Good piece in the Daily Telegraph that outlines the mess (‘best run’, ‘sensibly run club’ labels certainly have parallels to BRFC c2010)… By Tom Morgan and James Ducker 23 May 2022 • 10:15pm Burnley will play in the Championship for the first time since 2016 next season Over the four years since Burnley reached the heights of European qualification, the decline of the Premier League's "best-run club" began gradually and then, in recent months, went into freefall. Here Telegraph Sport dissects how the risky and contentious American leveraged buyout of a locally owned club leaves the Clarets facing the most expensive relegation in English football history. Boardroom inertia immediately before the takeover Mike Garlick's ownership of Burnley was hailed as a beacon of footballing overachievement. Analysis by the University of Liverpool's Centre for Sports Business Group concluded in 2019 that Burnley were the "most sensibly run club in the Premier League financially". In June 2020, six months prior to the ALK takeover, there was £80million in the bank and minimal long-term debt. However, as he brokered a sale, the club's ability to bounce back from the Championship became a good deal more brittle than it had been after previous Premier League relegations in 2010 and 2015. Those close to the club say alarm bells began ringing in the weeks after the club enjoyed one its happiest days – May 5 2018, when the Clarets secured seventh spot and a return to European football for the first time in 51 years. To some disappointment there would be no ambitious signings that summer to build on the record arrival of the previous season, Chris Wood. As a result the squad's average age gradually rose and cumulative values fell, with pleas for renewal falling on deaf ears as Garlick put an apparent brake on spending while the prospect of a sale grew and negotiations with potential buyers took place. The lack of Premier League safeguards With a £65million millstone now hanging around the club's neck, Burnley fans can quite rightly claim to have been failed by the system. Telegraph Sport reported a fortnight ago how the Football Association and Premier League are in talks about clamping down on leveraged buyouts as part of a new directors' and owners' test. But that will be of no comfort for a club which must now immediately start repaying a relegation clause connected with the takeover. The £170million deal secured by ALK Capital in December 2020 loaded the club with eye-watering levels of debt. Accounts published earlier this month show the fall to the Championship triggers the immediate repayment of “a significant proportion” of a £65million loan from US equity firm MSD Holdings. As a result, the initial parachute payment that gives most recently relegated clubs a head start will be of little help. Burnley are due to receive £42million in the first year from the top tier but that appears almost certain to be swallowed up, with Alan Pace’s ALK Capital also borrowing £37million from the club’s own bank to help finance the takeover. For a club now facing life without the Premier League TV money that currently accounts for 90 per cent of revenues, there will also be concern over interest rates for the debt within the club. The London Inter-bank offered rate is plus eight per cent and US private equity firms tend to use six or 12-month deals. The six-month rate is currently 1.8 per cent, which would make Burnley’s interest rate 9.8 per cent – around £6.5m a year. Unanswered questions for ALK Capital Pace, a former Wall Street financier who led the US consortium ALK Capital, has described the exact details of the takeover as confidential. The level of debt within the club was only laid bare earlier this month in the annual accounts, which detail how, in the event of relegation, "steps to reduce costs and borrowings to a level which are more sustainable for a Championship club" will be required. "In the event of relegation, the directors are satisfied that the group will continue to have the support of its lenders," the accounts add. However, there remains some confusion over how much a club with a proud history of retaining cash reserves has in the bank as it stands. Earlier this month, for example, it emerged Burnley had taken out a £12.5million loan from Australian firm Macquarie Bank in order to effectively claim up front the second half of a transfer instalment from Chris Wood's sale to Newcastle. The striker had moved to St James' Park in January after Newcastle activated a £25million release clause, but the second £12.5million instalment is not due until February 2023. There was no immediate explanation for why Burnley had taken the money as a loan now, rather than wait 12 months for Newcastle to cough up the rest of the cash. Pace, who is a committed Mormon, has repeatedly declined to go into extensive details about how the private investment firm purchased a controlling 84 per cent stake for about £170million. However, outlining his vision, he said in January 2021: "To be super clear, this is not Moneyball." ‘False economies’ under the new regime Pace arrived at the club with a long list of ideas and there has been much activity behind the scenes, which one source describes as: "A lot of fiddling around while Rome is burning." ALK, which embraces data and analytics, would help the club win an innovation award for its use of AiScout, an artificial intelligence-based platform for identifying player talent. Modernisation of Turf Moor has included revamped hospitality suites, new LED big screens and a new stand sponsor, Utilita. There are also new kit sponsors and a TikTok live stream for women’s team matches. New jobs behind the scenes included the appointment of Russell Ball as head of matchday operations, Harriet Harbridge as fan experience manager, Lola Ogunbote as business lead on the women's team, and Gurpri Bains as equality, diversity and inclusion lead. Wout Weghorst, Burnley's big January signing, shows his disappointment following their relegation Wout Weghorst, Burnley's big January signing, shows his disappointment following their relegation CREDIT: REUTERS In other areas, however, positions have taken longer to fill. Mike Rigg, the technical director since 2018, left last year. The club was for some time without a chief executive, technical director and head of academy. But ultimately it is the lack of player recruitment that has hampered a team which was close to the brink for more than a year. In 2021, Burnley had the lowest points-per-game total of all 92 Football League clubs. Pace flew to Croatia to try to tie up a deal for Mislav Orsic from Dinamo Zagreb in January but it fell through, leaving Wout Weghorst, a £12m buy from Wolfsburg signed as Wood's replacement, as the only mid-season arrival. Owners now need to fill managerial vacuum Whether Dyche still had fresh enough ideas to keep Burnley up is debatable. His relationship with Garlick, once rock solid, had become increasingly strained during their final two years together and there was exasperation at the lack of investment in the squad. Tensions remained in the wake of the change of ownership. Despite declaring initially that Dyche was central to their plans, ALK gradually seemed to be moving in a different direction to the manager, not least over the age and profile of players they wanted to target, and concern began to grow over results and performances. The four-year contract Dyche signed last September was described as a "marriage of convenience" by one insider. Despite his previous success on such a meagre budget, some of the players were also said to be supportive of a refresh when his shock sacking was announced in April. For some of the older players, in particular, there was frustration at Dyche's refusal to modify training schedules to help them cope with the demands of two matches a week. However, a month on, Burnley are no closer to finding a long-term replacement. Results initially improved under caretaker Mike Jackson, but the ownership were targeting Vincent Kompany, the current Anderlecht manager and ex-Manchester City captain, for the summer. Given the tall order facing Burnley now, there are serious doubts over whether Kompany would still consider the job. Whoever takes over faces a much tougher task building a squad than Dyche did in 2012, insiders point out. Player recruitment has become much more sophisticated among rivals over the past 10 years, and, despite a dip post-pandemic, there has also been heavy inflation on player values for youngsters in League One and the Championship. Enforced player clear-out to come The biggest worry of all is a potential struggle in the Championship, with the vultures already swooping to snatch Burnley's best talent. Everton and Aston Villa are already doing battle for the signing of defender James Tarkowski, who is out of contract this summer. Tarkowski is among nine players at the end of their deals and able to leave, with little incentive to stay given salaries will be automatically reduced. Company accounts all but confirm that a change in personnel is required: "In this scenario [relegation] the group has forecast a significant reduction in wages and salaries which will be largely achieved by contractual means existing in player contracts." Nick Pope could be among the players snapped up by Burnley's competitors Nick Pope could be among the players snapped up by Burnley's competitors CREDIT: AFP The England goalkeeper Nick Pope, winger Dwight McNeil and the forward Maxwel Cornet, who has a £17.5million release clause, would be high on the list of targets for rival clubs. Weghorst will also attract interest. Dr Rob Wilson, head of Sports Business Management at Sheffield Hallam university, has said relegation could be even more costly than it was for Sunderland, given the debt involved. Telegraph Sport revelations last week that Burnley's academy is set to lose its category-one status add to the sense of despair over the club's future prospects. The Professional Game Board (PGB) is expected to formally ratify a revokement this week, meaning that the club will no longer have the highest ranking for what will be an increasingly crucial talent pipeline. Burnley were one of a number of clubs, along with Leeds, Crystal Palace, Nottingham Forest and Birmingham City, who were provisionally afforded category-one status in the summer of 2020 during the Covid pandemic on the understanding that a comprehensive audit would be undertaken once it was safe to do so. But, after failing checks carried out by the Professional Game Academy Audit Company (PGAAC) during a full and thorough review earlier this year, it was recommended that Burnley’s academy is downgraded. There are minimal levels of investment expected in coaches, pitches and facilities to meet Cat 1 status.

We aren’t even posting flyers to all our existing (and dwindling) ST holder base, nevermind trying to attract anybody new - the £30 premium for any potential new purchaser tells us that. Still, *everyone* knows how and where to buy one in this day and age, don’t they? So why go to the bother of trying to market them?

To give that lot six years in the PL says he certainly was…

Right, so who else is on the list?

Great news for the N01 Dingle spotters too, they’ll have eleven to boo all in the same game…

I went to Andalusia last summer. You are right, I never saw a Malaga shirt, but spent a few days across in Cadiz and you saw their yellow shirt and flag everywhere…

Good as new too… never needed to be used.

Bang on the money. Yet, you are seemingly ‘negative’ to want and expect better (though this can only be for the good of the club), whilst you are ‘positive’ if you meekly accept the club’s approach to sales and marketing (which is to merely repeat what failed so badly last summer). Keep on with the failed polices for another summer and positive think the ST’s out of the door is the plan, obviously!

I’m sure, but not too many knocking about Lancs!

A normal club, I would agree with you, say a Leicester, as it would remind me of our own European campaigns and I’d think of the time of their lives their fans will be having. Southern clubs? No real opinion either way, good for them if they win one, I suppose. However, Man Utd or Liverpool? No, nay, never! Don’t want their hordes of local plastics to have a sniff of any more reflected glory… so, Hala Madrid!

*Everyone* knows all these things, do they? You have some serious knowledge of our fanbase, obviously. Though I bet if you asked a 100 ST holders when next season starts I wager you wouldn’t hear many responses of ‘July’. I want the best for the club, so on all matters I point out where they are going wrong and how we can improve, that is positive. We sold our lowest numbers of STs for thirty plus years last summer, so obviously the club needs taking to task on this issue and any way to improve comms and marketing around STs obviously needs looking at. Merely parroting the lines of incompetents that have somehow got themselves into senior positions at the club is not positive from my standpoint, but is actually working against the best interests of Blackburn Rovers, but some folk on here obviously enjoy the relationships they have developed within Ewood, fair enough if that’s how they get their kicks.

No you thought you’d patronise folk instead. Yes, of course you can use a website or ring up the TO. But if you aren’t particularly tech savvy/internet literate (as many older fans aren’t) so you miss all the tweets and FB posts, and you haven’t even received a flyer (Glen hasn’t, so presumably many others haven’t either), never mind a DD pack, then your marketing strategy is failing.

And if it is true it means Swag et al are happy for the infrastructure to get into this sorry state and not asking for said cheques… either way it is a piss poor way to run a club.

Glen asked if people received a ‘pack’, I said no, it was a leaflet directing to you the website. A statement of fact. So not sure why you have to go into full club defence mode again, have a day off.

I know, I received one, but thanks. It’s not a ‘renewal pack’, as there is no pack with DD details to complete, a SAE for return etc, it’s a flyer telling you to buy one on the website.

End of the day we are pouring over their accounts, their ownership, their potential fire sale with no mercy… as did they a decade ago. We are looking for evidence of a closing gap as they come back to our orbit, we aren’t suddenly going to go all philosophical over the evils of US venture capitalism, you swim with alligators, you get eaten. That’s football rivalry.

I did get something in the post, but I wouldn’t call it a ‘renewal pack’, just a leaflet directing me to the website.

South Asia has obviously struggled to produce footballers of any note (though that doesn’t mean there isn’t potential either there or in the diaspora). But a bit odd to lump east Asia in into it, as Japan and South Korea are consistently strong sides and do produce plenty of players that are across Europe’s top leagues…

Yes to the first part, but they will *only* get c5k due to the DE car park limitations for the coaches, as otherwise it would’ve been yes to the second part too…

Sums them up that they’d pick a Rovers defeat as a season highlight. Get that tinpot outfit back to where they belong…

So Sharpe is wrong. Plus the club (who always like to crow about even minimal improvements) are choosing not to publicise this well needed new drainage system? Hmm, doesn’t add up, sorry.

Yet a far more unlikeable fanbase with the millions of plastic hangers on that pollute every town, so… ‘Blue Moon… ‘

So no new drainage system then, perhaps don’t exaggerate for effect in future!

It’s a photo of a grass-less pitch, not really going to tell me much, is it! So Sharpe is wrong and we are having a new drainage system put in like you said this morning?

The mental gymnastics here 😁