It's common, all of the big football lenders insist on having the stadium as collateral as that's often the biggest fixed asset a football club has. That's how MSD now own Derbys stadium + training ground for instance.
I'd think the exposure is limited quite a bit by the clauses agreed up front. There's a reason why so many of our head coaches (not managers!) are relatively unknown and/or new to managing in England. They will be so keen to get the chance to showcase their talents sufficiently to get another (hopefully better) job after they leave Watford that they'll be willing to agree to severance conditions that will not impact the club as much as could be the case.
I can absolutely assure you that the general feeling is not that we are close to bankruptcy. Certainly not at the club or for the the majority of educated fans anyway. As for the rest? You lack the touch of @NathWFC. He can be negative but you never, ever think that he doesn't mean what he posts. But I sense you just post a lot of your negative thoughts for effect, rather than actually believing them.
It's going to be interesting in January to see if some money is available. It would be strange to think Ranieri would of agreed a deal without having some funds available for incoming players. Yes I know he's not the one actively going for players but surely a manager/coach of his standards will be making his options known over the coming months.
If he lasts that long . A tough run of games so Ranieri ought to get some leeway but will that happen ? Reality is we probably won’t see what he can do till mid December but guess the key is improved performances.
I am sure our owners have a very modest points target in mind for the next eight games. After that it will be different.....
Worth remembering that this is the same forum Eeyore who confidently predicted we'd get relegated from the Championship last year.
I've actually not seen him post anything worthwhile! Surely there are better things to do than post utter tosh or stuff where you're attempting to wind people up. Very odd
Not sure how accurate this is but we are 12th in the Premier league debt table . https://www.1sports1.com/ranked-premier-league-clubs-with-the-most-debts/2/
I would say that's fairly accurate, certainly in Watford's case anyway. However, I think the Pozzo's are working towards significantly reducing the debt this season. Next season, if we go down, selling Sarr will go further towards debt reduction. We'd probably get it down to virtually zero if we did this. Selling Sarr in January to Newcastle will probably get us around £70m as I believe Sarr would be the type of player on their radar and Watford would insist on the additional premium which Newcastle will have to pay on all transfers. If Watford sell Sarr for £70m and stay up, then it would be like a lottery win for the club. Debt would (or certainly should be) wiped off and we'd be in a good position to actually invest properly in the squad once more.
I just don't see any upside to us selling him in January and that would be a big departure from past Pozzo strategy too. Sarr's value isn't going to drop much between now and the summer and I personally think that's when we'll sell him.
We won't get £70 million for Sarr yet - needs to be more consistent to get to that value. I don't think Newcastle will spend big in January either....well relatively.
I think the January window could really be shaken up by Newcastle. They will be spending big and I think Watford need to board that gravy train while they are new to it all and are a bit naive. I honestly think Watford could get £70m out of them, but won't get anything like that from Liverpool. Of course it's not ideal timing for the club to lose their best player, but let's be honest, are we really likely to stay up this season? It's an outside bet at best even with Sarr. If we go down we'd have to sell 100% and we won't be getting anything like £70m in the Championship, with Sarr only having 2 years of contract remaining. We'd be in a poor bargaing position. This coming window is probably Watford's last chance to sell Sarr for big money and if Newcastle come sniffing I think Gino would be pragmatic and sell him. There is an alternative scenario of course and that is we stay up. Then we'd still be in a strong position to sell him as a Premier League club, but that's the gamble the owners would be making but completely dependent on how we're shaping up come January plus any forthcoming high bids for Sarr of course.
I don’t see the point in them spending big in January, main priority is getting the right manager in and staying up, then they can start afresh in the summer with a joined up approach to transfers, both in and out. January is a bad time to buy players and theyll also need to try and get rid of some as well.
Is it possible we could “sell” Sarr in January with a loan-back arrangement for the remainder of the season, in the same way Palace did when they sold Zaha to Man U?
Newcastle may well want to do business in January - but that’s historically a window where out-of-favour players move. I suspect they will be structuring themselves right now with a short-term plan for this season and then a longer-term plan which will kick off next summer. I think they will be looking at the likes of Lingard and Van De Beek in personally. I doubt they will be looking at Sarr anyway given they have Saint-Maximin playing there already.
It shouldnt be normal, the PL and EFL should ban it. If you can't run a football club without mortgaging the stadium you shouldnt be running it.
Whats the likelihood that we are indeed in a dire financial situation and thats bleeding out and affecting the general moral / performances amongst the squad? It was acknowledged how tight things got during lockdowns money wise, but even before that there was the whole thing with FA cup bonuses not being paid (I'm assuming there's some truth to that?). We've not spent big this window clearly, and even when Ranieri came in after only 7 games he's talking about how this seasons target is survival, basically 17th position, with next season being the one where we would aim higher, which is hardly the most optimisitic tone for a new manager this early in a season. I've heard rumours that Deeney was in dispute with the club early last season about money not being paid to him that he believed he was owed, leading to him refusing to play whilst deemed 'injured' by the club. Then you have two young, English midfielders who were important to us last year and having every sign that they would get a decent amount of game time this season, suddenly both turning down new contracts, and clearly not because they had their head turned by once in a lifetime opportunities at bigger clubs. It could simply be that we could not afford what they felt they were worth, or is there a more general feeling of financial instability behind the scenes? Obviously the fans just take another round of the mangerial merry-go-round on the chin, but each time it just increases the perception that we're a 'basket-case' club and again thats going to start putting of players, both within the club as well as potential future signings.. A lot of assumptions there, but lets face it we've had a lot of bleak perfomances over the last few seasons, and its of coure take you pick as to what could be the cause of them, theres certainly a number of factors. But even despite the opponents, the apparent lack of any 'new-manager-bounce' (which we've clearly ran out of by now) but just general no sense of players raising their game or busting a gut to impress at the weekend just appears to suggest there's a negative attitude at the club. As fans we're quick to point out to anyone who questions how this season we're back after five consequtive premier league seasons, but there seems to be no confidence amongst the squad despite that, we're playing like a championship team newly promoted.
Nice idea in theory and would make sense if the whole structure of football club ownership in England was overhauled. Completely pointless as an isolated rule change though and outright detrimental for most clubs.
Should we also ban mortgages? If you’d can’t buy the house outright you clearly can’t afford it and you’re not allowed it.
That may explain the fateful display at West Ham in 2019/20. What else could account for it when we'd just won two on the bounce and looked on the brink of safety? Maybe they'd shat themselves after the unexpected results from Bournemouth and Villa, but that seems a pretty feeble excuse, at least under normal circumstances.
That’s basically Ranieri’s schtick. He spent half of Leicester’s title winning season talking about getting to 40pts. Plus survival is undoubtedly our target for this year and so what’s wrong with saying it?
Yeah, hey I'm not suggesting I'm an expert in player psychology and yes its a very common manager approach ("all I care about is 3pts next game" etc) I guess I feel that approach is more common when you are trying to temper expectations of a team doing alright. For a team low on moral - and yes I understand survival is our target - I was just more expecting something slightly more inspring - "we can acheive more" kind of thing rather than it coming across as basically this season 17th is the best we can hope for.
We have taken out a loan against an installment due from Udinese for Pereyra next year (7th Oct), to the degree of €8.075m. I recall we had already taken out a loan against a previous installment - can anyone remember the amount? Would be interested to see how much we are getting for Bobby in total. Edit - just had a look back and the other installment was for the same amount, due in February next year. That takes the total to €16.15m. I can't imagine we got any more for him than that.
Probably still paying some of Gray's as he is only on loan at QPR. And even Deeney as sometimes players are owned money when they leave?