Spurs Future
Spurs Future
Good morning to all the happy Spurs fans out there on another wonderful sunny day, given we are the more intelligent bunch, understanding what is happening, every day is a sunny day for us.
WARNING - They eyes are dodgy today, there will probably be mistakes I don't see (literally).
Now while writing these pieces I can run into all sorts of subjects and take a trot down their path,cooking recently and then an article comes after.
On other occasions the article come first (as it did today) and the opening piece comes along afterwards.
Sometimes it'll be short sometimes it'll be long, but sometimes there will be little bits of additional news thrown in.
We have spoken of ITK recently, you know my record, you know what you read you have often heard before and I appreciate you all pointing this out on Twitter.
Vishal Vora on Twitter is one such follower who does and he sent me the ITK that Spurs and Everton are close to a deal for Pierre-Emile Højbjerg for, wait for it, wait for it, £18m and £60,000 wages!
I ought to change my handle to the Pied Piper.
There is absolutely nothing to worry about over the Højbjerg transfer, nothing.
Just be patient.
He is joining Spurs, Mourinho wants him, Spurs are getting him.
This was from the same account that on Wednesday was quoting my figures shortly after I had posted them and I wrote the post during the previous day, so you see I don't always throw news straight up on Twitter and I'm still ahead of the game.
I have seen tacks on Nicolò Zaniolo from the regurgitators but that is just Roma playing with the media, a Roma side that are in financial difficulty.
So many clubs in so many countries are financially strapped and they want a pre-pandemic price for their players to get them out of a post-pandemic financial mess.
Sorry the business doesn't work like that, you can't command the same fees, you have to be more realistic and accept that your assets (player transfer values) have depreciated.
Teams want high earners off the book but few clubs can afford to pay another high earner right now with vastly reduced income, we can't, as recent posts discussing wages has shown.
Still though the media and Twitter accounts link us to players way out of our price range or on wages we couldn't possibly hope to get anywhere near.
It doesn't matter what other clubs in their unique circumstances can do, we have to look at our own circumstances and what we can do.
We invested last summer, we can't invest like that this summer, we have to recover money given we are already committed to paying out £74m in transfer fees and that is AFTER taking into account transfer fees we have coming in from players we have sold.
Now I haven't sat down and gone through how much that is each year over the next 5 years but even if you just cut it into 5 then it's £15m to pay before you have bought anyone else.
The anti- Spurs fan just has no idea about business at all.
Wages and interest payments on loans is over £210m
Income is expected to be £260m
Transfer fees to pay £15m (at least)
We have taken on £175m loan (thanks to our positive accounts in recent years) at 0.5% but we can't use any of it for transfers.
We haven't taken running costs into account yet but you can plainly see the money ain't gonna be there this year while there are no fans in the stadium.
We are the Happy Clappers and they thing telling us we are happy is an insult, yesterday's article put that all in perspective.
They want us to play Victor Meldrew with them and be as miserable as they are, LOL.
Yet a section want us to spend as if nothing has happened, as if we have an additional £3,05m per game coming in from a full stadium.
Anyway that's enough of an opening tangent, lets get onto today's piece in response to a report that has just come out.
It makes for an interesting discussion and I'd like you to take your time reading this, think and let me hear your suggestions for cooperative working with clubs and the development of Tottenham Hotspur.
The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) committee have produced a report that says "the current football business model is not sustainable" and called on the Premier League to "step up" and help the English Football League (EFL).
Daniel Levy told Spurs fans the hard truth a year ago, a truth the fans don't want to hear.
As a business you "ride the surf".
By that I mean you look at your industry and see where your industry is going.
You them position yourself to be at the forefront of change, to "ride the surf" and be ahead of the game.
You do not wait for change to happen and then react to it, it's the old proactive vs reactive scenario we have talked about before.
You do not wait for the wave to come crashing down and then hop on your surfboard to try and ride it!
I have discussed how we can set ourselves up as a club before that benefits not only ourselves but the clubs we associate with.
1. Spurs should use sports psychologists as a part of weekly training. Become leaders and masters in the field. Assess all players mentally before they are brought rejecting any (whoever they are) without the right mentality.
We have seen with Danny Rose for instance how something like this is needed, we have seen Étienne Capoue have mentality issues at the club (thought he was entitled to a place, shouldn't have to fight for one) and Tanguy Ndombele (same problem).
We see davinson Sanchez being picked regularly, he plays well, but if he is in and out of the side, he makes mistake after mistake.
We saw Eric Dier come back from injury and was awful.
Both these are down to mentality. yes, there will be adjustment to get used to the pace after a lay-off (and doesn't that tell you why overseas purchases struggle initially) but with mental training that can be overcome.
A foreign player who adapts quicker to a new league has a better, more positive mentality. Shouldn't those be the players we should be buying?
So if we are going to spend £30, £40, £50, £60, £70m on a player, should be spend a couple of thousand checking him out mentally with psychologists?
It is common sense to me.
2. I have long proposed that Tottenham have tie-ups with clubs abroad in the major leagues where we can send developing players to get playing experience at a high level.
Youngsters abroad start their careers, out of financial necessity by the clubs, earlier than they do in the Premier League and our youngsters are now realising this and going abroad.
Had we followed my advice, we could have been sending these players we have lost, out on loan to a French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch or Belgian club.
Tom Carroll should have gone to Ajax on loan hen Christian Eriksen came to Tottenham, he wouldn't now be lost in the Championship, he would be a regular Premier League player.
Oliver Skipp needs to go out on loan. Yes he can do that internally to a Championship club, but I'd be asking every promoted club about a loan.
These are the clubs Spurs need to be helping for our own benefit, even more important if there are no parachute payments and they have to keep a tight rein on their budgets.
Wigan Athletic have gone into administration and there Chairman (at the time) Phil Garside I think it as said the parachute payment paid the wages they were encumbered with having been relegated from the Premier League.
Well that's bad management. Wages should only ever have been paid with a relegation clause reducing them.
You see how simply it is to kill a club by overspending,by being reliant on TV money.
The bubble burst for Wigan and they have been in a downward spiral they couldn't get out of since they were relegated in 2013.
Just seven years and for three of those they had parachute payments!
That is the route some Spurs fans want us to take, just irresponsibly spend money we don't have, commit ourselves to a wages budget and repayments we can't afford.
It can't happen to Spurs, exactly what Leeds United said when they were in the UEFA Champions League and a bigger club than Spurs at the time, yet it did.
From Wikipedia:
Under chairman Peter Ridsdale, Leeds had taken out large loans against the prospect of the share of the TV rights and sponsorship revenues from UEFA Champions League qualification and subsequent progress in the competition. However, Leeds narrowly failed to qualify for the Champions League in two successive seasons, and as a consequence did not receive enough income to repay the loans.
That is exactly what our fans are asking Daniel Levy to do, spend money we don't have to saddle ourselves with debt that can blow up in our face at any time and drag us down.
Leeds were last in the UEFA Champions League in 2001 (semi-finalists).
The result of the above was having to sell their best players, the manager leaving as a result, relegation in 2003/04 and a struggle since then to get back on the right track.
In 2020/21 they are back in the Premier League. Will they stay.
That is what spend, spend, spend supporters are asking for.
Because remember, which they don't, owners can not give money to buy players and can not just give money to a club anymore, it has to be paid back.
It is yet another debt, yet another noose around our necks.
Bury were expelled from the league through simply not having enough money, thanks to mismanagement and an owner draining the club.
The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) committee chairman, Conservative MP Julian Knight, told the Press Association there were "10 to 15 EFL clubs on a watchlist right now in terms of whether they go bust".
Money is tight abroad, clubs need to save money.
Juventus usually have around 50 players out on loan or part own them with buyback clauses.
Spurs need those kind of tentacles.
We get our players developed at first-team level and in return we are helping them to survive financially, keeping their costs down and reducing the need for transfers.
We should not have a player, decide we need to send him on loan and start searching around for clubs who might take him.
Spurs should have a list of clubs we help.
We should have agreements with these clubs to send a regular supply of talent coming through.
Of course, that should include British clubs, Scottish and English.
Had we had that is place we could have snt Marcus Edwards out on loan earlier,but he is one who really needed a sports psychologist putting him straight, he has wasted years of his career. He may be 22 in December, but what could he have achieved with the right mentality at 17 or 18?
He is playing catch-up with his career.
And he isn't the only one that happens to, anyone know where Josh Onomah is now, a player who showed he could live in the Premier League but another with the wrong attitude to the point where he was just going through the motions,not that any journalist could see it, but they don't know what to look for.
They have no training in the field.
3. Social Media and the Internet. Again this is something I have spoken about before and despite employing Social Media Managers who are good at their job, none have had the vision needed to make Tottenham Hotspur a huge online brand worldwide.
All Spurs do is utilise what we have. yes we need to increase following and that should certainly be a question you ask them, but, what is beyond that?
You ask the top Social Media guy in America about social media and he will tell you that you need to be putting out at least 50 pieces of fresh new content every single day, across your platforms.
You take one piece and turn it into multiple pieces of small content that gets fed through your system.
With an organisation behind us, Spurs' social media presence should be huge, but Spurs should not be working alone in my opinion, they should be working with all the other Spurs websites and certain social media accounts (obviously not every fan).
For instance Spurs should be working with a Spurs supporting influencer (on social media) in South Korea, in Asia, in Japan, in America, in Africa, in Australia etc.
The club should help them produce content, the club should for instance have them ask one question that they can produce multiple pieces of content for from the answer.
Care must be taken to work with people who can increase the fan base so their audience is important but take America, which is going to become huge of football eventually as more and more parents turn their children away form the violence of American Football.
That provides a huge opportunity to corner a market the same way Manchester United did in Japan.
We shouldn't fight with other clubs when the wave has crashed, we should be the riders of the wave.
Look forward, see the future, prepare for the future.
The Tottenham name should be going out through as many bloggers and social media outlets as possible so that you aren't hoping your capture supporters, you make certain you are developing faster than any other club.
Ride the crest of the way, don't try to ride it once it has crashed.
All Spurs do is utilise what we have. yes we need to increase following and that should certainly be a question you ask them, but, what is beyond that?
You ask the top Social Media guy in America about social media and he will tell you that you need to be putting out at least 50 pieces of fresh new content every single day, across your platforms.
You take one piece and turn it into multiple pieces of small content that gets fed through your system.
With an organisation behind us, Spurs' social media presence should be huge, but Spurs should not be working alone in my opinion, they should be working with all the other Spurs websites and certain social media accounts (obviously not every fan).
For instance Spurs should be working with a Spurs supporting influencer (on social media) in South Korea, in Asia, in Japan, in America, in Africa, in Australia etc.
The club should help them produce content, the club should for instance have them ask one question that they can produce multiple pieces of content for from the answer.
Care must be taken to work with people who can increase the fan base so their audience is important but take America, which is going to become huge of football eventually as more and more parents turn their children away form the violence of American Football.
That provides a huge opportunity to corner a market the same way Manchester United did in Japan.
We shouldn't fight with other clubs when the wave has crashed, we should be the riders of the wave.
Look forward, see the future, prepare for the future.
The Tottenham name should be going out through as many bloggers and social media outlets as possible so that you aren't hoping your capture supporters, you make certain you are developing faster than any other club.
Ride the crest of the way, don't try to ride it once it has crashed.
Now is the time to take advantage, are we?
The more that can come into our club from America and Asia is huge and that make a difference to our performance in the field as it gives us the greater and growing income that we need to become the top side in the country, if not the world.
Becoming the largest social media football club in the world is no easy task but what are our plans to dominate this sphere, can anyone see a path we are taking because I can't.
It takes vision, but I think it is easily achievable.
We lack people with ideas at the club perhaps, lack people who can think big.
Something you can't fault Daniel Levy for, he publicly stated he wanted to build the club to compete with Barcelona and Real Madrid, both on and off the field.
You don't make a statement like that if you don't have a plan you are working towards.
Unfortunately the let's do everything illegally crowd can't understand the very basics of building something successful.
This report called on the Premier League to "step up" and help the English Football League (EFL).
Sound familiar, this is exactly what I'm talking about. I was saying this years ago.
This doesn't mean you just give them money, no.
You help them improve their scouting, their coaching, you let them use you medical facilities, you help them set up community programmes to increase local support, you give help with merchandising, even negotiating commercial sponsorship.
And of course, you loan them youth players or a player coming back from injury.
Would Eric Dier have benefitted from being sent on loan to a Championship club in January, even though he was still recovering?
He remains at Tottenham for all medical treatment and training until he is approaching fitness and then joins his Championship side to play and get match fit.
The loan system needs to change in my view so that it can happen at more points throughout the season o accommodate these arrangements.
Each major Premier League club could have several clubs from the EFL that it helps and cooperates with.
Spurs could be working with clubs like Colchester, Southend, Gillingham, Charlton, Barnet, Brentford, Swindon, MK Dons or Luton for instance.
Will it not also mean, that without gambling, clubs being promoted and far more likely to go straight back down, thus turn the Premier League into an almost closed shop,much the same as UEFA want to do with the Champions League.
"Football must become more representative of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) groups and outlaw homophobic chanting."
To do this, which should only happen naturally, is racist, it is active racism against all but these groups,which is racism and isn't active racism illegal?
You employ the best,simple as that, whatever colour or creed, to do anything else is racism.
The lack of women's elite sport "risks undoing work to improve funding";
OK controversial perhaps, but women's sport is inferior to men's.
Personally I don't watch it, I don't watch women's football, golf or cricket, the only sports I'll watch are athletics (when men pretending to be women are not taking part) and some tennis games (preferably without grunting).
Tennis should return to using wooden rackets and become a game of skill instead of power, both in mens and womens tennis.
"The Premier League is the main income generator of English football. If it does not step up to help the English Football League, many more clubs will follow in Bury FC's footsteps. The EFL needs also to ensure it develops a more sustainable financial model."
The committee says their must be a redistribution of money, so in other words, the clubs nobody watches should be funded by those people want to see.
Sorry but that is charity.
Market forces operate, the money goes where people want to pay for it.
You help these clubs in other non-financial ways.
Perhaps you could pay for their scouting department or their youth academy,but you would need written into that that you have the firsts choice from all academy prospects.
Don't do any work chaps, let someone else pay for it,sorry I can't agree with that at all.
Every football club is a business and has to be run effectively as a business to pay for the football.
Why should football live outside the real world and just get distributed an amount of money from a poy that they haven't equally contributed to to create.
Why should one business financially prop up another?
Tottenham were a mid-table side virtually bankrupt when EIC and Daniel Levy came along and they have built and built the club so our fans now expect Champions League and trophies.
Well, if Spurs can do it, why can't every other club do it?
Why should a club who has built itself via it's business then have to give the money it generates to someone else?
Absurd.
Get off your arse and devise ways of growing your club.
It just shows we have a paucity of business men in this country, people who think too small or are self-interested, they are chairmen for the kudos, because it plays to their ego.
As stated earlier, there are many ways in which you can help smaller clubs without handing them a cheque they don't deserve.
Why not sign a commercial deal, where you negotiate a payment to a feeder club or a club you have an associating with and the company promotes that other club as well. You pay for the signage etc or perhaps they sponsor the smaller clubs community programe or pay for an extra member of staff for marketing.
There are many ways you can help without handing out charity.
All that proposal does is make the smaller club financially dependent on the Premier League, cut off from the realities of the business world.
Football in that kind of fantasy bubble is discrimination against successful businesses to prop up unsuccessful business.
Sorry you improve the management and promotion of the smaller business over time.If that takes 20 years, it takes 20 years.
Too many think it should be now, thus you must give us some money.
Sorry Wokeists.
You don't reward failure, just like you don't have another vote when you have had a vote, you move on.
COYS
2 comments
Also, the whole BAME thing isn't trying to force people to hire BAME individuals, but getting them in the door for interviews and selection. The Rooney rule in American football was put in place to ensure at least one minority person was INTERVIEWED for each position, not necessarily hired. They still had to prove they were the right person for the job. But by getting interviews and having a platform to show their skills, the number of BAME people being hired increased. Please explain why you think that's rascist.