What happens next year (and the next, and the next) when the same regulations require them to show a certain amount of income that they're highly unlikely to meet? They've survived this summer by selling assets left and right. It's not as if they can just continue to do that every year. Does anybody realistically expect them to increase their annual revenues by hundreds of millions, after borrowing money that will be taken out of their future revenue? Or will they simply stop signing new players? Neither seems feasible. It feels a lot like they've just chosen to ignore the cliff's edge that they're driving towards because they're not yet falling.
Even if they'll have succesfully reduced their wage bill, look how much money they've had to come up with this summer to make ends meet. They can't have reduced their wage burden by nearly enough to make that equation work out. Is it something like €300m of assets they've sold? If that's what it took to stay afloat in a single year, how are they not completely fecked in the future? A wage bill cutdown doesn't come even remotely close to matching that figure. They might have saved something like €50-100m per year that way, and that's if they do manage to negotiate all these salary cuts for the players they already have. Now count that against the drop in future revenues resulting from all these "levers." Where is the money supposed to come from next time? Will they end up having to become Red Bull Barcelona from the Amazon Stadium?
In case they haven't noticed, the global economy isn't at its best. It seems very optimistic to expect to significantly increase a club's revenue, because at the end of the day, that has to come from an increase in fan spending. I find it hard to believe that people are eager to buy more shirts and tickets, or more expensive TV packages. Sponsorship deals don't exactly become more lucrative during a recession, either, when the global population has to tighten its belt due to rapidly increasing costs of living. Advertising is only worth as much as people's disposable income, and we all have less and less of that these days.
Even if they'll have succesfully reduced their wage bill, look how much money they've had to come up with this summer to make ends meet. They can't have reduced their wage burden by nearly enough to make that equation work out. Is it something like €300m of assets they've sold? If that's what it took to stay afloat in a single year, how are they not completely fecked in the future? A wage bill cutdown doesn't come even remotely close to matching that figure. They might have saved something like €50-100m per year that way, and that's if they do manage to negotiate all these salary cuts for the players they already have. Now count that against the drop in future revenues resulting from all these "levers." Where is the money supposed to come from next time? Will they end up having to become Red Bull Barcelona from the Amazon Stadium?
In case they haven't noticed, the global economy isn't at its best. It seems very optimistic to expect to significantly increase a club's revenue, because at the end of the day, that has to come from an increase in fan spending. I find it hard to believe that people are eager to buy more shirts and tickets, or more expensive TV packages. Sponsorship deals don't exactly become more lucrative during a recession, either, when the global population has to tighten its belt due to rapidly increasing costs of living. Advertising is only worth as much as people's disposable income, and we all have less and less of that these days.
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