So, where did all the money go?

[Canaryboy]

5) Webber stating that he can't believe how poor some of our infrastructure is considering we've been in the prem for 4 years. Consistently reminds the fans of bad decisions made by the club.

Pretty sure we spent money in the summer of 2016 to retain Category 1 status, including building a new floodlit 3G pitch and relaying the pitch in the dome. 

Not sure the level of neglect is as bad as Webber is making out, those improvements were sanctioned by McNally. That cost also contributed to our financial loss in the last Premier League season.

Biggest McNally mistake appears to be the signing of Naismith and Jarvis, and that's probably the straw which broke the camels back when it came to accepting his resignation. I don't really think Colney is a justified stick with which to beat him, he took us to Cat 1 status and we built that big dome thing and an exact replica of the Carrow Road pitch, plus 3G pitches. Webber probably needs to see what Colney looked like 5 years prior to really judge.

Bringing in Dortmund coaches probably taking us to the next level, as they've come from one of the two most innovative clubs in the world for youth development, but I always felt that McNally improved Colney as soon as we were out of the woods financially.

Lack of top Championship players coming out of the youth system possibly valid criticism, but then McNally came into a League One side which had spent 3 or 4 years in the bottom third of the Championship, so could we have expected to be churning out good players? Adeyemi, Korey Smith, Declan Rudd all seem to be of about the quality you'd expect to come out of a skint team near the bottom of the Championship.... and we did actually find our youth team products very useful for a couple of years before outgrowing them, Spillane, Martin, Korey Smith all played an important part in getting us out of League One. Our youth system had to catch up with our growing status in the game, but significant legacy debt from the Doncaster regime of around £20m more pressing... a huge chunk had to be repaid instantly upon promotion to the Premier League under Lambert didn't it? 

I just think we'd all be best served to separate McNally's time here and Webber's time here completely, pretend that all of our problems were caused by Moxey (they weren't, but he's a convenient scapegoat), because any sort of PR war between two regimes not helpful. McNally did an excellent job here but didn't stick to the script towards the end, Webber will hopefully do an excellent job here too but that is made a little bit harder by some of the mistakes made towards the end of the McNally regime and the complete lack of ideas and spine to come from Moxey. 

I get equally annoyed by McNally's decision making in that final season and Webber's frequent references to his mistakes without acknowledging any of his achievements, sometimes makes me feel like Webber still perceives McNally as a threat to his job to be honest. 

 

[Canaryboy]

ps. Pretty sure in Webber's first two or three interviews he said that this club had very good infrastructure and that's one of the reasons why he moved from Huddersfield to Norwich. Wasn't aware of any gas explosion at Colney which destroyed any of it in the meantime, so perhaps he should stop banging that drum before somebody searches for those clips on YouTube. He's probably taking that line publicly because he needed to convince the board to keep funding Cat 1 at a time of austerity, which is fair enough, but he didn't walk into a tinpot club... he left a tinpot club. 

You don't get Category 1 if you don't have decent facilities. Fact.

We needed an indoor all year round pitch and a floodlit grass pitch to get Category 1. Fact.

McNally regime spent millions on the above. Fact. 

 

[morty]

The infrastructure on the whole is good though. We own our ground and training facilities, both are in reasonable nick.

But it could obviously be a lot, lot better.

And I think it's Webber's nod to our, generally, very short termist attitude while we were there, perhaps, arrogantly, assuming we had made it, and that Prem money would be there every year, for years to come. You could say got a bit too big for our boots, perhaps.

 

[RhythmicTheory]

I dont know if the current board would be better or worse than any new investors, so I would judge any offer on its merit, they board did save us from financial oblivion, but they do have a very poor track record in decision making, particularly with managers (though no easy task) and whilst the MD article is factually correct it doesnt account for:

1. At the start of the 14/15 season, we had no scouting department and that area of the club was a constant revolving door before then and leading up to Webber.  The money spent in Jan should have been spent (probably more effectively as cheaper prices) in pre season.

2. Alex Neil, whilst i liked him, made mistakes in the champs season, no surprise given hes jsut starting out, however, someone should have taken action earlier in the 16/17 season when it was clear the players werent playing for him.  Incidentally, I still think he may go on to do well, clearly, with no big egos, Preston is working out for him.  There were lots of comments about, players having earned their money already, this must have been apparent for senior pros like Martin.  The board have a history of making decisions far too late, the only time they havent is when Neil Adams fell on his sword and did it for them, which ended up with the anomalous playoff promotion.

I think we abolutely have the right structure for the long term, but again, it may prove this decision has been taken faaaar too late (you still need money to implement a cultural change).  Its all going to depend how good our current youngsters are next season (a bit of a get out of jail for them yet again if so) and what miracles webber can work, because we arent going up this season.

I like Farke so I hope we stick with him for the long term.

 

[morty]

So, apparently Wigan are in talks about a takeover.......

 

[Scott]

Anybody else seen that fat Ronaldo is looking to purchase a championship club?

 

[morty]

Anybody else seen that fat Ronaldo is looking to purchase a championship club?

Haha, yes. That would be amazing. Or disastrous. Definitely one of those.

 

[Scott]

I'm thinking the latter, but at least we would know the catering would be good.. plus I suppose he might know how to squeeze some goals out of our attack.. actually think he should just lace his boots up bet he could do a job haha

 

[GJP]

What a player.

 

[morty]

I'm thinking the latter, but at least we would know the catering would be good.. plus I suppose he might know how to squeeze some goals out of our attack.. actually think he should just lace his boots up bet he could do a job haha

Well he has certainly kept himself in good shape

 

[Canary World]

Loadsa money for Pritchard and spent next to nothing in poor quality Germans.

The club is desperate for a far eastern investor to come and save us

 

[splutcho]

"Poor quality Germans" as though Zimmermann hasn't been one of our best players this year. If you don't understand why we can't put the Pritchard money straight back into the squad then there's no point anyone explaining it to you.

 

[Canary World]

I understanding the budgeting reasons for why we are buying rubbish that is clear

But what I don't understand and maybe you can enlighten me is what are the board doing to increase working capital rather than day to day budgeting

What I haven't seen is a capital forecast requirement for the next 3 years or a projected return on current capital

 

[morty]

I understanding the budgeting reasons for why we are buying rubbish that is clear

But what I don't understand and maybe you can enlighten me is what are the board doing to increase working capital rather than day to day budgeting

What I haven't seen is a capital forecast requirement for the next 3 years or a projected return on current capital

Does any other football club work that way? I should imagine that the board are working hard to try and maximise revenue streams, I mean, why wouldn't they be?

 

[Canary World]

The approach is all short term, we want to be a self funding club, the model needs to be different. With a lack of a sugar daddy to pile money into the club, you would expect to see a strategy to plug the gap. Look at Wembley as an example it's more than just a football stadium eg concerts, conferences etc etc there is a sustainable model there that delivers steady capital for long term growth.
We want to have a different operating model I don't buy the concept of nobody else does it so we shouldn't either

The alternative and my preferred route is new stinking rich Chinese owners who will provide the long term capital

 

[morty]

The approach is all short term, we want to be a self funding club, the model needs to be different. With a lack of a sugar daddy to pile money into the club, you would expect to see a strategy to plug the gap. Look at Wembley as an example it's more than just a football stadium eg concerts, conferences etc etc there is a sustainable model there that delivers steady capital for long term growth.
We want to have a different operating model I don't buy the concept of nobody else does it so we shouldn't either

The alternative and my preferred route is new stinking rich Chinese owners who will provide the long term capital

Like I said, I would be very, very surprised if the board weren't already doing everything they can to maximise revenue. You mean like the Take that concert, kinda thing?

 

[Canary World]

Yip but not a one off but much more and part of a cohesive strategy that the fans can trust.

The current model seems to revolve around passing the club to nephew Tom. Again he hasn't articulated his vision for the future either.

Like most of the past few years the thinking is muddled and ill judged. Thank God they accidentally stumbled upon Paul Lambert who saved us.