Does any club have a long-term plan? United had to keep rebuilding. Players get old and go off the boil or want to move to other clubs so they get replaced. If you've got a high-value squad then replacing players is relatively easy as you sell for a decent amount plus you tend to have a higner income to start with.
When ADUG came in, we were on the verge of administration, had relatively few saleable assets so we needed significant investment. Now we've got that, our squad value is higher and this current financial year should see our income come in around the £280-300m range (maybe more depending on the CL), with a wage/income ratio under 70%.
Gross spend becomes largely irrelevant at that point as the real impact is on the bottom line, via amortisation, wages and any profit/loss on sale. If we bought 4 players at a total of £100m on five year contracts and ship them out after two years, replacing them with £100m of new players on the same wages, then the actual ongoing cost is zero, plus or minus any profit/loss on sale.
Ah now, if you get your wage turnover ratio down to 70% (Which will be pretty impressive) you'll still be in the same position that we are in, that once you pay wages and expenses, and sundry other bits and bobs, there's no cash left over to fund transfer signings. that means that ADUG are still going to have to be putting their hand in their pocket to pay for the net transfer spending. From the point of view of FFP, even if you get wages down to 70%, your huge amortization charge will push you into a large loss, unless you sell a lot of players for large profits on their book value.
The problem with man city's wage bill in 2011-12 (the last year figures were available) was that you were paying £8-10 million a year (which is far too much for a club like city) to too many players. Tevez and toure were at the top of the list, along with aguero and silva, who deserved those wages, and dzeko, ballotelli, Nasri and Adebayor, who probably didn't. The key for city to get their finances in control is to get rid of the players they didn't use, (adebayor, bridge, RSC, maicon) and then replace all bar the very best with quality players, on about £80k, saving Four or five million a year on wages at a time.
So far Tevez, ballotelli and adebayor are gone from that list. Arguably city should have moved on Toure, nasri and dzeko as well. Toure renewed his contract for another four years, If city were serious about breaking even they would have sold him and Nasri to one of the sugar daddy clubs in france. I didn't see too much in toure's performances to suggest that he's going to be a £10 million a year player for the next four years did you?
Fernandinho, would be a suitable replacement for toure, navas for Nasri, jovetic for ballotelli and soldado for tevez. As you suggest, all of these are on much lower wages. All you'd have to do then is sign a cheaper replacement on lower wages than dzeko, and you'd be well on the way to eventual financial sanity. One thing about this summers signings. Jovetic is a very good young player who could become top class, but the other three will all be 28 by november and they are what they are. City have spent a lot of money on proven second tier performers These are players who have shone largely in midtable in the spanish league, and in the Ukraine.
Also I don't think you can really compare arsenal's injection of some cash when Fitzman took over, and City. That money was a lump sum to get them going, which wasn't really out of line with what others were spending at the time. Bergkamp's other option when leaving Inter Milan was Aston villa. Within two years of Arsene Wenger taking over, they were making huge profits in the transfer market. They Sold Anelka for £22 million, and overmars and Petit for a combined £35 million to barcelona. They made £15 million profit on Henry, and £25 million on viera when they were finished with them. After the injection of cash, they very quickly became a profitable club, to the point where they could raise the money to build their stadium.
Five years on, City are still getting £100 million a year from their owners, either through direct funding, or suspiciously huge sponsorship deals with companies from the gulf that are falling over themselves to throw money at city. The Scale and duration of the ADUG spending spree is astonishing. I mean sergio Aguero plays for man city. Sergio bloody Aguero. And it's so bloody relentless. The size of city's spending is such that they've essentially bought a CL place. Man utd have a permanent one because of their size, Chelsea Spend so much that they will always have one. 2009-10 was the last time that three non-sugar daddy clubs made the CL. Spurs pipped you on pretty much the last day of the season, but you responded by going out and spending another £120 million on players. Even being really successful by their own standards wasn't going to be enough to keep spurs in the top four.
Ultimately what's done is done, and city have spent all that money, and won the title and the FA cup, and been twice runners up in the league, and the FA cup. You've established yourself as a big club around the world. It's the same with chelsea. Both clubs now sit happily in the top ten of the Deloitte footballing rich list. The next step is for city to get their finances under control, and run themselves like an efficient top club.
The argument that the premiership needs sugar daddies to provide competition at the top is a poor one. Man utd are the biggest club, but they spend money like a much smaller one, and missed out by a point to chelsea, and goal difference to city from winning 7 straight championships. It obviously hasn't provided enough competition. The major impact of Chelsea's arrival was to end arsenal's dominance. They didn't add competition, they just changed the name of the team that fought with man utd. now city have come and wiped mud in chelsea's eye and taken up the challenge of fighting man utd. now Jose is back.
The point is that Chelsea and Man City are now established as two big clubs with global standing. All that Roman and ADUG have to really do now is build bigger stadia, and let the clubs stand on their own two feet. If chelsea had a stadium like Arsenal's they'd already be turning over nearly £300 million and rolling in profit. That sum would put them very close to Man Utd's figure. A bigger stadium wouldn't be quite as beneficial for city, but You'd still have a very healthy turnover, which would enable you to afford one of the best squads in europe.
With Spurs moving to a 56k stadium in 2016, and us hopefully expanding anfield in a similar timeframe, you would be looking at six premiership clubs in any list of europe's top 10 richest clubs, and that's with only four CL places. That would be enough to create a very strong, competitive league. Indeed the new tv contract is likely to push Everton, newcastle and villa into the top 20 richest european clubs.
There's no real justification for allowing sugar daddies. If you limit clubs to spending what they earn, Over the next couple of years you would have six big clubs in england, capable of gradually affording to mount a title challenge. There will be a host of strong middle ranking clubs chasing after them and trying to make that step up, like Everton, Villa and Newcastle. Then you will have a number of very strong regional clubs, like Norwich, swansea, west brom and southampton (and sunderland if they were to ever get their act together). Already you are seeing these midtable premiership clubs signing promising players from europe, for substantial sums of money, out of profits. Swansea have paid £12 million for the top scorer in the dutch league. Norwich have signed Van Wolfswinkel, Fer and Redmond. Southampton paid £12 million for wanyama. This isn't like Middlesbrough under gibson, or fulham under Tigana. These clubs can actually afford to sign these players.
It will be interesting to see how city do this season under pellegrini, but it would be a lot more interesting if they had taken the necessary steps to end their continal reliance on their sugar daddy. We've seen that if you spend enough money, you can win the league, now what are you going to do next?
