Budgets

[Womble]

Old TFFers will remember the arguments around a year ago on the existence of an anonymised list of L2 teams' budgets, which is distributed by the Football League to each club.

It appears that the list has been sent round again, as in our programme on Saturday our CEO discussed this and our position in the L2 budget table. Apparently we are 15th (presumably now dropped since losing Tubbs and Barrett and replacing them with Connolly, the Reading loanee Tanner and Cardiff loanee Oshilaja).

The article also states that the average wage bill in L2 is £1.3m, and there was some talk around the ground on Saturday of the top budget being not far off £2.5m.

Do any other clubs publicise information like this?

 

[Luke Imp]

A budget wouldn't drop because you lost two players? You're talking about the current outlay, which will.

 

[White Army]

If rumours are to be believed our budget started off before the season at below a million, which explains our shockingly poor squad and poor start. Now the new owners have come in our budget has risen significantly shown by the amount of signings we have made and will continue to make. Rob Taylor and Adam Dugdale (who is apparently coming in today) have both been offered deals by us that the clubs that they were at couldnt match, something that i cant remember happening at Tranmere for a long time.

Next season we've been promised a top third budget by the chairman, whatever that is, probably somewhere above 1.5 million.

 

[Kenneth E End]

Reckon our budget is not far off the £1.8-2m mark. We've been able to invest more due to the £600,000 received for Andre Gray, ambitious investors,some enhanced gate receipts this season (averaging 8,500+) and some decent unbudgeted cup money.

Interest this season has been huge, I think up to the end of last year (or a decent sample size anyway), merchandise sales were up 300%.

 

[Alanstag]

We will be in the bottom 6/8, our budget has been drastically cut from previous frivolous seasons. I'm basing this on sound-bites from the club of us being nearer to breakeven and at times our activity has been limited whereas before that didn't seem to happen. In pre season I think Cox let a lot of players go he wouldn't have wanted to and brought in a lot of inexperienced players who I can't imagine being on a lot at all. Murray said this window he's spending what he has freed up from outgoings, and what a job he has done in terms of the quality.

 

[vanner]

Hey there, my first post.

Do you have a list of the anonymous budgets? I imagine ours is high but probably not in the top 3/5.

 

[Laker]

I reckon we're on about £1.2m. Not basing that on a lot of thought but we just don't have the money to burn and our highest earner (Berry) left us last summer while we've retained a lot of our promotion side which wasn't a particularly high wage either.

 

[Di Phelpsio]

Remember when we won League Two and our budget was 3 million! Which was absolutely ridiculous money. Admittedly, it paid off seeing as we returned to League One at the first attempt, but had we not been promoted, we could have entered financial disaster.

Funny to compare that to our current budget of 1.8million and we are top of League One.

 

[LordJord]

Our chairman has confirmed previously that we have a top 5 budget. So yes we are under performing, however we did have around 10 players out at one time, so now Im expecting us to continue climbing the table.

 

[Conker]

I imagine we are around or just below the average this season. We were in the top three pre-Christmas last season I believe!

 

[LordJord]

I imagine we are around or just below the average this season. We were in the top three pre-Christmas last season I believe!

If thats the case then that makes Paul Cox's hoofball even worse.

 

[Shrimpurh]

Comfortably in the top half of the budgets I'd guess around 5th, 6th ish

 

[Alanstag]

If thats the case then that makes Paul Cox's hoofball even worse.

Does beg the question, but I would factor in the hangover of our big spending championship year. Apparently most of the squad had promotion bonuses/raises in their already ludicrous contracts, we would have been paying players like Pilkington and Speight a wedge and neither really played. Still doesn't excuse the style of play which no matter how much we spent would have been the case.

 

[Matt_]

There will be very few, in any, clubs in the division with a higher budget than Town this season.

The club are throwing a lot at it this season in an attempt for an immediate return to League 1 and, as James Wesolowski said some months ago "anything other than promotion is a massive failure".

Thankfully things are currently looking going in terms of achieving that aim and the cup runs earlier in the season will have helped in terms of extra finances.

 

[White Army]

I don't understand why clubs will go all out to get straight back up to league one. It's not as if there's a massive difference in terms of finance from being in league two, compared to say the conference.

 

[T.A]

Next season could be great for smaller clubs like us, Burton and to a lesser extent Shrewsbury. The likes of Oldham, Dale, Preston, Port Vale, Bradford, Chesterfield, Coventry, Doncaster, Barnsley would all bring at least 500+ to Gigg. (Of course some of them might not be there next season) compared to Tranmere, Carlise, Luton and Pompey that will bring that in this league. Then you might even get Leeds, Rotherham, Wigan (to a lesser extent) and Blackpool who would all bring good numbers too.

 

[StagsForLife]

Next season could be great for smaller clubs like us, Burton and to a lesser extent Shrewsbury. The likes of Oldham, Dale, Preston, Port Vale, Bradford, Chesterfield, Coventry, Doncaster, Barnsley would all bring at least 500+ to Gigg. (Of course some of them might not be there next season) compared to Tranmere, Carlise, Luton and Pompey that will bring that in this league. Then you might even get Leeds, Rotherham, Wigan (to a lesser extent) and Blackpool who would all bring good numbers too.

Calm down your not bloody there yet.

 

[T.A]

Calm down your not bloody there yet.

That's the thing, I don't think we will. I know you're trying to wind me up but lets think for a club like us - hell even if you could manage to climb higher than the bottom half for once you could imagine it too. There's nothing more depressing than seeing clubs bring less than a 100 especially when it's nearly week in week out. Obviously It's a very southern league this year so it's to be expected but atmosphere is a big attribute to whether you enjoy the game.

We might even be able to pay our players for a few more years too.

 

[Matt_]

I don't understand why clubs will go all out to get straight back up to league one. It's not as if there's a massive difference in terms of finance from being in league two, compared to say the conference.

According to our Chief Exec we have automatically lost £500,000 from the Football League by being relegated from League 1, I'm not sure his sums are quite right there though.

http://www.express.co.uk/sport/foot...e-it-s-a-whole-lot-tougher-down-in-League-Two

 

[StagsForLife]

That's the thing, I don't think we will. I know you're trying to wind me up but lets think for a club like us - hell even if you could manage to climb higher than the bottom half for once you could imagine it too. There's nothing more depressing than seeing clubs bring less than a 100 especially when it's nearly week in week out. Obviously It's a very southern league this year so it's to be expected but atmosphere is a big attribute to whether you enjoy the game.

We might even be able to pay our players for a few more years too.

The American dream springs to mind..
Also I'm fairly sure we finished 11th last season above the mighty Bury.

 

[T.A]

Yeah but I actually mean for longer than the last 5 games where most teams had given up.

 

[halftimeresults]

Morecambe's budget is about £700.000, only Accy have a lower budget.

 

[northstandexile]

I heard that the Stags budget is only £800K this year and we are the third lowest.

 

[Jason H - ECFC]

I'd be very surprised if ours was as much as that.

 

[hellogregory]

Ours is embarrassing when you consider our league position. It's a disgrace really.

 

[White Army]

A lad on our forum has said we were after paynter but were put off after seeing what he was on. Apparently it wouldn't look out of place at the top of league one. This guy is the most reliable on the forum as well.

 

[T.A]

Ours will be in the top 5. I think Pompey and Shrewsbury at least will have a higher one than us.

 

[localhero]

A lad on our forum has said we were after paynter but were put off after seeing what he was on. Apparently it wouldn't look out of place at the top of league one. This guy is the most reliable on the forum as well.

Apologies to the Carlise lot but we should be leaving Paynter where he is so he can continue to eat up the budget of one of our relegation rivals.

 

[White Army]

Apologies to the Carlise lot but we should be leaving Paynter where he is so he can continue to eat up the budget of one of our relegation rivals.

Yeah, we definitely don't need him. Odejayi is bang on form and then we've got Hume, Donnelly, fenelon and Stockton.

 

[Railway Blue]

Reckon our budget is not far off the £1.8-2m mark. We've been able to invest more due to the £600,000 received for Andre Gray, ambitious investors,some enhanced gate receipts this season (averaging 8,500+) and some decent unbudgeted cup money.

Interest this season has been huge, I think up to the end of last year (or a decent sample size anyway), merchandise sales were up 300%.

Is there any news on Luton getting a new stadium to suit your growing crowds.