Embargo.

[OohMartWright]

23 hours ago, Rampant said:

Yeah, this. Having said that, lets play 'Predict the 8'......

Haven't a clue so: 

Mengi   (Man U)

Delap    (Man C)

Roberts (Patrick)   (Man C)

Grosicki    (free agent I think)

Carroll (Andy)  (free agent)

Shoretire  (Man U)

Hannibal   (Man U)

Brannagan  (Oxford)

 

Eight would be too many imo. 

Edit: Wisdom of course ^^^

Some good players in there, but please God not Andy Carroll or Hannibal. The former is just awful and would not suit the style of play we are trying to develop and the latter has probably the worst attitude I've ever seen in a young player.

[Day]

Rooney said he would like 8 more signings, doesn't surprise me, but it would surprise me if he got 8.

You have to remember Rooney has a winning mentality, I doubt he would be happy with just surviving or even mid table. He would want a promotion on his CV, prove the doubters wrong and 8 players with financial freedom would give him a better chance of achieving that.

Where we are though, waiting for a takeover, 17 months without revenue, half empty stadium, I doubt we will see much more if any transfer activity in this window at least.

[gccrowdpleaser]

I see a lot of people are arbitrarily picking out 3 points as put punishment. 

The system works on the basis that if you breach the rules you are deducted 12 points. That set of points is then subjected to a reduction based on the value over threshold. If you are less that 2m over the threshold then you qualify for a 'discount' or reduction of 9 points from the 12. 

Birmingham were a little under 10m over when they were pinned. They qualified for a discount of between 5 and 7 points from the 12. So were on the hook, pre appeal, for a deduction of 5-7 points 

The point being that if we are found to have breached then we have a max of 12 points for one season.

This is where it works in our favour I think because if the EFL were to find against us for all those years then the clubs they would be sued by clubs that didn't get into the playoffs.

Therefore the best thing that can happen for the EFL is that we are still compliant but that we have highlighted the loopholes which they can now close.

[Dean (hick) Saunders]

Let’s see tomorrow.

Ill practice my excited face..

[Boycie]

24 hours

[brady1993]

2 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

Those EOS players should only be replaced at the end of season or contract extended, unless we sell now and get a replacement in. They currently can't be extended due to embargo rules. 

A healthy squad (wage bill wise) is 2 first teamers per position - maybe a 3rd GK and CF (let's say 24 man squad).
The inexperienced players including Watson, Ebosele, etc would be either loaned out or wait in the U23s for a chance. Also assume Marshall is out.

That leaves a first team squad of this:

That means we need GK, RB, CB, AM, LW and CF to complete the 24 man squad. With Knight and Bielik out for a few months, 2 short term CM loans would be ideal. That takes us up the magic 8.

I'm still not convinced that the number '8' should be taken literally, it seemed an off the cuff comment with a made up largish number and I don't think should be read into much more than Rooney wants to make more signings.

With that said I'd more or less agree that's areas I think we'd be looking at. I would say I think it's more likely we look for a RW (with a left foot) than a LW, mostly because I feel what we are building towards benefits forwards being inverted and Jozwiak has looked better on the left than the right. I suspect if we bring anyone in up front they will be first choice as I think we have players to do the role now in Baldock and Stretton so would need a clear upgrade for it top be worthwhile.

There's one other thing I think worth considering when it comes to signings; we've mostly been focused on covering gaps so far and if things open up for us we might well consider trying to upgrade an area or two. In turn this might see one or two leaving.

[jono]

4 minutes ago, Boycie said:

24 hours

Is that 48 hours with a 50% discount ? 

[Dan_Ram]

2 hours ago, Ghost of Clough said:

That leaves a first team squad of this:

That means we need GK, RB, CB, AM, LW and CF to complete the 24 man squad. With Knight and Bielik out for a few months, 2 short term CM loans would be ideal. That takes us up the magic 8.

I think Watson and Ebosele have shown enough to be involved in the squad this year. I would be disappointed if they were loaned out. Cashin could also take the 4th CB place.

With CKR out long term and Knight not quite ready for a return, I’d be looking at 1x winger & 1x Centre Forward.
Possibly also another DM to take the load off Bird/Shinnie until Bielik is back.

It’s clear the team have a good spirit and fighting mentality, the worst thing we could do right now is bring 8x in and upset the apple cart.

[Crewton]

3 hours ago, Donnyram said:

The latter is too subjective to be a reliable method for a P&S calculation in my opinion.
 

There is almost certainly sufficient data to justify a different model based on a player retaining a decent chunk of value until he is into the last year of his contract.  Clearly not enough for the EFL though

I think it's far too subjective for clubs to set their own values for accounting purposes, particularly if those valuations can be set in order to allow greater expenditure. Fair Market Value in football is a pretty loose concept. For example, I'm sure DCFC would have included a residual value for Blackman/Butterworth/Anya towards the end of their contracts, but in reality they were worthless, because no-one would have been daft enough to pay money for them. 

If the EFL want to stop clubs spending too much, they should remove player amortisation from the FFP calcs and place more emphasis on cashflow and the simple comparison between income and expenditure, perhaps also set limits for overall gearing.

[RoyMac5]

19 minutes ago, Dan_Ram said:

I think Watson and Ebosele have shown enough to be involved in the squad this year. I would be disappointed if they were loaned out. Cashin could also take the 4th CB place.

With CKR out long term and Knight not quite ready for a return, I’d be looking at 1x winger & 1x Centre Forward.
Possibly also another DM to take the load off Bird/Shinnie until Bielik is back.

It’s clear the team have a good spirit and fighting mentality, the worst thing we could do right now is bring 8x in and upset the apple cart.

Why do teams loan out young players? To get experience? Better for our 'not quite ready' players to get 6 months football in than one or two starts and some last 15 minutes.

As for team spirit and fighting mentality, if the players that come in (who will probably not be on long contracts or massive wages) help us win more games then that will increase team spirit. 

I hope we get more players in because although I get laughed at it is clear that we could still have a good go at top 6. But we particularly need more goal threat and some CB/RB cover.

[JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta]

1 hour ago, David said:

Rooney said he would like 8 more signings, doesn't surprise me, but it would surprise me if he got 8.

You have to remember Rooney has a winning mentality, I doubt he would be happy with just surviving or even mid table. He would want a promotion on his CV, prove the doubters wrong and 8 players with financial freedom would give him a better chance of achieving that.

Where we are though, waiting for a takeover, 17 months without revenue, half empty stadium, I doubt we will see much more if any transfer activity in this window at least.

This. Financial freedom and freedom from an embargo are two different things. Even if the embargo does go then we are still hugely restricted on what we can do.

[BathRam72]

14 minutes ago, JuanFloEvraTheCocu'sNesta said:

This. Financial freedom and freedom from an embargo are two different things. Even if the embargo does go then we are still hugely restricted on what we can do.

Do tell

[England Ram]

The only hope if all the embargo’s are lifted is that we can get some other quality frees and loans in. 
There is no money if Morris stays in charge so I don’t know where people think it’s going to come from. 
 

[Ghost of Clough]

19 minutes ago, BathRam72 said:

Do tell

As in Mel/the club still need the money to sign players and pay their wages

[hintonsboots]

6 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

As in Mel/the club still need the money to sign players and pay their wages

It is always framed that Mel is funding the entire operation, rather than making up the shortfall between overheads and income. Certainly the wage bill will have plunged, but so have gate receipts. A good cup run, a sell on clause fee (Will Hughes) an increase in attendances will all help. Does anyone know roughly how much Mel is putting in each month ?

[duncanjwitham]

1 hour ago, Crewton said:

I think it's far too subjective for clubs to set their own values for accounting purposes, particularly if those valuations can be set in order to allow greater expenditure. Fair Market Value in football is a pretty loose concept. For example, I'm sure DCFC would have included a residual value for Blackman/Butterworth/Anya towards the end of their contracts, but in reality they were worthless, because no-one would have been daft enough to pay money for them. 

That's what the club was trying to grapple with by getting valuations from agents and pulling values from transfermarkt and other websites. In theory, it's no different to getting estate agent valuations and using sites like Zoopla to value property, although there's obviously a lot of issues with that approach (secrecy of actual player transfer values, lack of established criteria and rigour in valuing players compared to property etc).

I think if you were really committed to doing it, you could come up with something that would be good enough. You'd have to basically remove the clubs input entirely from the process though.  Maybe get 3 agent valuations and 3 website valuations for each player and average them as a starting point.  The have a specified list of rules beyond that - any player over 30 has no resale value, any player that plays less than 30 games in the last calendar year has no resale value, and so on.  Make it a straight forward process that anyone outside the club could re-run and get the same numbers, and document the hell out of it. (Not saying announce it to the public or anything, but there's no reason accountants, auditors or the EFL couldn't be given access.) 

1 hour ago, Crewton said:

If the EFL want to stop clubs spending too much, they should remove player amortisation from the FFP calcs and place more emphasis on cashflow and the simple comparison between income and expenditure, perhaps also set limits for overall gearing.

Still not sure cashflow solves anything. You have situations like Fulham signing Harry Wilson this season but not paying anything until next.  There's far too many ways around it.  The wages/turnover ration used in leagues 1 and 2 is still the best way for me. Let owners put what they want in in terms of transfer fees, but clubs have to be able to finance the on-going costs of those players themselves.

[Ghost of Clough]

14 minutes ago, duncanjwitham said:

That's what the club was trying to grapple with by getting valuations from agents and pulling values from transfermarkt and other websites. In theory, it's no different to getting estate agent valuations and using sites like Zoopla to value property, although there's obviously a lot of issues with that approach (secrecy of actual player transfer values, lack of established criteria and rigour in valuing players compared to property etc).

I think if you were really committed to doing it, you could come up with something that would be good enough. You'd have to basically remove the clubs input entirely from the process though.  Maybe get 3 agent valuations and 3 website valuations for each player and average them as a starting point.  The have a specified list of rules beyond that - any player over 30 has no resale value, any player that plays less than 30 games in the last calendar year has no resale value, and so on.  Make it a straight forward process that anyone outside the club could re-run and get the same numbers, and document the hell out of it. (Not saying announce it to the public or anything, but there's no reason accountants, auditors or the EFL couldn't be given access.) 

Still not sure cashflow solves anything. You have situations like Fulham signing Harry Wilson this season but not paying anything until next.  There's far too many ways around it.  The wages/turnover ration used in leagues 1 and 2 is still the best way for me. Let owners put what they want in in terms of transfer fees, but clubs have to be able to finance the on-going costs of those players themselves.

We want to hold the book value of players high until the final year.
What I would do is amortise on a straight line towards zero at the average retirement age (let's say 35), but the remaining amount written off in the final year.

In this example, we sign a 23 year old for £5m on a 5 year deal.
12 years until he's 35 so just over £400k amortisation a year. If he signs extensions keeping him at the club until 35, then it will be the same every year (shown by the blue line).
If he doesn't sign an extension and leaves at the end of his 5 years, then £3.3m will be amortised in the final year (shown by the year line)

[Crewton]

16 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

We want to hold the book value of players high until the final year.
What I would do is amortise on a straight line towards zero at the average retirement age (let's say 35), but the remaining amount written off in the final year.

In this example, we sign a 23 year old for £5m on a 5 year deal.
12 years until he's 35 so just over £400k amortisation a year. If he signs extensions keeping him at the club until 35, then it will be the same every year (shown by the blue line).
If he doesn't sign an extension and leaves at the end of his 5 years, then £3.3m will be amortised in the final year (shown by the year line)

I quite like that. 

[Ambitious]

Just out of interest: is it certain that we are out of the embargo tomorrow. I've seen quite a few claims that Rooney said we would be, yet not one media outlet has picked it up. I find it too strange that it's not a bigger story for someone not to have ran with it. 

[Srg]

Just now, Ambitious said:

Just out of interest: is it certain that we are out of the embargo tomorrow. I've seen quite a few claims that Rooney said we would be, yet not one media outlet has picked it up. I find it too strange that it's not a bigger story for someone not to have ran with it. 

Because that would be a good news story, if it does happen.