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Our playing budget - now we know

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  • It's obviously not perfectly accurate, but the new Football Manager game will give a good idea, it's surprisingly well researched.

  • The Times has an article about Wycombe today as the club continues its public relations drive to get this deal through.

    In it there's confirmation our playing budget now stands at £2m.

    It's also notable for two things - Pete Couhig's failure to actually spell out what his family are offering the club in return for taking it on, other than a sprucing up of the stadium and training ground.

    And a remarkable quote from Trevor Stroud, who believes our natural level is National League - despite us not having played that low for 25 years. It's a damning indicator of his failure of leadership - frankly the only thing that's national league at this club is the quality of the current board.

    One thing is very clear to me. This deal would have a much better chance of going through if Stroud were to publicly say he would not serve as one of the two Trust directors on a future board. Or better still, one of the Couhigs to announce they would not let him.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/decision-time-for-wycombe-wanderers-fans-on-try-before-you-buy-deal-nnq5pngch

  • @aloysius, I can't read the article as it's behind a paywall but if Trevor Stroud did say that the National League is our natural level then I find that very surprising.

    I believe we have split our time equally between tiers 3 and 4 since coming into the football league, 13 in each. There is nothing National League about that and our support is well above that level. He may be referring to our playing budget but that's not the whole story.

  • Just have to hope that this much hyped "plan" promises a lot more when revealed.

    And that everyone who can votes does so

  • The Times article does not spell out the detail, I’m expecting to get that at next weeks meeting. Indeed I’d be disappointed to read that information in the press before it’s presented to us. As I interpret TS’s comments refer to our budget being National League not our playing level. Interesting article for non Wycombe fans but nothing new for us.

  • @Steve_Peart it wouldn't be fair to the Times's business model to share the whole article but here is the direct quote from Trevor Stroud:

    The club has two options, "cut our cloth accordingly, and find our level, which I believe would be at the National League. Or find a 'partner'. And I think we've found one."

  • I would interpret Mr Stroud's quote differently to you, @aloysius . As I read it he is saying that the finances are such that without investment, financial realities mean it is likely we will slip to the national league. That feels like a realistic arguably slightly optimistic point of view.

    Each of us are free to make our own judgments on the Trust's management of the club. For what it is worth mine is that they will (hopefully) hand over ownership of the club with the club still being a FL club (indeed at a higher level than when they took over). In the circumstances, while they have no doubt made all sorts of mistakes, that means they have done an amazing job IMHO. I am grateful to all of them but as the trust leader for most of that period especially to Mr Stroud (as well as to the likes of Andrew Howard and Gareth Ainsworth.).

  • @aloysius the Trust directors will be elected by the membership won't they? Can't see how else they can be selected

  • @DevC you think that without investment Wycombe Wanderers could sustain an Isthmian League team? At the same level as Bowers & Pitsea and Potters Bar Town?

  • So things we still need to know then:

    1) How long will it take, and how much money will have to be spent before you believe our income will be at the level to make us a self-sustaining football club?

    2) Are you prepared to commit to spending that amount of money to make it so?

    3) What if your calculations are wrong, or we fail to pull the crowds in to support the model? Do you have enough money/are you prepared to spend what it takes to keep us going at the same budget/wage bill? And for how long?

    ps thanks for sorting out the beer tent, it's brilliant. Oh, and it's really fun seeing all the photos of fans in Chicago and New Orleans wearing Wycombe t-shirts, nice one.

  • Not sure sarcasm is particularly helpful in that context @eric_plant .

  • Not sure why these conversations are continuing. The simple fact is that we accept the deal with the risks or go under.No choice

  • You might be right @Hughie.

  • Not sarcastic at all, I genuinely love the beer tent and have already spent loads more than I would have otherwise spent were it not there.

    In fact, I reckon I've spent more there already this season than in the whole of last season. Seriously

  • @Hughie said:
    Not sure why these conversations are continuing. The simple fact is that we accept the deal with the risks or go under.No choice

    Without knowing if they've got any money or not?

    Or indeed, what the deal even is?

  • There are fleeting moments, Trevor Stroud says, when he asks himself if the offer is too good to be true. The chairman of Sky Bet League One Wycombe Wanderers, fan-owned since 2012, says the club has two options. “Cut our cloth accordingly, and find our level, which I believe would be the National League,” Stroud, who also chairs the Supporters’ Trust, says. “Or find a ‘partner’. And I think we’ve found one.”

    For the past three months, Rob Couhig, a 70-year-old American venture capitalist, and the 132-year-old football club have, essentially, been involved in a mutually beneficial “try before you buy” arrangement.

    Twelve games into the season and, with Couhig and his team’s investment, plus the ever-impressive leadership of Gareth Ainsworth, their inspirational manager, The Chairboys are second in the table and at Adams Park there is a crackle of excitement in the air.

    Couhig’s offer would result in the Trust retaining a 25 per cent stake in the club, two elected supporters on the board of directors and, crucially, the title deeds to Adams Park. But here’s the rub. Couhig’s proposal requires 75 per cent of Wycombe’s 875 legacy members (season ticket holders for three or more years) to vote in favour for the deal to proceed next week. “That, originally, was a defence mechanism,” Stroud says. “But it could come back to bite us.”

    It is a familiar conundrum. “The average League One or Two club loses between £500k-£600k a year,” Stroud says. “Last year we had the third lowest budget [in League One] and were still losing money. As a fan-owned club we’re asking supporters to fund that deficit every year. But we just can’t keep doing that, and the price of football is going up and up all the time.”

    Ainsworth, given the recent plight of Bury and Bolton Wanderers, accepts that “it’s a real double-edged sword”, he says. “But you want ambition and success in football — fans want that. And I believe [Couhig] is genuine, that he has the best interests of the club at heart.”

    In the summer the picture looked different. A relegation battle this season loomed after a deal with a previous group of investors fell thorough in May and Ainsworth, who led Wycombe to a 17th-place finish, was informed his playing budget was being cut by a third to £1.2 million — a figure smaller than several National League clubs.

    Instead, Couhig’s arrival furnished him with a budget of about £2 million with which 11 summer signings, including Fred Onyedinma from Millwall and Rolando Aarons and Paul Smyth on loan from Newcastle United and QPR respectively, added strength to a threadbare squad.

    New smart turnstiles and a fans’ village, with live music, in association with Rebellion, a local brewery, have been introduced and there are plans to spruce up the training ground and Adams Park.

    After the gripping 3-3 draw against Peterborough United on Saturday, Couhig’s nephew Peter, an ebullient, football-loving 46-year-old who has left his wife and three children back in Louisiana to oversee the club’s day-to-day running, explains how a conversation with his uncle over thanksgiving dinner a few years back sowed a seed that would lead to their investment in English football.

    After a deal to buy Yeovil Town collapsed in May the Americans looked at several EFL clubs including, Peter says, Bolton and Bury. “It took five and a half minutes to figure out how fed Bury were,” he says. Wycombe’s location half an hour from London, though, and the Supporters’ Trust’s involvement piqued their interest. “Essentially, we’re hoping to become partners with a community,” he says. “And, the football side is under control. Gareth is a fing legend. He’s one of the best people I’ve met. The way he puts his changing room together, it’s kind of magic.”

    The irrepressible Adebayo Akinfenwa, one of three team “Generals”, along with Matt Bloomfield and Joe Jacobson, who scored a 95th-minute equaliser from the penalty spot on Saturday in his 150th game for the club, agrees. “I’ve been in a lot of changing rooms in my career, but the culture and the togetherness here is amazing — it’s rare,” he says.

    Ainsworth, who moonlights as lead singer in The Cold Blooded Hearts and Peter Couhig, whose family owns music venues in Louisiana, share a passion for rock’n’ roll. “He grew up in New Orleans,” Ainsworth says of Peter, “I grew up in Blackburn, but we were both listening to Guns N’ Roses, Motley Crew and classic rock. It’s amazing the connection we have.”

    At full-time Ainsworth soaked in the adulation of the home support with The Troggs’ Wild Thing — Ainsworth’s moniker during a playing career as a swashbuckling winger for Wimbledon and QPR, among others — ringing in his ears. The players have chosen their own goal celebration songs, although if Akinfenwa’s choice — DMX’s Ruff Ryders — made it on to the sound system it was drowned out by raucous stoppage-time celebrations.

    Last week, The Cold Blooded Hearts even recorded their own version of Dion’s The Wanderer, the club’s unofficial anthem, in the Woodlands Lounge at Adams Park, which could soon be added to the match-day entertainment. Ainsworth, to rephrase the Sixties classic, may be a Wanderer, but he is the type of guy who likes to settle down.

    Last month, the 46-year-old rebuffed the overtures of Lincoln City, the latest club to covet his services, and celebrated seven years in the job, making him the second longest-serving manager in the Football League behind Morecambe’s Jim Bentley. “It would take something extra special for me to go, because of what I’ve built here, what I have here,” Ainsworth admits.

    It has been quite a journey but despite windfalls from FA Cup ties against Aston Villa and Tottenham Hotspur, a League Two Wembley play-off final, promotion to League One and a sell on clause in Jordan Ibe’s transfer from Bournemouth to Liverpool, debts of almost £2 million — which Couhig would clear as part of the deal — have accrued and so Wycombe are approaching a crossroads.

    “We were staring down the barrels in the summer,” Stroud says. “And if there’s a “no” vote, those barrels will very quickly come back up, and we will be staring at them again.”

  • Phew! Wish I was as quick (and articulate) on the keys @TrueBlu. Not read it yet because I wanted hastily (for me) to clarify to @eric_plant that I was referring to his last sentence. I know it was probably intended as a humorous quip (and I totally agree about the tent) but the reference to pictures of people in New Orleans wearing Wanderers kit came across as a bit sarcastic especially in the absence of recognition of the substantial injection of cash that has contributed to our present lofty League status.
    I overreacted.

  • Aah, have now read your post @TrueBlu .
    A verbatim transcription of the Times article, I assume. Lively stuff from Pete Couhig and interesting (a) that he seems to be more or less in residence here (I recall how emotional he became at the inaugural meeting when talking about his three children and how he would miss them) and (b) how reassuringly close he and GA are.
    Interesting stuff, thank you @TrueBlu .

  • oh that, yeah that was a bit sarcastic. Just a contrast between what we've been shown so far (pictures of americans with Wycombe flags) and what we've been told that we actually need to know (pretty much nothing)

    As a point of order, the "injection of cash" will either be converted into equity when he owns most of the club, or paid back with interest by next June. As of this moment he has "injected" no cash whatsoever other than in the form of a loan

  • I think it may have helped a little though @eric_plant .

  • It's not going to have helped much if we've got until next June (actually it may be sooner as the vote is taking place sooner that originally planned) to pay it back is it?

  • Oh, those negative thoughts. They just keep creeping in.

  • @eric_plant said:
    It's not going to have helped much if we've got until next June (actually it may be sooner as the vote is taking place sooner that originally planned) to pay it back is it?

    And more importantly, rapidly find a way to pay it back. I hope everyone, after examining the details of the offer and deciding to vote against have a realistic plan to repay the loan.

  • @mooneyman said:

    @eric_plant said:
    It's not going to have helped much if we've got until next June (actually it may be sooner as the vote is taking place sooner that originally planned) to pay it back is it?

    And more importantly, rapidly find a way to pay it back. I hope everyone, after examining the details of the offer and deciding to vote against have a realistic plan to repay the loan.

    That's the big problem isn't it.
    You can just stick a NO, and know it's not your job to work out the massive mess.

    It doesn't bear thinking about what happens if it's a No.

  • @peterparrotface said:
    @DevC you think that without investment Wycombe Wanderers could sustain an Isthmian League team? At the same level as Bowers & Pitsea and Potters Bar Town?

    To answer your direct question @peterparrotface , (as I always try to), honest truth is I don't know.

    Hardest part would be to get through the transition down to whatever level we could then sustain - eg how to keep paying player salaries currently under contract while revenues fall.

    If we ignored that practical (and potentially very serious problem) , I find it hard to see how we would manage a conference national team - the finances in that level are even more bonkers than Lg1 and Lg2 level. Hard to know how attendances would hold up so my view is possible we could hold at National Lge South or possible we would slip to one level below (where I see we find old foes from my youth (Bishop Stortford, Carshalton, Corinthian Casuals, Leatherhead, are Enfield town the reincarnation of Enfield of old).

  • In before EP, RITM or countless others...

    "beyond parody"

  • The main portion of @eric_plant post above still stands, You have to love the prospect of the investment and fear other options but finding out in 2 or even 5 years time that we had some fun but didn't make it to break even and the losses sit in a loan somewhere and they want their £ back is something that can't happen. The structure and amount of investment and the funding of the club going forward are paramount

    • Haven't heard anything sounding dodgy but would like to know before I voted if I had
    • Of course we could go bust anyway without any investment and that has to be considered
  • Indeed @Malone.

    But I suspect that is the reality. Do you disagree?

  • @DevC Thanks for the reply Dev

  • Agree with @eric_plant 's list above. It's hard to see us limping on after a no vote without finance, but we do need some answers. We don't want to be looking back from a struggling non-league phoenix club saying...'if it hadn't been for that bloody beer app shining in my eyes....'

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