So where has the money gone?

Here's 3 places:

1. Property speculation. The board have consistently over-estimated how much we would make from our property dealings: Doncaster originally believed that the revenues generated by development of other land owned in and around Carrow Road,would finance the building of the new South Stand and infill. In fact in excess of ?10 million had to be borrowed. As an aside I reckon the infill was between 2/3 and 3/4 empty today. And as a further aside, from what little was revealed about the dealings with Cullum it was clear that the stumbling block was the valuation of the club. This can only mean that the club's valuation of the land it owns was higher than Cullum's.

2. The Academy. I read somewhere that the average Academy costs ?3 million pa to run. I can't believe that ours costs that much, but nevertheless it is the case that our Academy has produced no players who are currently playing regularly at Championship level or above (the closest is our 3rd choice left back and fourth (or fifth?) choice centre back - Shackell).

3. Transfer Activity.Up until his last summer in charge (when the board finally pulled the plug - thus ensuring that, unlike in December 2005, they would have enough money to sack him) Worthington transferred in an average of 10 players a year, and got rid of an average of 10 players a year. Given that we have a Chairman who believes that 60% of transfers at this level are failures - it's impossible to understand why this was allowed to go on for 5 years.

Posted By: Mr Creosote, Aug 17, 00:18:21