BFC cash injection

For me it’s no longer about what they are having to put in/spend to keep things ticking over it’s now that I don’t really trust the recruitment to find us adequate players based on everything we have seen over the past two seasons and just feels like more money thrown after bad.

 

Pretty much agree with what you say.
Renewing is a difficult one for me. Apathy / age / distance and yes, the ludicrous situation where I may be paying for night matches that I often can't attend. Saying that, if I pay on the day, I will probably contribute more to the clubs coffers than I would with an ST, even though I get to see two thirds of the games.

 

Yeah, but he didn;t mean the first teams of Raith, Worksop and Guiseley.

 

I never quite understand this being levelled at the board and the recruitment, but for most transfer windows under this ownership people also are up in arms about us going to lose our star players. Those players who have been sold have come through the recruitment mechanism in place at the club.

 

I've previously worked on a project at a professional club, so had access to payroll data, player contracts and other financial information at that time, and I learned then that it's usual practice for transfer fees and other costs to be paid in instalments, so the information is perfectly sound. However, where the argument made by Neerav has always fallen down for me is that it applies equally to transfer fees paid for incoming players too. Unless we've somehow negotiated spectacularly worse terms for our incoming transfers as for the outgoing ones, then the instalment argument, in isolation, doesn't make logical sense. When it's linked to other issues, such as the fact that we, like pretty much every League One club, are now compelled to run with underlying operating losses due to the farcical way that the football pyramid is now structured and financed, then the constraints make more sense.

Player wages have spiralled so far out of control that operating with a payroll that equates to close to 100% of turnover, sometimes more, has become the norm, and pretty much every team in the EFL is still compelled to do so. All the various forms of financial fair play rules haven't served to significantly improve this situation. 'Normal rules' of finance simply do not apply to football clubs and, until such time as they do, then the financial challenges we have at BFC are generally no different to those of the other teams in League One. New owners would still have to operate in the same environment and would have to be prepared to make the same kind of ongoing investment.

There are only two ways to significantly improve the situation and realistically envisage a sustainable profit. One is promotion to the Premier League (NB: promotion to the Championship improves the overall situation from League One, but only at best to the prospect of roughly breaking even each year). The second is somehow having a regular cycle of profitable player trading that consistently generates millions in net transfer fees received. The lower down the pyramid you go, the harder it is to achieve the latter, which is where Conway and Lee's plans fell flat as they pretty much disregarded on-field achievement as being remotely important. The new owners have tweaked the thought process on this, but I doubt that anyone can currently believe that it has been a success, or can foresee a way for us to achieve sustainable transfer surpluses from our current playing squad.

There are plenty of ways in which the current ownership can legitimately be criticised for failing to achieve either of those two operating models, and its feasible that alternative owners could do better in this regard. However, unless they were also prepared to match the underlying funding that keeps the club afloat on a day to day basis, then any operational improvement that they could achieve would likely be swamped by the incremental losses from the lack of working capital injections. Ultimately, there isn't exactly a massive queue of people waiting to take that kind of challenge on.

Unlike many, I don't see the owners as the fundamental problem we have. To put it in very simple terms, I think they do more good than harm, which is a reasonable enough measure. The fundamental issue is that football finances in general are FUBAR, with no short-term prospect of them being fixed because those at the top of the food chain are intent on staying that way.

From a personal perspective, I put myself forward to be on the FAB to provide whatever input I could to assist our owners in improving things (fully acknowledging that it would be in a very limited capacity, but that it was also likely to be best option available to a normal supporter like myself to have any sort of input). Nothing has changed my view in that regard over the course of this season, which I'm finding just as frustrating from a playing/performance perspective as any other fan.

 

Divide my time between Bingley and that there York now. A job in Barnsley might have helped my decision

Up the Minstermen

 

There's also a further consideration for some of us in that the club is going to take our seats and convert them to safe standing - after they've "consulted" with us of course.
When are they doing the work? Before the end of the season.
When are they "consulting" ie telling us what theyve already decided? Who knows.

 

Top post.

Big fan of eloquence.

 

2-3 days a week. Posh bit So you might not bump into me.

 

I think that's a really intelligent contribution and a sensible assessment. The current owners' hearts are in the right place for me. The running of certain aspects has been very poor though. There looks, to me, to be a lack of joined up thinking at the moment and a lack of direction (although they are trying to address it). The transfer windows, particularly this summer will, I think, indicate whether the board are learning and the strategy is beginning to work. Its not about car parks, fanzone, price of a pie that is priority for me - its what happens on the pitch and we need to see some obvious improvement in player quality there regardless of whether we all like the manager or not. Recruitment and retention and a clear respect for the manager's role are key in my opinion but things may (or may not) take a while to completely sort out. And that's assuming the board make the right decisions. Its squeaky bum time for Barnsley fans. I do not want to go back to the type of games of the late 60's/early 70's.

 

Never heard of them. What kind of music do they play?

 

I want some pie.

 

Honey Pie... Underrated.

 

To update further on this the Hong Kong Companies site is now showing that £3m additional share capital was put in on 7th January 2025 by Neerav, JAQ and the Crynes.

I'll do the resultant share position when I've watched tonight's footy

 

I've just creamed my pants .

 

You’ve got to assume that we were intending to buy someone in January then. Otherwise what is the point of putting money in?

 

For this new £3m, 300,000,000 (300 million!) shares were issued in BFC Investment Company Limited at just 1p each. This has (again) doubled the total number of shares to 600,000,000.

Of the new 300 million issued, Neerav took 200,105,125 shares for £2,001,051, JAQ 36,000,000 shares for £360,000 and the Crynes 63,894,876 shares for £638,949.

Neither Chien Lee nor Pacific Media Group took any part in this share issue and the impact of the doubling of the number of shares in circulation thus halves their respective percentage holdings to 2.30% and 0.96%.

Neerav's investment takes him from 61.14% to 63.92% and JAQ goes from 11.00% to 11.50%. The Crynes maintained the same percentage at 21.30%. The full current holdings are:-

A Shares

Abhajay Trade and Commerce (Neerav Parekh) 383,538,948 shares which is 63.92% of the company (81.22% of the A shares)

Jamakepe Investments (Julie Anne Quay) 69,000,000 shares which is 11.50% of the company (14.61% of the A shares)

Chien Lee 13,800,000 shares which is now just 2.30% of the company (2.92% of the A shares)

Pacific Media Group 5,871,300 shares which is now just 0.98% of the company (1.25% of the A shares)

B Shares

Oakwell Holdings Limited (Crynes) 127,789,752 shares which is 21.30% of the company