Wage bill (FAO east of hampstead, and others)

The most recent Deloitte and Touche report (for 05/6, I think) put our player wage bill at £8.37m - the average for the division was £9.55m, and we placed 12th on the list (in line with the board budgeting for a mid-table finish). Yet the latest accounts had player wages reduced at £7.4m (an extraordinarily low 31% of turnover), out of a total wage bill of £14m!!

In other words, the non-footballing wage bill is astoundingly high: and the proportion of our income we spend on player wages must be one of the lowest in the division. Yet the debt remains at £17.7m - why? Because of the loans we have to service, both short and long term, incurred through securitising the Jarrold Stand, speculation on land, and all the associated costs that go with it.

Because we have to repay one short-term debt of £6m by Xmas next year, unremitting struggle on the pitch until then can only be expected - and consider this. At the same time as arguing we had to cut our costs in preparation for the end of our parachute payments, so denying the manager money to spend, we were taking out ANOTHER £1.3m loan to finance "office development".

The bottom line is we WOULD have more than enough income - if we hadn't totally hamstrung ourselves with all the loans and land purchases.

Posted By: thebigfeller, Oct 1, 10:14:17