Being competitive in the Championship

You have absolutely brought this on yourself by constantly talking down to everyone and anyone. You are not better than anyone on here. Your views are worth the same as anyone.

So whilst you continue to belittle me and try to talk down to me with your "I know best" attitude, I will call you whatever I like. There's a report button if you don't like it.

You're also tragically wrong in this instance (yet again) and it amuses me greatly.

 

You don't have to fund continual losses to be promoted from the Championship. Huddersfield didn't, based on your figures, and I doubt Sheff Utd did. In our case we're trying (or at least should be) to stabilise as a Championship club and then build from there in the hope that we have a season where everything aligns perfectly, just like it did in 1996/97.

Back in those days, there was repeated reference to 'cutting your cloth accordingly' from the likes of JD, Michael Spinks and co, and that's essentially all we're really aiming for. Under PC's ownership we mostly achieved this and, at the time of our promotion in 2016, we were generally admired as being a club who did the right things on a limited budget and got results. You could potentially make the same case for last season, although less clear cut. In both cases, we benefited in the promotion seasons from outstanding coaches, who got the most out of the limited resources they had available to them and produced successful teams. In both cases we also managed to disillusion both coaches by our subseuquent procurement strategies in the Championship to the point where both were ready to jump ship. In Stendel's case we did it within 6 months, whereas it took 18 months with Hecky. That in itself is a good indication of how quickly the running of the club has deteriorated.

For a club such as ours it's not about how much money you throw at the problem, and no-one sensible I've seen has ever argued for this. It is about making the most of your available resources and managing your assets so that you maximise the ultimate return on investment and their impact on performance in the time that they are here. Under the new owners we've shifted from doing this relatively well (albeit still with some inevitable failures) to a point where we're it seems we're almost disregarding the latter part of the requirement, and thus are damaging the ability to achieve the first part.

Look at our 'greatest ever transfer window' and the subsequent January business. With the exception of Solbauer's signing (at a stage when even the owners couldn't ignore the need for experience), pretty much none of the signings we made could be guaranteed to hit the ground running at a Championship level. They were essentially 'punts' on buying inexperience cheaply and hoping that they'd ultimately generate a return in transfer value. If you want to look at it cynically, you could potentially achieve this by playing them en-masse in a losing team heading for relegation, simply by the fact that they'd be 'Championship experienced' players by the end of it, based on appearances alone. Personally, I think this is why Pinilos, Cavare and Thiam were frozen out in the way they were, after we failed to move them on in the January window, as giving inexperienced players more games was a better 'value-generator' than playing those soon to be available on a free transfer, regardless of which option was the best in terms of immediate playing performance on the pitch. Throwing inexperienced young kids in at the deep-end also potentially stunts their development. Mads Andersen is a great example of this and it's no coincidence that his rapid improvement post-lockdown has been playing games alongside an experienced head in Solbauer in empty stadia, where there's no crowd to get on his back at the first sign of a mistake.

If the club really wants to progress as a Championship team, it has to balance it's investment decisions based on what they offer in terms of potential monetary return and on-pitch delivery (call it league points/£, for simplicity). To progress on the pitch you have to make some Solbauer type investments where the potential monetary return is sacrificed for improvement on the pitch and the ability to develop the players alongside them. The same applies to a few experienced loan signings and/or extending a key player's contract early enough to avoid the fire-sale scenarios we're so good at generating. If you do this, then you can mix them with a smaller number of punts aimed primarily at a monetary return (who inevitably progress more rapidly by learning from the experienced players), alongside which you develop players through the Academy structure to the point of them making the first-team. Generally we're pretty good on the Academy development side of things, so that's something that is already in place for us.

Long-term, you generate better value from the overall policy as a stable Championship club than as a yo-yo team between there and League One, and we seem to have completely lost our focus on this. Relegated squads inevitably get broken up more easily, and at lower potential returns, in addition to which you suffer from reduced revenues in the lower division. If you stabilise well enough, you generate incrementally better profits on your players, and can invest a little more upfront each time (look at Brentford or Bristol City for examples of teams who seem to be good at this side of things). The longer you sustain this cycle, the better your chance of building to the next level of being a mid-table/fringe play-off Championship team.

Ultimately, you also need to invest in a coaching team who can maximise what you have, and you have to support them to build on their successes. We've fundamentally failed to do this with the last two who achieved success for us (go back further and you could say the same about Andy Ritchie). Having a fundamental disconnect between the transfer policy and the requests of the coaches for where/how to strengthen isn't the way to go about it.

None of the above is about throwing unavailable funds at the problem. It's all about ensuring that whatever resources you have available are used in the optimal way, and we are far worse at that now than we were in the relatively recent past.

 

There are two main points here. Firstly, the need to keep financial stability is important. I can't think of a single person on this board who suggests otherwise. If BFC becomes financially unstable/indebted then there is the possibility of administration and no club. Secondly, however, it is down to the board to make sensible/shrewd decisions regarding the management and team building in the medium to long term. Given the need to keep financially stable this is a difficult task. I do think though that the board have got this badly wrong and in their quest to keep the club stable and indeed generate profit they have not looked at the medium to long term but have just looked at the short term. They have sold assets (players) for poor value and replaced with weaker products (more players). They have miscalculated because they have been greedy and in being greedy they may have inadvertently threatened the long term financial strength of the club. We will have to wait and see. Personally I have no time whatsoever for the current owners as they are not bothered about the club per se apart from it being a money making vehicle.
So, yes, financial security is important but also important is having a sensitive, thoughtful board who within that want to do the best for the club for its own sake. The current owners are not interested in BFC for its own sake. As someone above alluded to, why would a Chinese/American consortium take an interest in a smallish football team in south Yorkshire? The answer is clear.
Overall, to have a successful club is to have one that had some success on the pitch but also 'feels' healthy as an organism and as a part of the community. The takeover by these profit seekers has given us relegation and promotion but has caused a disconnect with the fan base because of greed. BFC is not a healthy club in my opinion and so therefore its not successful.
P.s. And before anyone says what the alternative is...at the moment there isn't one. The club exists and it is financially stable. That is clearly enough for some people. At some point though I'd like these people out.

 

No-one said keep Pinnock by matching the wages Brentford offered him! What they have suggested is that we could have held him to the terms of his contract with us for a further 6 months i.e. before the end of his contract. The two things are completely different. The argument remains about whether he would've accepted that or chosen to be disruptive but that's not what we're talking about here. You're suggesting that people wanted to pay him £20k+ per week (which is what I assume he's on at Brentford). Show me where anyone suggested that.

 

Chuffin hell, this thread is like reading War and Peace.

 

Best just skimmed over it's quite depressing reading.

 

I think it’s you that’s fallen into a trap of believing that your wage budget is where you should finish.

You don’t need to tell me about our wage budget, I know we don’t even compete with the Wigan’s never mind Wednesday & Derby & co. I’m not asking us to run at a loss. We know we can’t compete on signing proven quality that’s why we’ve been developing our own young players & for the most part it’s working.

I’m not asking for anything radical. Just look at it logically. We’re 14 points off 13th in the league & 24 points off the play offs. That’s not a million miles.

Of the team that got promoted we lost 4 of our best players & we pushed out Thiam, Pinillos, McGeehan & Cavare.

Of the first 11 from last season only Woodrow, Mowatt & Brown remain & Brown spent the first 2 months injured.

We basically threw away the first couple of months of the season by having to blood an almost brand new side full of kids who’ve barely played any competitive football before this season.

Imagine we only lost a couple of players - Davies who’s contract was up & Pinnock & Lindsay who only had a year left. Imagine we signed Solbauer & Ludewig last summer. Imagine we either kept Moore who had 2 years on his deal remaining or signed a forward over 6 foot who could actually win a header.

Do you honestly believe we couldn’t have pulled out an extra 10-15 points? Particularly in that first third of that season? I think we could. I don’t think I’m been overly optimistic.

There’s always enough badly run clubs that we can nearly always finish above where we should in terms of wages.

I’m not expecting a Blackpool type fairy tale but we can be closer to the middle of the table by just been a bit smarter & not losing two many key players in one window or not going a full season without a vital type of player.

Yes wages are the biggest factor in football but if that’s all that mattered Liverpool would be nowhere near the two Manchester clubs, Sheff Utd wouldn’t be 8 points above Everton & 20 above West Ham, in fact they wouldn’t even be in the Prem, Sheff Wednesday would be in the top 6 every season, Sunderland wouldn’t even dream of been in the same league as Wycombe never mind been a division below them next season.

 

Why even bother having 11 v 11? Just compare bank balances and say **** it.

 

A magnificent, eloquent and very apposite post.

 

The jump from League 1 to the Championship is very very tough now, much tougher than it used to be, and that is partly due to the different emphasis of the two control systems. In League 1, we have a system that basically tries to keep player pay at 60% of total revenue. SCMP operates on an ongoing basis, and therefore there is no cheating because the figures are under constant review. Of course, we could not have lost £3m last season if there weren't transitional arrangements for clubs relegated from the Championship (transitional arrangements relating to young players on long contracts), and those transitional arrangements give our club a good chance of bouncing back in their first season. Nevertheless, player wages are kept firmly under control, and that is fine until the club is promoted. At that point, the players receive a small increase in pay because their contractual Championship rate of pay is higher than their contractual League 1 rate of pay, but the increase leaves them very much below the general levels of pay that apply in the Championship. Our better players will compare their revised pay structure in the Championship with the pay structures available elsewhere in the Championship and will conclude that they need to move on. We are likely to be relegated, whether we can keep those players, or not, simply because if we do not sell, we have no transfer funds to improve the team, and if we do want experienced players, we cannot afford the market rate for experienced players of Championship quality. It is not an easy situation, and anyone who thinks it is has simply not thought it through properly.

Of course, our owners could risk everything. They could acquire the experienced players we need and they could pay them a competitive wage. It might have saved us this season, but what happens next season, because these pressures do not go away after the first season back. Well, I'll tell you what happens. The pressure is still there. Surviving for one season has no effect. The players are a year older, but their contracts are closer to maturity. We still have no cash unless we sell first and the owners still have to dip into their own pockets in order to finance acquisitions. How do I know this? Well, that is why Patrick Cryne instituted the policy in the first place. He was having to finance the losses that the club was making out of his own pocket and it was costing more than he was comfortable with. He called a halt, and that is why the club has its buy young, improve and sell on policy. It is experience that Patrick Cryne paid dearly to acquire. Experience that many are willing to just toss away because the club cannot compete in the Championship on the field because even though other clubs have revenues which are higher than ours, their owner are happy to lose money at astounding rates. The championship is a stupid place, and if you do not believe me, simply follow the future of Wigan Athletic.

 

At the end of last season, I was resigned to losing Davies. But was hopeful that we could keep one of Lindsay or Pinnock, one of Mowatt or McGeehan and one of Woodrow and Moore, so we would have continuity throughout the spine of the team. If we could do this, and bring in one or two good signings plus one or two quality loans, we'd be in a good position.

If Lindsay wasn't even talking to the club about a contract, then that means more effort should've been made to keep Pinnock, even for 6 months. Selling two first choice centre backs, as well as losing the back up centre back and first choice goalkeeper, whilst moving up a league was always asking for trouble.

 

I'm afraid I find Sheriff's analysis much more persuasive. We shall see.

 

I agree. It was the defence that was the gamble. Every other position remained intact. I was pleasantly surprised when we only lost Moore because I rated Woodrow as a better player. I even liked the look of the recruitment.

 

Pinnock was still under contract so we wouldn't have to match Brentford. I think most were advocating keeping Pinnock for at least the start of this season then see how it went.

 

And what if his commitment on the field was lessened. What if he made just enough innocent mistakes as a result to ensure we lost just as many games. What if his value collapsed as a result of those mistakes. What if his agent let it be known that you cannot trust Barnsley FC. That his clients had signed for us in the belief that we would be happy to let me move on if we made a decent profit on him, but when the chance came, we refused to let him go. What would that have done for our chances of signing other young prospects. What would that have done for our trading strategy.

Our trading strategy works because players trust us. When we want to sign promising youngsters, we have to sell the club to them. We point to our record of signing players, improving them and selling them on. Those players understand that benefits accrue to both parties to the contract, and there is a tacit understanding that the club will let the player move on when it cannot match the wage available elsewhere, and when it can make a profit. We only get the chance to make money on players because we are willing to let them go at the right time for both parties. Contracts never benefit one side to the detriment of the other. There always has to bean element of give an take.

 

You're not telling me that any player outside of Barnsley doesn't sign with the intention of moving on and making themselves a shed load of cash. We're not re-inventing the wheel here.

 

Moore and Lindsay had already got their moves. I think that most agents & players would understand that you can't sell everybody at the same time, so I don't think our trading strategy would've been undermined for not selling our player of the year for peanuts. Keeping hold of Watkins and Scowen till their contracts ran out didn't stop us from signing Potts, Moore and Woodrow.

 

The trading strategy doesn't work. We are being relegated again.

 

He makes signing for Barnsley sound like doing time.

 

Key word in that is 'again'.