FFP was put on hold, back on again

[davenportram]

Going to be voted on by proxy on April 25th

Glick still seemed confident and said that they don't expect any surprises

In informal votes (can't remember exact words) 23 out if 24 voting in favour

.

[Duracell]

Glick in same interview intimated he wouldn't gamble on players when asked by CG about Reading and Jason Roberts. Smallish gamble when you consider the rewards for Reading. Also I think said Reading had 12 Million incoming from selling players etc.

Glick said Jason Roberts was a gamble.

I think he was implying that he'd love to be able to sell £12m worth of players to bring in new players...

[blackNwhites]

Jason Roberts has not single handedly put Reading top though.

[RotherhamRam]

Jason Roberts has not single handedly put Reading top though.

couldn't agree adam le fondre is actually top goal scorer for reading and scored two goals again against southampton to put them top.

[RotherhamRam]

No but he's made a big difference to them since he's arrived.

Its coincidence. Last season they won their last 10 games to put themselves into the playoffs. This season they have gone on a 14 game run coninciding with WHU drawing 8 in the same run and Southampton dropping points, Thats the beauty about this league.

[Guest]

Its coincidence. Last season they won their last 10 games to put themselves into the playoffs. This season they have gone on a 14 game run coninciding with WHU drawing 8 in the same run and Southampton dropping points, Thats the beauty about this league.

They identified an area they needed to strengthen and brought Roberts in, he contributed to them being on the verge of promotion.

Had derby brought him in, we would have been better off than we are now.

It was not a coincidence.

[RotherhamRam]

They identified an area they needed to strengthen and brought Roberts in, he contributed to them being on the verge of promotion.

Had derby brought him in, we would have been better off than we are now.

It was not a coincidence.

I would rather have Le Fondre to Roberts. Roberts is a lot of money for couple of seasons Le Fondre no where near as much for many seasons. Roberts experience will have helped. However I would say the fact that Reading has the best defence in the league is probably more of a reason why they have done so well. Thier goal keeper last night was awesome and kept them in the game for the first 25 mins.

[Guest]

I would rather have Le Fondre to Roberts. Roberts is a lot of money for couple of seasons Le Fondre no where near as much for many seasons. Roberts experience will have helped. However I would say the fact that Reading has the best defence in the league is probably more of a reason why they have done so well. Thier goal keeper last night was awesome and kept them in the game for the first 25 mins.

Either one of them would have probably won the game for us today, money is all relative, It's only because we have been brainwashed that it comes into the equation, 6 goals in 15 should really what we focus on.

[ramblur]

Going to be voted on by proxy on April 25th

Glick still seemed confident and said that they don't expect any surprises

In informal votes (can't remember exact words) 23 out if 24 voting in favour

.

I thought the "proxy" vote (whatever that entailed) actually represented your "informal votes" above,and that he was implying the real vote was set for April 25.Unless my ears deceived,I thought he also said that one club was against and (bizarrely) that 20-23 were in favour.He described the newspaper report (presumably Independent) as "rogue".

Therefore,as far as I can make out,we have the League's website saying that a final vote was to have been taken at PP (which Glick now seems to say was a "proxy" vote),we have a "rogue" newspaper report claiming that it was scuppered at PP and that clubs wouldn't meet again till June,and we have this extract from a link you put up earlier in the thread (Simon Clegg,Ipswich CEO):-

"We still don't have definitive clarity,the final documentation will not be delivered until June".So,is Clegg unaware of the April 25 meeting?Does he join the "rogues" club,alongside the Independent?Is a vote to be taken on April 25,with clubs not knowing what they're (definitively) voting on?

I'm sure RD will quizz Glick on the outcome shortly after the meeting-after all we don't want it disappearing into the close season when RD coverage tails off.Still,SSN will surely cover something of such importance on the 25th,and if all else fails there's always the good old League's website to fall back on.

It occurs to me that whenever/if ever a vote is taken,there could be up to 5 clubs voting that would effectively no longer be League members due to relegation/promotion,which seems a little strange.Perhaps they were hoping WHU would get automatic promotion?

[duncanjwitham]

What Glick said was that we won't gamble with money we don't have, i.e. we won't splash cash hoping to recover it *IF* we make the prem. Reading didn't do that - Roberts was a gamble, but it was gambling with money that they already had in their pockets from earlier sales.

And to all the people praising the signing of Roberts - they sold two of their best players (Matt Mills and Shane Long) and spent significantly less on signing replacements. Their entire business model basically requires them to sell players each season just to survive (see Stephen Hunt, Doyle, Siggurdson, Bikey and so on). Would we all be happy if we sold Shackell and Brayford and replaced them with 30+ year olds on short-term £25k a week contracts or unproven lower-league players like Le Fondre?

[ramblur]

Sorry,I should have put "Championship" rather than "League" members.

[davenportram]

I thought the "proxy" vote (whatever that entailed) actually represented your "informal votes" above,and that he was implying the real vote was set for April 25.Unless my ears deceived,I thought he also said that one club was against and (bizarrely) that 20-23 were in favour.He described the newspaper report (presumably Independent) as "rogue".

Therefore,as far as I can make out,we have the League's website saying that a final vote was to have been taken at PP (which Glick now seems to say was a "proxy" vote),we have a "rogue" newspaper report claiming that it was scuppered at PP and that clubs wouldn't meet again till June,and we have this extract from a link you put up earlier in the thread (Simon Clegg,Ipswich CEO):-

"We still don't have definitive clarity,the final documentation will not be delivered until June".So,is Clegg unaware of the April 25 meeting?Does he join the "rogues" club,alongside the Independent?Is a vote to be taken on April 25,with clubs not knowing what they're (definitively) voting on?

I'm sure RD will quizz Glick on the outcome shortly after the meeting-after all we don't want it disappearing into the close season when RD coverage tails off.Still,SSN will surely cover something of such importance on the 25th,and if all else fails there's always the good old League's website to fall back on.

It occurs to me that whenever/if ever a vote is taken,there could be up to 5 clubs voting that would effectively no longer be League members due to relegation/promotion,which seems a little strange.Perhaps they were hoping WHU would get automatic promotion?

Im sure Glick said there was a vote by proxy with deadline of 25th April and that he didnt expect any surprises in that vote.

Perhaps its a case of vote by proxy and then ratify at the AGM. Bear in mind the context for Clegg's comments are the backdrop of FFP being brought in net season but with no sanctions for 2 years. It could well be voted on by Proxy in April but final documentation regarding sanctions etc being published in June due to the 2 year lead in.

[curb]

What Glick said was that we won't gamble with money we don't have, i.e. we won't splash cash hoping to recover it *IF* we make the prem. Reading didn't do that - Roberts was a gamble, but it was gambling with money that they already had in their pockets from earlier sales.

And to all the people praising the signing of Roberts - they sold two of their best players (Matt Mills and Shane Long) and spent significantly less on signing replacements. Their entire business model basically requires them to sell players each season just to survive (see Stephen Hunt, Doyle, Siggurdson, Bikey and so on). Would we all be happy if we sold Shackell and Brayford and replaced them with 30+ year olds on short-term £25k a week contracts or unproven lower-league players like Le Fondre?

Of course we would if it meant we were top of the league.

[duncanjwitham]

Of course we would if it meant we were top of the league.

Yeah, hindsight's a wonderful thing, but at the point we sold our two best players and replaced them with loans and lower-league players, this messageboard would go into absolute meltdown. And there's no guarantee that it would work anyway. If Roberts or Le Fondre had flopped, Reading would be left with nothing next season, other than having to sell another £6m player to cover their massive wage bill.

[ramblur]

Going to be voted on by proxy on April 25th

Glick still seemed confident and said that they don't expect any surprises

In informal votes (can't remember exact words) 23 out if 24 voting in favour

.

My apologies,having listened again your version appears to be right,in that proxy votes have gone out,to be registered on April 25th.He also used the word "stray" rather than "rogue",so I retract this from my earlier post.Interview on FFP starts at about 25m,22s:-

[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00q7xc7]http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00q7xc7

I still find it strange that something would be voted on in April when the exact details won't be known until June-why not just wait until June (especially as it seems there'll be no sanctions anyway for one and maybe two years)? I notice that Glick makes no reference to this at all.

The word you were seeking was "directional" (vote).

On early birds,I find it strange that anticipating 15k renewals would put us neck and neck with last year,when a club spokesman apparently said last year that the figure was 16,200 (though I'll have to search back again to see if this was a direct quote,rather than a poster's interpretation).

[ramblur]

I thought the "proxy" vote (whatever that entailed) actually represented your "informal votes" above,and that he was implying the real vote was set for April 25.Unless my ears deceived,I thought he also said that one club was against and (bizarrely) that 20-23 were in favour.He described the newspaper report (presumably Independent) as "rogue".

Therefore,as far as I can make out,we have the League's website saying that a final vote was to have been taken at PP (which Glick now seems to say was a "proxy" vote),we have a "rogue" newspaper report claiming that it was scuppered at PP and that clubs wouldn't meet again till June,and we have this extract from a link you put up earlier in the thread (Simon Clegg,Ipswich CEO):-

"We still don't have definitive clarity,the final documentation will not be delivered until June".So,is Clegg unaware of the April 25 meeting?Does he join the "rogues" club,alongside the Independent?Is a vote to be taken on April 25,with clubs not knowing what they're (definitively) voting on?

I'm sure RD will quizz Glick on the outcome shortly after the meeting-after all we don't want it disappearing into the close season when RD coverage tails off.Still,SSN will surely cover something of such importance on the 25th,and if all else fails there's always the good old League's website to fall back on.

It occurs to me that whenever/if ever a vote is taken,there could be up to 5 clubs voting that would effectively no longer be League members due to relegation/promotion,which seems a little strange.Perhaps they were hoping WHU would get automatic promotion?

Having listened again to the interview,it's clear that I misunderstood the element of the proxy vote,so I retract anything I said about such vote.I also retract the reference to "rogue",as the actual word used was "stray",and apologise for both misrepresentations in my original post.

[CornwallRam]

It seems that the early bird renwalls were open into May last year, when 16,200 were sold.

[url=http://www.thisisderbyshire.co.uk/Sales-Derby-season-tickets-encouraging/story-11315742-detail/story.html]http://www.thisisderbyshire.co.uk/Sales-Derby-season-tickets-encouraging/story-11315742-detail/story.html

I think that 15,000 is pretty good with the economic climate and the more 'honest' approach to PR in the last few months.

[ramblur]

It seems that the early bird renwalls were open into May last year, when 16,200 were sold.

[url=http://www.thisisderbyshire.co.uk/Sales-Derby-season-tickets-encouraging/story-11315742-detail/story.html]http://www.thisisder...tail/story.html

I think that 15,000 is pretty good with the economic climate and the more 'honest' approach to PR in the last few months.

I suppose it's a difficult one really-if the deadline last year had been the same as this year,would only 15k of the 16.2k only have renewed?My guess is that the current figure would be in line with their expectations and would be covered by the 10% price increase 'patch',therefore so far so good.The more critical consideration will be what happens from now on in-how many will be willing to pay the higher price after deadline,and will transfer activity entice them in? If last year's total sales were 17.5k and early birds were to pull in 15k,then we'd need to pull in another 2.5k to match last season (unlikely,I would have thought).For the 'patch' to work,I'd guess we'd just need to pull in an extra 700/800 more (though you can't work it out without knowing the categories that had fallen away).

I've commented before that I too welcome the more open approach of late.My interest in S/T sales lies purely in trying to assess whether we're on course for break even next season,and the signs don't look bad thus far.The next consideration (apart from non early bird S/Ts) will be the kind of season we have and the consequent influence on gates.I think it would be a foolish fan who might gloat over a fall in S/T numbers (and I'm not in that category),as any such fall would ultimately be likely to affect team building.

[CornwallRam]

I don't believe that this is going to happen - I think we're claiming poverty because we have no money, but:

If the owners really were going to pump in a load of cash to turn a mid-table team into an automatic promotion one, then the current PR would be pretty helpful, as would closing the early bird renewals early.

By claiming to be skint we could probably negotiate better prices form other teams. And just imagine what would happen to ticket sales if we signed four or five really exciting players in July. A few thousand extra season tickets holders all paying a higher price and the ground filled with 'walk ups' paying even more. If we really were going to spend, then selling a lot of cheap season tickets would be a bad move.

[ramblur]

I don't believe that this is going to happen - I think we're claiming poverty because we have no money, but:

If the owners really were going to pump in a load of cash to turn a mid-table team into an automatic promotion one, then the current PR would be pretty helpful, as would closing the early bird renewals early.

By claiming to be skint we could probably negotiate better prices form other teams. And just imagine what would happen to ticket sales if we signed four or five really exciting players in July. A few thousand extra season tickets holders all paying a higher price and the ground filled with 'walk ups' paying even more. If we really were going to spend, then selling a lot of cheap season tickets would be a bad move.

I've thought about your scenario myself,Cornwall,and would have considered it to be smart business sense (although a bit of a gamble in that you could never be sure that you'd drag back the lost S/Ts).The only problem I have with it is that they would surely have done it last year if they had the cash.I don't buy into this "over budget on wages" talk-the signing of decent players then would have driven revenues to cover a wage budget overrun.You might then be able to apply a 10% increase to a stronger (happier) base.

I still think we're entering this break even stage from a position of weakness,viz declining income (before the 'patch') and team strength below the required starting quality (with horsetrading + a little cash unlikely to change matters significantly).If FFP had come in undiluted next season,and if our owners' policy were to fail,we couldhave found ourselves in a mess.If income levels had continued to fall,how would we be able to change tack,as any action would be dictated by such income levels? In other words,the worse the situation gets under FFP,the harder it is to break out of.