DerbyFan

I keep seeing other clubs fans saying this! ? He may well keep the ground if he sells us, it may depend on who buys us and whether they want the ground as part of the sale, there are lots of clubs that rent their stadium, including a lot of the big boys, so they may not care, we have a long term lease, and it's owned by a fan, I'm not sure it really matters.

Maybe, but when all the other figures seem to add up it was a tad confusing, especially when I think I've seen the various finance people say that a figure of £5m is normally assumed for a Cat 1 academy. In reply to your earlier comment about us using the academy, that has always been the long term plan, Mel Morris has been working on improving it since he took control, it's been something of a pet project for him I think, it's just that it takes time for the best ones to come through, we do have some good players at U23 level who may also see game time, some of the ones who have been out on loan such as Max Lowe (as we have released Cole and Olsson - although we have Forsyth he has become sadly very prone to ACL injuries - up to 3 now I think), Luke Thomas and Kyle McAllister, but it is quite obvious that our U18's are where they're starting to really show some promise, that has taken some time to come to fruition, but now looks very good indeed, hopefully some will be involved next season. I think if you asked most of our fans, they would say the same thing, that we are really looking forward to having these lads break through into the team. I don't think as a fanbase we have ever been so enthused with the academy as a whole, most of us don't want to sign players just for the sake of it as it blocks their pathway, the only reason I could see us signing some is if either a lot of our older players go and we want some experience (not quite as old as the ones leaving) to help them out, or we think ours are not quite ready, so we sign some who are that can play immediately and hopefully turn a quick profit on them when ours are ready, or we sign loanees than are slightly older for the season to bridge the gap. We'll see, I guess.

Am I missing something, how can 5+5+5=14, and (3)+(5)=(9)? ? I think the £5m is an arbitrary figure for having a Cat 1 academy, not the exact amount that would be excluded for FFP purposes, I'm not sure how the accounts are interlinked, but the most recent accounts for the academy show a loss of around £12m, the ones from the year before showing a loss of around £6m I think it was. I believe this to have increased due to a lot of work being done on the academy, it has expanded to include around 5 or 6 more pitches but I can't be sure when exactly that work took place.

I need to check the accounts, but basically we started to spend more on players in the summer of 2015, when we appointed Clement, we bought Thorne before that, in summer 2014, but I seem to remember it being mentioned that he was basically paid for with what we earned from the Play Offs in 2014. I've found this in the accounts for this year about how we value players: I forgot to mention, things that have happened to the stadium (that I can remember) since the 2007 valuation, I've no idea how much these affect the valuation, but they have been done, and surely can only affect it in a positive way: big screen inside 2 big screens outside new hybrid pitch that included new full undersoil heating and all of the works and the artificial pitch perimeter (included digging it all up rather than making the pitch higher as some do, not sure when the last major pitch works was before that) new led perimeter boards (they're all led now, including the top of the stand facing part, I think there was also a previous set of led boards since 2007) new PA system (it was said at the time to be the best one you could get) new led floodlights painted the entire roof steel black (it was previously white) all the other painting works and general tidying up the club took back space that had been let out and made a new restaurant (The Yard) then took back what was a Starbucks and made an in house coffee shop (The Back Yard) full overhaul of the ticket office (I think this has been done a few times) we have our own Rams TV studio in the stadium (not the one for Sky) we use a 10 camera mix for Rams TV broadcasts, so theres been work done to make all of the camera locations - I believe this also includes basically the stuff that's in the portable vans that Sky use in a room near to the Rams TV studio - so all the camera views and all the technology that that requires major overhaul of the directors box area major overhaul of the boxes and hospitality area heating in the concourse 8 small screens (making 2 big screens of 4 each) in both the ticket office window and the megastore windows. new screens in all of the concourses and hospitality areas that's just the things I can remember, and the vast majority is very recent, ie. since Mel Morris. Re. The disciplinary commission, that's only a problem if you've broken the rules, they can investigate but if the rules are not broken they have no mandate to punish. As the EFL already okayed the sale before it happened I don't see how the commission can find we've done anything wrong, there would surely be comeback on the EFL if that was the case.

I'm not saying we don't need to get our costs under control (I won't say overspent, as that means spending more than the rules allow in my eyes, and we haven't done that) I know this, the club knows this, they've been saying it for the past few years, which is exactly why we've been selling people (yes we have also been buying people, but the club obviously feel they can do this and who am I to think we can't, they're the ones in control of the finances, and they obviously want us to remain competitive) I guess it being my club, I see the comments they make where as you don't, and you assume that they think they can carry on as they are, they don't, Mel Morris has said himself, multiple times, that we need to make cuts to our costs, he went into it in quite some detail during one of our fan forums that was available to view on Rams TV. He went into how much of the wage bill was being used on players that were not playing, and how much we would lose of that amount this summer, I can't remember the figures now, but it was interesting. We apparently made cuts to the academy last summer, I know that's FFP exempt, but it shows that we realised we needed to make cuts, the funny thing is, this has been a fantastic year for the academy, the U18's won the league, and then the national title, and as such are now in next seasons U19 version of the Champion's League, the UEFA Youth League, so maybe streamlining it has helped with the output, maybe it led to more focus from everyone involved. It does however, show that making cuts doesn't have to have a bad effect on the output. My point is though that that is not what the rules state, so we cannot be punished on what you, or anyone else for that matter, thinks they should state. They simply don't, and therefore it is not against the rules, it can be changed so it is against the rules in the future, but for this season and every previous season, everyone knew exactly what rules they were working to, and they worked within them, or they knowingly didn't and knew that as such they could be punished accordingly in the case of Birmingham. QPR weren't punished retrospectively, everyone knew they were going to be punished, they tried to put it off for as long as they could by taking it via the legal route, they knew, and everyone knew, what was coming, they couldn't have a points deduction, because that was simply not in the rules at the time, they could only be punished on the rules that they broke at the time, with the punishment that was in the rules at the time, even though everyone knew for future breaches points deductions would be relevant. Also, in case you don't remember, it was us that they beat in the Play Off final that year, they broke the rules, we didn't (that was before we started to spend anything significant, Mel Morris bought into the club the day before the final if I remember rightly, he took a gamble buying at, I believe, somewhere between what the club would have been worth if we went up and what it was worth when we stayed down) they got the riches by winning that game and we didn't. I've seen your posts in this thread suggesting before the Play Off final that both us and Villa should have been stripped of it because we 'broke the rules' and it should have been someone else that had the chance to go up. Well if that was the case this time, then that should have been the case last time, and that would have been us, the team that didn't cheat the rules, the team that finished in third in the league (I saw something I think in this thread about another time when it defaulted to the team that was next in line, hence us being in third were next in line), that would/could in the case of a game against another team that didn't breach the rules have gone up and got the riches of the Premier League and we probably wouldn't be having this conversation now. But we didn't, we had to suck it up and get on with it, which is exactly what we did. Of course Martin would have been available for sale, but you can only sell someone if there is a buyer, there wasn't as his wages are said to be high, therefore no one wants to buy him, or pay his full wages, and he went out on loan instead. Yes this is a problem the club caused, but once done, it cannot be fixed. In the case of George Thorne, there was no way he ever should have been worth less than we spent on him, he was a fantastic player, the best defensive midfielder in the Championship by a mile, he got injured (ACL - not the leg he'd done before, I seem to remember) I think it was 3-4 days after we bought him, in a pre season friendly. Then he finally came back and played most of the season after, and was having a good season and in the last game (before the Play Offs that we were in) an Ipswich player makes a horrendous challenge on him and snaps his leg in two. Such awful luck for both him and us (it definitely affected us for the first game of the Play Offs, and we lost heavily and although we put in a hell of a fight in the second leg, dubbed 'Istanhull' by our fans, it was too much to come back from) he came back during the season before the one just ended, and he just didn't look the same player, it was such a horrible thing to see, him looking a shadow of himself, I'm not sure he will ever be the same, too many terrible injuries, we ended up loaning him out to Luton in January, and then a few days later Jones goes to Stoke, and so Thorne plays only a few minutes in his time there. So we'll have to make a loss on him, a loss that should never have happened, but it will, so we'll have to deal with it, but it just shows you how you cannot take for granted what you will get for a player, and as such it's really hard to deal with something like that when it comes to FFP. Then there's Will Hughes, he should have gone for a lot more too, but again, an ACL in the first game of the season under Clement, both him and Bryson (also his knee, also the same game) were out for most of the season. It was those two injuries that made us panic into buying Butterfield and Johnson, probably not helped by having Clement, a rookie manager, having to deal with such a crazy situation, that no one could have predicted happening, on the first day of the season. Not saying that we as a club deserve sympathy for any of this or anything, just saying how best laid plans can change in a single moment, and what you think you'll get for someone doesn't always come to fruition, that can happen regardless of what value a player is at on the books, especially in Georges case where it was as soon as we bought him that he got his first major injury (of the two in his time with us). Anya will more than likely incur a loss, Davies a very small one (unless we've put his value down to £0 already, as we only paid around £500k, his release clause at Hull), Carson - I'm sure theres some debate on whether he came on a free or for a small fee, either way, it won't be a lot as he came from relegated (at the time) Wigan.

You don't seem to want to accept that what the club did is ok, you don't think it is ok, so it is not ok seems to be your attitude. I'm not sure how many companies are out there that deal with stadium valuation, I'm guessing not a lot as it's pretty specialised, maybe the EFL trust the one that we used? Maybe they told us which company to use when we contacted them before we did it? I don't know, I'm just surmising. I don't believe we are under a soft embargo, I'm not sure why the Daily Mail said that we were in the article the other day, no one else has said that we are any more, in fact I saw your other thread where you mentioned the Times article that specially didn't mention us at all in relation to being close to FFP, and I'm sure it was the Times that were the first to say we had a soft embargo before, it was said previously that we couldn't announce the signing of Shinnie because we were, then we announced it, after he'd recovered from his injury. I don't see how they can punish us for 1. Something they EFL have okayed and 2. Something that was allowed within the rules at the time. What the other clubs think now it's happened doesn't matter, they agreed to the rules, they clearly say that you can dispose of tangible fixed assets, this will presumably always be buildings and land, and as such will always lead to an uneven effect with being able to invest in them as infrastructure without taking an FFP hit and then selling them on, to whoever, and making a profit from the sale. Do you have any idea what the legal implications of punishing us for acting within the rules would be? It would surely be laughed out of court. I don't see it as being against the spirit, in finance it's surely pretty black and white, it's either allowed in the rules, or it's not. We've just released our retained list, and while there are some surprises, with Johnson, Blackman and Butterfield being given 12 month extensions on 'vastly reduced terms', I'm sure they are done for FFP purposes, to avoid the residual values meaning we take a hit to this years accounts. I probably expected Johnson to be given a new contract anyway, as he has been an important player for us in the last few months and I would expect him to rotate with Shinnie, with a youngster (more than likely Bird) to back them up, but Butterfield and Blackman, as our local paper said are expected to be released, however I think this will happen in July, so that our irregular amortisation means we take the hit next season instead, yes it means always chasing your tail, well it does until we can get the wages under control and then we can take larger amounts off the residual values and get back on track, but this is the situation we are in. At the end of next season we have Martin (apparently high wages but no residual value, we got him on a free and you apparently cannot have a residual value higher than you paid), Anya and Thorne out of contract, along with a few others that I don't think will mean too much of a hit (we didn't pay much for Davies) it's possible there could be interest in them this summer, but I'd expect them to go out on loan if anything (not Davies, he'll stay). There was interest in Huddlestone in January and I expect him to go this summer, I also expect us to sell Carson this summer, now that Roos has signed his contract, we may then choose to have a youngster (probably Ravas, as he has been with the squad for every game recently as the third choice) as backup, or we have Mitchell coming back from loan. Why on earth would the stadium be valued at £50m now when it was valued at £55m 11 years ago and there has been lots of work done in the meantime. Apologies for such long answers, I'm refreshing the new replies and while not quoting everyone I'm trying to reply to everyone in the one post so as not to have to cover the same ground in each reply.

I'm female ?

But it is legitimate profit, the rules specifically state this, the club had the stadium independently valued, you may not think the stadium is worth that, but if an independent valuer does then why should they listen to you rather than them, after all that is their job is it not, they should be right not you? The club is allowed to dispose of tangible fixed assets and count this as profit, regardless of who they sell it to providing it is fair value, hence the independent valuation, this is why the club made no attempt to conceal it, why would they? There's nothing wrong with the transaction and we're told the EFL okayed it before it happened. Loopholes can only be clamped down upon after they have been discovered, you cannot punish someone for finding a loophole and using it, that is why it is a loophole in the first place, it is not against the rules, the rules can be changed, but you cannot punish someone for something they did before the rules changed after changing the rules, as they didn't break them when they did it. Cutting the wage bill sounds easy, however, you can only cut the wage bill if people are either 1. Out of contract, or 2. Someone wants to buy them and/or take on their contract. It's easy with hindsight to say you shouldn't have signed someone on high wages, but once it is done, it is done, you are contracted to pay them that until the end of their contract, even if you quickly realise it is a mistake, surely you yourselves have found this at some point? We all wish we could turn back the clock and not do something, but it is not possible. There was a well publicised High Court claim, the details for which are in the 2017 accounts, this was settled out of court in October 2018, so obviously no one knows how that ended, but it could play a part in the above. As you mentioned yourself we have sold players, we sold the 2017/18 golden boot winner to fund last years signings, we let the (believed to be) high earners of Bent, Baird and Shackell go, as well as selling Weimann to yourselves, Jerome to Goztepe, Ledley left this January after he terminated his contract, we also let some younger players (Vernam, Zanzala, Guy and Hanson) that we didn't feel would make it go for small fees to the lower leagues, we also let Walker go for the sake of his career as he wanted first team football which we couldn't offer. We have 11* 10 first team players out of contract this summer (Bryson, Butterfield, Johnson, Olsson, Nugent, Pearce, Blackman, Roos*, Elsnik, Cole and Ambrose), even if we might keep a few of them, that is a huge chunk of wages gone, and of the ones that may re-sign, most will not be on anything like the wages they are on now as they are in their 30's, and coming to the end of their careers, so they won't get great offers anywhere, including here. We have an extremely good academy, with many players likely to play a part next season, you may have noticed some of them on the bench for us already during this season, as Bogle was last season before breaking through during this one, so we may not need to spend too much this summer, to let them take their places in the squad. That inflation calculator doesn't take into account the work that has gone into the stadium over the years, adding to the value. I don't know about the non-football staff being in the other company, as I say, I'm not an accountant, I don't understand the workings or the reasonings. I do know that the club has a joint venture with Delaware North for the catering, Club DCFC, which I believe is owned jointly by the 2 parties, so I'm not sure how that would work with regard to FFP, or whether it is even relevant to this. With the rent, I believe most stadia are owned in the same way as ours now is, ie. by the same owner in a different company, so I don't think this makes a difference to the market rate. *We've just announced Roos has signed until 2022.

I didn't mean that the roof project would make the current valuation higher, that was mentioned purely to help explain what the reasoning may have been for Mel Morris in particular for wanting to buy the stadium from the club, ie. the events venue, I probably shouldn't have added the 'also' to make this clear. The Sky article I referenced also states that we cleared the stadium sale with the EFL before going ahead with it. In which case, I'm not sure how anyone can have a problem with us doing this? I can understand the argument of having a problem which such loopholes being in the rules, but in that case the problem is with the rules, not the clubs that have found the loopholes, clubs and people in life in general are always finding loopholes, isn't there a lawyer nicknamed 'Mr Loophole'? I can understand why other fans may think this is unfair if their club is not in a position to do the same, however, the same goes for most things, not everyone has the players to sell for huge sums, and don't get me started on parachute payments being used for anything other than their intended purpose, football finance is an uneven playing field, it always will be, and clubs will always be looking for ways to compete financially, so long as they don't explicitly break the rules, I'm not sure how clubs can be punished for this? I've seen a lot of fans talk about the valuation, but in reality, how does anyone know? I believe the valuation for the accounts is based on how much it would cost to rebuild minus depreciation. I know that some recent stadiums have cost an awful lot more than that to build, so maybe it's not so outlandish? I'm also not sure whether the market value for a sale would be the same as the valuation for the accounts, ie. minus the depreciation? I'm not an accountant, and to be honest, most of it goes straight over my head, but I could see the section about the stadium valuation mentioned, which is why I created this account to point it out, as I could see you had repeated the same about the doubling and then doubling again a few times in this thread already, and I believed it to be misinformation. Again, not being an accountant, I don't understand what it means, but I have noticed on the accounts a 'Revaluation reserve' which to my untrained eye looked like it was being depreciated each year, which I assume is due to the stadium, as it appeared in the 2008 accounts and disappeared in the 2018 accounts. As for the rent, I'm not sure whether the value should be the market rate for a sale of that size, or whether the market rate is based upon what other clubs are paying, there are a lot of clubs renting their stadium in both the Premier League and the Championship, I doubt many are paying anything like that kind of sum, even in a more expensively valued stadium.

If the valuation was £55m in 2007, then surely it's entirely possible it could have gone up to that amount in the 11 years from then to the sale? There has also been a lot of work done to the stadium in the last few years, that while not increasing the value by that amount solely, does still add value. There has also been talk locally, and I see Sky picked up on it in a recent article, of a roof being added to the stadium, to create a better venue for events. Sky Article Derby is without a proper events venue at the moment, our Assembly Rooms has been closed for over 5 years now due to a fire in the plant room, those years since have seen a lot of wrangling over whether to replace it with something more suitable for larger events, at a higher cost, or to refurbish what is there, which is essentially too small, at a lower cost. It has been decided that it will be refurbished. We have an 'arena', right next to the stadium in fact, however, this is a velodrome and completely unsuited for events outside of this, there have been a lot of recent complaints about the sound quality in the (small) fixed seating block above the track, but it has been a case of making do, for now. I believe all of this may have influenced the decision to look at using the stadium as an events venue, and may have influenced the purchase by Mel Morris, to make sure this happens for the sake of the city, as it is not only the club he cares about, he is from Derby and wants the best for the City of Derby also, especially if as is rumoured, the club is sold, either partially, or fully to another party.

I have no idea why you keep referring to the stadium valuation being £20-21m in 2013, and therefore doubling to the £41m book value at the sale and then doubling again to the sale value of £81m. The stadium was valued in 2007 by King Sturge LLP at £55m. The £20-21m you mention is referring the historical cost of the stadium. Look back through further sets of accounts and you will quite clearly see this stated. It was revalued in 2013 'as required under FRS 11' by Jones Lang LaSalle, but unlike with the 2007 valuation there is no mention of said value in the notes, and the book value did not change, apart from the expected depreciation.