Tranmere

[out0lunch]

Lot of presumablys in there Mike !
Ok go with your idea and downgrade, how much will that cost pa

Also I believe the club's insurance company are dealing with any claims and not the club

[thnhouse]

I'm obviously not making myself clear..One Director did take money out some years ago and allegedly still owes some of that to the club and presumably why the High Court case which again presumably been settled out of court. We still don't know the details as the the club has never been transparent in such things. But I doubt anyone is taking money out now. I could be wrong!



Did we not expect the major shareholder to have been ousted some time ago and if not, why not?

From the last fans forum it was pretty much explained that they'd not been able to get him to sell as he'd disengaged with the board. I think there's also troubles with his valuation of the club and the previous legal wrangles.

I don't think he is taking money out of the club currently in loans or any other means , probably because I don't think we're exactly swimming in cash currently.

But the question remains, why do you think if we were saving 500k a season our controlling interest would keep that cash in the club to let us spend it on the first team?

[TK20]

The reason why MikeSBs argument and Wartmans is so flawed is that if we don't spend any money on an academy and save this 750k, who is playing in the first team? Volunteers?

We would have journeymen like Chris Porter (2k a week) or Bowery (1800 a week) throughout the whole squad which would see our wage bill shoot up massively.

Compounding that is the fact there would be virtually no resale value in any of our players. So we spend more on wages for no return.

In terms of transfers it's worth remembering we sold George Nunn for 300k, we had 500k from clauses in Westwood and Hanleys contract plus George Cooper in recent times.

I expect Ng, Pickering and Kirk all to fetch reasonable fees in the near future also.

An academy is the only way to run a sustainable club without PL TV money. If you don't like our model, I notice Port Vale are doing very well down the road in Burslem.

[MikeSB]

The reason why MikeSBs argument and Wartmans is so flawed is that if we don't spend any money on an academy and save this 750k, who is playing in the first team? Volunteers?

We would have journeymen like Chris Porter (2k a week) or Bowery (1800 a week) throughout the whole squad which would see our wage bill shoot up massively.

Compounding that is the fact there would be virtually no resale value in any of our players. So we spend more on wages for no return.

In terms of transfers it's worth remembering we sold George Nunn for 300k, we had 500k from clauses in Westwood and Hanleys contract plus George Cooper in recent times.

I expect Ng, Pickering and Kirk all to fetch reasonable fees in the near future also.

An academy is the only way to run a sustainable club without PL TV money. If you don't like our model, I notice Port Vale are doing very well down the road in Burslem.

Sorry but your last paragraph is flawed as 90% of L1 and L2 clubs do not have or wish to have Cat2 academies. Your last sentence is crass. They won't go out of the league. Again you miss the same point I keep making is that even if we downgraded our academy to Cat3 or Cat4 young local area kids will still have opportunities to come and train with us. I very much doubt that our cat2 has made ANY difference to the players development. As it didn't before we had RH..if the academy costs are halved that MUST mean more money for the first team. Have you any evidence what players wages are here, eg Porter and Bowery?

[thnhouse]

Mike, I feel like a broken record here, it only means more money for the first team if that money stays in the club. Which as we've discussed may be quite unlikely given our current state.

[AstonAlex]

You only have to analyse results of the various levels of Academy clubs over several seasons in, for example, the FA Youth Cup to see that Cat 1 perform better than Cat 2, who perform better than Cat 3 etc etc. But let’s not let financial or performance evidence get in the way of emotion. After all, look where that’s got us with Brexit!!

[out0lunch]

Sorry but your last paragraph is flawed as 90% of L1 and L2 clubs do not have or wish to have Cat2 academies. Your last sentence is crass. They won't go out of the league. Again you miss the same point I keep making is that even if we downgraded our academy to Cat3 or Cat4 young local area kids will still have opportunities to come and train with us. I very much doubt that our cat2 has made ANY difference to the players development. As it didn't before we had RH..if the academy costs are halved that MUST mean more money for the first team. Have you any evidence what players wages are here, eg Porter and Bowery?

Still waiting for a costing Mike to what you are proposing with a downgrade

[MikeSB]

You only have to analyse results of the various levels of Academy clubs over several seasons in, for example, the FA Youth Cup to see that Cat 1 perform better than Cat 2, who perform better than Cat 3 etc etc. But let’s not let financial or performance evidence get in the way of emotion. After all, look where that’s got us with Brexit!!

Its nothing to do with the academy level but the ability of PL clubs to attract and pay very high wages to youngsters and why one of ours (forgot his name) who went to Chelsea..That is the problem in lower league clubs being able to sign their cast offs unless they are desperate.

I just look at from a simple POV....If we can as I believe we can, run our academy at half the cost or less, based on the same principles that local kids will go to their nearest club. They will develop as they have always done based on one coach or a 100 and more importantly, we will give them a chance of league football, earlier than most.

Whether any financial savings will result in more investment in the first team then the answer is I don't know but if the money is available then why not? But then we should be able to compete with similar size clubs like Accrington and Bury, Rochdale on wages if not our training facilities and reputation. Maybe again its a case of players preferring not to travel too far from their home base?

[MikeSB]

Still waiting for a costing Mike to what you are proposing with a downgrade

As I just said my friend that I don't know but when I looked at this closely a couple of years ago, its the FA that sets the rules for each academy level and number of coaches and Cat 2 like ours was circa what we pay ie 760K with a smaller contribution from the FA and PL which is why Dario liked it so much but Cat 3 was around 150K with the PL/FA contributing circa 300K and from memory Cat4, clubs were allowed to do it virtually as they liked ie which ironically was the way Dario did it in his early days.

[thnhouse]

Whether any financial savings will result in more investment in the first team then the answer is I don't know but if the money is available then why not?

For the reason I keep repeating to you.