False Economy.

[rocknrollman no2]

While answering a point made on another thread,the subject of cuts becoming a false econcomy came up.

Now i know the club hasnt got any money and there have been loads of cutbacks,but surely if we had kept a few of the players we have sold or loaned,then maybe we might not be in the dire straights we find ourselves in.

I know its a balancing act between selling our assets and keeping the club solvent and like those in charge i dont have any easy answers,but what message does it send out to the fans when as soon as a player starts to score goals or gets noticed,the club sells him.

With that attitude,we will never go anywhere except downwards.

Edited 18 September, 2008 by rocknrollman no2
spelling

[alpine_saint]

Completely agree, but unfortunately the Luvvies on here will tell you there is no such thing as "false economy" and "sensible compromise" where banks are concerned.

 

Utter bollllox.

 

Barclays have just spent a fortune on buying up Lehman Brothers - they've hardly got a liquidity problem themselves...

[70's Mike]

It is starting to look like the master plan only covered one side of the equation , cut costs.

 

The problem is that the gates are dropping like a stone and with it income.

 

A winning side is the only way to maintain gates and thus income.

 

Ruperts vision may work in Den Bosch but the cost base their is low and with it attendances.

[alpine_saint]

It is starting to look like the master plan only covered one side of the equation , cut costs.

 

The problem is that the gates are dropping like a stone and with it income.

 

A winning side is the only way to maintain gates and thus income.

 

Ruperts vision may work in Den Bosch but the cost base their is low and with it attendances.

 

You mean he took the fan base for granted..........

[70's Mike]

You mean he took the fan base for granted..........

 

 

i could not possibly comment but feel free to

[Whitey Grandad]

You mean he took the fan base for granted..........

Insult your customers at your peril

[70's Mike]

Insult your customers at your peril

 

The problem is this time he has not said anything but maybe is insulting our intelligence

[OfnPanad]

Once again, the man in charge and earning an excessive amount of money for making these decisions is the ONLY one who can't see he's making the wrong ones.

[Saint Billy]

While answering a point made on another thread,the subject of cuts becoming a false econcomy came up.

Now i know the club hasnt got any money and there have been loads of cutbacks,but surely if we had kept a few of the players we have sold or loaned,then maybe we might not be in the dire straights we find ourselves in.

I know its a balancing act between selling our assets and keeping the club solvent and like those in charge i dont have any easy answers,but what message does it send out to the fans when as soon as a player starts to score goals or gets noticed,the club sells him.

With that attitude,we will never go anywhere except downwards.

 

Agreed, plus we have Skacel doing feck all. Unless he is refusing to play, why on earth is he not being used?

[SOTONS EAST SIDE]

Saints are like going to your favorit fish&chip shop that gets taken over, The quality at first looks good but underneath the quality is quite poor, You hope the customers keep going back out of loyalty(being fans) saying that things will improve to where it was before, but when they dont your customers (life blood) soon stop coming leaving only the die hards who go still because theres nothing else close by and the alternative is to unpalettable!

[um pahars]

Agreed, plus we have Skacel doing feck all. Unless he is refusing to play, why on earth is he not being used?

 

Exit2 heard a story/rumour (I'll let him confirm) that the reason Skacel is not playing is due to his £4k appearance fees being too much.

 

Is that another false economy??? or do you have to draw the line somewhere???

[davefoggy]

letting rasiak, andrew davies & saga go = relegation

 

false economy indeed

 

cant wait for the AGM so i can hear RL excuses, IF he shows his face

[alpine_saint]

letting rasiak, andrew davies & saga go = relegation

 

false economy indeed

 

cant wait for the AGM so i can hear RL excuses, IF he shows his face

 

Seeing as his re-appointment to the board has to be formally approved by the shareholders, I would argue that he HAS to be there..

[FMPR]

The argument will be getting the finances on the straight and narrow or administration

[davefoggy]

The argument will be getting the finances on the straight and narrow or administration

 

hate the use of that word

 

if things were that bad we wouldn't have paid £1m for Morgan

Schneiderlin

[FMPR]

I would suspect the deal is appearance absed anyway so nowhere near £1m was the initial outlay.

[Wes Tender]

While answering a point made on another thread,the subject of cuts becoming a false econcomy came up.

Now i know the club hasnt got any money and there have been loads of cutbacks,but surely if we had kept a few of the players we have sold or loaned,then maybe we might not be in the dire straights we find ourselves in.

I know its a balancing act between selling our assets and keeping the club solvent and like those in charge i dont have any easy answers,but what message does it send out to the fans when as soon as a player starts to score goals or gets noticed,the club sells him.

With that attitude,we will never go anywhere except downwards.

 

I couldn't agree more. Lowe is like all others who are in charge of businesses but come from a financial background. The only thing he understands is the bottom line on a balance sheet. Any concept of speculating to accumulate is alien to him. He has always failed to recognise when a little investment in taking us further by the astute purchase of a few better players would cement or improve our place in the top half of the Premiership, thus keeping us on the gravy train. His philosophy has always been to prefer buying several average players rather than a few top quality ones.

 

But essentially, his biggest mistake is not understanding that there are a different set of rules appertaining to the entertainment industry to a normal business. He relies too heavily on the premise that because we are fans (fanatics) we will continue to support the team through thick or thin, regardless of what is served up in front of us. What he has failed to see with that scenario is that there is resentment that the prices have not dropped since we were in the Premiership. He expects us to pay the same to watch a bunch of home grown youngsters as the stars of World football who we would watch in the Premiership. In short, we are being taken for granted and some sections of the customer base have also even been verbally insulted too by him. When attendance levels are so vital currently to our very survival, his failure to at least set prices at a realistic level when such a large body of fans despise him will almost certainly mean that unless the team get a good run of wins, lower attendances will be the final nail in his and our coffin.

 

We are faced with a massive dilemma. On the one hand his financial expertise may well save the club from administration in the short term, but longer term he is the most divisive person that could possibly be chairman when the prime requirement for survival is unity of purpose. In normal circumstances with somebody in charge who was not so despised by most, I for one would rally round and do anything I could to help turn this predicament around. But with Lowe in charge again and Wilde too, I find myself not being that bothered to do anything other than just attend home matches. STs, buying merchandise or goods in the concourse? Forget it.

[CHAPEL END CHARLIE]

Whoever the Chairman was it would have been an unavoidable necessity to reduce the wage bill and rely more on our youngsters - we don't actually have any choice in that as the bank effectively control the club and he who pays the piper calls the tune .

We all have our own ideas regarding which players should have been retained or released , I for instance would have moved heaven and earth to persuade Youssef Safri stay if at all possible , but that's all water under the bridge now .

What was a truly false economy (and a idiotic footballing decision) was allowing Nigel Pearson to leave . I'm quite confident he would have stayed had a reasonable offer be presented to him and IMO we'd be the better team for it . That decision was all Rupert Lowe's work and if at the end of the season we've relegated and in Administration as a result he will have to carry the full responsibility .

[FMPR]

But surely thats what happened in Lowes absence. The board speculated they would blow a load of money on trying to get Prem football back only for it to fail.

 

As always when you gamble theres a negative side as well

[aintforever]

I would suspect the deal is appearance absed anyway so nowhere near £1m was the initial outlay.

 

It's still making a commitment to pay £1m, something you wouldn't do on the verge of admin.

[VectisSaint]

Seeing as his re-appointment to the board has to be formally approved by the shareholders, I would argue that he HAS to be there..

You could argue that, but you would lose. He doesn't have to be there. With his lap dog he controls a huge percentage of the shares, and the corporates would not vote him out. Its a foregone conclusion, unless Wilde sees the light before then.

[alpine_saint]

You could argue that, but you would lose. He doesn't have to be there. With his lap dog he controls a huge percentage of the shares, and the corporates would not vote him out. Its a foregone conclusion, unless Wilde sees the light before then.

 

You are right. But if he doesnt turn up to his "coronation" because he is scared of a few difficult questions, what message does that send ??

[OldNick]

no wonder this country has the biggest credit card debts in Eurpoe , people really dont understand living within your means.

We are supposedly losing between 100-300k a week if anyone knows how to reduce those costs keep high wage earners and stop fans feeling the credit crunch please let us know.

 

Would rudi put enough bu## on seats to pay his appearance money because he hasn't done so in his time at the club.Im not sure that he'd do any bettrer than surman at L/B but he might add solidity.

 

As for the Barclays taking over Leemans and so can afford us, of course they can but why would they want to keep throwing good money after bad if we were not making any effort to reduce our costs.

 

Of all of you on here questioning the clubs way of going forward at the moment, are you willing to go into administration and -15 points to see that having the failures from last season pull things around.Quite truthfully if we went -15 you may as well lock the gates and not bother turning up,I have a sneaking feeling some might quite like that.

[OldNick]

You are right. But if he doesnt turn up to his "coronation" because he is scared of a few difficult questions, what message does that send ??

Ark at you someone who wont even answer them on a message board.

[SaintRichmond]

It is starting to look like the master plan only covered one side of the equation , cut costs.

 

The problem is that the gates are dropping like a stone and with it income.

 

A winning side is the only way to maintain gates and thus income.

 

Ruperts vision may work in Den Bosch but the cost base their is low and with it attendances.

 

 

Rupert's vision ??? ..... What vision is that then ?? ....... Classic example .... Svenson........ Anyone who knows anything about Footbal would have told you that the odds of his leg holding up for a season was long. ( To come back ffor even a few games rom an injury he had, is bordering on the miraculous.

 

Yet Lowe, IMHO, ignored that, and has got rid of a few decent "centre backs", and brought some dubious "past sell by" ones, on the cheap

 

Our young Team DOES need some GOOD "old" heads to guide them, and Svenson is such a player ........... but only if he can play

 

Lowe did not think it through correctly, IMHO

 

Rupert's vision ??? ..... Impaired .... should definitely have gone to Specsavers.

[OldNick]

Rupert's vision ??? ..... What vision is that then ?? ....... Classic example .... Svenson........ Anyone who knows anything about Footbal would have told you that the odds of his leg holding up for a season was long. ( To come back ffor even a few games rom an injury he had, is bordering on the miraculous.

 

Yet Lowe, IMHO, ignored that, and has got rid of a few decent "centre backs", and brought some dubious "past sell by" ones, on the cheap

 

Our young Team DOES need some GOOD "old" heads to guide them, and Svenson is such a player ........... but only if he can play

 

Lowe did not think it through correctly, IMHO

 

Rupert's vision ??? ..... Impaired .... should definitely have gone to Specsavers.

How many games would have Davies have played by now? If he hadn't gone would we have got Morgan? I myself do not know but the club had everyone up for sale and we couldnt offload players, and Davies was the only one we coud scrape some money in for. The club has taken on a lot of players on high wages and so those players are hard to shift. I cant see how you get out of that one.

[Saint Billy]

Scenario.

 

Public zoo in financial trouble, sells its Tigers, Lions and Chimps to help its poor financial situation, but unfortnuately leaves no prize attraction for the paying public to see and then complains that it is still loosing money because of lack of paying customers.

 

I blame the circus that owns the zoo for thinking that operating on the cheap is the ideal solution. Surely these financial brains and city folk could of come up with other options apart from "Sell everything quick and hope we survive with next to nothing".

[Seaford Saint]

Whoever the Chairman was it would have been an unavoidable necessity to reduce the wage bill and rely more on our youngsters - we don't actually have any choice in that as the bank effectively control the club and he who pays the piper calls the tune .

We all have our own ideas regarding which players should have been retained or released , I for instance would have moved heaven and earth to persuade Youssef Safri stay if at all possible , but that's all water under the bridge now .

What was a truly false economy (and a idiotic footballing decision) was allowing Nigel Pearson to leave . I'm quite confident he would have stayed had a reasonable offer be presented to him and IMO we'd be the better team for it . That decision was all Rupert Lowe's work and if at the end of the season we've relegated and in Administration as a result he will have to carry the full responsibility .

 

I agree with this post 100%. As much as I dislike Lowe, it might just work but on the evidence presented so far, I don't think it is working.

[Whitey Grandad]

Exit2 heard a story/rumour (I'll let him confirm) that the reason Skacel is not playing is due to his £4k appearance fees being too much.

 

Is that another false economy??? or do you have to draw the line somewhere???

I have paid big money for my two season tickets and for that I expect to see players like Skacel, not a bunch of understudies.

[No 2 to Maybush]

Exit2 heard a story/rumour (I'll let him confirm) that the reason Skacel is not playing is due to his £4k appearance fees being too much.

 

Is that another false economy??? or do you have to draw the line somewhere???

 

It depends on whether having Skacel in the side would guarantee another 160 bums on seats to cover his appearance money. If you could guarantee another 500 attendees at each home game should he play, then of course that has to be attractive. I would guess that the budget has been based on a home gate of 15K ( if Rupes and Cowen are as financially astute as rumoured they would certainly work off a low mean) without including Rudi in the equation, as it was anticipated that he would leave. If he is on 4K appearance fee, thats 184k per season if he plays all games. I would imagine thats the annual salary of one of the young guns.

 

The premise of the thread is that selling "stars" (who singularly FAILED to produce the goods last season) is a false economy. If they had not been sold, I doubt the club would have been able to start the season.

 

Glad to see the diehard Lowe bashers are still in evidence on this board. Ever wonder if the persistent grizzling and moaning on this singular topic (ie Lowe) might have something to do with the dramatic drop in people using this board?

[Whitey Grandad]

no wonder this country has the biggest credit card debts in Eurpoe , people really dont understand living within your means.

We are supposedly losing between 100-300k a week if anyone knows how to reduce those costs keep high wage earners and stop fans feeling the credit crunch please let us know.

This has been discussed before. The balance of spending at this club has been completely wrong. Less than half the spending was on players' and coaching staff so where on earth did the other £18m (insert your figure here £....) go?

[OldNick]

Scenario.

 

Public zoo in financial trouble, sells its Tigers, Lions and Chimps to help its poor financial situation, but unfortnuately leaves no prize attraction for the paying public to see and then complains that it is still loosing money because of lack of paying customers.

 

I blame the circus that owns the zoo for thinking that operating on the cheap is the ideal solution. Surely these financial brains and city folk could of come up with other options apart from "Sell everything quick and hope we survive with next to nothing".

and so all the zookeepers lose their jobs because the admionistrators comein and so the animals starve to death.

Do you seriously believe had we had Rasiak Saga and JW the results would have been better? Davies perhaps but he is still injured.Anyway I doubt the lions chimps etcwe had were exciting enough to draw the crowds.

This team has many fans still behind it and after the last 2 seasons of fans pleading to play the kids...recall the furore under HR when he said you wouldnt win with kids and they were 2-3 years younger then.

[OldNick]

This has been discussed before. The balance of spending at this club has been completely wrong. Less than half the spending was on players' and coaching staff so where on earth did the other £18m (insert your figure here £....) go?

im as dumbfounded as you Whitey. Seeing that our council tax bill for the stadium of £1m surprised me, add on the running costs of the acadamy and i suppose it builds up.

Why the club doesnt come out and educate us fans what a free transfer costs and how a player is rewarded would help a lot.They would only have to put up a dummy transaction and then we all could see how mad the wages and bonusses that footballers were on.Perhaps the powers that be would have a better time of it.

[ottery st mary]

im as dumbfounded as you Whitey. Seeing that our council tax bill for the stadium of £1m surprised me, add on the running costs of the acadamy and i suppose it builds up.

Why the club doesnt come out and educate us fans what a free transfer costs and how a player is rewarded would help a lot.They would only have to put up a dummy transaction and then we all could see how mad the wages and bonusses that footballers were on.Perhaps the powers that be would have a better time of it.

 

The truth re Gasmi and especially Pulis would help me at least.

[Whitey Grandad]

im as dumbfounded as you Whitey. Seeing that our council tax bill for the stadium of £1m surprised me, add on the running costs of the acadamy and i suppose it builds up.

Why the club doesnt come out and educate us fans what a free transfer costs and how a player is rewarded would help a lot.They would only have to put up a dummy transaction and then we all could see how mad the wages and bonusses that footballers were on.Perhaps the powers that be would have a better time of it.

Yes, something doesn't add up, does it? If our income last year was £14m then we could sell all the players and play schoolboys but we would still be losing bucketloads. From what I understand, our spending pattern is fundamentally different from most other clubs in the same division. How expensive is the academy? We keep getting told that the club is skint, but the big questions is 'where does all the money go?'

[sperm_john]

heavens knows how much money we wasted a few seasons ago when we had a squad as long as your ear

[Whitey Grandad]

heavens knows how much money we wasted a few seasons ago when we had a squad as long as your ear

Yes, every time we changed managers we brought in another lot of average players.

[SaintRichmond]

How many games would have Davies have played by now? If he hadn't gone would we have got Morgan? I myself do not know but the club had everyone up for sale and we couldnt offload players, and Davies was the only one we coud scrape some money in for. The club has taken on a lot of players on high wages and so those players are hard to shift. I cant see how you get out of that one.

 

 

I agree times are/were hard, and that players had to be "shifted" as you put it.

 

Problem was, Lowe staked EVERYTHING on an untried Dutch duo, whilst ALSO selling a lot of "experienced" players, leaving us with a bare bones YOUTH inspired Team for the CCC

 

Ironically enough, I firmly believe that our current Young Squad are playing the sort of FOOTBALL that would be worthy of the Prem, BUT, until we get back, a lot of that will be wasted, as most CCC defences have a lot of "muscle" players that can, and have negated our lightweight attack

 

It is worth noting as well, that Poortvliet has already had to adapt his tactics,to include more seasoned EXPERIENCED players

 

In short, I believe Lowe was WRONG to stake everything on YOUTH, ( for once, Dodd was right) , and the recent shift in playing choices demonstrate this

 

Whether he HAD to sell every player he has, is a moot point, but, in the case of Svenson, he had scant thought of REAL cover, in the (likely) event that Killer did not make too many matches.

 

Being frugal is one thing ..... but at the potential expense of Relegation to Div 1 ???? ........ BAD BUSINESS SENSE MR LOWE

 

Attendances at St Mary's SHOULD tell him something, but I suppose it depends on how many of us Customers he thinks he can do without

[JohnnyFartPants]

Completely agree, but unfortunately the Luvvies on here will tell you there is no such thing as "false economy" and "sensible compromise" where banks are concerned.

 

Utter bollllox.

 

Barclays have just spent a fortune on buying up Lehman Brothers - they've hardly got a liquidity problem themselves...

 

 

Well perhaps they have a decent banking philosophy about when someone owes them money, they are strict about getting it. Perhaps Lehmans are not quite so strict, which is why they are now Barclays *****!!