Can anyone explain clearly where we are heading ?

[old wittonian]

U23's played 3 at the back, with 2 advanced wing-backs from the games I saw. Towards the end of the season they really showed how that system can be attacking and produce chances / goals. They played the ball out from the back quickly and the midfield was far more fluid than the 1st team. Found space out wide and in the box against teams who packed the defence. To be fair, they rarely played against sides who pressed high up the pitch and the central defence did sometimes get caught on the counter. Conceded some easy goals in games they otherwise dominated.

But did they continually look to pass it back to a Cody clone.

 

[Rangiora Wolf]

I'll leave this table here so that we can have some context. It's sorted by the annual wage bill - Wolves are 13th at 52.25 million, comparable with Aston Villa and Southampton. Top Six in league position are all in the top seven in the annual wage bill, with the exception of Everton. I've also added the spending per point earned, which gives you some insight to "value." Looking at this metric, you could say that Brentford massively overachieved compared to what they spent, while ManU and Everton were among the worst. Wolves are clearly overachieving, with the fourth best wage bill per point earned.

Other interesting tidbits - Crystal Palace, Leicester, and West Ham have much, much higher wage bills than Wolves (20k and above). I would expect Newcastle to start shooting up the annual wage bill - last season, they were 13mil higher in annual wages than Wolves.

This is why we need more revenue streams for recurring annual costs - not one-time injections of funds.

Club	Annual Wage Bill​	Points​	Spend/Point​	Rank - Annual Wage Bill​	Rank - Spend/ Point​	League Position​
Manchester United	£ 214,210,000​	58​	£ 3,693,276​	1​	20​	6​
Chelsea	£ 173,640,000​	74​	£ 2,346,486​	2​	19​	3​
Manchester City	£ 149,192,000​	93​	£ 1,604,215​	3​	16​	1​
Liverpool	£ 139,752,000​	92​	£ 1,519,043​	4​	14​	2​
Arsenal	£ 87,310,000​	69​	£ 1,265,362​	5​	7​	5​
Everton	£ 86,510,000​	39​	£ 2,218,205​	6​	18​	16​
Tottenham	£ 75,536,000​	71​	£ 1,063,887​	7​	6​	4​
Crystal Palace	£ 72,950,000​	48​	£ 1,519,792​	8​	15​	12​
Leicester	£ 72,810,000​	52​	£ 1,400,192​	9​	13​	8​
West Ham	£ 71,956,000​	56​	£ 1,284,929​	10​	8​	7​
Newcastle	£ 65,850,000​	49​	£ 1,343,878​	11​	11​	11​
Aston Villa	£ 59,970,000​	45​	£ 1,332,667​	12​	10​	14​
Wolves	£ 52,250,000​	51​	£ 1,024,510​	13​	4​	10​
Southampton	£ 52,140,000​	40​	£ 1,303,500​	14​	9​	5​
Brighton	£ 40,280,000​	51​	£ 789,804​	15​	3​	9​
Watford	£ 38,750,000​	23​	£ 1,684,783​	16​	17​	19​
Burnley	£ 36,920,000​	35​	£ 1,054,857​	17​	5​	18​
Norwich	£ 29,600,000​	22​	£ 1,345,455​	18​	12​	20​
Leeds United	£ 23,810,000​	38​	£ 626,579​	19​	2​	17​
Brentford	£ 18,320,000​	46​	£ 398,261​	20​	1​	13​

The problem is that because we've done bugger all in previous transfer windows, we could be back in the championship before these alternative revenue streams start to pay dividends

 

[Eastyorksyeltz]

But did they continually look to pass it back to a Cody clone.

They did pass back when things were not on in the final third, but normally to the midfield, who were, as I said considerably more mobile and prepared to carry the ball forward, make through passes on a more regular basis than we saw from the first team. This was often a gamble, which probably contributed to that defensive frailty which was evident in some of the games.

 

[Deleted member 8455jwf]

I’m not sure the Zenga era was an unqualified success. I accept that it appeared we were let down at the 11th hour by Lopetegui, but the treatment of Jackett, and the subsequent Zenga shambles, was not a great start. After that, I think we should credit Mendes more than Fosun for much of the next year or so. Credit to Fosun for listening to the advice that was being offered, but I wouldn’t go much further than that.

Reckon the £100 odd M they gave us was pretty good ownership as well tbf

 

[Mark Rankines Lovechild]

Works equally well with the team or this (and most other transfer threads)

 

[BlahBlah]

This is why we need more revenue streams for recurring annual costs - not one-time injections of funds.

Club	Annual Wage Bill​	Points​	Spend/Point​	Rank - Annual Wage Bill​	Rank - Spend/ Point​	League Position​
Manchester United	£ 214,210,000​	58​	£ 3,693,276​	1​	20​	6​
Chelsea	£ 173,640,000​	74​	£ 2,346,486​	2​	19​	3​
Manchester City	£ 149,192,000​	93​	£ 1,604,215​	3​	16​	1​
Liverpool	£ 139,752,000​	92​	£ 1,519,043​	4​	14​	2​
Arsenal	£ 87,310,000​	69​	£ 1,265,362​	5​	7​	5​
Everton	£ 86,510,000​	39​	£ 2,218,205​	6​	18​	16​
Tottenham	£ 75,536,000​	71​	£ 1,063,887​	7​	6​	4​
Crystal Palace	£ 72,950,000​	48​	£ 1,519,792​	8​	15​	12​
Leicester	£ 72,810,000​	52​	£ 1,400,192​	9​	13​	8​
West Ham	£ 71,956,000​	56​	£ 1,284,929​	10​	8​	7​
Newcastle	£ 65,850,000​	49​	£ 1,343,878​	11​	11​	11​
Aston Villa	£ 59,970,000​	45​	£ 1,332,667​	12​	10​	14​
Wolves	£ 52,250,000​	51​	£ 1,024,510​	13​	4​	10​
Southampton	£ 52,140,000​	40​	£ 1,303,500​	14​	9​	5​
Brighton	£ 40,280,000​	51​	£ 789,804​	15​	3​	9​
Watford	£ 38,750,000​	23​	£ 1,684,783​	16​	17​	19​
Burnley	£ 36,920,000​	35​	£ 1,054,857​	17​	5​	18​
Norwich	£ 29,600,000​	22​	£ 1,345,455​	18​	12​	20​
Leeds United	£ 23,810,000​	38​	£ 626,579​	19​	2​	17​
Brentford	£ 18,320,000​	46​	£ 398,261​	20​	1​	13​

Good post. It does need to be said though that one of the revenue streams was meant to be buying young players and selling them on for a profit.
In the last 12 months players like Botman, Vitinha and Sanches (it appears) are going for substantially more money than they would have cost a year ago, when it appears for Botman at least, we stalled over a few million and he's now strengthened a direct rival who will expect to overtake us.
There is the element of lost profit to consider, along with the main point that not strengthening your team results in a poorer season on the pitch and less chance of the best players wanting to join you.

 

[LosgallardosWolf]

Where are we going?....down the ****ter

 

[Bossworld]

It's going to cost us fans in the long term, whether that's wider admirers or people who would have gone, thinking 'I'm not wasting £40 plus travel to see that'. There's already a growing sentiment of 'boring Wolves' levelled at us for our antics after the second PL season.

On one hand, rationally Liverpool and Man City are streets ahead of the rest of the league, Chelsea are back on solid ground, Arsenal and Spurs are making solid signings, and Man Utd are, errm, Man Utd.

Chuck West Ham into the mix and on paper, that's all the European places gone already.

Truly hopeful the Newcastle project fails but that's another club splashing the cash, then I'm sure Everton will do something daft too. Add on Leicester City and suddenly we're bottom half.

I can see that there's no point spending £100m in a window, when it's potentially the difference between finishing 9th or 12th, but I'm starting to get fearful of relegation. Every club bar the 'big six' and Everton has only been (back) in the PL since 2012 at the earliest. Every club has a shelf life in this league.

 

[Corporate Wolf]

Unless there is some serious turn around in Fosun‘s investment in playing staff there is only one direction….

 

[lostwolf]

I'd be right behind a self sufficiency plan if they were doing it right but I don't think they are, we needed to flesh out the squad for a couple more seasons before we went sell to buy. We don't' have enough saleable assets and are pinning our hopes on someone buying Neves before we can bring anymore players in, if Neves doesn't move we are pretty much relying on MGW going but he won't bring in as much money. We are so light in certain areas that any sale would need more than one player coming in to give us an adequate squad and we haven't replaced the experience we lost in Ruddy, Saiss and Marcal leaving, and possibly the maestro Moutinho (although I think he will sign a new deal now)

We buy from Portugal all the time and these clubs are the epitome of self sufficiency, your Benfica's, Sportings and Portos have prolific youth systems that generate a lot of players for the first team and for sale, they hoover up top talent from Portugal and South America before they gain a reputation and they develop them well, and they move their in demand players on quickly as they always have a succession plan and they have squads big enough to cope with the players they let go each season, we seem to want to follow this model but we are so limited by a small squad and not speculating on enough players.

Spot on. Like you I'd be right behind self-suffiency, anything else is at best a bit unsporting and at worst reckless. I also agree that it's the way we're going about it that irks me.

We desperately need to supplement our potentially 'flippable' players (if that's the way the club think they need to go) with proven quality and steel. In part, this is due to the need to ensure we remain a decent PL side, but also it's so that those flippable lads can play the kind of football they're capable of to demonstrate that 10m of player is worth 30m a couple of seasons later. RAN is arguably an example of how last season, for the first time, that plan fell down: instead of showing he's worth c40m (which I believe he could be), he ends up having a mixed season with some struggling players around him.

The other issue I have with Fosun's brand of self-suffiency is the lack of any movement on the ground - I understand the arguments against investing there, but if they were serious about longer-term self-sufficiency that's one of the ways you build it.

 

[lostwolf]

Some people really do need to get their heads out the sand if they think everything is hunky dory at the club. How can the lack of movement in the market and the current strategy from this ownership not concern people? The warning signs have been there for some time. This strategy will see us relegated sooner or later, surely, surely people can see this?? Evidently not!

Winter is coming.

 

[Starsky]

I'd swap Fosun for the vast majority of owners at this level.

The CCP have killed it.

 

[SmiffyWolf]

I'll leave this table here so that we can have some context. It's sorted by the annual wage bill - Wolves are 13th at 52.25 million, comparable with Aston Villa and Southampton. Top Six in league position are all in the top seven in the annual wage bill, with the exception of Everton. I've also added the spending per point earned, which gives you some insight to "value." Looking at this metric, you could say that Brentford massively overachieved compared to what they spent, while ManU and Everton were among the worst. Wolves are clearly overachieving, with the fourth best wage bill per point earned.

Other interesting tidbits - Crystal Palace, Leicester, and West Ham have much, much higher wage bills than Wolves (20k and above). I would expect Newcastle to start shooting up the annual wage bill - last season, they were 13mil higher in annual wages than Wolves.

This is why we need more revenue streams for recurring annual costs - not one-time injections of funds.

Club	Annual Wage Bill​	Points​	Spend/Point​	Rank - Annual Wage Bill​	Rank - Spend/ Point​	League Position​
Manchester United	£ 214,210,000​	58​	£ 3,693,276​	1​	20​	6​
Chelsea	£ 173,640,000​	74​	£ 2,346,486​	2​	19​	3​
Manchester City	£ 149,192,000​	93​	£ 1,604,215​	3​	16​	1​
Liverpool	£ 139,752,000​	92​	£ 1,519,043​	4​	14​	2​
Arsenal	£ 87,310,000​	69​	£ 1,265,362​	5​	7​	5​
Everton	£ 86,510,000​	39​	£ 2,218,205​	6​	18​	16​
Tottenham	£ 75,536,000​	71​	£ 1,063,887​	7​	6​	4​
Crystal Palace	£ 72,950,000​	48​	£ 1,519,792​	8​	15​	12​
Leicester	£ 72,810,000​	52​	£ 1,400,192​	9​	13​	8​
West Ham	£ 71,956,000​	56​	£ 1,284,929​	10​	8​	7​
Newcastle	£ 65,850,000​	49​	£ 1,343,878​	11​	11​	11​
Aston Villa	£ 59,970,000​	45​	£ 1,332,667​	12​	10​	14​
Wolves	£ 52,250,000​	51​	£ 1,024,510​	13​	4​	10​
Southampton	£ 52,140,000​	40​	£ 1,303,500​	14​	9​	5​
Brighton	£ 40,280,000​	51​	£ 789,804​	15​	3​	9​
Watford	£ 38,750,000​	23​	£ 1,684,783​	16​	17​	19​
Burnley	£ 36,920,000​	35​	£ 1,054,857​	17​	5​	18​
Norwich	£ 29,600,000​	22​	£ 1,345,455​	18​	12​	20​
Leeds United	£ 23,810,000​	38​	£ 626,579​	19​	2​	17​
Brentford	£ 18,320,000​	46​	£ 398,261​	20​	1​	13​

Interesting table considering 3 of the bottom 5 got relegated

 

[SmiffyWolf]

I'd swap Fosun for the vast majority of owners at this level.

The CCP have killed it.

Totally agree but I feel we are just a cog in moving players around Europe and the agency stuff makes them extra money . So really win win for them .

If this was a project then nevermind the team but the ground would be sorted as well .

Without banging the villa drum their owners seem to want to push again this season . The ground the squad . Our owners dud but haven't in 2 years or why no work on stadium or invested in squad.

I am starting to move to hopefully wears listed to be sold . Yes I hear some saying careful what you wish for and in the past we did this . I. The past many clubs have done various things but the reality is today not 5 / 10 years ago.

 

[hollo]

There are a lot of contract extensions to sort out for our senior players. Too many of our best players only have a couple of years left.
Please renew gibbs white, neves, traore, dendoncker, semedo, podence.
This is negligence, that's what this is!


Sign some new players too!

 

[Starsky]

Totally agree but I feel we are just a cog in moving players around Europe and the agency stuff makes them extra money . So really win win for them .

If this was a project then nevermind the team but the ground would be sorted as well .

Without banging the villa drum their owners seem to want to push again this season . The ground the squad . Our owners dud but haven't in 2 years or why no work on stadium or invested in squad.

I am starting to move to hopefully wears listed to be sold . Yes I hear some saying careful what you wish for and in the past we did this . I. The past many clubs have done various things but the reality is today not 5 / 10 years ago.

This "careful what you wish for" argument is nonsense.

This shower aren't even spending what we generate nevermind any additional injection of funds and their judgement stinks(Summer of Silva) so what would we lose exactly?

Even Mendes has given up.

They are now exactly the same as Lai at Albion. Finished by the CCP.

 

[Dingle Chris]

Championship.

 

[wwbug]

This "careful what you wish for" argument is nonsense.

This shower aren't even spending what we generate nevermind any additional injection of funds and their judgement stinks(Summer of Silva) so what would we lose exactly?

Even Mendes has given up.

They are now exactly the same as Lai at Albion. Finished by the CCP.

I will look at the team on 1 September . And I think we will all know by then if Fosun are a busted flush .

 

[Irish_Wolf]

If asset stripping and winding down is the future then in order to save us from an almighty crash we need a whole new approach to transfers. Spending the likes of 35m on Silva for example is a lead pair of boots while trying to tread water,same goes for Semedo.

We need more signings like Jota or Neto and RAN,, players who potentially will make the club huge profits

Money should be invested in scouting and not just looking to Mendes. I just have a feeling if it goes belly up with Fosun we will be left with nothing and starting from scratch, league one anyone?

Restructure now. Invest in scouting, plan for a future.

Fosun are like the rich parents and we are currently a snowflake child club.

 

[Deleted member 8455jwf]

This "careful what you wish for" argument is nonsense.

This shower aren't even spending what we generate nevermind any additional injection of funds and their judgement stinks(Summer of Silva) so what would we lose exactly?

Even Mendes has given up.

They are now exactly the same as Lai at Albion. Finished by the CCP.

Lai has taken £10M out of Albion to loan his other businesses. Fosun wrote off £100M we owed them last season.

Slightly different

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

Lai has taken £10M out of Albion to loan his other businesses. Fosun wrote off £100M we owed them last season.

Slightly different

As stated in previous posts, the debt wasn't written off, just capitalised and turned into equity. Wolves are now worth c£300m. Fosun will get that back when the time is right to sell.

Concerns for me are - can we stay in the prem with squad we have and will Fosun be tempted to use us as a source of revenue to support other businesses.

 

[Deleted member 8455jwf]

As stated in previous posts, the debt wasn't written off, just capitalised and turned into equity. Wolves are now worth c£300m. Fosun will get that back when the time is right to sell.

Concerns for me are - can we stay in the prem with squad we have and will Fosun be tempted to use us as a source of revenue to support other businesses.

The debt was effectively written off, if Fosun would have wanted to they could have just had us pay it back to them (with interest) and then sold when it was paid back

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

The debt was effectively written off, if Fosun would have wanted to they could have just had us pay it back to them (with interest) and then sold when it was paid back

Where is the logic in that? Fosun paying interest on borrowed money to pay a debt to... Fosun.

 

[Deleted member 8455jwf]

Where is the logic in that? Fosun paying interest on borrowed money to pay a debt to... Fosun.

What? No the club would pay with it's revenues the money to Fosun.

Fosun lent us £100odd M, they could have had us repay that to them with revenues Wolves made (with interest if they wanted to). How is that Fosun paying interest on anything?

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

What? No the club would pay with it's revenues the money to Fosun.

Fosun lent us £100odd M, they could have had us repay that to them with revenues Wolves made (with interest if they wanted to). How is that Fosun paying interest on anything?

You do know that Wolves are owned by Fosun?

 

[RosehillWolf]

Article in Financial Times today is very grim reading. Dark days ahead I’m afraid. We are in massive trouble according to Warren Buffet
I’d actually go as far to say that we are ****ed

 

[YouGottaRaulWithIt]

Article in Financial Times today is very grim reading. Dark days ahead I’m afraid. We are in massive trouble according to Warren Buffet
I’d actually go as far to say that we are ****ed

I much prefer an all-you-can-eat buffet.

 

[StraightToPopworld]

Yep, reads like we’re set to be sold off. I wonder if Peak6 know anyone who’ll take it off Fosuns hands…

 

[RosehillWolf]

I much prefer an all-you-can-eat buffet.

There ain’t no money for a bag of mini cheddars let alone a buffet !

 

[RosehillWolf]

Yep, reads like we’re set to be sold off. I wonder if Peak6 know anyone who’ll take it off Fosuns hands…

Mike Ashley ?

 

[Loefah]

All makes sense now why the taps have been turned off. When the CCP was brought up before on here it's been regularly dismissed as pant wetting but it's obviously having a major influence.

 

[Deleted member 8455jwf]

All makes sense now why the taps have been turned off. When the CCP was brought up before on here it's been regularly dismissed as pant wetting but it's obviously having a major influence.

This was always the route of travel CCP or no CCP I believe. Just how an investment firm works.

 

[WeAreTheWolvesII]

I would presume that we're up for sale without it being announced and I hope the lack of action this summer may mean an agreement is close.

You read the FT article and it just shows the situation are in and it's quite bleak for them, so you ask why would they possibly want to keep Wolves? What are we doing for them? Nothing. Everyone knows football is not where you go if you want to make money and you could make a strong case to say we've peaked, so if they cash in now then they've done very well.

They're also not stupid. They know our valuation will drop if we go down and they know it's possible if you stop investing - as it is for 14 teams in the league.

People talk about the brand, the esports etc. but from what I can see when you look into the figures of what it actually does, it's not much at all in the big picture. So I don't think losing the brand would be a major issue for Fosun.

Of course, the big issue is whether we actually can attract a proper buyer.

I know we're nowhere near their level but I was surprised at the general level of interest in Chelsea given the price and then there's Everton talk, so there does still seem to be a major appeal to Premier League clubs, so maybe we can.

 

[hollo]

Yes, peak 6 could get more american investors onboard. I would rather a rich sheikh than a leveraged american buyout.

 

[wwbug]

I would presume that we're up for sale without it being announced and I hope the lack of action this summer may mean an agreement is close.

You read the FT article and it just shows the situation are in and it's quite bleak for them, so you ask why would they possibly want to keep Wolves? What are we doing for them? Nothing. Everyone knows football is now where you go if you want to make money and you could make a strong case to say we've peaked, so if they cash in now then they've done very well.

They're also not stupid. They know our valuation will drop if we go down and they know it's possible if you stop investing - as it is for 14 teams in the league.

People talk about the brand, the esports etc. but from what I can see when you look into the figures of what it actually does, it's not much at all in the big picture. So I don't think losing the brand would be a major issue for Fosun.

Of course, the big issue is whether we actually can attract a proper buyer.

I know we're nowhere near their level but I was surprised at the general level of interest in Chelsea given the price and then there's Everton talk, so there does still seem to be a major appeal to Premier League clubs, so maybe we can.

I think you have captured the situation in a nutshell. Letting contracts run down is a classic for selling. Not buying players on long and expensive contracts is another.
We are much more attractive as a club than when we were sold by Steve Morgan , but also not such a good investment for potential.

 

[Glow69]

If asset stripping and winding down is the future then in order to save us from an almighty crash we need a whole new approach to transfers. Spending the likes of 35m on Silva for example is a lead pair of boots while trying to tread water,same goes for Semedo.

We need more signings like Jota or Neto and RAN,, players who potentially will make the club huge profits

Money should be invested in scouting and not just looking to Mendes. I just have a feeling if it goes belly up with Fosun we will be left with nothing and starting from scratch, league one anyone?

Restructure now. Invest in scouting, plan for a future.

Fosun are like the rich parents and we are currently a snowflake child club.

Semedo type signings are exactly what the fan base wet theirself over and craving for as they always do. Big name, big fee from a big club and when it doesn't go to plan In their eyes (imo he had a cracking 2nd season) it's the clubs fault for spending the big dollar on someone!

Lose lose situation.

Buy potential then its 'what about now'. Buy now for big money, doesn't work out for the player then it means the board are clueless.

 

[dewolfman]

Who is due back at training this week?

 

[Bill McCai]

Article in Financial Times today is very grim reading. Dark days ahead I’m afraid. We are in massive trouble according to Warren Buffet
I’d actually go as far to say that we are ****ed

We are in massive trouble according to Warren Buffet?!! What?

 

[Mile End Wanderer]

Midtable club that is stagnating slowly

 

[Eastyorksyeltz]

We are in massive trouble according to Warren Buffet?!! What?

Either a subtle sense of humour, or a misreading of the article I assume?