Chairman The cost of Covid

Open stuff from Tiger and good to note.

It only goes to show how important the model is. Player trading is essential to us as a club with a limited number of revenue streams and it has been a godsend in the pandemic too.

Whilst it would have been good to speculate some of the FosBap and Dickie monies into the squad, keeping the club afloat and from acquiring more debt is probably more important in these uncertain times.
 
I hope those laughing at the possibility of Swindon going under take note as I do those that want us to spend big. I feel we are not that many steps away from similar issues if we are not careful.
 
I hope those laughing at the possibility of Swindon going under take note as I do those that want us to spend big. I feel we are not that many steps away from similar issues if we are not careful.
I think that goes for most professional football clubs these days. We are very lucky that our owners will invest but not stupid money which puts us in real danger of going bust. If that means flirting with league 1 promotion every year and the odd cup run, occasionally day out at Wembley for the trophy final while watching up and coming players wear the yellow shirt then that’s fine by me.

Look at the players that have left us:

Ledson & Rothwell established championship players
Baldock & Lunstrum have done well in the premier league
Roofe is tearing up the Scottish premier league and europa league
Tyler Roberts is doing well as a squad player in the premier league
Curtis Nelson & O’Dowda are established championship players and Nelson could be in the premier league next season.
Marvin Johnson finally settled in the championship.
Baptiste & Fosu could both be premier league players next season with Fosu doing especially well.
Dunkley is a well established CB in the championship.
QPR fans are raving about Dickie.

All those players have played for us in the last 5 years, that’s some going for a club our size!
 
I hope those laughing at the possibility of Swindon going under take note as I do those that want us to spend big. I feel we are not that many steps away from similar issues if we are not careful.
Totally agree. A return to the Conference days or worse is not worth it.
 
After a slightly dodgy opening year, the finances at the club have been very strong. To lose upwards of £2m in a year and still be looking at turning a profit is exceptional and we're in a far more fortunate position than most.
I agree. I have, i believed deservedly, criticised the board. The start was an utter shambles. They over promise every window.

But over this pandemic i believe they have been absolutely brilliant!
 
After a slightly dodgy opening year, the finances at the club have been very strong. To lose upwards of £2m in a year and still be looking at turning a profit is exceptional and we're in a far more fortunate position than most.
Agreed.

Taking into account the amount of debt we're in, the rent on a stadium we don't own, and the current financial crisis of the last year, we're very lucky to have the board that we do, as they've kept us afloat, and ticking over well, and deserve a lot of praise.

Thank you Tiger and the board 👏 👏
 
I hope those laughing at the possibility of Swindon going under take note as I do those that want us to spend big. I feel we are not that many steps away from similar issues if we are not careful.

I think the model can be adapted further in the future though. By no means ‘spend big’ but certainly look to ‘spend more’ in the future.

Peterborough are a fine example of that. They’ve been doing the buy cheap, develop and sell on model for much longer than we have and are starting to get quite sizeable sales for their players. They’ve started spending more and have been commanding bigger fees as a result. They’ve spent big for this division on Jonson Clarke Harris (£1.26m) and got themselves the division’s top goalscorer and a sellable asset who could command a very decent fee. Ivan Toney was signed for £650k and sold for £5m. A good investment and an even better sale.

It makes our purchases and sales look rather small in comparison. By no means do I want to see us in the brown stuff by overspending nor can I claim that every Posh signing been a success (ask them what they thought of Exodus Geohagon) but maybe we do need to be a bit more bullish with our acquisitions and sales. More Marvin Johnson’s - signed for £600k, sold for £3m rather than Ledson’s whose £750k sale still feels £500k light.
 
I think the model can be adapted further in the future though. By no means ‘spend big’ but certainly look to ‘spend more’ in the future.

Peterborough are a fine example of that. They’ve been doing the buy cheap, develop and sell on model for much longer than we have and are starting to get quite sizeable sales for their players. They’ve started spending more and have been commanding bigger fees as a result. They’ve spent big for this division on Jonson Clarke Harris (£1.26m) and got themselves the division’s top goalscorer and a sellable asset who could command a very decent fee. Ivan Toney was signed for £650k and sold for £5m. A good investment and an even better sale.

It makes our purchases and sales look rather small in comparison. By no means do I want to see us in the brown stuff by overspending nor can I claim that every Posh signing been a success (ask them what they thought of Exodus Geohagon) but maybe we do need to be a bit more bullish with our acquisitions and sales. More Marvin Johnson’s - signed for £600k, sold for £3m rather than Ledson’s whose £750k sale still feels £500k light.

TBF Peterborough have been working to their model for about 15 years. They started with speculating with the conference players like Aaron McLean and George Boyd for about £100k before building a more stable platform and making more substantial speculative purchases. We've been doing this for about 5 years and at that point Peterborough were only signing players like Nicky Ajose for £300k.
 
TBF Peterborough have been working to their model for about 15 years. They started with speculating with the conference players like Aaron McLean and George Boyd for about £100k before building a more stable platform and making more substantial speculative purchases. We've been doing this for about 5 years and at that point Peterborough were only signing players like Nicky Ajose for £300k.
They are odd in that they always seem to have good attackers and play good football but can’t even get into the playoffs. This looks like being their year but I wonder what has held them back.
 
We need to live in the real world, unfortunately some of our fans don't seem to grasp reality or how to run a business.

Said many times before, we are a small/medium sized club based in a city/county that is not a fervent football area no matter how much we would want it to be..

And we have very limited resources, so we need to cut our cloth accordingly.
 
I think the model can be adapted further in the future though. By no means ‘spend big’ but certainly look to ‘spend more’ in the future.

Peterborough are a fine example of that. They’ve been doing the buy cheap, develop and sell on model for much longer than we have and are starting to get quite sizeable sales for their players. They’ve started spending more and have been commanding bigger fees as a result. They’ve spent big for this division on Jonson Clarke Harris (£1.26m) and got themselves the division’s top goalscorer and a sellable asset who could command a very decent fee. Ivan Toney was signed for £650k and sold for £5m. A good investment and an even better sale.

It makes our purchases and sales look rather small in comparison. By no means do I want to see us in the brown stuff by overspending nor can I claim that every Posh signing been a success (ask them what they thought of Exodus Geohagon) but maybe we do need to be a bit more bullish with our acquisitions and sales. More Marvin Johnson’s - signed for £600k, sold for £3m rather than Ledson’s whose £750k sale still feels £500k light.
I think that our model will change.
The whole Academy structure is designed to produce our own players.
Much as I dislike the Plastics, look at their model. They seem to produce some very good young players that they sell on albeit at a higher level.
Tiger seems to be copying this. Stevens is hopefully the first of many players that we will bring through into the first team.
That doesn't mean that we can't buy players and sell them on, but you would hope (and expect) that more of the Acadrmy players will come through
 
TBF Peterborough have been working to their model for about 15 years. They started with speculating with the conference players like Aaron McLean and George Boyd for about £100k before building a more stable platform and making more substantial speculative purchases. We've been doing this for about 5 years and at that point Peterborough were only signing players like Nicky Ajose for £300k.

Yup. That’s the point I was making. At some point in the future we’ll have to accelerate the plan to make those bigger returns. The odd £75k-100 here and there with a return of £1m is good but it’s not in the same league as what Peterborough are doing. I take the point that Posh have been doing it for longer than we have and it does take time.

I made the point some months ago that you create Oxford United missionaries this way too. The likes of Roofe, Ledson, Rothwell etc can put in a good word about us and acquiring talent can be made easier this way too. I’m just keen to see us start to step it up soon, I guess.
 
Yes, might as well rename it the Oxford City academy if it’s just going to produce skinny kids that go straight into local non league, as has seemed to be the case at times in the past.

Absolutely. I wonder whether we need a bit of a mindset change within the senior squad management? After all if they hit a glass ceiling below the first team they won't be showcased for future sales. Yes: Shandon and Stevens (reluctantly and belatedly).....
 
Yup. That’s the point I was making. At some point in the future we’ll have to accelerate the plan to make those bigger returns. The odd £75k-100 here and there with a return of £1m is good but it’s not in the same league as what Peterborough are doing. I take the point that Posh have been doing it for longer than we have and it does take time.

I made the point some months ago that you create Oxford United missionaries this way too. The likes of Roofe, Ledson, Rothwell etc can put in a good word about us and acquiring talent can be made easier this way too. I’m just keen to see us start to step it up soon, I guess.

My point is that we may still a little way from being at that point yet. Peterborough didn't rapidly accelerate, they made steady progress.
 
I think that our model will change.
The whole Academy structure is designed to produce our own players.
Much as I dislike the Plastics, look at their model. They seem to produce some very good young players that they sell on albeit at a higher level.
Tiger seems to be copying this. Stevens is hopefully the first of many players that we will bring through into the first team.
That doesn't mean that we can't buy players and sell them on, but you would hope (and expect) that more of the Acadrmy players will come through

They've started the process for a few for us as well. :)
 
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