Success is highly dependant on getting this right:

[FulhamStu]

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Financial Fair play, if I understand it correctly, means we can only spend a certain % (80% ?) of our turnover on players.  I am not sure how this relates to salaries and transfer fees paid, but I am sure there is a formula.

If we blow FFP as Leeds and Forest have done we will get a transfer ban.

We have players on big salaries and this needs to be carefully managed.  We need big players but can only afford within FFP to pay so much overall.   Players on big salaries will need to be worth  the money in terms of what they bring to the team.   I would imagine our big earners are Parker, Ruiz, McCormack, Amorebieta and Hugo.

How many of these players are really worth the BIG salary?   McCormack and probably Hugo at the moment, Parker probably.  I would suggest Ruiz is not worth big bucks - good player at times but does not contribute enough as we have discussed many many times.   Amorebieta if on big money is not worth it as not THAT good and always injured.

People blame Magath for leaving out Ruiz and Amor, however I suspect the club were trying to offload for the abvov reason.  They only have a half season left on their contracts and I am sure we will let them go unless we can sell for something (will not be much).

I suspect we also needed to loan Mitroglue and Stek for these reasons.

Whilst we are carrying these salaries, I susect we can't afford within FFP to bring in other players on big money.   This is probably why we have bought in journeymen and need to promote the youth, who are after all our future.

I hope we are able to offload Ruiz and Amor and bring in at least one effective big player in Jan (Central Defender would be ideal).

If we screw up FFP we will be knackered so have to spend out money wisely, Khan has said pretty much exactely this.  He has said he will spend, but the players need to be worth it.  FFP is I suspect having a bigger effect than most people realise.

[cmg]

An interesting and well considered piece and I'm sure the conclusions are pretty solid. The only snag is that the whole business of players' salaries is based on guesswork. No one knows what the real score is. In the US players and agents have found it advantageous to be open about remuneration and so salaries are more or less a matter of public knowledge. Here guesswork and rumour prevail.

My own two penny worth is:

If Hugo has been on tip-top PL money these past couple of seasons no wonder he looks so happy.

McCormack's transfer, although supposedly involving big bucks (again we don't know for sure) and presumably involving a nice financial package for him, was between two Championship clubs. I don't see why his salary should be of PL proportion. 

[MJG]

Two things will have an effect on us. A loss of anywhere between 5-10K fans per home game and around £40M in TV money we will not get.
Thats why we always needed a clear out last summer, so be it Magath or any other manager we would have lost a lot of players.
When the accounts for 13-14 come out in 2015 I really fear we have lost a shed load of money last season with all the feckups in players and managers.

Our wages alone for June 2012-June 2013 was £67M (9th highest in the Prem) I dont see that going down anytime soon. And that was 92% of our turnover.

I fully expect June 2013-June 2104 to have wages in the £75M plus region and out % of turnover possibly higher. Its another reason why we had to cut players.

[FulhamStu]

An interesting and well considered piece and I'm sure the conclusions are pretty solid. The only snag is that the whole business of players' salaries is based on guesswork. No one knows what the real score is. In the US players and agents have found it advantageous to be open about remuneration and so salaries are more or less a matter of public knowledge. Here guesswork and rumour prevail.

My own two penny worth is:

If Hugo has been on tip-top PL money these past couple of seasons no wonder he looks so happy.

McCormack's transfer, although supposedly involving big bucks (again we don't know for sure) and presumably involving a nice financial package for him, was between two Championship clubs. I don't see why his salary should be of PL proportion. 

You are right, I have totally guessed, however there are reasons to believe I am on the right lines.  These players were all signed during the PL years and for various reasons are players who would had choices...  Hugo was a free transfer so able to negotiate his own terms from a position of strengh.  Parker had other offers and would have been on big bucks etc etc.   The point is however, dispite whatever the actual numbers are, we can only afford a salary wage bill of xxx, so assuming top players demand high salaries we need to make sure our top earners are the ones who deliver the most on the pitch.  If my assumptions are correct, I do not think all these players are affordable as they do not deliver enough.

[FulhamStu]

Two things will have an effect on us. A loss of anywhere between 5-10K fans per home game and around £40M in TV money we will not get.
Thats why we always needed a clear out last summer, so be it Magath or any other manager we would have lost a lot of players.
When the accounts for 13-14 come out in 2015 I really fear we have lost a shed load of money last season with all the feckups in players and managers.

Our wages alone for June 2012-June 2013 was £67M (9th highest in the Prem) I dont see that going down anytime soon. And that was 92% of our turnover.

I fully expect June 2013-June 2104 to have wages in the £75M plus region and out % of turnover possibly higher. Its another reason why we had to cut players.

Yes, I am sure we had no choice what so ever, and why we would have been very happy for another club to have wanted Ruiz or Amor which was why Magath did not play them.   This is one of my reasons for being unhappy with Ruiz.  Basically, we can't afford him unless I am totally wrong with my assumption that he earns a high salary.   People keep saying we should spend money on new players.  Khan has said, he will buy players if they are worth it, however Khan can't screw FFP or it would tie his hands totally if we were given a transfer ban.  I guess the parachute money helps cushion this to a large extent but Mackintosh is probably earning some of his salary making sure we don't put ourselves in a position where we are dead and burried.

[MJG]

To give you an idea of wages between PL and Championship this is a good graphic.

[MasterHaynes]

underlines the importance of the academy to produce a production line of good youngsters. The current U18 team does not compare to the squads we have had over the last 3-5 years, there are 3-4 players that stand out the rest need to develop and hopefully blossom but for whatever reason, with the occasional exception the performances on the pitch of both U18 & U21 teams has generally been poor, even when we have fielded strong teams. I know the academy, with the odd exception, is laudably trying to reduce the reliance on buying and bringing in talent from around Europe and lower league clubs (e.g. WIlliams, Roberts, LVC, Woodrow,Kaca,Kavanagh, Grimmer, Burn,Hyndmann,Burgess) with more emphasis to develop from scratch kids from the local area where we compete with other premier london clubs but I fear if either or both teams get relegated from their top tier then we will find it even harrder to attract players with the requisite talent. 
A little investment now may pay dividends in the future. I hope we are not cutting back on the youth budget, just looking at the players I have named shows the success of past investment, long may it continue.

[MJG]

underlines the importance of the academy to produce a production line of good youngsters. The current U18 team does not compare to the squads we have had over the last 3-5 years, there are 3-4 players that stand out the rest need to develop and hopefully blossom but for whatever reason, with the occasional exception the performances on the pitch of both U18 & U21 teams has generally been poor, even when we have fielded strong teams. I know the academy, with the odd exception, is laudably trying to reduce the reliance on buying and bringing in talent from around Europe and lower league clubs (e.g. WIlliams, Roberts, LVC, Woodrow,Kaca,Kavanagh, Grimmer, Burn,Hyndmann,Burgess) with more emphasis to develop from scratch kids from the local area where we compete with other premier london clubs but I fear if either or both teams get relegated from their top tier then we will find it even harrder to attract players with the requisite talent. 
A little investment now may pay dividends in the future. I hope we are not cutting back on the youth budget, just looking at the players I have named shows the success of past investment, long may it continue.

What we have to remember is that some of the players who have come through from the U18 & U21's are actually anywhere from a year or even 3 years too early into the first team squad. And so thats why the younger teams are suffering, along with having a number on loan or injured.
usually if you could get 1 sellable youngster a year you are laughing, arguably we have possibly half a dozen currently where we could get good deals for them.

[MasterHaynes]

Hi MJG I know you follow the academy even more closely than I do and agree with your point that we have promoted a huge number at once leaving a bit of a hole in the U21's, but only Roberts would have qualified for the U18s. I know the U18 games I've watched end of last season and beginning of this season we have played some very young players - which I don't think did them any favours either.

The problem as I see it is we will always be a selling club so many of the youngsters we have promoted will be sold on fairly quickly so we really need to have players regularly coming through as we will not be able to reinvest most of that money coming in. I know the accepted stat is that you are lucky if you get one player per batch but I find it difficult to accept this given our recent success, it's not through sheer luck that we have some sort of freakish glut of good players. I have had many arguements with my son over the last couple of years when I;ve been telling him that we had 8 or more players in the academy that would come through into the first team in the near future, his response was the same - statistically lucky if you get 1. Imagine my delight with whats come to pass(old dad's actually right for once!), even with the current evidence he still can't accept we have 3-4 more players that could be pushing for inclusion.

I strongly believe we could easily field a team and subs comprised completely of our youngsters under 21 in the championship which would hold their own against several of the teams there.Oh I may be looking through rose tinted glasses but do believe  the likes of Passely, Richards, Donnelly Burgess with a few other possibles like Plumain will be knpcking on the 1st team door within nexr 8-12 monhs with O'Halloran,Evans, Nabay, Denirian, Edun, Baba and Torre following them in 12-18 months time which allows to sell players like Roberts when we have a player like Deano to step into the gap, who by the way I believe will make the fans quickly forget about Roberts and hail the 2nd coming of Damien Duff in his prime..

[MJG]

Not sure I can disagree with any of that.
I have been told that while the u18's this year may struggle the next batch have some real diamonds in them.

I have always believed our group of 18-21's we are currently watching could hold their own in this league. Under a proper manager from day one the plan to remove the dead wood in the summer and go with the youngsters could have worked... And to some extent is working.

I think some of the players who are 20/21 and nowhere near the team may have missed the boat,  but I'd give most of them till summer 2016 to prove themselves.

[copthornemike]

Doesn't spending on youth development and infrastructure, e.g. increase of capacity of Craven Cottage, fall outside of the FFP provisions?

[fulhamben]

Doesn't spending on youth development and infrastructure, e.g. increase of capacity of Craven Cottage, fall outside of the FFP provisions?

yes

[fulhamben]

To give you an idea of wages between PL and Championship this is a good graphic.

what would it be if you took city and Chelsea out of the equation?

[MJG]

To give you an idea of wages between PL and Championship this is a good graphic.

what would it be if you took city and Chelsea out of the equation?

Have no idea but as it's averages the basic ratio will still stand relevant to championship.  Look at income as well for each club. We were around a 70m income club 18 months ago,  now more like 25-35m.
Also championship has high to low earners so you would need to take them out for say mid table averages.

[filham]

 We are still carrying a large squad, just look at the players listed on the match day programme it is always longer than our opponents. I would think there is pressure on Kit to transfer players out before we can bring in any new players.

[fulhamben]

We are still carrying a large squad, just look at the players listed on the match day programme it is always longer than our opponents. I would think there is pressure on Kit to transfer players out before we can bring in any new players.

its made up of kids that should still be playing under 21s and will be on peanuts