Barnsley chairman Neerav Parekh, chief executive Jon Flatman and sporting director Mladen Sormaz met with supporters this week to discuss various topics. Here is what was said about....
FINANCES
Flatman: It costs £17m every year to run this football club.
To run the football side – the academy, first team, coaching staff – takes up £11m, including player wages.
It costs £4m every year roughly to keep the lights on – admin staff, insurance, stadium maintenance, pitches. It costs about another £2million to put matches on, stewarding and other aspects.
In terms of revenues, we get about £3million from broadcast, about £1.7million for commercial, £3.5million from supporters – tickets, food and beverage. That is about an £8.2million shortfall.
Player trading is one of the ways the shortfall is made up. But we don’t sell £8.2million of players every single season – in fact this summer was no where near that. Even if we do sell players, very often the money is paid over a series of years.
So we go to the ownership every month for a cheque in order to keep the lights on. That is a huge amount which we need to applaud. It doesn’t go in as loans, it goes in as equity and you cannot get it out.
If we reduce the football costs, the quality on the field diminishes and it’s a vicious cycle.
We are putting every penny we can onto the field to make it work.
The priority is getting the first team and academy as good as they can be.
So we had to make cuts off the field, and some of that is fan experience.
But it’s balanced by the fantastic support we’re receiving from the council which will result in a permanent fanzone, better hospitality facilities and better food and beverage offering on the concourse.
Any business that is losing £8m has to make some pretty tough decisions.
TARGETS FOR THE SEASON
Parekh: The goal is to get back to the Championship then stabilise in mid-table without the risk of relegation every season.
We have been very close the last two years. I think it’s realistic. I wouldn’t be travelling all this way if I didn’t have Premier League ambitions but, at this point, it’s not realistic.
‘SELLING THE BEST PLAYERS’
Parekh: It is categorically untrue that Barnsley sell all their best players. Last January we had bids for all the players who were out of contract – Devante Cole, Herbie Kane, Jordan Williams and Nicky Cadden.
We could have sold all of them and not had to invest as much money but we chose to keep them. Luca Connell and Adam Phillips have been around for years. Every single club in this country sells players.
REPLACING LAST SEASON’S STARS
Sormaz: McAtee and Cole are two quality players who any team is going to struggle to replace. It’s important to remember that Devante was signed in the Championship so we had those funds at the time. The striker market this summer was one the hardest we’ve seen. Close rivals to us have missed out on players because clubs just aren’t letting them go. Players we might have been in for are now not making squads or playing much.
It was a really tough one. We had to look at who can replace the goals we lost. We think Davis, throughout the whole season, can probably get the same as John or maybe more. Stephen got double figures last season playing out wide so we thought, in a more central role, can we get more out of him? Max Watters has shown the role he can play in this squad.
GAMES BEING MOVED FOR SKY
Flatman: Because a lot of clubs are losing money, they are keen to take any money they can.
As a consequence of that, Sky, as a rights holder, have a right to move a certain number of games.
There is an impact of that on fans.
We are feeling the impact of that, as well as dodgy boxes and moving games. It presents an uncertain future.
The trade-off is the additional money from Sky and we’re looking at how we use some of that to equal out some of those issues.
We saw the attendance against Wycombe on a Tuesday night and wanted to address it straight away, so we made offers to fans for the Charlton game like two additional fans with a season ticket holder for free. We will continue to try that.
It’s not Sky’s fault. They want people in grounds as well.
It’s not in their interests to have banks of empty seats. We have to work together to find what works.
HAVING 4 FIRST TEAM COACHES
Sormaz: It’s the average number for clubs at our level. Darrell has different specialisations for each area – attack, defence and set pieces. I think it’s really important when you have a really long season that players are getting that individual work.
LOANING OUT JACKSON SMITH
Sormaz: We see Jackson as the long-term ‘keeper for four or five years but, if he had a shaky start, it could be difficult for him to recover. The logic was that, after having Jackson in the door for a month or two, we felt a little bit more development was needed. Plan A was to get him in a loan in the window but now we’re getting him out at Grimsby where he’s developing. We brought Gaga (Slonina) in because we think he’s quality. Players will have ups and downs throughout the season. There is no obligation for us to play any loan player.
NEILL COLLINS
Parekh: We looked at Neill’s data in the States. He hadn’t played the high press style for a couple of seasons but he did do it for a couple of seasons, so we thought he would be able to implement it. He is one of the nicest and most professional people in football but he wasn’t the right fit and that’s why we eventually parted ways.
