[Archived] Financial Crackdown

[67splitscreen]

Clubs must submit independently audited accounts to the Premier League by 1 March each year with requirements to note any material qualifications or issues raised by auditors

Clubs must submit future financial information to the Premier League by 31 March each year as early warning for any club taking undue financial risk

An annual requirement to demonstrate to the Premier League Board that a club does not have outstanding debts to other clubs

An annual requirement to demonstrate to the Premier League Board that a club is not in debt with regard to income tax or National Insurance and payroll taxes

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How many sets of A/C do they want, is our club year end of May???? So next year on the 1st March we would only have 9 months of T/A. ??????

[philipl]

Clubs usually have a 30 June financial year end which coincides with the season end.

So this requires the information to be filed 8 months after the year end. Quietly behind the scenes, the PL has had to assist three clubs get through difficult times by closely monitoring what was going on in their financial crisis and in at least one case acting as marriage broker to facilitate transfers solving indebtedness problems between clubs.

Taking the points and looking at the practical implications to the recent past:

Clubs must submit independently audited accounts to the Premier League by 1 March each year with requirements to note any material qualifications or issues raised by auditors-

Most famously, Liverpool's accounts last year had a serious question on them from the auditors as to whether they would raise the finance they needed. Both West Ham and Pompey have failed to file accounts by the deadline required by Companies House so this stops that sort of behaviour.

Clubs must submit future financial information to the Premier League by 31 March each year as early warning for any club taking undue financial risk

I'd hate to be the person writing that report for either West Ham or Man U just now. Pompey is a very grey area despite the take over. The owners of Chelsea, Wigan and Fulham are going to have to give some very explicit assurances about the nature of their loans to those clubs.

The owners of Sunderland, Stoke, Villa and Bolton will also have some explaining to do.

An annual requirement to demonstrate to the Premier League Board that a club does not have outstanding debts to other clubs

The richest league in the world was enormously embarassed to find out that Thaksin's Man City regarded commitments to pay clubs in Croatia and Ukraine for transfer fees as avoidable/delayable. City came within a whisker of being banned from all transfer activity by UEFA/FIFA and it required incredibly deft negotiations involving the FA and PL to avoid that public sanction because had the ban come in, Abu Dhabi would have walked and the PL would have had one spectacularly bankrupt member club on its hands.

Since then both Liverpool and Pompey have transferred players back to Spurs when they did not have the cash to pay transfer fee instalments when they fell due.

An annual requirement to demonstrate to the Premier League Board that a club is not in debt with regard to income tax or National Insurance and payroll taxes

That would cause red faces at Man City and Pompey in the recent past.

All in all, these regulations are a very good thing and EXTREMELY GOOD news for well managed clubs like Blackburn Rovers.

The PL had got wage inflation under control until new owners turned up at Man City, Pompey and West Ham two and a bit seasons ago. All those clubs got themselves into all kinds of messes subsequently so although it is bolting the stable door after that particular horse has gone, hopefully:

- there will be much less opportunity for cowboy buyers in the PL

- the purchasing of clubs leveraging its own assets into the never never as happened at Liverpool and Man U will be prevented

- it leaves open the opportunities for genuinely rich owners who want to plough their own money into the "fun" of having a PL club which of course is being threatened by Platini's proposed changes. The PL acting decisively in the way it has might just head the Platini changes off and conceivably puts an alternative model on the table for UEFA to adopt.

This BBC article takes no prisoners in naming names and stating facts that are in the public domain. There are real sanctions in terms of bans on transfers and registering contract extensions.

[Boz]

This all sounds great to me and is long overdue.

I'm just wondering whether there is likely to be any teeth to back up these proposals.

It can only be positive for a well run and financially sound club such as BRFC. I didn't miss anything about wage % limits included did I?

[philipl]

Platini's new rules to preserve the status quo starts in 2012

I guess new owners will just have to build the most lavishly outragously expensive corporate suites for themselves and sign mega advertising deals for their other businesses and all will be OK.

If Standard Chartered think appearing on Liverpool's shirt is worth £80m, the Abu Dhabi refuse collection company is bound to be able to justify buying Messi in order to be on the Man City shirt.

[philipl]

Strong signs that another PL club- Hull- are sliding into deep trouble because of the financial difficulties of their new owner.

Under the PL's new rules coming in next season, Hull would be blocked from signing new players or entering into new contracts with existing players.

...that is if Hull are still in the PL by then.

[unluckymorton]

Strong signs that another PL club- Hull- are sliding into deep trouble because of the financial difficulties of their new owner.

Under the PL's new rules coming in next season, Hull would be blocked from signing new players or entering into new contracts with existing players.

...that is if Hull are still in the PL by then.

That makes our close season dealings make an awful lot of sense to me. We were all a little frustrated as to where the money was being filtered, but it seems to me that paying off debt and balancing the books could prove to work in our favour in the not too distant future when clubs like Pompey and Hull are hitting financial difficulties.

[thenodrog]

Hull City chairman was bragging about their financial integrity just 12 months ago.

[rebelmswar]

Hull City chairman was bragging about their financial integrity just 12 months ago.

The designer of the Titanic was doing the same -water tight integrity- as it was sinking.

No one is blinder than a person facing facts they do not like.