I was interviewed by Gregor Robertson for the Times last year for the 10 year anniversary (lack of modesty klaxon) & I likened Venky’s to someone who buys a stately home, sacks all the gardeners & maintenance staff, then burns it to the ground...then thinks...”Perhaps we should think about rebuilding it ?” Only now, they’ve reverted to Venky’s 1.0 & seem set upon a course of further destruction of the legacy.

It’s not asset stripping if they pump in £200m first. It’s loss mitigation.

Do you know what asset stripping means ? Genuine question...

No...it was shared in confidence.

20-25% of Gross Development Value is a reasonable desktop estimate I suspect...c.£20m perhaps ? (170*450k) 🤔

My understanding is that talk of early retirement is wide of the mark

Nailed it.

Somebody concerned about m’learned friends...

In the words of Vic & Bob I just couldn’t let it lie....😉 Upon checking...the share capital increases are with the parent company VLL. The company that is subject to FFP is the football trading entity BRFC (per Kieran Maguire’s podcast) not the parent. Let’s look at the BRFC figures then to see what V’s have injected... June 16 - share capital £146.9m, loans from parent £87.2m June 19 - share capital unchanged, parent loans £126.8m The owner has therefore introduced funds of....£39.6m...spooky (!)...over a 3 year period. This suggests that Rovers are sailing close to the FFP wind as of June 19. The June 20 numbers will reflect some of the Covid impacts but the June 21 ones will potentially be a bloodbath....hence the whole Brockhall project IMHO...

The purpose of the Academy is two-fold, provide first team players, then sell them to help fund the clubs working capital. If we lose Cat 1 status, both of those become harder. Developing other clubs players of course helps them....so it would be perverse in the extreme to pursue that intellectual argument....*insert pithy comment here* 🤨

I was still editing my post...re-read it now 👍🏻

https://www.mikethornton.xyz/ffp-and-p-and-s/ if a club loses more than £39m via the FFP calculation it is subject to penalty. If the club is to continue trading, it must pay its bills so it either borrows more or the owners put more share capital in to provide working capital. Owners can put in more than the £39m if they choose....but the funds would not mitigate the FFP fail & the idea is that a fine would be imposed to negate the impact of the cash injection. So in practice...they are restricted as to what they can invest. The FFP calculation isn’t just a case of adding up 3 years P&L numbers. It is an adjusted calculation. So owners are allowed to invest extra on allowable expenditure e.g. stadium redevelopment, training ground etc. So Venky’s could well have been investing more than £39m gross...because some of that is allowable.

Well you can sell all your players as well so don’t get hung up about that...😉

I wish I could double like this...outstanding...

They aren’t different for FFP. A club can lose up to £39m in a 3 year cycle...though that has been extended due to COVID. When a club loses money, the owner can invest up to £39m to cover those losses via loans or share capital. We must be perilously close to the FFP threshold before COVID. This whole proposal is to my mind to bring us back in line. It has nothing to do with improving facilities.

The money V’s put in is literally to pay the bills. An internal overdraft if you will. The FFP calculation restricts what owners can put in. If they put more in than the FFP calculation we are in embargo, fine, points deduction territory.

That’s the point...V’s could if they wanted invest to do this...the fact that they aren’t but instead are realising the latent value of that land will generate a profit which helps our FFP calculation. Its not what JW had in mind.

I hate to say it...but FFP...this helps our FFP...

Sadly I agree...

The club doesn’t own land in India....the balance sheet being managed here is the club’s...

Exactly this...to pretend it’s anything about a new improved facility is frankly implausible.

Lazy f*cker 🤣 Losing half the footprint, half the pitches, rebuild STC but no bigger than current one

That’s not what the plans show

1. Rebuild the Riverside 2. Refurb/renew the rest of Ewood & it’s environs 3. Invest in the ladies team 4. Buy a Brexit busting feeder club in RoI 5. Appoint a sales & marketing director 6. Appoint someone to run merchandising & licensing 7. Appoint a fan liaison officer charged with building bridges with the community 8. Give away Rovers shirts to every new born child in BwD (Google Atalanta) 9. Give Rovers shirts to every 10 year old child in BwD (Google Accrington Stanley) 10. Design innovative fan membership schemes to encourage attendance 11. Issue a Fan Charter that says the club will run on ethical grounds - e.g. no gambling sponsorship, no vaping sponsorships - actively pursue commercial partnerships that are ethical/green 12. Change the floodlights to LED panels to allow pre-match entertainment options & demonstrate our green credentials I just came up with those off the top of my head (yes, we know...they’re lame...) but there are folks out there that can do this stuff, that want the best for their club. What we have is distant, remote owners and one of the lamest executive boards I’ve ever seen at Ewood. Over to you...😉

If Venky’s wanted to make a statement, they could upgrade/refurbish Ewood/Brockhall with their own cash with no FFP implications. This strikes me as Waggott coming up with a wizard wheeze to improve cash flow. Is he targeted on that metric I wonder ?