£206m spent on wages is borderline insane. What on earth were they thinking?
The scale of this breach by the way is FAR worse than Forest or Everton if found guilty (eg no allowed mitigations). It’s horrendous and makes you wonder why on earth action on Rodgers wasn’t taken in the first 2 months
“However, for a club such as ours, whose sustained sporting achievements have justified the levels of investment required to compete with the most established clubs and pursue our ambition … ”
Now, where have I heard that before? Oh yes, Peter Ridsdale when he destroyed Leeds United.
I genuinely feel sorry for the rank-and-file Leicester fans.
comment by The Light Brigade (U22847)
posted 14 minutes ago
“However, for a club such as ours, whose sustained sporting achievements have justified the levels of investment required to compete with the most established clubs and pursue our ambition … ”
Now, where have I heard that before? Oh yes, Peter Ridsdale when he destroyed Leeds United.
I genuinely feel sorry for the rank-and-file Leicester fans.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
When Leeds fans start seeing the similarities to Peter Risdale in those comments it really is time to worry
Top and the board are high stakes gamblers. They bet all their chips on Rodgers and European football. When it looked like they could lose everything - they put more chips down and gambled even more. They’re still doing it - hoping promotion will let them off the hook for an obvious EFL breach this season. Utter madness
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year
^^^
Based on what is known publicly, BHA has to be
the best run club in England for sure, maybe Europe.
Remarkable.
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 4 minutes ago
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We were never as well run as Brighton Mersey - check back through the accounts. We breached FFP in our promotion season and were unpunished due to getting promotion. We were always pushing at our limits even before the 2021 season. What was different back then was our recruitment - which at the time was the best in the division by a mile.
We had a first class recruitment team built by Pearson and Walsh and Rudkin basically inherited an absolute golden opportunity in 2015/16 (the way Ranieri did).
Now you’re right - we gambled recklessly in 2021 - but the club had started to show some concerning signs before that. What appeared to be the model club, really wasn’t when you looked at the finances with more scrutiny. We were never Brighton - we just had the best recruitment in the top 4 divisions at one stage. We then started to kid ourselves we were one of the big boys and the rest is history
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 47 minutes ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We gave them most of that
comment by Sheriff JW Pepper (U1007)
posted 13 minutes ago
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 47 minutes ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We gave them most of that
----------------------------------------------------------------------
😂
Interesting comment 99. If we breached FFP in our promotion season, are you now saying that Vichai wasn’t the saint you’ve always made him out to be?
Secondly, being a bear of little brain when it comes to high finance, if Top says that we are financially secure, can someone please explain why it is wrong for Top to put hundreds of millions INTO a club whilst it is perfectly acceptable for the Glazers to take millions OUT of a club?
comment by Bowstring (U17642)
posted 3 minutes ago
Interesting comment 99. If we breached FFP in our promotion season, are you now saying that Vichai wasn’t the saint you’ve always made him out to be?
Secondly, being a bear of little brain when it comes to high finance, if Top says that we are financially secure, can someone please explain why it is wrong for Top to put hundreds of millions INTO a club whilst it is perfectly acceptable for the Glazers to take millions OUT of a club?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I don’t think I’ve ever said Vichai was perfect have I? That he never made a single mistake? It was Vichai who fast tracked Rudkin into post after all - not Top. But by comparison to his son - he’s absolutely a saint.
The difference is he would make the ruthless decisions needed to protect the financial and footballing interests of the club and I firmly believe that we would have never have reached this point under his stewardship. For one. - I don’t think he would have afforded Rudkin the amount of power Top has and then placed his complete trust in his handling of the Rodgers incident. He seemed to be far more pro-active in binning off managers who weren’t performing.
So yep, while I think the club even under Vichais tenure made some questionable decisions, that’s nothing compared to what’s happened after 2021. I’m just saying we’ve got previous for it - to a much lesser extent.
On your second question - well that’s a perfectly legitimate one in my view and just highlights the unfairness of the rules and the system. I’m not a financial expert - but basically the gross debt United are in is perfectly allowed it seems because their expenditure (including servicing the debt to the glazers) is covered by their vast turnover.
The rules have been brought in to stop someone like Top ladening a small club with annual expenditure far beyond its turnover and then walking away. That’s fair enough but it stops owners who have no intention of walking away from putting their money into their clubs.
It’s a rubbish system that benefits the top 6. Still doesn’t excuse what we’ve done though
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 19 minutes ago
comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 4 minutes ago
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We were never as well run as Brighton Mersey - check back through the accounts. We breached FFP in our promotion season and were unpunished due to getting promotion. We were always pushing at our limits even before the 2021 season. What was different back then was our recruitment - which at the time was the best in the division by a mile.
We had a first class recruitment team built by Pearson and Walsh and Rudkin basically inherited an absolute golden opportunity in 2015/16 (the way Ranieri did).
Now you’re right - we gambled recklessly in 2021 - but the club had started to show some concerning signs before that. What appeared to be the model club, really wasn’t when you looked at the finances with more scrutiny. We were never Brighton - we just had the best recruitment in the top 4 divisions at one stage. We then started to kid ourselves we were one of the big boys and the rest is history
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yeah, I totally agree with this 99. But it was the way we recruited and sold players that made us well run. We were certainly better run than now!!
Yep I see your point Mersey, completely agree. We recruited amazingly and sold at the right time. In that respect, very similar to Brighton really. Unfortunately we had Rudkin negotiating contracts and then hiring Lee Congerton to boot and it all started going pear shaped.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
In regard to United, they may not be breaching the FFP rules, but how much money has been taken out of the club in the last 10-15 years which would potentially have been available to invest in the team? I don't think it's any coincidence that it's coincided with a relatively barren period of winning trophies and being overtaken by others.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 14 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I have to disagree on Brighton there Nuneaton. We are in the trouble we are in because we broke our business model and decided to gamble financially. While I completely agree that Brighton could be relegated if they start making poor recruitment decisions - they aren’t paying out the kind of ludicrous wages we were and therefore it wouldn’t have the same impact as we have faced
Basically the way they have sustainably built the club means that even if the worst was to happen - while it will be a huge blow, I don’t think you’ll see them financially unravel in quite the same way. Also they’re evidently not stupid enough to let their assets run down contracts and leave for free.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Basically Nuneaton what I’m trying to say is we have been racking up losses since before Covid. I can’t remember the last time we recorded a profit - I think maybe 2018/19 im not sure. So basically been consistently spending beyond our means (and we aren’t the only club to do this) - which even before we hired Rodgers meant we were very reliant on remaining a premier league club.
Since the appointment of Rodgers (and the impact of Covid) - we went up several gears and racked up the kind of losses that meant we had to get European football to pay for them. The season we finished 8th effectively killed us off. £92m loss meant we had to finish in roughly the same league position while selling Fofana to not breach PSR and of course limiting all incoming transfers
I don’t see Brighton being anywhere near that stupid - eg they can soften the blow because they aren’t financially gambling like we have been
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Well nearly all - we signed Faes
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 12 hours, 44 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So what you're saying here is that Brighton will only be ok whilst they continue running the club properly and as soon as they stop doing that they're in the cr@p. NSS.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Seems to me that Leicester did what we (Wolves) refused to do and strengthen from what was a relatively strong position in an attempt to try and break the top 4. It's a gamble but after successive 5th place finishes a calculated one. It didn't pay off though and in retrospect it looks terrible. We were in a similar position, successive 7th places and needed the right investment to break top 6. We sold Jota and blew it all on Fabio Silva , and when the new PSR came in and the manager wanted funds to push on he was told that the cupboard was bare. To be fair to Rodgers, even though he had a good old moan at least he didn't do what Lopetegui did and abandon ship.
The upshot of it all though is that under the present financial restrictions it is virtually impossible for a club of Leicester or Wolves size to compete at the top regardless of how ambitious their owners are. I don't buy that this is an unintended consequence of the PSR rules, it's quite deliberate. Villa will struggle next season but they may just have the extra turnover and possible CL income to ride it out. Meanwhile City are allowed to continue collecting trophies whilst racking up multiple rule beaches. Not saying it should be a free for all but the current set up stinks.
Still find it incredible though that the losses could be so great given the players that have been sold, Chilwell, Tielemans, Barnes, Schmeichel, Kante, Fofana, Mahrez, Maddison, McGuire are just the ones of the top of my head.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Oldgoldilox (U17303)
posted 2 hours, 1 minute ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 12 hours, 44 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So what you're saying here is that Brighton will only be ok whilst they continue running the club properly and as soon as they stop doing that they're in the cr@p. NSS.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
No that's not what I'm saying. It is not possible to keep on doing what Brighton are doing indefinitely, they do well because their recruitment has been good, both at managerial and player level. They need to keep selling their best players, eventually it will catch up with them, they won't make the right choices and will end up in trouble. That doesn't mean to say they would be badly run, it's just inevitable that it will happen - a model which needs you to act to near perfection cannot be successful in the medium to long term.
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
I'm probably a little late to the party with this thread - but my humble opinion:
I think all of us expected this type of news and a potential points deduction, but for me personally, the biggest issue beyond the scope of the total amount (there are several other clubs 'projected' for similar losses but hopefully for the benefit of their supporters they can arrest potential problems earlier than us) is more the money that has been wasted on poor assets.
I get the punt at top 4. In fact I think we were all excited about the potential to break into it even intermittently. For me, that isn't an issue, but rather a calculated and expected risk.
And whilst the situation is always going to be nuanced in terms of the different things that led to us being in this situation, the body blow was the summer without sale. This, and perhaps it's with some hindsight, I think was a needless gamble. It's one where I feel the ownership believed they needed to make a show of not selling to 'prove' that we were challenging the upper echelons rather than actually consider the value in it. Perhaps this was affected by our accelerated progress over the past decade and I almost can accept the idea of getting lost in the fantasy of some sort of regular challenge for CL football.
If that was a direct hit into the side of our ship, the slow flooding and resulting rot was the way we, almost flippantly, abandoned our wage structure.
This sits at the feet of Rudkin. Again, I can accept the gamble on high-cost players who didn't work out - this is going on at the vast majority of PL clubs and, particularly with our generally good ability to get top dollar for high-end sales, is never going to have a significant impact from a financial perspective. The issue was the ludicrous wages given out and contracts being allowed to run down. In particular, to players who had little to no impact and/or are still on the books now! Whilst this was Rudkin's fault, Top needs to have taken ownership (literally!) and either sacked Rudkin or been far more hands-on with this situation.
I do think Top is a loyal owner, we have seen this with his continued funds into the club to help cancel out debt and ease any concerns from this perspective. Therefore, it seems natural that he would be loyal to his employees - but this should not be at the expense of his business or a football club he is clearly linked to emotionally. And in particular, Rudkin has been a repeat offender. Get him gone.
I've read frustrations about Man City and Everton - "if Man City had been charged and deducted we'd have been in the top 4...if Everton had been done last season we wouldn't have come down" - both of these are factually true but my gut feeling is that this frivolous aspiration was always going to happen at some point after the taste of such unprecedented success (particularly with Rudkin involved).
Brighton have been highlighted this week as a stark contrast and Villa have been referenced as the next team to challenge the status quo - although looking at the latter's finances, CL football can quite suddenly go from aspirational to a necessity.
I appreciate the idea behind FFP in terms of protecting clubs from going out of business. Whilst I have doubts about it being this pure in terms of its implementation and the 'top six' , I do get the theory and appreciate that there is a recognition of allowances for growth to business in order to help 'smaller' clubs becoming more competitive financially and on the pitch.
However, it will simply not work for any substantial amount of time. Even if you forget about any shenanigans that, at best, have involved the bending of rules, it's just not set up to be effective for the majority of clubs. If you look at the larger clubs, their ability to spend is contributed to significantly by their global marketing and turnover. Even if a smaller club invests significantly through funds that can be written off by FFP it will take years, possibly decades to reap effective financial benefits. And even then, the larger clubs will have continued to have accelerate their own growth as well as likely continued to reap financial rewards through success on the field.
There are really only two options, bulldoze your way through the status quo and financial restraints like Man City did or, for the majority of clubs even with billionaire owners: take a leap. Unfortunately, the distance continues to increase as you take that leap.
The smaller clubs are therefore left with the options of :
Accept your place and maintain your own position in the PL with some moderate/intermittent success
Accept your place and, through luck and/or bad decisions eventually slide down towards relegation
Gamble on FFP and take a punt for some short lived success
The system is broken but that doesn't mean we should be able to avoid the rules of the system - even if only for the other clubs who, perhaps at least for now, are looking to adhere.
I expect us to, if we go up - and after negotiations about circumstances/money used for long-term investment - get a points deduction of around 8 - 10 points.
Some positives...kind of:
This has occured whilst we have an owner who, at the moment, is still invested in the club and has cleared our recent debts
If we get promoted, with some potential in terms of finances coming through from delayed payments for transfers, and looking to adhere to FFP as much as possible, future deductions may be avoidable
It looks like everything going belly up at the minute has pulled the players together and hopefully that mentality will continue and be coupled by the fans attitude for the remainder of the season to help get us promoted.
Sorry - I struggle not to ramble on and I am terrible at proof reading.
As a post script -
Asking Top to resign is ludicrous, in my opinion , unless there is another owner who would be willing to invest as much and is guaranteed to stick around for the foreseeable. Unlikely.
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
Some good points there KTF and mostly agree. When I say im ’King Power Out’ I mean for the long term - not next week. I’m fully aware that the ownership and board have placed us in a situation where in the short to medium term the club has become devalued in terms of its footballing and financial status. It Top had sold and walked away while we were riding high in 2021, it could have been a great solution for him and everyone. Instead - there is little option now but to fix the mess of his own creation because he’s overseen a staggering drop in revenue, huge sporting underachievement and incoming sanctions. LCFC wouldn’t exactly rank high on most prospective investors lists of football clubs to take on right now
What I want him to do in an ideal world is to restructure the club and put people in position that can turn this around. I think if that was going to happen then last season would have been the catalyst. Instead he’s kept Rudkin firmly in post and that’s why I believe we will continue to be unsuccessful in the long term under the ownership of the King Power group. They simply are not learning the key lessons - get the structure right at the top of the club
Ideally now, the best I can hope for is promotion to stem the bleeding. Then when we go down again and take even more points deductions, the financial impact won’t be so hard. Eventually once the club is stablilised, maybe then he will have the good sense to either source alternative investment and take a back seat or to sell up completely
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
Yes, I think you are right. If we were to steady the ship somehow and stay up, it would be interesting to see what they did about the stadium plans. Less so the additional seats and more so the facilities being built around the ground. Although, any money they brought in would be years down the line and I'm not sure would be substantial enough to impact anything in terms of significant revenue and turnover contribution.
As you suggest, Rudkin being let go or even his role being 'revised' would probably add some confidence for the supporters. I guess bringing in a new director when you are an owner who isn't in the country a lot of the time is a concern for him. Rudkin must be an excellent talker though.
posted 3 weeks, 3 days ago
comment by Keep_the_faith1 (U8129)
posted 1 day, 12 hours ago
I'm probably a little late to the party with this thread - but my humble opinion:
I think all of us expected this type of news and a potential points deduction, but for me personally, the biggest issue beyond the scope of the total amount (there are several other clubs 'projected' for similar losses but hopefully for the benefit of their supporters they can arrest potential problems earlier than us) is more the money that has been wasted on poor assets.
I get the punt at top 4. In fact I think we were all excited about the potential to break into it even intermittently. For me, that isn't an issue, but rather a calculated and expected risk.
And whilst the situation is always going to be nuanced in terms of the different things that led to us being in this situation, the body blow was the summer without sale. This, and perhaps it's with some hindsight, I think was a needless gamble. It's one where I feel the ownership believed they needed to make a show of not selling to 'prove' that we were challenging the upper echelons rather than actually consider the value in it. Perhaps this was affected by our accelerated progress over the past decade and I almost can accept the idea of getting lost in the fantasy of some sort of regular challenge for CL football.
If that was a direct hit into the side of our ship, the slow flooding and resulting rot was the way we, almost flippantly, abandoned our wage structure.
This sits at the feet of Rudkin. Again, I can accept the gamble on high-cost players who didn't work out - this is going on at the vast majority of PL clubs and, particularly with our generally good ability to get top dollar for high-end sales, is never going to have a significant impact from a financial perspective. The issue was the ludicrous wages given out and contracts being allowed to run down. In particular, to players who had little to no impact and/or are still on the books now! Whilst this was Rudkin's fault, Top needs to have taken ownership (literally!) and either sacked Rudkin or been far more hands-on with this situation.
I do think Top is a loyal owner, we have seen this with his continued funds into the club to help cancel out debt and ease any concerns from this perspective. Therefore, it seems natural that he would be loyal to his employees - but this should not be at the expense of his business or a football club he is clearly linked to emotionally. And in particular, Rudkin has been a repeat offender. Get him gone.
I've read frustrations about Man City and Everton - "if Man City had been charged and deducted we'd have been in the top 4...if Everton had been done last season we wouldn't have come down" - both of these are factually true but my gut feeling is that this frivolous aspiration was always going to happen at some point after the taste of such unprecedented success (particularly with Rudkin involved).
Brighton have been highlighted this week as a stark contrast and Villa have been referenced as the next team to challenge the status quo - although looking at the latter's finances, CL football can quite suddenly go from aspirational to a necessity.
I appreciate the idea behind FFP in terms of protecting clubs from going out of business. Whilst I have doubts about it being this pure in terms of its implementation and the 'top six' , I do get the theory and appreciate that there is a recognition of allowances for growth to business in order to help 'smaller' clubs becoming more competitive financially and on the pitch.
However, it will simply not work for any substantial amount of time. Even if you forget about any shenanigans that, at best, have involved the bending of rules, it's just not set up to be effective for the majority of clubs. If you look at the larger clubs, their ability to spend is contributed to significantly by their global marketing and turnover. Even if a smaller club invests significantly through funds that can be written off by FFP it will take years, possibly decades to reap effective financial benefits. And even then, the larger clubs will have continued to have accelerate their own growth as well as likely continued to reap financial rewards through success on the field.
There are really only two options, bulldoze your way through the status quo and financial restraints like Man City did or, for the majority of clubs even with billionaire owners: take a leap. Unfortunately, the distance continues to increase as you take that leap.
The smaller clubs are therefore left with the options of :
Accept your place and maintain your own position in the PL with some moderate/intermittent success
Accept your place and, through luck and/or bad decisions eventually slide down towards relegation
Gamble on FFP and take a punt for some short lived success
The system is broken but that doesn't mean we should be able to avoid the rules of the system - even if only for the other clubs who, perhaps at least for now, are looking to adhere.
I expect us to, if we go up - and after negotiations about circumstances/money used for long-term investment - get a points deduction of around 8 - 10 points.
Some positives...kind of:
This has occured whilst we have an owner who, at the moment, is still invested in the club and has cleared our recent debts
If we get promoted, with some potential in terms of finances coming through from delayed payments for transfers, and looking to adhere to FFP as much as possible, future deductions may be avoidable
It looks like everything going belly up at the minute has pulled the players together and hopefully that mentality will continue and be coupled by the fans attitude for the remainder of the season to help get us promoted.
Sorry - I struggle not to ramble on and I am terrible at proof reading.
As a post script -
Asking Top to resign is ludicrous, in my opinion , unless there is another owner who would be willing to invest as much and is guaranteed to stick around for the foreseeable. Unlikely.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I think I’m in love with this post more than our owners. Which for 99 must feel incomprehensible 😂
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Leicester post £215m combined loss
Page 1 of 2
posted 4 weeks ago
£206m spent on wages is borderline insane. What on earth were they thinking?
The scale of this breach by the way is FAR worse than Forest or Everton if found guilty (eg no allowed mitigations). It’s horrendous and makes you wonder why on earth action on Rodgers wasn’t taken in the first 2 months
posted 4 weeks ago
“However, for a club such as ours, whose sustained sporting achievements have justified the levels of investment required to compete with the most established clubs and pursue our ambition … ”
Now, where have I heard that before? Oh yes, Peter Ridsdale when he destroyed Leeds United.
I genuinely feel sorry for the rank-and-file Leicester fans.
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by The Light Brigade (U22847)
posted 14 minutes ago
“However, for a club such as ours, whose sustained sporting achievements have justified the levels of investment required to compete with the most established clubs and pursue our ambition … ”
Now, where have I heard that before? Oh yes, Peter Ridsdale when he destroyed Leeds United.
I genuinely feel sorry for the rank-and-file Leicester fans.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
When Leeds fans start seeing the similarities to Peter Risdale in those comments it really is time to worry
Top and the board are high stakes gamblers. They bet all their chips on Rodgers and European football. When it looked like they could lose everything - they put more chips down and gambled even more. They’re still doing it - hoping promotion will let them off the hook for an obvious EFL breach this season. Utter madness
posted 4 weeks ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
posted 4 weeks ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year
^^^
Based on what is known publicly, BHA has to be
the best run club in England for sure, maybe Europe.
Remarkable.
posted 4 weeks ago
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 4 minutes ago
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We were never as well run as Brighton Mersey - check back through the accounts. We breached FFP in our promotion season and were unpunished due to getting promotion. We were always pushing at our limits even before the 2021 season. What was different back then was our recruitment - which at the time was the best in the division by a mile.
We had a first class recruitment team built by Pearson and Walsh and Rudkin basically inherited an absolute golden opportunity in 2015/16 (the way Ranieri did).
Now you’re right - we gambled recklessly in 2021 - but the club had started to show some concerning signs before that. What appeared to be the model club, really wasn’t when you looked at the finances with more scrutiny. We were never Brighton - we just had the best recruitment in the top 4 divisions at one stage. We then started to kid ourselves we were one of the big boys and the rest is history
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 47 minutes ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We gave them most of that
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by Sheriff JW Pepper (U1007)
posted 13 minutes ago
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 47 minutes ago
Brighton meanwhile have announced a record profit of £122.8m in the 2022-23 financial year……you see it can be done
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We gave them most of that
----------------------------------------------------------------------
😂
posted 4 weeks ago
Interesting comment 99. If we breached FFP in our promotion season, are you now saying that Vichai wasn’t the saint you’ve always made him out to be?
Secondly, being a bear of little brain when it comes to high finance, if Top says that we are financially secure, can someone please explain why it is wrong for Top to put hundreds of millions INTO a club whilst it is perfectly acceptable for the Glazers to take millions OUT of a club?
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by Bowstring (U17642)
posted 3 minutes ago
Interesting comment 99. If we breached FFP in our promotion season, are you now saying that Vichai wasn’t the saint you’ve always made him out to be?
Secondly, being a bear of little brain when it comes to high finance, if Top says that we are financially secure, can someone please explain why it is wrong for Top to put hundreds of millions INTO a club whilst it is perfectly acceptable for the Glazers to take millions OUT of a club?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I don’t think I’ve ever said Vichai was perfect have I? That he never made a single mistake? It was Vichai who fast tracked Rudkin into post after all - not Top. But by comparison to his son - he’s absolutely a saint.
The difference is he would make the ruthless decisions needed to protect the financial and footballing interests of the club and I firmly believe that we would have never have reached this point under his stewardship. For one. - I don’t think he would have afforded Rudkin the amount of power Top has and then placed his complete trust in his handling of the Rodgers incident. He seemed to be far more pro-active in binning off managers who weren’t performing.
So yep, while I think the club even under Vichais tenure made some questionable decisions, that’s nothing compared to what’s happened after 2021. I’m just saying we’ve got previous for it - to a much lesser extent.
On your second question - well that’s a perfectly legitimate one in my view and just highlights the unfairness of the rules and the system. I’m not a financial expert - but basically the gross debt United are in is perfectly allowed it seems because their expenditure (including servicing the debt to the glazers) is covered by their vast turnover.
The rules have been brought in to stop someone like Top ladening a small club with annual expenditure far beyond its turnover and then walking away. That’s fair enough but it stops owners who have no intention of walking away from putting their money into their clubs.
It’s a rubbish system that benefits the top 6. Still doesn’t excuse what we’ve done though
posted 4 weeks ago
comment by 99 Problems (King Power OUT) (U12353)
posted 1 hour, 19 minutes ago
comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 4 minutes ago
Let’s not forget we we heralded as the Brighton of 8 years ago with peoples from clubs far and wide coming to see how we were doing it.
We won’t the league, challenged for Europe and as The Light Brigade points out we “did a Risdale”. We overspent reliant on Europe. And what happened, relegation!
We were stupid. Our bosses were reckless in their approach and we should never be run reliant on over achieving vs our historical position.
Let’s hope we can rebuild but this is going to hurt for many years to come and is extremely worrying if we can get promotion.
A mess.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
We were never as well run as Brighton Mersey - check back through the accounts. We breached FFP in our promotion season and were unpunished due to getting promotion. We were always pushing at our limits even before the 2021 season. What was different back then was our recruitment - which at the time was the best in the division by a mile.
We had a first class recruitment team built by Pearson and Walsh and Rudkin basically inherited an absolute golden opportunity in 2015/16 (the way Ranieri did).
Now you’re right - we gambled recklessly in 2021 - but the club had started to show some concerning signs before that. What appeared to be the model club, really wasn’t when you looked at the finances with more scrutiny. We were never Brighton - we just had the best recruitment in the top 4 divisions at one stage. We then started to kid ourselves we were one of the big boys and the rest is history
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yeah, I totally agree with this 99. But it was the way we recruited and sold players that made us well run. We were certainly better run than now!!
posted 4 weeks ago
Yep I see your point Mersey, completely agree. We recruited amazingly and sold at the right time. In that respect, very similar to Brighton really. Unfortunately we had Rudkin negotiating contracts and then hiring Lee Congerton to boot and it all started going pear shaped.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
In regard to United, they may not be breaching the FFP rules, but how much money has been taken out of the club in the last 10-15 years which would potentially have been available to invest in the team? I don't think it's any coincidence that it's coincided with a relatively barren period of winning trophies and being overtaken by others.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 14 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I have to disagree on Brighton there Nuneaton. We are in the trouble we are in because we broke our business model and decided to gamble financially. While I completely agree that Brighton could be relegated if they start making poor recruitment decisions - they aren’t paying out the kind of ludicrous wages we were and therefore it wouldn’t have the same impact as we have faced
Basically the way they have sustainably built the club means that even if the worst was to happen - while it will be a huge blow, I don’t think you’ll see them financially unravel in quite the same way. Also they’re evidently not stupid enough to let their assets run down contracts and leave for free.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Basically Nuneaton what I’m trying to say is we have been racking up losses since before Covid. I can’t remember the last time we recorded a profit - I think maybe 2018/19 im not sure. So basically been consistently spending beyond our means (and we aren’t the only club to do this) - which even before we hired Rodgers meant we were very reliant on remaining a premier league club.
Since the appointment of Rodgers (and the impact of Covid) - we went up several gears and racked up the kind of losses that meant we had to get European football to pay for them. The season we finished 8th effectively killed us off. £92m loss meant we had to finish in roughly the same league position while selling Fofana to not breach PSR and of course limiting all incoming transfers
I don’t see Brighton being anywhere near that stupid - eg they can soften the blow because they aren’t financially gambling like we have been
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Well nearly all - we signed Faes
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 12 hours, 44 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So what you're saying here is that Brighton will only be ok whilst they continue running the club properly and as soon as they stop doing that they're in the cr@p. NSS.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
Seems to me that Leicester did what we (Wolves) refused to do and strengthen from what was a relatively strong position in an attempt to try and break the top 4. It's a gamble but after successive 5th place finishes a calculated one. It didn't pay off though and in retrospect it looks terrible. We were in a similar position, successive 7th places and needed the right investment to break top 6. We sold Jota and blew it all on Fabio Silva , and when the new PSR came in and the manager wanted funds to push on he was told that the cupboard was bare. To be fair to Rodgers, even though he had a good old moan at least he didn't do what Lopetegui did and abandon ship.
The upshot of it all though is that under the present financial restrictions it is virtually impossible for a club of Leicester or Wolves size to compete at the top regardless of how ambitious their owners are. I don't buy that this is an unintended consequence of the PSR rules, it's quite deliberate. Villa will struggle next season but they may just have the extra turnover and possible CL income to ride it out. Meanwhile City are allowed to continue collecting trophies whilst racking up multiple rule beaches. Not saying it should be a free for all but the current set up stinks.
Still find it incredible though that the losses could be so great given the players that have been sold, Chilwell, Tielemans, Barnes, Schmeichel, Kante, Fofana, Mahrez, Maddison, McGuire are just the ones of the top of my head.
posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago
comment by Oldgoldilox (U17303)
posted 2 hours, 1 minute ago
comment by Nuneaton_fox (U7936)
posted 12 hours, 44 minutes ago
I've expressed my view on this, Brighton are a car crash waiting to happen, like any other smaller club who dare to try and feast at the top table.
It's fine while you keep on unearthing terrific players and have a decent manager to meld them into the team quickly enough to replace the great players you've previously found and had to sell on; once you can't do that you're in serious trouble - as we've found out unfortunately. Even if we hadn't been relegated last season, we'd still be in the mire with the EPL and facing a huge points deduction with those figures.
I agree that whilst Vichai wasn't perfect by any means, I don't think he would have let this situation escalate to the extent that it has, he would have taken action to correct far earlier.
What a mess!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So what you're saying here is that Brighton will only be ok whilst they continue running the club properly and as soon as they stop doing that they're in the cr@p. NSS.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
No that's not what I'm saying. It is not possible to keep on doing what Brighton are doing indefinitely, they do well because their recruitment has been good, both at managerial and player level. They need to keep selling their best players, eventually it will catch up with them, they won't make the right choices and will end up in trouble. That doesn't mean to say they would be badly run, it's just inevitable that it will happen - a model which needs you to act to near perfection cannot be successful in the medium to long term.
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
I'm probably a little late to the party with this thread - but my humble opinion:
I think all of us expected this type of news and a potential points deduction, but for me personally, the biggest issue beyond the scope of the total amount (there are several other clubs 'projected' for similar losses but hopefully for the benefit of their supporters they can arrest potential problems earlier than us) is more the money that has been wasted on poor assets.
I get the punt at top 4. In fact I think we were all excited about the potential to break into it even intermittently. For me, that isn't an issue, but rather a calculated and expected risk.
And whilst the situation is always going to be nuanced in terms of the different things that led to us being in this situation, the body blow was the summer without sale. This, and perhaps it's with some hindsight, I think was a needless gamble. It's one where I feel the ownership believed they needed to make a show of not selling to 'prove' that we were challenging the upper echelons rather than actually consider the value in it. Perhaps this was affected by our accelerated progress over the past decade and I almost can accept the idea of getting lost in the fantasy of some sort of regular challenge for CL football.
If that was a direct hit into the side of our ship, the slow flooding and resulting rot was the way we, almost flippantly, abandoned our wage structure.
This sits at the feet of Rudkin. Again, I can accept the gamble on high-cost players who didn't work out - this is going on at the vast majority of PL clubs and, particularly with our generally good ability to get top dollar for high-end sales, is never going to have a significant impact from a financial perspective. The issue was the ludicrous wages given out and contracts being allowed to run down. In particular, to players who had little to no impact and/or are still on the books now! Whilst this was Rudkin's fault, Top needs to have taken ownership (literally!) and either sacked Rudkin or been far more hands-on with this situation.
I do think Top is a loyal owner, we have seen this with his continued funds into the club to help cancel out debt and ease any concerns from this perspective. Therefore, it seems natural that he would be loyal to his employees - but this should not be at the expense of his business or a football club he is clearly linked to emotionally. And in particular, Rudkin has been a repeat offender. Get him gone.
I've read frustrations about Man City and Everton - "if Man City had been charged and deducted we'd have been in the top 4...if Everton had been done last season we wouldn't have come down" - both of these are factually true but my gut feeling is that this frivolous aspiration was always going to happen at some point after the taste of such unprecedented success (particularly with Rudkin involved).
Brighton have been highlighted this week as a stark contrast and Villa have been referenced as the next team to challenge the status quo - although looking at the latter's finances, CL football can quite suddenly go from aspirational to a necessity.
I appreciate the idea behind FFP in terms of protecting clubs from going out of business. Whilst I have doubts about it being this pure in terms of its implementation and the 'top six' , I do get the theory and appreciate that there is a recognition of allowances for growth to business in order to help 'smaller' clubs becoming more competitive financially and on the pitch.
However, it will simply not work for any substantial amount of time. Even if you forget about any shenanigans that, at best, have involved the bending of rules, it's just not set up to be effective for the majority of clubs. If you look at the larger clubs, their ability to spend is contributed to significantly by their global marketing and turnover. Even if a smaller club invests significantly through funds that can be written off by FFP it will take years, possibly decades to reap effective financial benefits. And even then, the larger clubs will have continued to have accelerate their own growth as well as likely continued to reap financial rewards through success on the field.
There are really only two options, bulldoze your way through the status quo and financial restraints like Man City did or, for the majority of clubs even with billionaire owners: take a leap. Unfortunately, the distance continues to increase as you take that leap.
The smaller clubs are therefore left with the options of :
Accept your place and maintain your own position in the PL with some moderate/intermittent success
Accept your place and, through luck and/or bad decisions eventually slide down towards relegation
Gamble on FFP and take a punt for some short lived success
The system is broken but that doesn't mean we should be able to avoid the rules of the system - even if only for the other clubs who, perhaps at least for now, are looking to adhere.
I expect us to, if we go up - and after negotiations about circumstances/money used for long-term investment - get a points deduction of around 8 - 10 points.
Some positives...kind of:
This has occured whilst we have an owner who, at the moment, is still invested in the club and has cleared our recent debts
If we get promoted, with some potential in terms of finances coming through from delayed payments for transfers, and looking to adhere to FFP as much as possible, future deductions may be avoidable
It looks like everything going belly up at the minute has pulled the players together and hopefully that mentality will continue and be coupled by the fans attitude for the remainder of the season to help get us promoted.
Sorry - I struggle not to ramble on and I am terrible at proof reading.
As a post script -
Asking Top to resign is ludicrous, in my opinion , unless there is another owner who would be willing to invest as much and is guaranteed to stick around for the foreseeable. Unlikely.
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
Some good points there KTF and mostly agree. When I say im ’King Power Out’ I mean for the long term - not next week. I’m fully aware that the ownership and board have placed us in a situation where in the short to medium term the club has become devalued in terms of its footballing and financial status. It Top had sold and walked away while we were riding high in 2021, it could have been a great solution for him and everyone. Instead - there is little option now but to fix the mess of his own creation because he’s overseen a staggering drop in revenue, huge sporting underachievement and incoming sanctions. LCFC wouldn’t exactly rank high on most prospective investors lists of football clubs to take on right now
What I want him to do in an ideal world is to restructure the club and put people in position that can turn this around. I think if that was going to happen then last season would have been the catalyst. Instead he’s kept Rudkin firmly in post and that’s why I believe we will continue to be unsuccessful in the long term under the ownership of the King Power group. They simply are not learning the key lessons - get the structure right at the top of the club
Ideally now, the best I can hope for is promotion to stem the bleeding. Then when we go down again and take even more points deductions, the financial impact won’t be so hard. Eventually once the club is stablilised, maybe then he will have the good sense to either source alternative investment and take a back seat or to sell up completely
posted 3 weeks, 5 days ago
Yes, I think you are right. If we were to steady the ship somehow and stay up, it would be interesting to see what they did about the stadium plans. Less so the additional seats and more so the facilities being built around the ground. Although, any money they brought in would be years down the line and I'm not sure would be substantial enough to impact anything in terms of significant revenue and turnover contribution.
As you suggest, Rudkin being let go or even his role being 'revised' would probably add some confidence for the supporters. I guess bringing in a new director when you are an owner who isn't in the country a lot of the time is a concern for him. Rudkin must be an excellent talker though.
posted 3 weeks, 3 days ago
comment by Keep_the_faith1 (U8129)
posted 1 day, 12 hours ago
I'm probably a little late to the party with this thread - but my humble opinion:
I think all of us expected this type of news and a potential points deduction, but for me personally, the biggest issue beyond the scope of the total amount (there are several other clubs 'projected' for similar losses but hopefully for the benefit of their supporters they can arrest potential problems earlier than us) is more the money that has been wasted on poor assets.
I get the punt at top 4. In fact I think we were all excited about the potential to break into it even intermittently. For me, that isn't an issue, but rather a calculated and expected risk.
And whilst the situation is always going to be nuanced in terms of the different things that led to us being in this situation, the body blow was the summer without sale. This, and perhaps it's with some hindsight, I think was a needless gamble. It's one where I feel the ownership believed they needed to make a show of not selling to 'prove' that we were challenging the upper echelons rather than actually consider the value in it. Perhaps this was affected by our accelerated progress over the past decade and I almost can accept the idea of getting lost in the fantasy of some sort of regular challenge for CL football.
If that was a direct hit into the side of our ship, the slow flooding and resulting rot was the way we, almost flippantly, abandoned our wage structure.
This sits at the feet of Rudkin. Again, I can accept the gamble on high-cost players who didn't work out - this is going on at the vast majority of PL clubs and, particularly with our generally good ability to get top dollar for high-end sales, is never going to have a significant impact from a financial perspective. The issue was the ludicrous wages given out and contracts being allowed to run down. In particular, to players who had little to no impact and/or are still on the books now! Whilst this was Rudkin's fault, Top needs to have taken ownership (literally!) and either sacked Rudkin or been far more hands-on with this situation.
I do think Top is a loyal owner, we have seen this with his continued funds into the club to help cancel out debt and ease any concerns from this perspective. Therefore, it seems natural that he would be loyal to his employees - but this should not be at the expense of his business or a football club he is clearly linked to emotionally. And in particular, Rudkin has been a repeat offender. Get him gone.
I've read frustrations about Man City and Everton - "if Man City had been charged and deducted we'd have been in the top 4...if Everton had been done last season we wouldn't have come down" - both of these are factually true but my gut feeling is that this frivolous aspiration was always going to happen at some point after the taste of such unprecedented success (particularly with Rudkin involved).
Brighton have been highlighted this week as a stark contrast and Villa have been referenced as the next team to challenge the status quo - although looking at the latter's finances, CL football can quite suddenly go from aspirational to a necessity.
I appreciate the idea behind FFP in terms of protecting clubs from going out of business. Whilst I have doubts about it being this pure in terms of its implementation and the 'top six' , I do get the theory and appreciate that there is a recognition of allowances for growth to business in order to help 'smaller' clubs becoming more competitive financially and on the pitch.
However, it will simply not work for any substantial amount of time. Even if you forget about any shenanigans that, at best, have involved the bending of rules, it's just not set up to be effective for the majority of clubs. If you look at the larger clubs, their ability to spend is contributed to significantly by their global marketing and turnover. Even if a smaller club invests significantly through funds that can be written off by FFP it will take years, possibly decades to reap effective financial benefits. And even then, the larger clubs will have continued to have accelerate their own growth as well as likely continued to reap financial rewards through success on the field.
There are really only two options, bulldoze your way through the status quo and financial restraints like Man City did or, for the majority of clubs even with billionaire owners: take a leap. Unfortunately, the distance continues to increase as you take that leap.
The smaller clubs are therefore left with the options of :
Accept your place and maintain your own position in the PL with some moderate/intermittent success
Accept your place and, through luck and/or bad decisions eventually slide down towards relegation
Gamble on FFP and take a punt for some short lived success
The system is broken but that doesn't mean we should be able to avoid the rules of the system - even if only for the other clubs who, perhaps at least for now, are looking to adhere.
I expect us to, if we go up - and after negotiations about circumstances/money used for long-term investment - get a points deduction of around 8 - 10 points.
Some positives...kind of:
This has occured whilst we have an owner who, at the moment, is still invested in the club and has cleared our recent debts
If we get promoted, with some potential in terms of finances coming through from delayed payments for transfers, and looking to adhere to FFP as much as possible, future deductions may be avoidable
It looks like everything going belly up at the minute has pulled the players together and hopefully that mentality will continue and be coupled by the fans attitude for the remainder of the season to help get us promoted.
Sorry - I struggle not to ramble on and I am terrible at proof reading.
As a post script -
Asking Top to resign is ludicrous, in my opinion , unless there is another owner who would be willing to invest as much and is guaranteed to stick around for the foreseeable. Unlikely.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I think I’m in love with this post more than our owners. Which for 99 must feel incomprehensible 😂
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