Its time to balance the books!

[Donnyjim]

With two benefactors leaving and a yearly shortfall of £5 million this model is clearly unsustainable. Its time for a long term realistic business plan to be put in place at the club. This includes marketing Doncaster Rovers the brand! Buying the stadium off the council. We have some unique selling points, lets use them.  

In these times of austerity, we have to at least try and balance the books. Clearly we can not do that with £9 million wage bill.  We need to put an end to short termism and a sticking plaster mentality.

The downside to this, is that we probably will have to get relegated first. It will mean losing a lot of the top wage earners. You have to break some eggs to make an omelette!

However, every cloud has a silver lining and I think that it presents itself as and opportunity for the club to wipe the slate clean and implement a long term sustainable business plan. Peterborough Utd have a wage of £3 million and we have more going for us than they do (League table?).

I fear that if the above does not happen John Ryan will leave and we will be heading back down the leagues again with spiralling debts

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Should have happened a long time ago IMO.  I've always wanted a more sustainable club if that means poorer quality players then so be it.  I'd much rather us be proactive and different as a club.  Now the current Mckay idea is one way and I believe he'll stick around upon relegation we'll just see him going for players that are not quite as high profile.

But what I'd like to see also is much more focus on the youth system and much better work on growing the club with the crowds.  Now this means lower ticket prices for sure, but the potential at lower prices clearly is there, we sold 5500 STs at Belle Vue yet we've only sold the same this season at a much better stadium.  Sadly the marketing priorities of the club aren't quite right.  That needs to be much improved.  IF we go down it'll be rare an away club brings close to 1000, that gives us 14,000 home seats to play with.  They can be filled at cheaper prices, we have to offer 2000 away tickets for the bigger games but that's the max so still approaching 13000 tickets we could shift to home fans.  Even at an average price of £150 per ST that's a good £2m of ticket revenue.  But the key to this is getting hold of the stadium so we can gain more from the catering etc within the stadium.

[Donnylass]

A few years ago Leyton Orient struggled. they'd been sold as a club for a fiver.  They turned it around and brought in the idea of kids season tickets for £10 in the west stand. Parents had to be with them. But the price of the season ticket was more of a write off, it was to get the kids in to the ground, buying the shirts etc and buying the food and drinks at half time (this part will only work if we own the club). But it got the kids hooked.

Maybe £10 is too low, but half the price/ or just reduce what we charge now, just to get them through the gates. Like you said it's a long term thing. Eventually they will be adults paying adult prices, maybe bringing their own kids for £20, £40.

[benaldo]

With two benefactors leaving and a yearly shortfall of £5 million this model is clearly unsustainable. Its time for a long term realistic business plan to be put in place at the club. This includes marketing Doncaster Rovers the brand! Buying the stadium off the council. We have some unique selling points, lets use them.  

In these times of austerity, we have to at least try and balance the books. Clearly we can not do that with £9 million wage bill.  We need to put an end to short termism and a sticking plaster mentality.

The downside to this, is that we probably will have to get relegated first. It will mean losing a lot of the top wage earners. You have to break some eggs to make an omelette!

However, every cloud has a silver lining and I think that it presents itself as and opportunity for the club to wipe the slate clean and implement a long term sustainable business plan. Peterborough Utd have a wage of £3 million and we have more going for us than they do (League table?).

I fear that if the above does not happen John Ryan will leave and we will be heading back down the leagues again with spiralling debts

SO if a 9 million pound wage bill is required as a minimum to compete at this level, what do you think Rovers should do? I know, how about getting a really good football agent in to get great players to Rovers for a fraction of the cost? Sound like a good idea?

Some people must have trouble putting one foot in front of the other.....

[donnyroversfc]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

[Wellred]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

It must be great to live in your own little world. Welcome to la la land

[donnyroversfc]

Why is that Wellred?

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

Some major flaws in that though.  Can you see Friend and Bennett being around, they're good prospects?  Also surely their wages are not cheap at all, I'm sure Friend got a nice pay rise in his new contract.

As for these BSP/L2 players. Well firstly they'll have to be good enough, secondly do you think they'll come cheap?  They'll require transfer fees and why should their clubs sell them cheap if they're that good?  We wouldn't expect our club to and we didn't either at that level.  Also if they're coming up they'll want a decent wage given that in league 1 we'll be one of the top teams in there after potentially the Sheffield clubs, Preston and Hudds if they stay down, so they might expect a decent fee.  It's not quite as easy as you make out is it?

[sedwardsdrfc]

well it is on football manager

[DRFC-PERKINS]

The McKay thing isn't a long term plan, but it gives us an time and a opportunity to sustain our championship status. If Mckay goes after next season(as planned) it gives us the chance to lower the wage bill and help us stay in the championship until then. If we have half the wage bill we have now and manage to stay in this league by 2013/14 it will be a massive achievement. Yes we will loose key players but even if Mckay leaves then, we can try and replace them with cheaper lower league players, with the money we've saved from wages and made from tv money. Like other teams have and like you said doncasterroversfc, but without having to get relagated or loose the chance to get quality players in at this moment in time..

I don't want us to go down, but If we do it's not the end of the world. Loosing John Ryan would be however.

The Mckay situation IMO is more important now than it was before the 4 directors resigned, because we can get quality in on the cheap and Cheap is what we need.

RTID    

[WBDRFC]

Why is that Wellred?

I've got a couple of reasons:
1. The drop in TV revenue is huge - we are talking millions. The wage bill will have to be eliminated altogether if the club are to balance the books.
2. Players are on contracts - you can't just get rid of them if we are relegated. We will have to either sell them or wait until their contracts come to an end. If relegation does happen, the players will likely be on the same wages as they are now - which would be catastrophic for the club.

The best thing to do would be to try to maintain Championship status, continue to cut the wage bill as and when contracts expire, continue to bring in loan players on cheap deals, have a big marketing revamp, adjust ticket pricing to take into the current economic situation facing supporters.

[drfc1951]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

Some major flaws in that though.  Can you see Friend and Bennett being around, they're good prospects?  Also surely their wages are not cheap at all, I'm sure Friend got a nice pay rise in his new contract.

Plus will these young ambitous players see us as a club lacking any ambition.

As for these BSP/L2 players. Well firstly they'll have to be good enough, secondly do you think they'll come cheap?  They'll require transfer fees and why should their clubs sell them cheap if they're that good?  We wouldn't expect our club to and we didn't either at that level.  Also if they're coming up they'll want a decent wage given that in league 1 we'll be one of the top teams in there after potentially the Sheffield clubs, Preston and Hudds if they stay down, so they might expect a decent fee.  It's not quite as easy as you make out is it?

[donnyroversfc]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

Some major flaws in that though.  Can you see Friend and Bennett being around, they're good prospects?  Also surely their wages are not cheap at all, I'm sure Friend got a nice pay rise in his new contract.

As for these BSP/L2 players. Well firstly they'll have to be good enough, secondly do you think they'll come cheap?  They'll require transfer fees and why should their clubs sell them cheap if they're that good?  We wouldn't expect our club to and we didn't either at that level.  Also if they're coming up they'll want a decent wage given that in league 1 we'll be one of the top teams in there after potentially the Sheffield clubs, Preston and Hudds if they stay down, so they might expect a decent fee.  It's not quite as easy as you make out is it?

Yeah i agree tbh, i've probably made it all seem a bit easy and obviously its not. With the wages we'd save on Copps, Stock and Sharp though we would be able to get a few good prospects in with cash to spare. Transfer fees would be the biggest problem. L2 teams seem to be wanting alot more for their players than they did before (swindon rejecting offers of 500k for example). Kee and O'Kane, who i think are both very good players and would stand out in league 1 wouldn't be too much of a problem.

I can see both Friend and Bennett staying yes, although i would say the latter needs to be played more or he may want out?

We need to have a very small squad (made up of mainly good young prospects) then Saunders can obviously use his contacts to get some loan players in to compliment the squad.

Goalkeepers
Gary Woods
New gk

Defenders
James O'connor
George Friend
Tommy Spurr
Sam Hird
James Husband

Midfielders
Martin Woods
Kyle Bennett
James Baxendale

Strikers
Chris Brown


That is the squad i'd keep for next season, with all the outgoings that'd free up a lot.

Then we'd probably need permanent signing for Striker x2 midfielders x2 Defenders x2 and fill the rest of squad by promoting some youth players and loaning a goalkeeper and 2 or 3 more. I'd hate to think how much we're wasting on the wages of players such as Keegan, bouhenna and Chambers.

I'd have though also that most players would have it written in their contracts about a wage decrease if relegated.

[Wild Rover]

Prey tell me how that \"Frees up\" anything. Any saleable player will have a value, but to simply say XYorZ should go is ignorance personified. Any non salable player, under contract will want paying off ( or at the very least any portion of his contractual salary with DRFC with any new club ). Very few at DRFC are short term contracts, so to think simply by \"Getting rid\" of players DRFC reduce outgoings is nonsense. If wage bill is currently 9 million and all players were \"Paid off\" it would cost? ..........Yes you got it.......a minimum of 9 million for EVERY  year they are contracted for.

[donnyroversfc]

Prey tell me how that \"Frees up\" anything. Any saleable player will have a value, but to simply say XYorZ should go is ignorance personified. Any non salable player, under contract will want paying off ( or at the very least any portion of his contractual salary with DRFC with any new club ). Very few at DRFC are short term contracts, so to think simply by \"Getting rid\" of players DRFC reduce outgoings is nonsense. If wage bill is currently 9 million and all players were \"Paid off\" it would cost? ..........Yes you got it.......a minimum of 9 million for EVERY  year they are contracted for.

Aren't alot of our players out of contract in the summer? Also, how much would we lose in TV revenue if relegated?

[Wellred]

Like I said earlier. You live in a world a million miles away from reality.

[sedwardsdrfc]

I'd hate to think how much we're wasting on the wages of players such as Keegan, bouhenna and Chambers.

yet you would keep chris brown who is clearly crocked

[donnyroversfc]

And as i said ealier Wellred, why is that?

[fudgepacker]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

Your right, it's not a long term plan but if you think like this....

We loan Striker A from abroad. He plays 20 games and scores 15 goals. Newcastle buy him for 5 million. Doncaster Rovers get a percentage of the fee. If this happens on just a couple of players in the next 2 years that alone would plug a portion of the 5 million gap we now have in the wage bill.

Personally I think the Mckay plan in genius, for a small investment by ourselves in wages we get the opportunity to get a fee in return for the sale of the player.

[fudgepacker]

Prey tell me how that \"Frees up\" anything. Any saleable player will have a value, but to simply say XYorZ should go is ignorance personified. Any non salable player, under contract will want paying off ( or at the very least any portion of his contractual salary with DRFC with any new club ). Very few at DRFC are short term contracts, so to think simply by \"Getting rid\" of players DRFC reduce outgoings is nonsense. If wage bill is currently 9 million and all players were \"Paid off\" it would cost? ..........Yes you got it.......a minimum of 9 million for EVERY  year they are contracted for.

Aren't alot of our players out of contract in the summer? Also, how much would we lose in TV revenue if relegated?

TV revenue is around £4 million a season, it drops a hell of a lot in League 1 hence why its important to stay in this league.

[donnyroversfc]

I'd hate to think how much we're wasting on the wages of players such as Keegan, bouhenna and Chambers.

yet you would keep chris brown who is clearly crocked

Hes under contract, and i doubt someone will buy him.

So basically then, its stay up or bust? Thats the way you're making it out to be. Even with all these so called superstars we are still 5 points adrift from safety and looking like there is no way out of it!

Income will be less in league one but so will expenditure. Next season is when we'll see if Saunders really does have the managerial ability to make a success out of very little money.

We can no longer compete in the Championship, we need relegation to be able to regroup and get us back to a budget our club and fanbase can sustain.

[Wellred]

And as i said ealier Wellred, why is that?

other posters have answered for me already but I suggest you go back and read your posts and then maybe you might get an idea as to why I think why!

[sedwardsdrfc]

i also have to argue who in their right minds would want the majority of the drfc squad? nobody who can match or improve upon their wages let alone pay a worthwhile fee thats a given.

so it turnes out that our policy of buying crocked players because there cheap turnes out more expensive because there crocked and never play who would have thought it

[donnyroversfc]

Their will be clubs queing up for the likes of Coppinger, Stock and Sharp. The rest? well most of them are out of contract so it wouldn't be a problem moving them on.

[dickos1]

The McKay thing is not a good long term plan though Benaldo.

Think relegation will be a good thing for us, yeah we'll lose TV revenue but we can have a total overhaul of the playing squad, we have too much dead wood and short term contracted players at the squad.

We have a good spine of players who we can work the team around next season (Bennett, Baxendale, Hird, Friend, Spurr). Stock, Coppinger and Sharp HAVE TO leave if we are to balance the books, im guessing they are our top 3 earners?

There is some top quality prospects in BSP/L2 who we could possibly replace the big earners with. Kee and Grabban for sharp should work out cheaper. O'kane for Stock. Good young players that we can build a strong team with for relatively small wages.

Your right, it's not a long term plan but if you think like this....

We loan Striker A from abroad. He plays 20 games and scores 15 goals. Newcastle buy him for 5 million. Doncaster Rovers get a percentage of the fee. If this happens on just a couple of players in the next 2 years that alone would plug a portion of the 5 million gap we now have in the wage bill.

Personally I think the Mckay plan in genius, for a small investment by ourselves in wages we get the opportunity to get a fee in return for the sale of the player.

Exactly, people just can't see it though..
This strategy was only ever going to be a short term one to gain survival this year, and then build the club.
There was no alternative, and we shouldn't even be discussing it until the end of the season, nobody can say they are certain this is the correct way forward for the club. It's impossible.
But we are split into 2 groups those that are willing to get behind the board and see what happens at the end of the season and then those that piss and whine all the time when we're still only halfway through the process. We have 19 games to go, our biggest 19 games for a very long time. So let's forget about what we think is right or wrong and talk about it come may when we all know if it's been a success or not..

[Wild Rover]

Their will be clubs queing up for the likes of Coppinger, Stock and Sharp. The rest? well most of them are out of contract so it wouldn't be a problem moving them on.

Thats just it though, most of them are not out of contract in the summer. And to go back to one of your earlier posts, exactly what has the loss of \"Monies\" from being in the Championship to do with your grand plan. That can only make matters worse, not better.

[Muttley]

With two benefactors leaving and a yearly shortfall of £5 million this model is clearly unsustainable.

The losses in the last 3 years have been:
2011: £2.60m
2010: £0.97m (presumably better due to sale of Matt Mills)
2009: £2.01m

So certainly not the £5m p.a. that you mention

[Wild Rover]

I think you will find that the posted losses do not include \"Loans\" made to DRFC, This year alone Ryan and Watson have put in 3.2 million ( i assume loans as opposed to buying shares in DRFC ).