not directly relevant to our situation it does seem to be appropriate.
The Fans Facebook pages use the word more than anything else. I DON’T look anymore
I do think there is ambition but the speed in which such things have happened has caught us ahead of where we thought we’d be.
The results and table don’t lie but the performances have been, by and large, good enough to justify our approach.
If we were going to spend money it might be central defence or holding midfield but outside of that I’m not sure. People are critical of Teemu but could we have predicted his “drought”
What’s my bottom line? I dont know I love my club, am frustrated by results, but enthused by our qualities.. “Money Changes everything” is another favourite lyric and it sure does
5
It is a great article GG but I still think you may not quite have got it right if my thinking is correct.
Step 1: Use funds to improve training and development facilities – done
Step 2: Get the club on a solid financial base where we do not have to sell to stay alive – done
Step 3: Use the new facilities to attract some top youngsters and make our academy work for us – ongoing with Lewis, Aarons, Godfrey, Buendia and if I am reading correctly McCallum, Mair, Power, Sitti, Jaiyesami (Spelt that wrong I m sure – sorry Dallang), Famewo, and others
Step: Build a squad that can get us there and hold us there once more funds are available – working on that one for next season but OH we got so close this season.
Yes, I agree if Delia and Co can find someone that can put in more cash without denuding the club and putting us in the position of Fulham last season, Aston Ville this season if they are not careful and even Ipswich they should fall on their swords but honestly, it seems to me that the current plan is not far off track and I definitely agree with your assumption that if little old Norwich can get this over the lin they can show other of the smaller clubs how it CAN be done if they are brave and clever enough. What we are doing could change the face of football.
It would just be nice if some of the anti-Delia group would be a little more polite in the comments and resort to foul personal insults which must hurt.
13
Agree 100% with that final paragraph, Gordon.
Cheers for the comment.
2
I’ll be honest, most of the worse insults come from the anti-anti Delia faction. They seem to take any politely worded criticism of how the club is run as a personal insult and respond in kind
21
Exactly.
12
Well said. I would also add in response to the line in the article “one that would have enabled the club to bring in three or four players who would have made us better”. Though i agree with the sentiment and would love to see it, it really isn’t as simple as it’s often suggested. One of the biggest issues is the size of the market your shopping in.
PROBLEM 1: So you’ve identified 3 or 4 players that would walk into your first team squad and improve you and give you an increased chance of surviving in the premier league. The first issue comes with that if these players can improve your team, the chances are they will equally improve at least a third of premier league teams and similar levels of the other top 5 leagues in Europe (and probably some of the minor leagues too).
PROBLEM 2: So these players you’re courting are also being courted by other teams so their transfer values start to increase as the selling club are aware of the interest and want to maximise their asset.
PROBLEM 3: So you’ve solved problems 1 & 2 and agreed an inflated transfer fee on some “guaranteed quality” so you’re able to discuss personal terms. We want to insert a relegation clause because that’s sensible and we don’t want another Naismith debacle. The other interested parties don’t want/need to do that as they are “established” premier league sides or La Liga/Serie A/Bundesliga sides/Ligue 1 – you’re the player – who do you chose?
PROBLEM 4: You’ve sorted the contract (without the relegation clause) and agreed your inflated transfer fee and you take them to Norwich. They could also live in Brighton (nearer London), London (West Ham & Palace) and Watford to name a few – could maybe chose Seville, Marseille, Lisbon – could be pushing for Europa League rather than relegation scrap – you’re the player – who do you chose?
PROBLEM 5: You get over all the problems and get all four players over the line. 2 settle quickly and deliver what you expect. 1 doesn’t settle, never reaches the level required. Last 1 gets injured first game in – looks like you’re going to get relegated. You’ve now got 4 large contracts long term on your books and you’re not in the premier league. You hope to make money on the first two as they performed and get the off the books. The lad that didn’t perform, you take a loss to get him off the books and the injured lad, you just have to wait while he recovers taking his big salary. All meaning you can’t bring in new players as your wage budget is maxed but you need new players.
These are the issues clubs like us will always face until the point we can establish ourselves in the premier league. So our current plan of investing in young players before others have circled and scouting great value players such as Buendia & Pukki is our best chance of establishing ourselves as the money generated from sales of those success stories is the key to our survival and any failures are easily dealt with financially. You can also see that young exciting talent now want to come to Norwich because they can see a pathway to the first team and coach wishing to play and develop them which bodes well for the future to.
1
I couldn’t disagree more that the Prem is the ‘only place to be’.. Not only is that massively insulting to the many, many more fans who support teams with no realistic chance of ever making it to the so called ‘promised land’ of the Prem, but it also flys in the face of my own greatest days supporting City.. I wouldn’t swap a home win in the Prem against Man City for, Wembley, playoff semi v Ipswich, winning the Champ last season etc etc. I support my team whatever the league we’re in, and the real fun is riding the roller-coaster.. Not sitting still in the Prem or any other league
3
Fair comment … and yes, a tad insulting in hindsight. My badly made point is really that if we’re not striving to be the best we can possibly be – ie. in the PL – then why are we doing it.
Sorry that was poorly worded and offensive (to some).
0
Financially the PL is the only place to be. How many clubs break even in the Championship without parachute money? Maybe the tack is to campaign for a smaller cliff edge between the top two divisions
16
One point that needs to be taken into consideration is just how much the club could, or would, cost a potential purchaser-and note, purchaser, rather than investor.
Clubs that tend to be taken over and find themselves under new ownership are usually (but not exclusively) in a tailspin. Falling gates, falling down the league or leagues and in debt up to their eyeballs.
Which tends to mean that the current owners want to get out quick-and will accept any reasonable asking price. Which means that A.N.Owner can allocate, out of his/her budget, a fairly, comparatively, small sum to take over, however its done, and then put the majority of said budget into building the club up again with said injection of funds.
If our owners were to sell, they wouldn’t need to do it on the cheap. The club prospers in every sense apart from, right now, its position in the league.. But even that is within the stated aim of the business-top 26 and all that.
So we’;re not going to come cheap for anyone looking to buy us. There will be those, of course, who would say that, for the right person, Delia and Michael should be prepared to give the club away. But why should they? Woulds you or I sell our house to someone for £1 or whatever just because the potential purchaser can, to paraphrase an idiot, “…make the house great again”. No. OK, its a weak comparison but the business sense is there, why build something up to be the kind of ongoing business success it is at present, just to give it away?
MWJ sold his publishing company for around £7 million. Maybe a little and above their true worth at the time but he is, essentially, a businessman, and he wanted a fair price for something he had built up pretty much from scratch. Can’t see his and Delia’s attitude to NCFC (if they ever decide to sell) being any different.
So, NCFC are not going to come cheap to one of the myriad individuals or businesses who would, we are told, be keen to purchase the club. But say a deal is done-I’m not going to name or guess an exact figure but its going to be in the tens of millions of pounds bracket-£50 million, £60 million?.
Then how much more does the buyer inject in to the club to make it the sort of successful and long term member of the Premier League that, right now, seems to be beyond us. The same amount again? Probably.
And then when does FPP kick in?
We’d be a lot more viable proposition if we were struggling on the field or as a business. The Turners came along when things were nowhere near as good as they are now. And Peter Cullum’s offer of £20 million came when we were adrift at the bottom of the Championship.
A Cullum would need a lot more than that to even get to the table at the moment.
The self sustaining model the club has set itself out to be is being employed by a lot of clubs at the moment. Take this one and a recent quote from its MD.
“We have a self-sustaining business model at this club. That means all the investments we make on the pitch are funded by the revenues we generate off the pitch,”
That’s the MD of Arsenal.
We’re not going to drop the way we are doing things now. It’s the way ahead in the game and, for all the perceived failings it can bring with it (eg) we’ll never spend £20 million on one player, it’s here to stay.
And whilst we may not sign anyone for £20 million, we’ll as sure as hell sell a lot of players for that amount-and more. Starting in June.
9
Good stuff, Ed.
Cheers for the comment. Hard to disagree … as much as I want to. 🙂
1
I suppose an analogy could be owning a much loved classic car. Suppose I bought this for £2,000 and put work in to improve it and thanks to that and a favourable classic car market this has a current value of £60,000. Imagine my personal income has fallen and I can only afford to run the car thanks to being able to hire it out for weddings etc. Imagine then this source of income fails and I end up in the position where I can not afford to service or insure this car would I be foolish to give the car away to someone who could look after this car? Should I hold out for £60,000? I see the similarities to the questions that the club owners need to ask. Can they afford to run the club? If they sell should they ask for the market value or for a return of their original investment?
1
Enjoyed the article, but would take issue with four points in particular. Firstly, the proportion of net worth invested by the owners, which you suggest would place our owners at the top of that particular table. Yet we are famously debt free – we have no internal or external debt other than the short term loans and overdraft taken out as shown in the 2019 accounts. Our owners are owed not one penny and effectively have nothing currently “invested” in the club.
Secondly, our owners net worth is shown as £23m. I think that’s always the figure quoted for them and goes back to about 2005. Apart from anything else the club is worth at least £50m (probably nearer £100m) and they own 57% of it so their net worth is a lot higher than £23m.
Thirdly, Webber went on record on the night we won promotion and effectively said that our transfer pot would be around £20m. It is well documented that we offered around £15m for a French striker who turned us down. The Farke/Webber PR about how they can’t buy better players is just that – PR. They could easily have bought two or three at £5m apiece. They chose not to. Which is fine, but don’t believe everything which comes out of their mouths just because of who they are. Some of it is total b*******.
Fourthly FFP has rules which, among other things, restricts the losses you can make over a three year period and limits the proportion of wages against turnover generated. It really doesn’t matter how wealthy any new owner may be – once they have bought the club they are restricted with how much they can effectively spend, unless they generate turnover. That’s why Villa or West Ham getting relegated would mean fire sales of their players – they would have to reduce net loss. We don’t have to do that. We might choose to sell some players, but we don’t have to.
Lots of other clubs talk about self-funding but no one is doing it at quite the level we are. Arsenal’s turnover is more than 4 times what ours us. Man Utd’s is 8-9 times. Their “self-funding” is on a different planet.
3
A very well balanced article I enjoyed reading.
I’m quite well known in MFW circles for not exactly being a fan of Delia and Michael but to me the most salient point Gary makes is that anybody who thinks funds are diverted “where they shouldn’t be” is just plain wrong. I don’t believe a word of any of that, as I’ve consistently said.
I’m not going to “get you started” on the social club issue but in my opinion they milk that for all it’s worth but as it costs the club next to nothing I don’t really mind. Ego trip or genuine concern for the club? It’s not really my business but I know what I reckon.
Self-funding is such a noble idea but a reality check tells me it cannot work.
I’m just cacked off that every time we get to the PL we consistently fail to establish ourselves.
And there really is only one door that can be laid at.
30
Sorry – one final point. Every study of “soccernomics” as they like to call it, tells us that the wealth of the owner and the money spent on transfer fees does not equate to level of success in any way. The only measure which consistently delivers is the level of wages paid i.e. the best players get paid the most; the teams which can afford the best players are the most successful. If your 25 man squad is earning an average of £100,000 a week you will do better than a squad earning an average of £30,000 a week, most of the time.
However, you can discover/make the “best” players – they all start somewhere – and I would suggest that in Aarons, Godfrey, Lewis, Buendia, Cantwell, Pukki, Idah and a few others with potential, we are showing that we are quite good at doing that. That they will move on is inevitable (actually whether we stay up or go down is irrelevant – they will all move on if they’re good enough to) because we cannot pay the money they can earn elsewhere and would never be able to with a turnover level we have.
1
If we maintained that turnover by staying up then we would be able to keep those players happy
1
No, I don’t think so. We could never afford to pay a player £100k a week on crowds of 27,000 and a city/county with our catchment zone. Good players will always leave us to earn more elsewhere.
2
The best article regarding our situation that I’ve read on this site Gary.
I would point out that under our current owners we have come close to administration on more than one occasion which means they are not the safe pair of hands many believe they are.
Delia has now been in charge for more than twenty years and in my opinion the club has made no progress whatsoever. In stead we seem to lurch from one hopeful idea to the next and I’m now firmly of the opinion it’s more about Delia maintaining her hobby than providing the supporters with the best football possible.
I am overjoyed at the football Farke has produced, the most entertaining I’ve witnessed in nearly sixty years of watching City. However I’m certain the self sustaining plan will never establish the club in the premier league and this surely must be the end game of any plan.
22
I’m no fan of Delia but to say the club has made no progress in the last 20 years is ridiculous.
We were treading water in the championship when she took over, crowds of 12k and heavily in debt.
We are now in a far healthier position compared to those dark days and will be next season, whatever league we’re in.
3
Yes I agree that progress has been made since the late 90s. The question will be have we progressed since 2006?
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You obviously missed the previous twenty years to Delia coming along when we were consistently in the top division and even performed well in Europe.
Over twenty years of Delia and we’re still little Norwich with no money.
6
Not at all, I remember those days very well but it was far easier for smaller clubs to have continued success in the 80s/90s – to me this era is now a bygone age.
Given their resources the current owners have performed admirably, better than several bigger and wealthier clubs even.
However, for me there are two main criticisms – they haven’t been able to establish us in the Prem and they haven’t been able to expand the stadium, something we have been crying out for for many years.
They have progressed us, but now I feel its time for somebody else to help us make that next step.
So yes their time as owners is probably coming to an end and when that happens the club will be in a far healthier position than it was in 1996.
1
In those twenty years before Delia (BD?) there was no Sky, BT, or Amazon to distort the money available in the game. When the Big Four (or Five, or Six) depart to their European Super League, as they inevitably will, the playing field will become a bit more level, and things may become a bit more equal.
5
A good article with some fair points.
I think the key thing which Norwich have never managed to achieve is balance. The youth system is now the best it has ever been and also as mentioned the training facilities, thank you to the generous supporters who put in their hard earned cash to achieve that!
In the past under Chris Hughton and Alex Neil money was provided and in areas badly spent, but youth was never introduced into the team from our own stock?
Now the tables have turned and we have an exciting pool of talent making it’s way into the first team.
Drawing you to the point of balance looking at the great Manchester Utd in their hay day youth came through the ranks but money was spent in key areas and a good balance was struck. Now I’m not saying we have the budget or the pull for those type of players but let’s say to spend 10M on a centre back is not above and beyond or a good loanee? Contracts nowadays have more clauses than a politicians manifesto! Surely there are relegation clauses so we dont get stuck with huge wage bills?
I believe Micheal and Delia do hold the best interests of the club but there is a negative element to the club which hasn’t changed since Nigel Worthington was in charge “oh well we are a little club it was nice to be in the Premier league for a season.” Now for life long Norwich fans that is still a bitter pill to swallow 17 years on and it does beg the question the proof was there then, why do you think the situation has changed now? What also has to be taken into consideration is that the longer you are out of the Premier League the larger the financial jump is to stay in it. If relegated next season we will potentially loose 5 players to Premier league teams. This is understandable but then puts us back at square one and doesn’t guarantee us bouncing back up.
Self funding is great in theory but isn’t great for fans who have ambition for their club, at least to do something is surely better than to sit on your hands and do nothing?
10
Has self funding ever been possible in the PL?
May be possible in the lower leagues but not at our present position.
Frankly I feel sorry for DF. Last year promotion was done on a shoestring, they must be deluded if they thought he could do that in the PL. our budget must have been the lowest ever given to any promoted club. The result of that as we know is relegation.
Next season, when we have sold our very best players we could have a possible £100m more in the bank.
Never in the field of premiership football have so little been given and so much expected!
Sadly I can’t see Webber and DF being here next season, they have been dealt a poor hand here.
20
Well said Ken, my sentiments entirely.
9
Well said Ken, my sentiments entirely. I feel very sorry for the way Farke and Webber have been treated by our self centred owners.
3
Except that they knew the rules when they agreed to join, but don’t let the truth get in the way of being able to insult the owners again.
2
Hi Gary
A good read and some excellent replies.
Recently city announced they have purchased a couple of but of land for future development of the ground to help with the self funding but increasing the capacity to about 35k.
I read that the corner by the hotel can’t be unfilled due to some agreement on the lease surely that can’t be true.
We were told the city stand couldn’t be expanded over land they didnt own they now do so can we expect that to start.
Self funding is a great idea and most city supporters like the idea but there are those that are like many from other clubs just dream of spending the owners money.
If FFP were to work then clubs would be forced to work with in there income Man C get millions in sponsorship from the owners own airline Eithad to help, our owners don’t have that luxury.
I have said many times Delia has sprouted about them being poor millionaires and that they have courted investment but none came forth I can only say they possibly got the wrong people looking or scared off said investors by the conditions they might have put in place.
As with Martin P I do not think they squirrel money away from their Social club and they have put their hands in to shallow pockets over the years but the limited ambitions of top 26 is no longer funny.
How many organisations take a short term loss for a long term profit surely borrowing a bit more so spending in the summer could have given the club a fighting chance of survival would have been repaid with a second season in the premiership and then a third but unless the footballing gods deem to pass on some luck we will never get to know what this team could achieve with a little more help.
Onwards and upwards
OTBC
6
Hi Alex.
I presume the land the hotel is built on is leased by the club to the hotel chain – I’ve forgotten which one they are tbh!
As long as aforementioned hotel chain isn’t in breach of the lease they are immovable until said lease expires. Business leases can be shorter term than those on domestic flats but while the club can try and buy out the terms of the lease the hotel does not have to agree to such an offer by law.
The building hardly lends itself to cheap and easy integration into the stadium anyway.
I reckon that one’s a no-no mate.
1
Hi Martin
Prior reading your comnent I had asked a few questions below.
But the corner is oart and parcel of the ground and I suppose it would make those rooms very hard to fill if the corner was filled in
0
Yep, the Holiday Inn is there for a while yet-don’t expect change there in the short or even medium term, at least not via any prompting, suggestions or offers from the club.
The deal they arranged to build there was, I believe, a very good one for both parties at the time. It may now, of course, favour them over us but no-one could guess where the club was going when it was built.
I used to stay there quite a bit & it was usually near to full, even in a non-football week. Its main non-football business is overnight stops for coach parties and believe me, they roll up, one after the other most afternoons, decamping hungry/sleepy tourists doing the “…if it’s Thursday, it must be Norwich and the Norfolk Broads” thing. Weekends usually sees it near to capacity-and, prior to and after matches, the bar is usually heaving. They cater for the football and do very well out of it indeed. They also charge quite high prices-for a chain and site that is ‘out of town’, particularly so. But they can! I stay in the city now, its cheaper!
I wouldn’t like to say it’ll definitely still be there in ten, even fifteen years time. But I would say the odds that it will be are more than favourable at present.
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Great article Gary.
I applaud the club for its self-funding efforts particularly the brand of football played by Daniel Farke and Stuart Webber, however it will only work if you get the recruitment right time and time again.
One of the biggest problems to me is you are successful like last season it doesn’t take the big clubs long to come knocking for your best players. At a guess I think we will lose 3-4 players next season which is fine if the recruitment is as brilliant as last season.
And as we know Daniel and Stuart won’t be here forever so we will have to rely on their replacements, hopefully they will prove as successful but it is not guaranteed.
What is the other option than self-funding ? I agree with you Gary and Martin to say that the Smiths are pocketing money out of the club is ludicrous and I do not believe there is a billionaire waiting to purchase us.
Quite a few years ago I know the Smiths did look, Though as I say I am doubtful, but it maybe worth them having another look around. But that in itself is no certainty that would turn us into a established premiership club. For instance Marcus Evans according to some sources puts in a sizeable amount of money ( millions) each year into Ipswich, he certainly hasn’t reaped any reward there !
In fact I would argue there are very few clubs for whom that title would apply, the traditional top 6 plus Everton, Wolves & Leicester with their present owners, in nearly 3 decades of the premier league in each of those decades roughly 8-9 clubs come and go.
What is unfair is that clubs like us who abide by FFP have to see clubs like Bournemouth and Villa flout the rules spend millions more than they should and then the fine is a slap on the wrist.
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Football should be self funding as should any business but it fails because there is a lot of reflected glory that owners are prepared to pay for. With regard to our owners, I believe I share a lot of their values and prefer them immensely to Robert Chase. However, I feel there is a limit and we probably reached it in 2015. Looking back at the current ownership, they took over in the late 90s and helped stabilise the finances, they also took some sound commercial decisions such as selling land which Chase had bought at the bottom of the market (I’m not sure whether this was accident or design on his part) and lending money to improve the catering at the ground. Appointments saw the club improve its marketing and also improve its position on the pitch. All so far so good. They made mistakes after relegation in 2005 but this was acknowledged and the club pulled round to enjoy a double promotion and a couple of good years in the PL. The owners’ probably faced a reduction in their personal income and this was the point where succession should have been explored. This was the point where the loans were repaid and our working capital was hit and my concern is that the self funding model will eventually rebound on us and force the owners to sell from a position of weakness. An article in the Bournemouth programme pointed out the lack of profit over the past decade which given the relative success of the past decade is a cause of concern. We just about break even with 8 years out of 10 having some form of PL income. Looking at the accounts since 1995, this is not a new issue just the numbers have got bigger. The loss made last year was eye-watering, I am aware that much of this was down to promotion clauses and legacy wages but we would still make a loss without PL income. We can sustain a few years of failure with 2 years of parachute money and some very valuable playing assets but we can not afford 5 years outside of the PL (maybe that is a positive as a motivating factor that other clubs lack). I don’t move in the same circles as our owners so I do not have a personal attachment to them and I am not under 40 so my identity as a Norwich fan is not tied up to the owners. I think a lot of the over-protectiveness of the owners by fans come from people who feel they have something to lose if the ownership changed. We have to face facts that self funding requires prolonged success and that one day the club ownership will change. I know that the owners had their fingers burned when the Turners got involved but I hope they look to sell from a position of strength. The personal wealth stats are intriguing. Our club is worth a significant amount and is this included in that wealth estimate? If it is then it must the vast majority of their wealth. In terms of how much they put in I believe it to be a relatively modest amount as loans were converted to equity. The club value has increased a lot in the past 20 plus years
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John you are spot on, you really are.
Back in the REALLY dark days Chase bought the then Read’s flour mill kind of opposite the ground for about £2m and I think we sold it for £6m after he had been driven out. That kept the club afloat for a while – it was many moons ago when £4m counted for something.
After all, Chase was a builder/developer so on that score at least he knew what he was doing. As the original purchase was in the name of the Club the profit was ours and Chase could not touch it in retrospect.
Just look how the area has developed – King Street etc is landlord’s paradise as I know from personal experience.
There are no easy answers to this one but I like your take on it.
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I don’t think we’d be able to keep Aarons, Lewis et al next season, even if we did stay up.
They’ll go to where they can, at the very least, double their wages, have a better chance of winning honours and further their, else maintain international ambitions. They’re not Norwich fans. They don’t have the emotional connection to the club that we have. We’re their employer. If a bigger and better opportunity comes along, they’ll take it. We all would. It’s why Adshead left Rochdale to come to us, its why Madders left us to go to Leicester. And its why, in all likelihood, Zaha will leave Palace..
So, stay up or go down, there will be big money departures. Because even if we stayed put f0r 5 or more seasons,
Ken asks if self funding has ever been possible in the Premier League? It’s what Burnley are doing. And what Arsenal want to do-read that quote from their MD in my previous comment.
Like it or not, this is football’s business model for this decade. But Webber and DF will be here next season because its the business model they bought into. We may not all want to. But it is how football clubs are going to be ran in the future.
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A really interesting and wellthought-out article Gary and I’m sure that the ‘tin hat’ will come in very useful.
Yes, we owe Delia and Michael a massive debt and many will say it is time for them to step aside, but look what has happened at QPR – I believe that Tony wanted to buy/give funds to NCFC before moving on to QPR and we all know what happened there.
One analogy I’ll give is that I had a fairly old car that was beginning to need several expensive repairs to keep it running. I therefore looked at financing a much newer one that would come with several years warranty and it was the best move I could have made, especially as the interest I paid on the money I borrowed was negligible and of course no expensive repairs and a much improved fuel economy.
IMO, SW and DF should have been given £20M – £30M to buy a player/players in the knowledge that we would be getting MANY times that if we could survive a 2nd season in the PL, but sadly that was not too be and we find ourselves perilously close to being relegated!!
I see Connor Southwell in his article today comments that when LCFC escaped the clutches of relegation 5 seasons ago that they won 22 it of 30 points and IF we were to replicate that feat, we would have the magical 40 points, though I realise that that may still be insufficient to maintain our PL status!!
Another point that Connor raised in the past week and that I raised several weeks ago, is that I wish Pukki and Buendia would try to lift some more of their shots off the ground, as I’ve seen at least 3 where the opposing GK has prevented a goal being scored by saving it with his outstretched boot.
https://www.edp24.co.uk/sport/norwich-city/canaries-great-escape-premier-league-lessons-1-6505376
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Hi Gary.
A few question that possibly someone might have a clue about.
In my previous comment today I mentioned that city has purchased 2 parcels of land said at the last AGM and were looking at the feasibly of expanding the ground
1) Surely all the studies into this expansion would have been long ago
2) It was mentioned that city would lose capacity while the building work was done
3) The last price was upwards of £20m possibly £30m
4) Chase and Carter being builders hopefully would have installed foundation adequate to with stand future development
5) Losepool built over and around the existing Kop so that capacity was lost surely city could do a similar build.
If the hotel corner was infilled that would give a few hundred more seats and any new stand could have extra corporate boxes for the prawn sandwich brigade
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An excellent article – just don’t expect a boardroom drinks invitation anytime soon. There is a single-mindedness at Carrow Road and media comments are normally reserved for times when we are doing well and self congratulation is the order of the day. On one such occasion Delia and Michael proclaimed that they would, open day, hand over to their hapless nephew. I’ have seen nothing suggesting that this is no longer the plan.
What everyone seems to forget is that there is no guarantee of automatic promotion following relegation. Ask, Stoke, Middlesbrough or Huddersfield. If we find ourselves wallowing at the footer of The Championship – expect D&M to choose that moment to make a sharp exit and leave young Tom to clear up the mess.
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Ha! You’re not wrong Michael….
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“Hapless”? As someone said in an earlier comment, it would be helpful if the Delia haters could confine themselves to proper debate rather than personal attacks, but I guess being negative is a personality trait for some.
Any evidence for him being “hapless”? No, thought not.
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Delia and Michael aren’t going to step aside. They contribute nothing, invest nothing and their footballing genius had the club on the verge of bankruptcy ( rectified by selling players) as well as leading the club into the third tier. Refusing to invest in the quality needed to actually attempt to stay in the Premier League is a massive strategic error.
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Your Westminster reference made me think.
In the last election one of the parties seemed more determined to be idealistically pure than to be winners. The others decided they were going to do whatever it took to be winners-deny their recent history, lie about their intent, attract new support with unachievable promises etc. The side I wanted to lose won, but that doesn’t mean I want to be like the other lot and it doesn’t mean I want my side to continue in the same way.
I’m not completely in either support or opposition to Delia and Michael. I would like the club to have much more money but worry about what’s happened to many other clubs.
One of the fun/frustrating things about being a Norwich fan is that you rare start a season knowing which division we’ll be in the next; I guess that won’t change quickly.
1
How about adding a “thumb down” symbol, for comments we disagree with?
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We were promoted last season because we were lucky enough to have 4 or 5 players mature from the academy at just the right time, and simultaneously emulate Huddersfield Town in using the German model. Very lucky, it paid off.
It eventually failed for Huddersfield because they failed to inject sufficient cash to strengthen further and to keep their core staff and team intact.. It will fail for us for the same reason. Next season, our best players will leave for better deals, together with DF and others. Fact.
We all assume that we will be promoted again either next season or the season after, thus topping up the coffers again. But this will not happen without the team that suceeded last year and oh so nearly suceeded this term.
But The Owners will not mind because the bank balance will be healthy and that’s all that matters. Which infuriates the fans who support and spend their hard earned cash to keep the club going. When the fans vote with their feet, the ‘cash is king’ business plan will eventually fail, and maybe we’ll hear a plaintive cry of ‘where are you’?
This season has been like being invited to a posh party where the other guests have arrived well dressed and bearing champagne and wine of the best. We pitch up, full of youthful enthusiasm, with nothing. We get p*ssed, embarrass ourselves, and head home early. Sad. Ring any bells?
4
Kenny McLean would take a bottle of Mad Dog 20/20, surely – and the rest could share a 1.5 bottle of Lambrini.
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Sadly, Old Yeller, the football club has to be ran as a business and one that returns, whatever it takes, a profit. Applies to all businesses. When you start losing money, year after year after year, you cease to exist. It’s nearly happened to us a few times. Whilst we were playing Paulton Rovers in the FA Cup a few years ago, the club was close to going into administration. Some very clever talking and business thinking stopped that happening but it was as close to happening as it could have been.
So the bank balance HAS to be healthy. From the point of view of the continuing existence of the football club, there is no other option. Cash is king. Lets all try to lead our lives in defiance of that mantra. And see where it gets us. No thanks. I’d love to move up to the next level and have a 7 bedroomed detached house and drive a brand new Range Rover. But I can’t afford to. If I borrowed the money to do so it might mean a few months of false glory. But the end result would be the same. Debt. Eviction. Liquidation.
What’s the alternative? Who is going to spend £50 to £60 million to buy the club and then put in twice that, at least, again, to bring in the sort of players on the level of wages we’d all then expect? And, given that wouldnt all be self generated, how would we then circumvent FFP rules?
Voting with our feet won’t bring about positive change at all, it would just lead to a half empty stadium and players either wanting to leave or not wanting to join because the club will look at odds with its support. Plenty of clubs rattle around the lower leagues with half empty stadiums, something that has just perpetuated their collective demise. We’d join them.
1
Our situation is almost farcical.
We are due to end this season 10-20M quid in profit. If we go down we’ll also likely sell somewhere between 30-50M worth of players.
As a result we will be in The Championship cash rich (at least for a season), paying tax on profits, all because our owners couldn’t float us some cash to spend that money this year.
I wonder if we’ll hear the same people demanding we don’t spend on players, as we see 10M’s come in from sales.
5
Late to this, unfortunately. Very good, generally,
I don’t think that the first question should be whether, or not, additional investment is the only answer.
The Club is forecasting a record turnover this season, plus a projected profit at year end of circa £20m, before player sales, yet still claims to have a small budget for transfers.
Of course, it’s all about cash flow, but I’m still struggling to see how the asset protection, in terms of new contracts, has swallowed up so much of the extra money.
2
Very good article Gary and yes, you will need your tin hat.
This issue is building week on week and unfortunately for the pink and fluffy brigade, will not go away.
At least on this forum, with the odd exception, a debate can be had, with both sides getting column inches to expound their theories. Contrast that to the other forums where such debate is instantly shut down by Delia philes, who balk at any criticism of their leader.
Even here, some are on the point of blarring openly at the thought of such conversations upsetting the ownership.
As Gary alludes to in his article, the lemming like happy March to relegation and beyond flies in the face of football supporting. The very reason we all became infatuated with our club as youngsters was the fervent wish that they would go on to great glories. However unrealistic that may have been. I don’t see Norwich City as “little” and I despise the inference that they are.
The levels of frustration amongst a large proportion of the clubs support, not a handful as ludicrously suggested on here last week stem from preachy articles from the various “super fans” who inhabit the back pages of the local press on a daily basis, toeing the party line and casting aspersions on such people who don’t share their divine image of the club.
That, and the cabal of pals cobbled together by radio Norfolk to give a radio Pravda style take on all matters Norwich city. Talk to ordinary supporters, at work, in the street, in the gym, at games, in the pub, online. They ain’t happy.
The North Korean style succession plan, where only somebody related to Delia smith is acceptable as a steward of Norwich city fc is farcical. passing our club down like a bloody family heirloom. If the mans name wasn’t smith, how many on here would welcome him as the next owner? Thought not.
I congratulate Gary on brooch ing this thorny subject, as he states, he comes under pressure not to print anything other than nicey nicey platitudes so kudos to him for opening up a rip roaring debate and giving us something to get our teeth into, which is the point of it all.
It’s only the start. This debate will grow and grow.
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Hi Chris
I’m a bit late in the day with my reply so I’ll keep it relatively short.
Gary’s link [above] to the Jon Punt/Ian Woodcroft piece on ACN is well worth a perusal. Please read both halves of it.
MFW doesn’t go for nicey-nicey platitudes either cos ours are nearly always opinion pieces under an individual name so as long as it’s non-libellous our writers have far more freedom to express ourselves than others.
0
Forgot to add: as much as I personally would like to see Delia depart with dignity the one thing I cannot stand is people on social media saying she takes financially from the club. I’d love to see those types prove that which isn’t true!
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Cheers Chris. To be fair, the piece hasn’t attracted the venom I had braced myself for but plenty disagree with the thrust of it, which is fine.
I accept that mega-rich owners are not the answer (Mick D has a piece on MFW today on that very subject) but no-one has yet been able to explain to me why Delia and Michael are the only folk capable of owning/stewarding this club.
Those who thought I was asking for a billionaire to come in and take over have missed the point I was trying to make (which is probably because I didn’t make it very well).
Thanks again for the comment.
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Good debate provoked by this article. I too am late to the debate.
I would like to add a few points. Sky and the other broadcasters are powerful in the football economic model. Gate receipts are not very important in comparison. Sponsorship deals are important whereas sales through the club shop are relatively unimportant. Owners, who are willing and able to circumvent the Financial Fair Play rules make a difference in a club’s budget. In my opinion, what some owners have done is cheating.
Boycotting games will not make much financial difference so will not be a lever to get the owners to sell the club. In many ways I would rather have the current board rather than rich overseas owners, who regard owning a football club in the world’s most important league (in terms of publicity and exposure) as a vanity project.
I think that the Premier League will have to change in the next decade due to pressure from the Broadcasters. The FFP rules are a good idea but the PL will not enforce them against the top clubs for fear they will take their ball and play in a break away European League.
There are other models for running major sports, for example American Football, which does try to level the playing field by using its draft system and salary caps, etc..
I think there is more wrong with football than the ownership of NCFC. Maybe I hark back to the good old days when any team could climb the leagues and get to the top. Teams cared about the FA Cup and fielded their best team and fans flocked to see the potential cup upsets. Like the ‘59 cup run. Players often stayed at one club for their whole career. Managers where given time to build a team.
However, we are where we are. Our owners are not leaving in the short term. Hopefully Weber and Farke stay another season at least. We will sell several players for large profits. So what do I want to see for NCFC.
1. The current academy set up is maintained, where we buy in young players and develop most of them into saleable assets that play in the first team for a while. Remember most of the youngsters that are touted as ours were bought from other clubs.
2. The style of play from pre academy to first team must be consistent to allow players the best chance of progressing in the club.
3. We need to maintain the Sporting Director and Head Coach model. Ideally the Sporting Director uses Weber’s analytical method of unearthing value added players. (Brentford use a similar method). The Head Coach needs to be world class and well versed in the latest sports science.
4. The club need to expand the stadium as a priority to tap into the unfilled potential fans.
5. The club need to be great at communicating with its fans. It has been good but less so this season.
6. I want to be entertained and see football that gets me off my seat. That may be a single player like Huckerby or a team like last season.
7. I want a successful club but not at all costs, for example cheating the FInancial Fair Play rules would not be acceptable.
8. I want owners, who genuinely love the club.
I think that will do for now!!!
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Great post Colin … agree with most of that.
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