AnotherDerbyFan

On 05/11/2021 at 21:34, Hxj said:

mmmm - I would have more confidence in their arguments if:

1.  They discussed 'solely';

It comes down to which side of the fence you want to stand on:

1. Without Covid, the club would have avoided admin completely 
2. If the club was better run, the club could have avoided it despite Covid.

On 05/11/2021 at 21:34, Hxj said:

2.  They discussed the HMRC winding up petition in January 2020 and the proximity of the Administration to HMRC recommencing winding up petitions on 1 October 2021.

Was this potentially linked with a failed takeover/investment? Not the Fake Sheikh, but someone else?

On 05/11/2021 at 21:34, Hxj said:

3.  They could also tell me what happened to the £75 million odd owed to the football club for the ground.

I've been scratching my head over that since the beginning. 

On 17/10/2021 at 17:01, Davefevs said:

The article is contradicting itself….say £13.5m for a few months (assume to January) but headline says season.

A few months being the end of the season.

16 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

The victimhood is rolling on I see...

The penalty decisions against us is atrocious though. 2 stonewall penalties vs Forest and another vs Preston spring to mind. The second penalty shout vs Preston looked more like a loss of balance than a foul. There have been a couple other strong shouts this season, and quite a few soft ones.. yet not a single given. You'd expect these things t even out somewhat, but we do tend to be on the wrong side of the decisions a lot more than the decisions being in our favour.

The ref vs Preston was one of the worst displays I've ever seen, missing obvious fouls against both sides. A Preston player got clipped on the edge of their box as they were making a breakaway... no foul and Derby have the ball to start another attack. Earlier in the game, Knight knocked the ball past the defender, who made no attempt to play the ball but blocked Knight off from getting on the end of it and knocked him to the floor. Again no foul given, but this time Preston have the ball to start an attack of their own.

16 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

I will seek to find the full quotes.

Plus, seems Derby fans were blaming the EFL- not just online views then, but chants of "Eff the EFL" in the away end at Preston Saturday.

Nothing new. That been chanted at every game since the original charge.

16 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

 

I wonder when the majority will grasp that their current position is largely the fault of Mel Morris and Stephen Pearce, plus that they might need some good will at some stage.

Found this from the time it was announced last September that the EFL were due to appeal the verdict.

Aged well!! 

Not going to get irate but they really deserve all they get on current trends, don't they?

Interested to know why they think they are being singled out when Bury seemed not to even get that privilege, Bury were suspended in early August IIRC and kicked out within a month- give or take. Proof of funds was a deal breaker in their case was it not. Granted Bury were not in administration, but back in August, did Mel show proof of funds for the season- if not then why were they allowed to start the season.

11 hours ago, The Constant Rabbit said:

Anyone give me the cliff notes?

 

12 pts this year and 9 next?

 

@Mr Popodopolous

Is your avatar Precious McKenzie?

12 points this year, minus however many the appeal panel see fit (anything from 0 to 12), plus however many for P&S. I'll be very surprised if there is any deduction next season.

43 minutes ago, hertsexile said:

Derby Just trying to dodge the bullet once again looking for every loop hole in the book to upset  legal process rather than facing the music. 

It's not a loophole if it's written in plain English "you can do 'this' if 'that' happens"

7 hours ago, REDOXO said:

Ok so Derby County’s administrators are mounting an appeal based upon no accounts for previous years.
 

In your words transactional data that has not to this point been seen and the idea that this ‘data’ will show that they were never in financial difficulty despite never having produced accounts for the several years in advance of Covid.

Is that a fair summary?

That's not quite right. It's not about 'financial difficulty', but whether in balance of probabilities, we entered administration solely because of Covid.

There are many ways that statement can be interpreted.

In the basic sense, if we had the £20m cash we missed out on as a result of Covid, would we avoid admin completely?

A little example here of how much money if left in Mel's piggy bank. Let's say he had £30m at the start of 2020 (before lockdown). The plan being to slowly reduce his input so that the club will run at an organic profit. By the end of the 21/22 season, that goal was set to be achieved, and no more money ever needs to be taken from his piggy bank.

However, Covid struck which ruined those plans. Sales made in the summer to get some cash in and others let go to cut the wage bill. Fans still not allowed in so further sales and cutbacks necessary in the Jan window. But still, not money left by Autumn 2021.

On 12/10/2021 at 22:34, Hxj said:

Clearly there will be a commercial decision about what you do, that don't have to accept any offer, but the Administrators will have to justify themselves more than a benevolent owner would. However if his contract is up in the summer, this is his fifth season at Derby (@AnotherDerbyFan will know more than me) it clearly makes it more likely that he will be sold.  Plus do you want a player around who really doesn't want to play for you?

Yep, final year. To keep things simple, only Bielik, Bird, Knight, Sibley and Jozwiak are currently contacted beyond the end of the season as a result of embargo restrictions.

8 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

@JamesBCFC

Administration appeal

It's a genuine disgrace that they are appealing it but they- and Andronikou in his Portsmouth days- have form, so though the audacity is shocking it is Derby and to an extent Andronikou. Probably late October to mid November.

FFP

That's still up for negotiation or a hearing. Mooted to be 9 pts plus a further 3 suspended and the usual business plan.

In the case of the 2nd, what I would like to see is a good catch-all approach, albeit I don't know if possible...

If avoid relegation this season by less than 9 pts- added to this season's total- down they go!

If relegated in any event- added to next seasons total- ie they start League One on -9 with a further 3 suspended and still in and around the business plan. The only way is up!

If survive by more than 9 pts, then next season ie start next season on -9 etc in the Championship- down the bottom of the League.

Think of it as a nice game of snakes and ladders.

They can keep haggling if they wish but they remain under embargo for many matters- and people are being disappointingly charitable, e.g. 32Red are forwarding some funding, Arsenal are letting them defer the Bielik instalment- as it goes there is a provision in terms of football creditors rule for this. For example if a club cannot meet their football creditor obligations as they fall due, then central funds/awards can be redirected in order to fulfil this or help to fulfil this. Ergo, a chunk of the next TV and Solidarity money should go to Arsenal for Bielik on release. that is to say instead of to Derby just send some to Arsenal if required and give Derby the remainder...unsure how TV and Solidarity money is distributed over a year/season however. I don't understand why that rule isn't automatic for clubs in administration what with the football creditors rule.

I think you're being a bit harsh by calling it a disgrace. Based on the discussions we've had on the subject, you must surely concede that there is some merit to the appeal. You didn't say Wigan's appeal was a disgrace, yet their justification of the Covid impact was even weaker than ours.

The season the P&S deduction occurs should be this season and no later. With what you're advocating, you may as well just implement an automatic relegation and save everyone a lot of wasted time.

1 hour ago, downendcity said:

Has Derby yet produced accounts yet? 

If I fail to submit my self assesment tax return on time I receive a fine, which escalates the longer I delay. I think I'm right in saying (because I've always submitted and paid on time) that any tax due can have a penalty applied depending how long payment is delayed. 

Something along these lines would sort clubs out in terms of submitting accounts with a sliding scale of points deductions for delayed submission of accounts. 

On that basis Derby would likely be in the Conference next season! 

I'm led to believe that a club doesn't have to submit accounts after going into administration? I could be wrong on that though.
P&S submissions would still be due for all relevant periods so it's not as if we can escape punishment by hiding accounts... they even saw provisional accounts before we went into administration anyway.
Don't forget, the delay in submitting the accounts was because of the ongoing charge, appeal, and then subsequent discussions to produce a set of accounts both the club and EFL were happy with.

1 minute ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Think it says on the EFL site that appeals for this are heard within 3 weeks? Can't remember the exact number but no major delays feel likely with the administration appeal. Late October to mid November IMO.

Wigan's was about a month iirc

1 hour ago, hertsexile said:

Here we go again Derby trying to stop due process by appealing. Why do they think they are a special case every other club that has gone into administration has excepted their 12 point deduction and got on with it ! 

Wigan

29 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I would hope that regular snapshots and projections were done, on various scenarios:

• best case, season started but full crowds by Sept/Oct
• worst case, no crowds in 20/21
• sone scenarios in between

Maybe the way to look at it milestones. So were the club's actions at that exact point in time in line with what they're saying.
If there wasn't any lockdown at all from March 2020 onwards, would we have been fine?
Did our transfer activity in summer 2020 mean that we would have been fine if stadiums were opened up as expected at the time?
Did our transfer activity in Jan 2021?
Did our transfer activity in summer 2021?

Arguments could be made for either side for most of those. However, other than reducing the wage bill in summer 2021, we'll have a big task arguing in favour of not needing to sell players when we had bids for them.

29 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

But, even if this scenario planning did take place, Mel just went with the most risky / reckless option.  Other clubs didn’t, they scaled back.  So did Derby to some extent, but you still sacked Cocu at a huge cost.  You still spent more than us on signings.

I doubt any money has made its way to Cocu to date, so I wouldn't put that as a factor against the admin appeal.

2 hours ago, downendcity said:

This might be a simplistic take on this.

When the new ffp rules and limits were introduced Morris, in common with the owners of every other club, had 3 years in which to take the appropriate steps to bring Derby’s finances into line by the time of the first ffp reckoning. As we now know he did none of that, choosing instead to continue to spend, spend, spend in an attempt to gain promotion to the prem so that he had to resort to the convoluted “sale” of Pride Park to avoid them hitting the ffp buffers.

Had he taken the right steps financially at the outset, yes it would have compromised their promotion aims, but that was the case for every other club that did comply, but more importantly, with better financial controls back then would Derby’s position have become so dire that administration become the only option?

I used to be a mortgage adviser and remember seeing various clients following the “credit crunch” in 2008 onwards. Many of them had been living beyond their means for a few years, racking up overdraft, credit cards and personal loans and then re-mortgaging when they reached their credit limits, to consolidate their debts and bring monthly payments down. They would rinse and repeat this excercise whenever the debts reached a critical level. Unfortunately with the collapse of  property values they were no longer able to do this and their financial chickens would inevitably come home to roost. Funnily enough, according to the clients it was never their own actions that caused the problem, but they would usually cite the impact of the credit crunch/recession/ less overtime etc. etc..

I can understand the administrator looking for every means by which to improve Derby’s appeal to a prospective purchaser, but It seems to me that Covid is a convenient reason on which to hang an appeal ( and yet another option for Derby to play the victim being pursued by the heartless EFL), but it does seem to me that, like many of my mortgage clients,  Morris bought most of this on the club due to his profligacy at a time when the new financial rules should have caused him to be more financially cautious and responsible.

 

Past spending is irrelevant if the club could have avoided administration completely if it wasn't for Covid. In my opinion there are two key questions:

1. At which point do you take that snapshot?
2. Could we have avoided administration despite Covid?

Would that snapshot be the start of Covid lockdowns (March 2020), the start of the 20/21 season, or do you also factor in the belief that we wouldn't have been in lockdown for anywhere near as long (end of 19/20 we were hoping to have fans in from the start of the 20/21 season, then it was pushed back a few months...?
We could have not bought players last summer such as Jozwiak and Byrne for fees plus others for free, but this could be ignored depending on when the snapshot is taken. We definitely could have sold players inn the summer window just gone (notably Buchanan and Lawrence who both had bids rejected) and I think they have to look into whether Mel could have carried on funding the club.

I personally think we'll be unsuccessful purely based on those final two reasons. I am hoping to be wrong though 

4 hours ago, Leveller said:

I find it fascinating that there is in depth analysis of the accounts on OTIB, while there seems to be very little actual analysis in the Derby forum.

I'm amazed you read all 20k+ posts on the topic to come to that conclusion

On 07/10/2021 at 08:11, Hxj said:

I'm not convinced by those figures, as except for 2015/16 I can't tie them into the accounts.  The relevant additional intangibles in 16/17 were £21.1 million and in 17/18 were £15.0 million and the 2018 accounts refer to acquisitions of £18.5 million.

@AnotherDerbyFan's figures might be right, just presented differently.

Those figures were from Transfermarkt. I may have used them at the time due to laziness.
We can get more accurate figures off the post balance sheet purchases which covers summer transfers. Estimates still required for 19/20 onwards winter windows.

PBSP = post balance sheet purchases

So I take it these calcs to figure out the total for each season:
15/16 = 22.056 + Blackman + Camara + Olsson + 0.323 (winter agent fees)
16/17 = 14.184 + Nugent + McAllister + winter agent fees (total agent fees = 1.962)
17/18 = 12.763 + Jerome + winter agent fees (total agent fees = 2.180)
18/19 = 18.541 + winter agent fees (total agent fees = 4.293)
19/20 = Bielik + agent fees (total agent fees = 2.142)
20/21 = Jozwiak + Byrne  + agent fees

Estimated Totals:
15/16 = 27.559
16/17 = 17.034
17/18 = 14.293
18/19 = 19
19/20 = 9
20/21 = 4.2

@Mr Popodopolous average original contract length is 3.3 years, but the players signed for big fees were all 4 or 5 years

16 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Couple of other observations, one of them tbh is partially lifted from Derby5hire and his Twitter.

New company

How does a company in administration- in this instance Derby County- get assigned as a relevant legal entity to a new company or indeed would it be classed as a subsidiary?

Injuries and Professional Standing

Derby as I understand it are under the Professional Standing rule.

That is up to 23 players who have made one appearance in the relevant competition.

When they signed Jagielka and Baldock, especially the latter reports suggested that it was tied to the unavailability of Kazim-Richards. Bit of an emergency signing to January, and possibly Jagielka for Bielik- he too was until January.

Bielik was supposed to have a long term injury and so was to an extent Kazim-Richards.

If there are returns significantly ahead of time how does this cross over with the terms of the 23 of professional standing, in particular the two 'emergency' additions. I hope that the EFL will not sit idly by.

I interpretted the situation as the EFL allowing us to go up to 25 players on the understanding Kazim and Bielik will miss a 'considerable proportion of the season'
Bielik for example, picked up a similar injury at a similar time the season prior. He made his U23 return in October, made a premature return to the first team in November, before finally playing again in December. I expect the same sort of schedule again.
Kazim was supposed to be about 3 months (so mid-Nov). It's not unreasonable for those types of injuries to heal a bit quicker, so mid to late October is fair.

On 03/10/2021 at 10:29, Hxj said:

Personally I've never understood that view.  The rules say that you measure over the set period and have a limit for that period.  If a club's spending control is so bad they have multiple breaches it's only their fault surely?

Any news on the appeal against the -12 points from your side?  I have heard nothing.

Oh and Derby are now on the Embargo list again for being in Administration!

I agree to an extent, but not in this case. 

If Birmingham had exceeded limits for 2 periods in a row just because they wanted to spend more, they would have had no excuse and would rightfully be punished for both periods.
Our case is considerably different to that... trying to stay within the limits (even if using as many loopholes as possible) only to find out 5 years later that the actual budgets were considerably different to those used.

Haven't heard anything about an appeal - very doubtful we have.

We're permanent members of the list now... I think we've all accepted that 

On 30/09/2021 at 18:16, Mr Popodopolous said:

Saw this elsewhere- seems that RamsTrust had a meeting with the EFL.

Bit of special pleading or?

Clearly like the administrators and my post the other day, they won't say "well tbh, it's a fair cop, guv, yes we deserve the maximum".

All the same, it seems that the EFL did not agree with their take on certain issues.

An argument that the -12 for administration is a punishment and then to seek to dock points for P&S overspending would be double jeopardy- the EFL disagreed.

It is not double jeopardy and while I don't wish to criticise a Supporters Trust, I certainly don't, they should know this fact. They are two separate processes and one is automatic for clubs who suffer insolvency events, the other is financial results or in this case, restated financial results base, They are among those who should know better tbh.

Applied for the integrity of the competition is spot on, so is the clarity in terms of what is and isn't double jeopardy. What MIGHT be double jeopardy is if they were punished for the 3 years to 2018, then 2019, then the combined average without resetting the individual losses to £13m like with Birmingham and possibly Sheffield Wednesday.

For example if you took the 2016/17 and 2017/18 losses into 2018/19 without adjustment that could be double jeopardy but if you took the 2018/19 on a restated number and assessed it at a £13m P&S loss and the prior 2 were reset to £26m in total if they exceeded it, that would be okay.

Admin and P&S as 'double-jeopardy' is a total red herring though. Then again this is unprecedented for the EFL in a sense because it's unheard of to get a side going into administration still with unresolved and outstanding P&S issues,

Double jeopardy was referring to the previous charge where we were found non-complaint to FRS102, then being penalised again for failing P&S. Personally, I see P&S as a contunuation of the original charge, even if it isn't officially viewed that way. 

Double jeopardy seems to have been thrown in there by someone who doesn't understand the whole picture.

4 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Saw an interesting claim elsewhere- once Covid allowances factored out, once accounts restated in terms of amortisation and profit on disposal as a result being adjusted, and I can't spend long on this but once all that done, then Derby apparently posted a profit in both 2019/20 and 2020/21!?

That would be quite a gamechanger. In which case though, release the accounts- club and consolidated- as it is quite a turnaround.

Profit or within the limits. I'll be surprised if it's the former. Before or after P&S resets for failed periods.

On that topic, are all 3 years reset to £13m, or just years which exceed that figure?

On 28/09/2021 at 11:27, Mr Popodopolous said:

That's an illuminating article, thanks for posting Dave.

Reading that, I posted snippets of the press conference the other week and tbh the administration team did seem somewhat bullish.

Couple of bits. IIRC the bit bumped up (as per Govt site) for HMRC as preferential is employee NI, VAT and PAYE. There are some other categories but those feel the most relevant in cases like this- the rest of the HMRC debt owing would be secondary preferential.

The other bit is a claim I've periodically seen elsewhere that their wage bill is £15m, £12m and perhaps even as low as £10m.

I struggle to see how personally.

a) Club in isolation

b) Consolidated

c) Just the football staff

d) Just the players

e) Inclusive of NI, PAYE?

No doubt it's dropped but the running costs were huge in 2017/18. That's as in Revenue -  Operating Costs.

It's a large organisation but the Sevco 5112 IIRC had an operating loss of £45-46m. Has this really been slashed so far in 3 years, 4 at a push!

Take a look at the first team squad and tell me what you honestly think the player wage bill currently stands at then?

Signed under £12.5k embargo: Marshall, Byrne, Jozwiak, Kazim

Signed under £4.5k embargo: Allsop, Davies, Jagielka, Steraman, Morrison, Baldock

Recent academy graduates: Ebosele, McDonald, JBrown, Watson, Hutchinson, Stretton

Longer term academy graduates (in 2nd or 3rd season): Buchanan, Bird, Knight, Sibley

Other: Roos, Forsyth, Bielik, Shinnie, Lawrence

You refer to the 17/18 wage bill, yet ignore who we've offloaded since. Vydra, Weimann, Shackell, Jerome, Bent, Baird, Ledley, Nugent, Butterfield, Blackman, Pearce, Johnson, Bryson, Bennett, Keogh, Olsson, Thorne, Martin, Anya, Huddlestone, Wisdom, Carson. you could probably count on one hand how few were on less than £20k pw.

On 25/09/2021 at 11:42, Mr Popodopolous said:

On a side note, I have to say that some on DCFCFans do their club little credit. Or few favours.

Now forums are forums and it's not like they carry much sway but it seems to me that Derby need to rebuild bridges not only with the EFL but start to with other clubs too. Mel leaving will have helped.

The thing about DCFCFans however, is how independent from the club is it? I noticed eg that there are club advertisements that might help to fund it.

Sure that Gibson and the EFL would be quite interested at some of the comments that appear on there. How arms length from the club is it. The forum operator also appeared to be one of Mel's favoured guests for behind closed doors fan briefing.

Their statement going into administration didn't help, EFL took a part of that badly and Rooney reportedly intimated that he would consider throwing youth products in if a further deduction ie the mooted one for FFP arose. Made reference to the integrity of the competition.

As a club they need to watch their step tbh. I'm sure the administrators will take a pragmatic approach fwiw but a shitload of goodwill has been burnt through by Mel and no small number of gloating fans since 2019

Completely independent. 

Club adverts no different to any other google advert - targetted towards the user. David stopped them as soon as admin was announced.

The club at various times has invited people to supporter meetings. The recent few have had representatives from a range of 'supporter groups', such as Punjabi Rams, The Rams Trust, and of course DCFCfans. Earlier meetings during Mel's spell as owner invited a group of fans (only from the forum) as it is the largest supporter group, of which many other members of other supporter groups have accounts on it.

Rooney's comment was essentially saying we'd start preparing for next season, given 21 points pretty much means relegation. It would still be a reasonably strong team for us with all having already played first team games and all being classed as professional standing (with the exception of Williams who is a scholar).

1 minute ago, Davefevs said:

@AnotherDerbyFan

What is your view on whether Derby pay Rooney alone or whether it is a combo of Derby and Red32.  I guess (split made up) if Rooney is on £90k p.w. and Derby pay £20k / Red32 £70k, I'm guessing Red32 aren't gonna be required to pay £3.5m to Derby in Sponsorship???  Just my simple concept.

It'll be entirely Derby, with increased sponsorship. Hopefully only a few months until we finally see some accounts to give us a clue on how much extra 32Red are giving us

3 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

On the match purchase TV income: it'll be interesting to see how clubs account for it but it wasn't any part of existing deal, not Sky, nor EFL. Clubs were allowed to sell via their own arrangements and keep revenues, hence would have replaced to some degree matchday income.

RamsTV income could potetnially fall under match ticket income, but the much more likely option is for it to be grouped with TV income.

3 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

Sponsoring is invariably rolled up as Commercial Activity (for that is what it is,) but with Derby who knows? So one assumes there was no perimeter advertising at Pride Park last year, no use of trademark or copyright for intellectual property, that Derby laid off/furloughed all its commercial department? Bet it didn't.

Sponsorship is separate from commercial.

3 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

As for remaining within FFP limits, even your beloved Chairman has now conceded you haven't done that despite attempting, using the most contrived practice, to pretend you had.

The quicker Derby fess up, show the numbers and take their punishment, the better for them as their protracted pleadings are making the average fan, who couldn't normally give a flying about them, begin to wish their existence is short lived, better for the benefit of the game.

I gave a very vague comment, which could relate to 'new Derby method' or a 'standard method'.

6 minutes ago, Monkeh said:

Then your club deserves absolutely everything you get,

You could of sold those and not enter administration 

But then reading your post and clutching at straws I doubt you have the brain power to understand this

Like I said, not selling those players will be a contributing factor as to why it'd very unlikely we'll had the admin points deduction removed. Would selling the players we received offers for have been enough to get us through to a point of being self-sufficient? We'd have needed to raise £20m from sales for it to outweigh the Covid impact.

PS. I'm sure you can think of better insults than that. 0/10 for creativity, 1/10 for effort.

3 minutes ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Small point on the amortisation bit, don't have time to scroll through all the posts so apologies if already covered.

It all has to be accounted for eventually. Chances are that with Derby's methods, a breach could have materialised somewhere down the line. 

I remember figures posted by @AnotherDerbyFan months ago that showed amortisation over a lot of seasons using different methods.

Assuming that every penny of fee was correctly accounted for either through amortisation or impairment- of fees not goodwill- then it would've caught up with the club at some point, in a P&S context.

Possibly, it depends how it was spread out.

Method 1: £5m underspend, £5m underspend, £5m underspend = compliant in 3 periods
Method 2: £5m overspend, £10m underspend, £10m underspend = compliant in 2 periods

In all honesty, you probably would have seen us hit with much bigger points deductions if you had let us stick to 'The Derby Method'.

6 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

But that's exactly what you are suggesting, that revenues were severely hit by Covid. I know Derby think themselves an exception and love so to do but you can't have it both ways. Whilst TV & EFL fundings are less volatile, as Covid demonstrates ticket & commercial income may be. The point of accounts being to be able to see what you've banked and when? Who knows whether Derby front loaded commercial arrangements to suit in any given period without them being reported? Rangers did it for years, banking 'income' (sic) from deals secured against future revenues.

Why would commercial and match revenues be zero in 20/21? Didn't you play, didn't you sell online subscriptions to punters,

That falls under "TV, broadcasting revenue and football league income"

6 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

did all your commercial punters pull out? That's not what 32Red's accounts are likely to say or what their commercial director has spoke of this week re Rooney.

That falls under "sponsorship"

6 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

I think had you published your accounts when you were required so to do you would have been found to have contravened FFP, been deducted points, faced sanctions and wouldn't have benefitted from the prize money you did. Maybe that would have put you under? All conjecture as we won't know until, like all other clubs are required to, you publish your accounts, in full, non-impaired.

If we had published accounts when we were required, they would have likely shown we were still within the limits due to the amortisation policy.

8 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

@AnotherDerbyFan out of interest, what did Derby do re season tickets last season?

We were given 5 options for 19/20:

1. Pro-rata refund (I think it took until the start of this season for the remaining people to get it)
2. 20% discount on 20/21 ST
3. 10% discount on 20/21 ST with free RamsTV subscription for the remainder of the season
4. 4 match ticket vouchers for 20/21
5. No refund

For 20/21:

1. The above options to be carried over to 21/22
2. Option to get full refund on 20/21 ST, but had to request it before a certain match day
3. Pro-rata refund if keep 20/21 ST

Probably some other options, but can't remember off the top of my head

19 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

I guess there would be a counter-argument....what did MM do to mitigate Covid?  Should he have signed Joswiak, te Wierik, Kazim-Richards, Marshall, Byrne, Ibe and Clarke (loan) in such a Covid-landscape?

Other clubs cut back last summer (most didn't admittedly).

That's a good point. You could also add why we rejected multi-million pound offers for the likes of Lawrence and Buchanan just days before Mel started discussing administration.

A counter-counter-argument could be that no-one knew how long fans wouldn't be allowed in the stadium.

Too many complexities in it for me to think there's a realistic chance of getting the deduction overturned.

9 minutes ago, chinapig said:

I would nevertheless suggest that any reasonable person properly instructed as to the law as the lawyers say would apply the same logic i.e. that the impact of Covid was not unique to Derby, and therefore dismiss the argument.

The "we lost more than those little clubs" argument ignores the possibility that the clubs you disdain might have lost a smaller amount but an equal proportion of their income and amounts to special pleading. It also ignores the costs side of the equation, those costs having got out of control over a period predating Covid.

It doesn't matter if Covid affected other clubs or not and by how much. All that would matter is if without Covid the club wouldn't have entered administration.

9 minutes ago, chinapig said:

Still, Honest Mel is Innocent t-shirts could be a new income stream I suppose.

8 minutes ago, semblar said:

I won't dismiss that out of hand, but you have seen counter-arguments here already. Yes, the income will have dropped for sure.... but the same is true for all of the clubs in the championship (parachute clubs excepted perhaps) - none of them have had income from tickets or hospitality/commercial streams. SO the question to ask is why Derby and not most of the clubs? For that the answer most would jump to would be the "shenanigans" that Mel got up to chasing the dream.

See my above comment.

1 hour ago, chinapig said:

 

The supplementary rules already allow for adjustments for COVID-19 and apply to all clubs equally. So you can't just pluck a figure out of the air. Assuming you ever come up with any actual accounts.

Shockingly there is no special provision for Derby, so more victimisation by the EFL.

1.1.7  COVID-19 Costs means lost revenues and/or exceptional costs incurred by a Club that are directly attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic and that are identified and calculated in accordance with such guidance as issued by the Board;

and:

1.1.11  P&S Calculation means, save as indicated below, the aggregation of a Club’s Adjusted Earnings Before Tax for T, T-1 and T-2. In respect of Season 2020/21 only, the P&S Calculation shall be the aggregation of:

(a)  the mean of the Adjusted Earnings Before Tax of T and T-1; and

(b)  the Adjusted Earnings Before Tax of T-2; and

(c)  the Adjusted Earnings Before Tax of T-3;

That's P&S, not related to administration or cash flow

48 minutes ago, BTRFTG said:

You just don't get it, do you?

How can you state there was a drop in income when you've no idea what the income was in the preceding periods? What purpose do you think accounts play? Why are they important?

You claim you were driven to administration by 'cashflow' problems associated with Covid yet that doesn't accord with the numerous dodgy dealings obvious  in the numerous accounts pre June 2018 and since then? Yeah, nobody knows as accounts haven't been filed since and that, if for no other reason, should see strike offs.

You don't need to be an accountant to see Derby gambled sums far, far beyond their means. Covid didn't turn Ince's mother into a scout, or pay ransoms to dodgy associates for scouting reports highlighting Mbappe & Dembele are 'useful', or sign a succession of expensive &  overpaid chancers. And that's the problem with gambling, when you lose you lose. You don't get your stakes returned.

If Derby fans, like Morris,  are looking for sympathy because they are/were weak and addicted to the prospect of success I give you the immortal prophecy of Jim Bowen:" Look what you could have won." That you also appear to have done your BFH; deserving of cheats, I'd say.

It's you who doesn't get it. A club's revenue isn't volitile... it's not going to go from £30m to £10m, then up to £40m in successive seasons in the Championship. In 17/18 revenue was just under £30m. Roughly £15m of that was from match receipts and commercial/hospitality activities (which would have been £0 (or certainly very close to) in 20/21. 
In 17/18, we reached the Play-off semis and early rounds of the cups (Man Utd away in FA Cup). 18/19, it was the Playoff Final and cup games away to Man utd, Chelsea, Southampton and Brighton (I think all 4 of those were on TV?). Match receipts would have been down in 19/20 (no Playoffs or cup run), but sponsorship thanks to Rooney would have offset that slightly. 20/21 would have been similar to 19/20, but for a full year of Rooney sponsorship. For simplicity, it's reasonable to just assume £30m revenue for all seasons, minus the Covid impact on match receipts and commercial/hospitality activities... c50% of revenue.

It's not about what we spent prior to Covid. It's about whether the numbers stack up to say we would not have been in administration if it wasn't for Covid - in our case, was the business going to be self-sustainable from the 22/23 season onwards.

I'm not looking for sympathy at all. I'm simply putting forward a potential viewpoint that some on here instantly choose to dismiss without actually looking at it in detail.