EFL Verdict

[The Scarlet Pimpernel]

34 minutes ago, Rich84 said:

Can the accountants on here break this down? Are the EFL as an organisation sat on a pot of money while a lot of their members are struggling?  And then they ask the members to fund the ongoing court case with us.......

Also, what intangible assets would they have, as an organisation? Understand tangible as that would be property wouldn't it? 

 

No, they don't have £111m in the bank as such look at their net assets figure below. Not worth anything. The scandle here is that they have taken advantage of allowable late submission of their own accounts whilst having several clubs under embargo for doing exactly the same. This organisation is unbelievable!!!

[hintonsboots]

Out of control Quango.

[RoyMac5]

13 minutes ago, The Scarlet Pimpernel said:

No, they don't have £111m in the bank as such look at their net assets figure below. Not worth anything. The scandal here is that they have taken advantage of allowable late submission of their own accounts whilst having several clubs under embargo for doing exactly the same. This organisation is unbelievable!!!

Yes that was the outrageous point. They really do think they can get away with anything - the tail is wagging the dog!

[cool_as_custard]

10 minutes ago, The Scarlet Pimpernel said:

No, they don't have £111m in the bank as such look at their net assets figure below. Not worth anything. The scandle here is that they have taken advantage of allowable late submission of their own accounts whilst having several clubs under embargo for doing exactly the same. This organisation is unbelievable!!!

Yes, they did have £111m in the bank at the Balance Sheet date AND their net worth is negative largely because they owed their creditors £115m more than they were owed by their debtors (just a coincidence the numbers are equal)

[Rich84]

9 minutes ago, The Scarlet Pimpernel said:

No, they don't have £111m in the bank as such look at their net assets figure below. Not worth anything. The scandle here is that they have taken advantage of allowable late submission of their own accounts whilst having several clubs under embargo for doing exactly the same. This organisation is unbelievable!!!

Realise they don't have £111m, just asked if they are sat on a pot of money, because as you point out the net worth is only a measly £60m..... ok, some is assets but if it says £111m in bank and £90m owed and only outgoing commitments of £150m then doesn't that mean they could in theory put their hands on some of the £60m and help out the lower league clubs that have cash-flow issues? I don't include Championship clubs as relatively they are all better off.

Just asking the better qualified if that makes sense? Obviously nothing is straightforward but they do appear to have the ability to support their members in a positive manner.....

[Tamworthram]

24 minutes ago, The Scarlet Pimpernel said:

No, they don't have £111m in the bank as such look at their net assets figure below. Not worth anything. The scandle here is that they have taken advantage of allowable late submission of their own accounts whilst having several clubs under embargo for doing exactly the same. This organisation is unbelievable!!!

I’m not an accountant and very happy to be corrected and educated but, surely the accounts show that they DID have £111m in the bank as at 4/8/20. It’s offset by the large amount of creditors falling due within, and more than, 12 months but the vast majority of this is accruals and deferred income which seems to be a rolling amount and pretty much the same each year. Doesn’t that mean it’s just an accounting entry and those liabilities will never materialise provided the EFL continues to exist and deliver the league fixtures? 
 

I may well have got that completely wrong.

[Dan_Ram]

What’s the next steps on this?

Are we still waiting for the written reasoning behind the 100k fine decision at which point it’s likely the EFL will appeal (or not)? Or have I missed that?

Then I assume if the EFL don’t appeal, next stage is to resubmit accounts, get out of embargo but also reveal if we have breached P&S in resubmitted years?

[The Scarlet Pimpernel]

2 minutes ago, Tamworthram said:

I’m not an accountant and very happy to be corrected and educated but, surely the accounts show that they DID have £111m in the bank as at 4/8/20. It’s offset by the large amount of creditors falling due within, and more than, 12 months but the vast majority of this is accruals and deferred income which seems to be a rolling amount and pretty much the same each year. Doesn’t that mean it’s just an accounting entry and those liabilities will never materialise provided the EFL continues to exist and deliver the league fixtures? 
 

I may well have got that completely wrong.

That's why I said "as such". I'm looking at what they are worth rather than what at that point they had in the bank. As I say, that's not the issue though. Its the shocking double standards regarding taking advantage of submission date allowances.

[RadioactiveWaste]

23 minutes ago, Dan_Ram said:

What’s the next steps on this?

Are we still waiting for the written reasoning behind the 100k fine decision at which point it’s likely the EFL will appeal (or not)? Or have I missed that?

Then I assume if the EFL don’t appeal, next stage is to resubmit accounts, get out of embargo but also reveal if we have breached P&S in resubmitted years?

Yes I think that's the situation.

If the EFL appeal the fine that delays resolution. I think we could still resubmit our accounts/P&S figures anyway, as I doubt we're going to appeal against that part of the sanction (and have zero chance of that succeeding IMO) but we might not because "the process is still ongoing"

[Eddie]

5 minutes ago, RadioactiveWaste said:

Yes I think that's the situation.

If the EFL appeal the fine that delays resolution. I think we could still resubmit our accounts/P&S figures anyway, as I doubt we're going to appeal against that part of the sanction (and have zero chance of that succeeding IMO) but we might not because "the process is still ongoing"

I wouldn't be surprised if the EFL wait until the last possible moment before appealing the fine, then give the appeals process until the day after the transfer window closes to deliver its verdict. It won't be a points deduction, but as far as they are concerned, it would be the next best thing. If they could swing it out to beyond January, so much the better.

[AndyinLiverpool]

2 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I wouldn't be surprised if the EFL wait until the last possible moment before appealing the fine, then give the appeals process until the day after the transfer window closes to deliver its verdict. It won't be a points deduction, but as far as they are concerned, it would be the next best thing. If they could swing it out to beyond January, so much the better.

Here's one possibility- the efl is currently trying to get Wycombe to calm down and call off the attack dogs so it can annou ce it will not appeal. That's why it's taking so long.

[DCFC1388]

Its been over a week now since the appeal result & punishment was announced. Surely the fact the IDC knew their outcome their report really shouldn't need to take a week to type up? I know it will be long & complicated but seriously, it wont take any longer than a day for someone to type it up correctly.

[Ghost of Clough]

13 minutes ago, DCFC1388 said:

Its been over a week now since the appeal result & punishment was announced. Surely the fact the IDC knew their outcome their report really shouldn't need to take a week to type up? I know it will be long & complicated but seriously, it wont take any longer than a day for someone to type it up correctly.

I never expected it until next week

[duncanjwitham]

2 hours ago, Rich84 said:

Can the accountants on here break this down? Are the EFL as an organisation sat on a pot of money while a lot of their members are struggling?  And then they ask the members to fund the ongoing court case with us.......

Also, what intangible assets would they have, as an organisation? Understand tangible as that would be property wouldn't it? 

 

Not an accountant, so take with a (massive) pinch of salt...

Tangible assets are physical things, like property, factory machinery etc. Intangible assets are non-physical things like Trademarks, Intellectual Property, brand recognition etc.  I suspect the EFLs biggest intangible assets is the EFL brand, and the agreements in they have in place to have the 72 clubs competing in their competitions.  That must be worth a fair amount, given the amount of money it generates.

I'd be very wary of judging the cash that the EFL have around at any given moment. A lot of stuff they're involved with basically boils down to collecting money and funnelling it to clubs - e.g. selling TV rights, collecting the payments and then paying it prize money etc to the clubs.  So I suspect at any given moment there could be plenty of payments that have been collected but not yet passed on.  That doesn't necessarily mean they are sitting on piles of cash for no reason. (Caveat: this is total speculation, and I could be very, very wrong here.)

In terms of the accounts submission extension, if we wanted to be generous to the EFL, they aren't directly under the FFP rules that requires clubs to submit accounts at the same time to 'ensure' 'fairness' (quote marks fully intentional here!).  The clubs have to comply with additional rules that the EFL don't.  They aren't competing with other football leagues, and have no requirement to be 'fair' to other leagues.  It's very much a "one rule for me, one rule for thee" situation though. Not a great look. 

Also, obviously, **** the EFL!

[Ambitious]

I guess we will get the report within the next week which takes us to 9th July. The EFL (and ourselves) then have 14 days to appeal the decision which takes us to 23rd July. We don't have to publish our new accounts until the 18th August. 

I would say should we be within P&S that we would put in our accounts almost immediately after the EFL take a decision on whether to appeal the £100k fine. I think that would get the transfer embargo off our back.

Nevertheless, I would also advise if we are going to fall foul that we will wait until the very last day to put in our accounts, at least until after the first game or two have been played. It would mean that we keep our Championship position, but will have had to battle with a transfer embargo on top of having next to no players whatsoever. It would just mean that Mel won't lose £10m in income for this next season. It would definitely mean almost certain relegation, but Mel will be hoping to be long gone by then. 

Modern day football, eh? Don't you just love it! 

[duncanjwitham]

22 minutes ago, Ambitious said:

I guess we will get the report within the next week which takes us to 9th July. The EFL (and ourselves) then have 14 days to appeal the decision which takes us to 23rd July.

It's probably worth saying, you don't just stand up and say "I appeal!", you have to submit the specific grounds on which you think a mistake was made during the original decision. You can see bits of the detailed EFL submissions in the written reasons from the previous appeal, for example.  So don't expect a decision on whether to appeal (from either side) on the day the reasons come out.  And if takes the full 14 days to submit, it probably isn't the EFL deliberately delaying things to screw over our transfer plans, it's their lawyers doing their proper due diligence etc.

[rammieib]

1 hour ago, Ambitious said:

I guess we will get the report within the next week which takes us to 9th July. The EFL (and ourselves) then have 14 days to appeal the decision which takes us to 23rd July. We don't have to publish our new accounts until the 18th August. 

I would say should we be within P&S that we would put in our accounts almost immediately after the EFL take a decision on whether to appeal the £100k fine. I think that would get the transfer embargo off our back.

Nevertheless, I would also advise if we are going to fall foul that we will wait until the very last day to put in our accounts, at least until after the first game or two have been played. It would mean that we keep our Championship position, but will have had to battle with a transfer embargo on top of having next to no players whatsoever. It would just mean that Mel won't lose £10m in income for this next season. It would definitely mean almost certain relegation, but Mel will be hoping to be long gone by then. 

Modern day football, eh? Don't you just love it! 

But why not put them in now? If we are in within P&S, put them in, show we comply and get the transfer embargo lifted.

[Big Bad Bob]

1 hour ago, Ambitious said:

I guess we will get the report within the next week which takes us to 9th July. The EFL (and ourselves) then have 14 days to appeal the decision which takes us to 23rd July. We don't have to publish our new accounts until the 18th August. 

I would say should we be within P&S that we would put in our accounts almost immediately after the EFL take a decision on whether to appeal the £100k fine. I think that would get the transfer embargo off our back.

Nevertheless, I would also advise if we are going to fall foul that we will wait until the very last day to put in our accounts, at least until after the first game or two have been played. It would mean that we keep our Championship position, but will have had to battle with a transfer embargo on top of having next to no players whatsoever. It would just mean that Mel won't lose £10m in income for this next season. It would definitely mean almost certain relegation, but Mel will be hoping to be long gone by then. 

Modern day football, eh? Don't you just love it! 

So we have option a) hang on to our accounts and not get relegated this season, but stay under a transfer embargo and option b) submit accounts now, have the embargo lifted and sign players, but potentially get relegated. 

[Sparkle]

6 minutes ago, rammieib said:

But why not put them in now? If we are in within P&S, put them in, show we comply and get the transfer embargo lifted.

I suspect there is a lot of work involved - time to be patient

[duncanjwitham]

9 minutes ago, rammieib said:

But why not put them in now? If we are in within P&S, put them in, show we comply and get the transfer embargo lifted.

I suppose there's a chance that the report might clarify exactly how we need to restate the accounts.  Maybe they give us some leeway to cover having to switch methods or something, or even (unlikely I know) say we can carry on with our method providing we document it properly or something.