Do you mean find £10m down the back of the sofa to pay for a Klavan-esque stop-gap signing? (Presuming that’s available)
Or do you mean fund an £80m commitment for someone like Upamecano (including fee, wages, signing on, January premium etc)
Perhaps you haven’t got anymore of a clue than I have what Klopp means by a centre back and what he has asked for?
Criticising the owners in this context in pointless. If we go with your interpretation of Klopp’s comments - that he has been denied the opportunity to sign a Centre Back and he’s pissed off - then how do you pick a side in that fight without knowing what Klopp has asked for, what state the finances are in and what such an outlay would do to the club?
I mean, in the summer the club we were selling lads to fund the down payments on transfers. I think we’d have probably got a centre back in the summer if we’d shifted Grujic, Wilson and Origi. My suspicion is that the clubs finances are far worse than is generally understood. And it doesn’t look like things are getting better anytime soon.
How much is one league title “worth” in the January window?
How much more valuable (or not) is making long-term adjustments in the coming summer when we are afforded greater clarity and flexibility about the situation – on both the football and finance fronts?
But then how much is long term survival of the club worth?
Its one thing that we as fans are not privy to the exact details of the club’s finances but another thing when the people who do, are now equally clueless about the future finances because of the uncertainties of this pandemic.
I am sure the club has tried their best to make adjustments and accruals as much as they could with whatever information they had. That is why even in the uncertainties, they manage to find enough money to sign Jota with the payment arrangements, that is why they found money to sign Tsimkas and Thiago.
So its not right that the club had not tried to make adjustments and spend future money, they did with whatever information they had but its not a bottomless pit, they cannot keep making accruals and making future speculations on finances that might not happen and might affect our long term competitiveness.
As I said earlier, long after clubs go bankrupt and owners sell their clubs, the Premier League will still be here. I want to win every season. So does the owners, so does Klopp and all the players I believe. But if we have to wait another season to win again so as for the club to believe to ride through the financial uncertainties, so be it. But Klopp will do as much as he could and I believe that is what he wants all of us to focus, yes we are all frustrated by the lack of transfers but lets get over the frustrations and focus on the realities and WHAT COULD be done with the existing resources.
I don’t think it is really a matter of the league title, and what that might be worth. It is not out of reach yet, but framing a potential capital expenditure that way makes it seem both more risky than it is, and misses the real problem. Keeping pace at the very top of the league is a very high standard to target.
Over the last third of the season so far, the side is garnering about 1 point a game. Good for 14th in the 6-match form table. If that keeps up, the margin to a CL spot could easily be 3 matches in early March with 10 left to play. Then, the club is in a hole - and the scenario potentially gets ugly from there. Which players want to stick around, which ones want out? Is it a full rebuild instead of a refresh? Does Klopp have the stomach for that?
If we can sign a “3rd pairing”/4th choice/clone-of-Ragnar Klavan type player this January and win the title OR we can sign a 1B, long-term partner for Virgil this summer, I would choose the latter basically every single time.
As you allude to, I think the only exception would be if we feel we need to act now to preserve our Champions League spot. Otherwise I would happily make a “better” decision in the summer when there is more clarity regarding fans in the stadium, some funds have been raised by selling fringe players, and space has been made for wages.
IMO, moving the needle between 4th, 3rd, 2nd, or 1st this season is worth very little. We are living in difficult times, we got horrendously unfortunate injuries, etc. I don’t think the perception of our club and the squad changes very much if at all. It’s just a bad year. It’s only if there is a serious concern of us finishing 5th or lower that I think demands immediate investment.
The right player in the summer instead of just A.Player now could leave us in a much better position to keep challenging at the very top of the league for years to come.
Come on this is Klopp not Mourniho. He’s reluctant to spend money at the best of times or at least able to play ball on low funding. Do you really think there’s a possibility that he’s tried to ask for something like this? The most realistic scenario is he’s asked for about €25m for Botman or something similar.
When buying a player most of the fee is paid in future instalments. Why would a 6 month wait mean we are better placed to make a more significant financial commitment?
Yeah, I think it’s more likely to be closer to the second scenario than the first, knowing Klopp.
Let’s even take your suggestion. A deal can be done for Sven Botman. It’s not going to be €25m is it. Include wages, agents fees, signing on, Lille playing hardball cos it’s January, and we’re desperate. More likely to by a commitment of €40m
Even €25m might be prohibitively expensive.
What I want people to acknowledge, before the pitchforks come out, is
We don’t know what state the club is in
We don’t know what, if anything, Klopp has asked for
No no, 490 millions is the club’s annual revenue for 2019-20. We effectively progress into the top five in terms of revenue. In 2018-19, we were seventh.
The drop in revenues for us, compared to 2018-19, is roughly 43 millions. That’s what you’d expect with the empty stands.
Man Utd’d drop on the other hand is spectacular: 118 millions, from 627 to 509 millions. That means that we’ve almost closed the gap on them in terms of revenues.
Liverpool returned to the top five in our Money League for the first time since 2001/02 with total revenue of £489.9m, a £43.1m (8%) decrease compared to 2018/19. On the pitch, the club decisively ended its 30-year wait for a league title, combined with success in the UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup and continued participation in the Champions League. This collectively drove a £27.6m increase in commercial revenue as well as delivering the second highest broadcast revenue of Money League clubs (£203.9m), boosted by the recognition of UEFA distributions in respect of the Champions League Final triumph played at the beginning of the financial year ending in 2020.
Despite Liverpool’s continued on-pitch success, broadcast revenue decreased by £59.9m (23%) in comparison to 2018/19 as a proportion of Premier League distributions was deferred into the financial year ending in 2021 as a result of the extended season. Reaching the Round of 16 stage of the Champions League before the disruptions caused by the pandemic meant that Liverpool recognised the majority of its 2019/20 UEFA distributions in the financial year ending in 2020, unlike some other clubs.
While Liverpool has set their longest domestic unbeaten streak at Anfield in the club’s history (68 games), they have missed the presence of its passionate fanbase both on and off the pitch as matchday revenue fell £10.8m (13%). After significant investment in Anfield in recent years, coupled with reported exploration of further expansion opportunities, the club will be seeking to restore matchday revenue as fans return to the stadium.
With the Reds continuing to enjoy success on the pitch, they will be optimistic for revenue growth once normality resumes. In particular, with the new Nike arrangements coming into effect for the 2020/21 season, the club will be confident of increased merchandising sales through the successful utilisation of Nike’s global distribution network, capitalising on its on-pitch success.
So just look at the Deloitte article again, and reading it properly this time, this covers Liverpool’s loss in revenue during the 19/20 season.
So it essentially covers the effect of the pandemic from the cessation of football in March through to summer 2020? We were down by £50m in a season that went largely unaffected, save for the last two months?
Anyone else really worried what this means for the 2020-21 accounts - a period in which we will have had to play a whole season behind closed doors and the pandemic affecting other revenues?
If two months at the tail end of a league campaign can wipe £50m off revenues, what the fuck is a whole year going to do?
Based upon the Deloitte figures, without any further adjustments for changes to TV moneys and Commercial activities, our revenues stand to fall another £72.5 million this season simply from the loss of matchday revenue leaving us with a massive black hole in the accounts.
FSG will obviously have to plug this gap (if only to act as guarantors on addition bank loans), hence perhaps their reluctance to finance transfers in this window. It may also impact upon our ability to do any significant transfer business this summer.
I’m not really worried at all. FSG have a £ or two profit after their ownership of us. We’re not going bust any time soon. Having no fans was always going to have a massive impact on the club’s finances. I’d be worries if we were a club with poor owners who scraped every penny together. Now they will be frucked. Will the government allow half the pro clubs in the country to go bust? We’ll see. Will they allow affluent owners to bail their teams out? Again, we’ll see. The complete stagnation of the transfer market speaks volumes.
Why the PL and Sky didn’t have a massive push to televise every game for a few £ per match I’ll never know. Wouldn’t have made the loses back but they could have taken the whole streaming market quite easily with sensible pricing. Stream in HD and upgrade all their current customers to 4K or similar.
So we are expected a decrease of £120 million in revenue over 19/20 & 20/21 seasons. Yet our expenses (specially wage bill) is expected to remain the same.
So if we sign/signed a CB, the assorted costs (fees, wages) would have bloated the expenses while the revenue continues to dip.
We have a bunch of players (Grujic, Wilson, Karius, Origi, Shaqiri, Keita, AOC) who have contributed little on the pitch while making an adverse impact on our revenue (not able to sale) and expenses (wages).
So if we sign/signed a CB, the assorted costs (fees, wages) would have bloated the expenses while the revenue continues to dip. Yes I’m repeating
All combined, we could have been in a very dire financial situation with potentially long term impact. The only mistake I see FSG/Edwards have made is holding out for better deals for Grujic, Wilson etc.
