Author Archives: JJ (Tony)

Sharpe’s honeymoon period is over

Posted by JJ (Tony) in Specials and tagged with , , , ,
Sharpe

The honeymoon period for the new chairman is coming to an end as a storm rages over Emmerson Boyce’s contract.

 

“There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.”

David Sharpe should take heed of Machiavelli’s words.

A club that was tipped to win the Championship by the highly rated FourFourTwo magazine ended up being relegated. The mistakes of the past two seasons have dragged the club down and there is real danger of the slide continuing.

Is the youthful Sharpe capable of steadying things up and leading the club back to the Promised Land? What clues is Sharpe giving when one reads between the lines of his comments? Where are Latics really heading?

The young chairman is working on the creation of a new order at Wigan Athletic. The upheaval continues amid a climate of uncertainty. What kind of club will Latics be a year from now? What kinds of realistic expectations can fans have of the future?

Sharpe has certainly stepped into a difficult situation, but he continues to put on a brave face in his dealings with the media. Sharpe invariably paints an optimistic picture, whilst acknowledging that mistakes have been made in the past.

However, the initial gloss is now starting to wear off and fans are starting to read between the lines of what Sharpe has said. The sceptics will say that his comments are no more than window-dressing, that the Whelan family is no longer willing to put money into the club and that without it the club will languish in its “natural” position in the lower tiers of English football.

Fans who have been shell-shocked by the events of the past season were dealt a further jolt yesterday with the news of Emmerson Boyce’s impending departure.

 “Our ambition is to regain our Championship status as quickly as possible and we would like Emmerson to be a part of the team this coming season because we feel he could continue to help us . However, the reality of our current situation is that we are in League One and we have to maintain a wage structure in line with our status.”

The Boyce issue was always going to be a tricky one for Sharpe. After nine years at the club the player had become a legend, with massive fan support. According to Boyce the deal he was offered was “laughable”. Sharpe acknowledges that he would like Boyce to continue but clearly his view of a suitable deal differs greatly with the aspirations of the player.

However, by taking a tough stand in the case of out of contract players, Sharpe has set a precedent for the future. The deals he offered to Gaetan Bong and Kim Bo-Kyung were also not acceptable to the players, who will be moving on.

The Boyce scenario is not going down well with the majority of fans who hold the player in such high esteem, but the figures involved in the offer are unlikely to be publicly revealed. Without them it is difficult to take the side of either club or player. However, even if Boyce were to be offered a regular contract it would be on a salary commensurate with League 1, not with one of the Championship or the Premier League to which he had been accustomed. Moreover Boyce will be 36 in September, probably the reason why the club was offering a pay-as-you-play deal. The player made only 26 league starts compared with 50 the previous season.

We await the news regarding a contract renewal for Jermaine Pennant. The winger made an impression through three spectacular goals from free kicks, although he never managed to complete in full 90 minutes in a match since joining in January. Moreover he does not have the pace to pass his full back. However, Pennant does have experience, class and technique. But given the salaries he has earned in the past will he be tempted by an offer commensurate to that of a League 1 club?

Last Friday Sharpe talked about the return of Andy Delort, Rob Kiernan, Oriol Riera and James Tavernier from loan spells:

“They’ll all be in for the start of pre-season on June 25, and they’ll all be big players for us next season.”

The sceptics were quick to dismiss Sharpe’s statement as mere posturing, that most of the four would be gone by the end of August. They were backed up by the Daily Mail reporting on that same day that Cardiff City and Reading were in a battle to sign Kiernan for £100,000.

The retained list published on Monday confirmed that:

“ …..the four remain contracted to Wigan Athletic beyond June 2015, and unless that situation changes, will be returning to pre-season training with the rest of the squad on June 25.”

It was quite a turnaround within the space of three days. Dreams of a Delort-Riera partnership are now appearing less than realistic.

It was also confirmed that Latics have 18 players contracted beyond June 2015, excepting the seriously ill Juan Carlos Garcia. However, as in the case of the four players sent out on loan, the club communique once again includes that proviso “and unless that situation changes” . Contracts will also be offered to the young players Jordan Flores (19 years old), Tim Chow (21), Matty Hamilton (19) and Ryan Jennings (19).

In April Sharpe had stated that Latics were going to need at least ten new players for next season. But a couple of days ago he raised that figure:

“There could be, in the end, up to 15 players we bring in, and that means every day is a challenge.”

Clearly he is expecting more players to leave than he was a month ago.

Should Latics have a squad of 24 senior players, with 15 players of them new, only 9 will remain from last season. Whatever the mathematics it is clear that Sharpe expects at least half of the players with contracts beyond June 2015 to depart.

Sharpe continues to reiterate that the recruitment team of himself, Gary Caldwell, Jonathan Jackson, Graham Barrow and Matt Jackson are meeting on close to a daily basis to look at future acquisitions. He states that:

“There’s probably a list of five or six players in each position who we’re looking at. But the deal’s got to be right for the player and the football club.”

He refers to the wage structure. For the deal to be right for the player and the club, the recruitment team is clearly focusing on players whose salary aspirations would fall within the new wage structure. Typically they would be from clubs in the lower reaches of the Championship, from League 1 or League 2 clubs, or Scotland.

Sharpe also expresses his preference for “young, hungry players between the ages of 24-27, ones who have done it before, who know what it’s like to win promotion, who are willing to learn and put in the hours, and buy into Gary’s brand of football.”

Bringing in 15 new players is a mountain of a task, but media reports suggest that deals are already in motion. They include midfielders John McGinn, 20 years old, from St Mirren and the 21 year old Max Power from Tranmere. It is also rumoured that they have made a £500,000 bid for 24 year old Chesterfield left winger Sam Clucas. The media also reports interest in the rugged 30 year old Rangers central midfield player Ian Black, the 25 year old Bristol City striker Jay Emmanuel Thomas, the 31 year old Australian striker/attacking midfield player Scott McDonald from Celtic and the 31 year old goalkeeper Andy Lonergan from Bolton.

The honeymoon period for David Sharpe has come to its end. Should Boyce depart from the club, as it seems he will, Sharpe will be unpopular with supporters who will feel he could have done more to keep the player at the club. Some have mentioned a possibility of a player/coach position, as was offered to Caldwell. However, at least one media report last summer suggested that Caldwell’s new contract had been on a salary 50% lower than before.

However, Sharpe is already showing the kind of toughness that is going to be required to get the club back on track. Moreover, up to this point, he has shielded rookie manager Caldwell from the brunt of criticism and backed him in reversing the decision regarding Tim Chow’s contract.

The club faces a further period of upheaval, but the hope is that Sharpe and his team can put together an infrastructure that will serve the club for years to come.

Given the current focus on the comings and goings of the playing staff it is not surprising that the matter of the Charnock Richard facility has taken the back burner. Will the club be going ahead with the original plans, even if it is in League 1?

Sharpe’s honeymoon period is over, but he is taking charge of introducing a new order of things at Wigan Athletic. It will be a rough ride for the young chairman.

The question remains whether his new order will be sufficient to elevate Latics back into the higher divisions or whether it will merely provide the sustainability for the club to exist in the lower divisions of the Football League.

 

A Delort and Riera partnership

Posted by JJ (Tony) in Player profiles and tagged with , , , , ,

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“They’ll all be in for the start of pre-season on June 25, and they’ll all be big players for us next season.”

David Sharpe’s announcement has provided a fresh boost for Wigan Athletic’s bid to regain their Championship slot.

The return of Andy Delort, Rob Kiernan, Oriol Riera and James Tavernier from loan spells is surely a declaration of intent from the young chairman. Moreover if the club is as active in the transfer market as media rumours suggest, the squad for the coming season is going to be as strong as any in League 1.

Bringing back the loanees has its financial implications, but Sharpe is clearly willing to stick his neck out in the bid for promotion. At a time when the club is at the point of jettisoning its higher earners, Sharpe is clearly gambling on Delort and Riera delivering the goods. Strikers are an expensive commodity on the transfer market and rather than splash big money out on a player from another club, Sharpe is using the players he already has. Moreover Grant Holt, Billy Mckay and Martyn Waghorn remain on the books.

So many players suffered in the depressive climate of the relegation season recently concluded. That included Kiernan and Tavernier. Neither could reach his previous levels of performance and they were shunted off on loan in the January transfer window by the hapless Malky Mackay.

Kiernan remains highly regarded by Birmingham City manager Gary Rowett following a series of good displays. After leaving Wigan in January he had to wait until February 21st to make his first start against Brighton, playing in midfield, but from then on became a regular in the centre of defence. Kiernan had been promoted to Wigan’s first team in the second half of the 2013-14 season by Uwe Rosler, for whom he had played on loan at Brentford the year before. He performed well, particularly when playing in a back line of three, showing good positional sense, skilful in his distribution.

Tavernier too suffered in that spell at Wigan. He had arrived with good credentials from Rotherham where he was a favourite of the fans. His ability to strike on goal and make crosses with pinpoint accuracy was already evident in the pre-season. Sadly he could not produce his true form in the seven games he started at Wigan. He just did not seem to have the pace or quickness of thought to play as a full back in an orthodox back four. However, being employed as a wing back, Tavernier was to make a lasting impression in Bristol City’s League 1 title winning team. His spectacular goal from 45 yards against Colchester might look a freak, but given Tavernier’s technique and ambitious approach, it could well have been intentional.

 

Riera was shipped back to Spain in January after a frustrating time at Wigan. He had taken time to adjust to the physicality of the Championship and was hardly helped by the lack of service from a dysfunctional midfield.  However, a well taken goal against Blackpool surely boosted his confidence and he looked more comfortable in the 4-0 win over Birmingham City that followed. But Riera was surprisingly left as an unused substitute on the bench in the next game at Birmingham, in favour of a newly arrived Andy Delort. Riera was never given a run of starts after that and his confidence dwindled.

It was therefore no surprise when he joined Deportivo La Coruna. Since his arrival at the Galician club he has been a regular starter at centre forward and has scored four goals. His last one, a 60th minute header at Malaga, salvaged an important point for a side fighting to avoid relegation from La Liga.

 

Delort too will look at his time at Wigan with regret. Thrust into a lone centre forward role he looked like a duck out of water. A player who had scored 24 goals the previous season in Ligue 2 looked sure to make his mark in the Championship, but Delort had been used to playing with a twin striker at Tours. Rosler was to stick by his formula of playing with one central striker, as did Mackay when he first arrived.  Delort was sent back to a Tours side that was struggling against relegation. He has not been able to reproduce his prolific goalscoring of the previous season. Delort has scored two goals in thirteen starts.

During the time that Delort and Riera spent at Wigan many fans had hoped to see them play in tandem as twin strikers. But it never happened. However, there is now a prospect of seeing that Latin partnership for Latics in League 1.

Given their unhappy stays at Wigan, neither player will be over keen to return. Moreover stories of members of Latics’ coaching staff writing the two of them off have become more and more credible. Tim Chow too had been written off, being told that he would not receive another contract, only for Caldwell to intervene and bring the young player back into the fold.

Given the united front shown by Sharpe and Caldwell up to this point, we can assume that the manager is supportive of the return of the four players. It looks like Caldwell’s preferred formation will be 3-5-2, which would suit them. Tavernier is a natural wing back with great attacking potential. Kiernan would slot into a back line of three capable of passing the ball out of defence. Moreover Delort and Riera could make a formidable partnership up front.

Much will depend on the ability of Caldwell, and the coaches, to bring the best out of the four players. Latics paid around £5.5million for Delort, Riera and Tavernier. A good season from them could help the club back into the Championship, in addition to increasing their values on the transfer market, which will have nosedived over the past eight months.

Wigan Athletic are keen to put the nightmare 2014-15 season behind them. The slate needs to be wiped clean for those who suffered the contagion that swept through the squad. It is a fresh start and the four players still have much to offer.

Judicious use of the loan system

Posted by JJ (Tony) in Reflections and tagged with , , , ,
Nick Powell

Nick Powell had a big initial impact as a loan player for Latics.

“As much as I like Patrick Bamford – I think he is a terrific player – Murph has scored more goals and he has scored more in a squad that was pretty unfancied at the start of the season. He is the one that has the dragged us with his boot laces [into the play-offs] with all the goals he has scored. He has been brilliant. Patrick Bamford is a Chelsea player. He is a Premier League footballer on loan. Daryl Murphy is a Championship football player at a Championship club. Congratulations to Patrick, because he is a terrific player, but I think Murph deserved it.”

The words of Mick McCarthy on Patrick Bamford winning the Championship Player of the Year award ahead of his own Daryl Murphy and Watford’s Troy Deeney.

The choice of the 21 year old Bamford for that award raised eyebrows among many fans of Championship clubs. Bamford is technically a Chelsea player, although he has never actually played for them. He was signed from Nottingham Forest for £1.5m, in January 2012, but loaned out to MK Dons, Derby County and Middlesbrough.

In fact this season Chelsea loaned out no fewer than thirty four players. Eighteen went overseas, two to Premier League clubs, the remainder to the Football League. Also among those loaned out was Josh McEachran, who looked like he was going to be a key loan signing for Wigan Athletic last year. McEachran had been a star at youth level, with a combination of vision and skill that made him look an England player of the future. Before joining Latics in January 2014 he had already been on loan at at Swansea City, Middlesbrough and Watford. This season he was dispatched to Vitesse Arnhem.

McEachran made five league starts and two in the FA Cup for Latics in a disappointing stay. It is now doubtful that the player, now 22 years old, will ever play for Chelsea again. Is McEachran’s failure to realise his potential due to a lack application or have all those loan spells undermined his self-belief?

Wigan Athletic had no less than 11 loan players at various times during the 2013-14 season under Owen Coyle and Uwe Rosler. The most notable of them was Nick Powell, who for a while gave the forward line a cutting edge and unpredictability that has not been since evident. Sadly injury and loss of form led to Powell fading away in the second half of the season. This season Manchester United loaned him to Leicester City, but the Foxes cut his loan prematurely in December, citing a lack of commitment to training.

Coyle had prided himself in being an adept user of the loan system during his spell at Bolton, where he had worked with young talents such as Daniel Sturridge and Jack Wilshere. Rosler had used the loan system at Brentford to bring in players with a view to future signings, Adam Forshaw being a prime example.

Only one of those loan players in 2013-14, Martyn Waghorn, was to stay at the club. Nine of the eleven had experience of first team football in the past, with Tyias Browning and Will Keane the exceptions.  Interestingly after returning to their clubs or joining new ones, none of the eleven were to become regular first team players this past season.

In return Latics sent eight players out on loan to other clubs, including Grant Holt to Aston Villa.

The loan system has become a big feature of modern day English football. The big clubs use it to effect in developing players and reducing their salary costs at the same time. Clubs taking players on loan not only usually pay their wages, but give players valuable first team experience. Cash-strapped Football League clubs use it as a means of recruiting players without having to deal with long-term contracts that can be a noose around their necks.

Chelsea have been exceptional in using the loan system to get better value out of their players. They recruited Romelu Lukaku from Anderlecht for £13m in 2011, then sent him on loan to West Bromwich Albion and Everton, until the latter club paid £28m for him last summer.  Also in 2011 they signed Thibaut Courtois from Genk for around £8m, but within weeks they sent him off on loan to Atlético Madrid. Courtois was to establish himself as one of Europe’s outstanding goalkeepers during three years in the Spanish capital.

Chelsea have also made a big investment in their academy and their teams won both the FA Youth Cup and the Premier League under-21 competition last season. The majority of their successful young players are sent out on loan to clubs in lower divisions, where they will meet a physicality and competitive edge way beyond that of the under-21 competitions.

Bamford himself says “I’d advise every young player to go out on loan rather than stay and play in the Under-21 development league. There’s a massive difference between playing Under-21 football and being on the bench at Chelsea, and playing every week in a league where you are playing for people’s livelihoods and helping to pay their mortgages. ….The tempo in the Under-21 league is a lot slower, it is very technical and there is none of that nastiness; that is something you have to learn from playing in league games.”

Bamford has certainly made the difference at Middlesbrough, who were in 12th place last year but are now challenging to promotion through the playoffs. It is no coincidence that Bamford went to Boro after a successful loan at Derby, given that Aitor Karanka, ex-assistant to Jose Mourinho, is their manager.

How Wigan Athletic could have used a talent like Bamford this past season.

Of the nine players signed on loan only one was a striker, Jerome Sinclair. Unfortunately the 18 year old, signed in March, was to make just one appearance, as a substitute.

Due to the mass exodus of players in the winter transfer window, Malky Mackay had to bring in a lot of new blood. He signed two players on permanent contracts for modest fees and three free agents. By the closing of the transfer window on February 2nd he had signed four players on loan. He later used the emergency loan option to sign up three more young players.

According to Football League rules a club can have a maximum of five loan players in a match day squad of eighteen. Standard loan rules allow clubs a maximum of four players who are under 23 and a further four over 23 per season.  It is the player’s age on June 30th prior to the start of the season that is taken into account.

Emergency loans exist to cover clubs for injuries and suspensions. But in reality clubs use them as a short term measure of bringing in fresh blood. The two emergency loan windows operate from August 31st to the fourth Thursday in November and from the beginning of March until the fourth Thursday of that month. Mackay brought in Sinclair and Josh Murphy during that latter period.

Mackay came under criticism for bringing in young players on loan from other clubs and giving them match time at the expense of the club’s homegrown talent. But Gary Caldwell was to give opportunities to Tim Chow, Jordan Flores, Lee Nicholls and Louis Robles from the development squad during the five games remaining. Interestingly, none of the young trio of loanees – Murphy, Ojo or Sinclair – taken on by Mackay even made the bench in the final two matches.

Given the pattern of the past couple of years we can expect Wigan Athletic to have some 5 or 6 loan players in their squad. However, Caldwell will most likely seek more experienced loan players while at the same time providing opportunities for homegrown talent.

Mackay’s signing of inexperienced youth loanees on short-term emergency loans smacked of desperation. It is something Caldwell will surely avoid, preferring to send a message out to young players within the club that it is possible to progress through the ranks to the first team.

One wonders if Caldwell can use the loan market to unearth another player with the skills of Nick Powell, but with the application of someone like Patrick Bamford. Good strikers cost a lot of money. Having been unsuccessful before Wigan Athletic will baulk at splashing out a large sum on a striker who might not come off.

The loan system has become an integral part of life for Football League clubs in an environment dominated by the financial might of Premier League clubs like Chelsea.

However, it is a tool that Wigan Athletic can use to their advantage if they are judicious in its use. Only time will tell if Caldwell and the club’s recruitment team can use it to transform the club’s season.

Splashing money on a striker and the SCMP

Posted by JJ (Tony) in Financial and tagged with , , , , , , ,
Does the SCMP penalise the smaller clubs?
Does the SCMP penalise the smaller clubs?

Bristol Rovers were in dire straits in late January 2002. It was their first-ever season in the 4th tier of English football and they were doing badly, occupying the 87th place of the 92 league clubs.

A trip to a Premier League club in the FA Cup sounded like a recipe for disaster. But Rovers’ 3-1 victory at Pride Park was to prove the showcase for a young striker whose hat-trick destroyed Derby that day. Nathan Ellington was only 20 at the time, but was heading towards twenty goals for the season in a struggling side.

At the time Wigan Athletic were hovering around mid-table in League 2, the 3rd tier. Latics had finished in the top six the previous three seasons and manager Paul Jewell had spent freely in a bid to get promotion.

In summer he had paid Dundee United £500,000 for Jason de Vos, £750,000 to Wolves for Tony Dinning and £300,000 to Watford for Peter Kennedy. He had followed that up in December with the signings of John Filan from Blackburn for £600,000 and Gary Teale from Ayr United for £275,000.

However, Latics were just not scoring enough goals. They had scored a paltry 53 in 46 league matches the previous season and desperately needed someone who could put the ball in the back of the net.

Jewell’s signing of Ellington for £1.2 million a couple of months later raised eyebrows in the English football world at the time. It was an enormous fee for a club in the third tier, with an average attendance of around 6,000, to pay to one in the tier below them. However, in the following season Ellington’s 22 goals propelled Latics to winning the division. Ellington was to go on to form that wonderful partnership with ex-Bristol Rovers teammate, Jason Roberts, that was to help Latics reach the Premier League.

It had been Wigan’s sixth season in the third tier when Ellington was signed in 2002, but just over thirteen years on Wigan Athletic are contemplating life back there. But it is a different club now than it was then and the Financial Fair Play protocol has come into play. Can Latics once again get out of the third tier, albeit within a differing economic climate?

There have been many theories put forward as to why Latics were relegated this season. But, no matter what was going off the pitch, scoring only 39 goals in 46 league games was the main contributory factor. Dave Whelan had splashed some £8 million during the summer transfer window in signing strikers Andy Delort and Oriol Riera together with Adam Forshaw and Emyr Huws, who were expected to provide some creativity in midfield.

Sadly the gamble did not come off and none of the four was to play in the second half of the season. Forshaw was sold, Huws injured and the two strikers sent back to their home countries on loan. Given the failed investment made by Whelan, will his grandson and new chairman, David Sharpe, be brave enough to follow a similar path this summer by making major investments in players?

Whelan had splashed money around in both the 2001-02 and the 2014-15 seasons in bids for promotion. However, in 2001-02 there was little hope of a return on his investment. Over two decades he was to pour around £100 million into the club with little hope of getting any of it back. Not only was getting promotion to the Premier League at a considerable financial cost to him, but he had to keep pouring money into for the club to stay there.

In 2007 following the departure of Jewell and an unfortunate spell under Chris Hutchings, Whelan brought back Steve Bruce to steady the ship. Bruce did exactly that. Hutchings had presided over six successive defeats, taking Latics into the bottom three. Bruce arrived in November and managed to steer Latics into 14th place, well clear of relegation. In the 2009-09 season that followed they finished 11th. But Bruce’s success had come at a financial cost. The result was Wilson Palacios and Emile Heskey leaving in January and Antonio Valencia in July. Nevertheless Latics had made losses of £11.2 million and £5.8 million over the two seasons with Bruce in charge.

Roberto Martinez was appointed in the summer of 2009 with the brief of slashing the wage bill, but maintaining Wigan’s Premier League status. Even before the season had begun Lee Cattermole had been sold for £3.5 million. Martinez was to guide Latics into 16th place, with the operating loss for the season cut to £4 million.

The 2010-11 saw Latics finish in 16th place once again, with a loss of £7.2 million. But in the 2011-12 season they were to turn things around financially, finishing 15th with a profit of £4.3 million. A profit of £822,000 was made the following season when they won the FA Cup but were relegated from the Premier League.

Relegation to the Championship saw the club cut its cloth according to its changed circumstances. Wages for 2013-14 were cut from around £50 million the previous season to £30 million. A profit of £2.6 million was announced.

However, profit and loss statements do not tell the full story of a club’s finances. Accountancy uses the concept of amortisation, which tends to distort the picture.  In simple terms transfer fees are spread over the term of a player’s contract.

Let’s say that Wigan paid a £2.8 million transfer fee to sign Andy Delort in 2014, who was given a four year contract. The amortised value is therefore £700,000 per year. On the accounts for this year the transfer fee would therefore appear as an amortisation of £700,000. Delort’s amortised book value after one year would therefore be £2.8 million, less £700,000, equalling £2.1 million.

Now let’s say that Delort is sold for £2.0 million after being at the club for two years. After two years his amortised book value is £1.4 million, so the accounts for 2016-17 would show a profit on the sale of £2.0 million less £1.4 million, that is £0.6 million. Let’s also say Delort’s annual salary was £1million. For that year’s accounts Latics would actually show a profit improvement of £2.3million due to lower wage costs of  £1 million, lower amortization costs of £0.7 million and the £0.6 million profit on the transfer.

The use of amortization in accounting for football club profits and losses is an art unto itself. However, the declared profits shown by Wigan Athletic in the last three years of reporting suggest that the club has been heading in the right direction. In simple terms its long-term sustainability depends on nothing less than making sure that incomings outweigh outgoings.

The higher than usual level of transfer activity and changes in wage costs over the course of the season just finished will certainly keep the club’s accountants busy. However, in layman’s terms the transfer fees received through the sales of such as James McArthur and Callum McManaman outweighed those spent.  Moreover the January sales and departures enabled the club to drastically its wage bill.

Wigan Athletic today announced its new season ticket prices, David Sharpe stating that:

“Gary Caldwell and his staff will work tirelessly to get things right on the pitch, and I’m sure that our loyal supporters will support the players as they always do. We want to reward our supporters after a difficult season and by reducing prices by 5% we are demonstrating how much we appreciate the support we have received. Our fans will play a massive part in the new era of the club. Our season cards continue to be the most cost effective way of watching Wigan Athletic and remain extremely competitive compared to other clubs. We are committed to making the cost of watching football affordable to all.”

The club’s admission prices were among the lowest in the Championship division, where average attendance dropped to 12,882 from 15,176 the previous season. A further drop in attendance would appear inevitable, even if the club has a successful season. The prospective fall in attendances, together with reduced admission prices, means a significant further drop in gate receipts.

The average attendance in League 1 this year was 7,061. It was the larger city clubs – Sheffield United, Bradford City and Bristol City – who averaged over 10,000. Over their previous six seasons in the third tier Wigan Athletic averaged 5,841, with the highest yearly average of 7,287 in the promotion season 2002-03 and the lowest yearly average of 3,967 in the first season 1997-98.

With gate receipts becoming a more critical factor, Sharpe will be hoping he can maintain average attendances at least around the 8,000 mark. After their successes in the past decade in particular, Latics now have a greater fan base than before. However, he will be aware that he has to keep admission prices relatively low to compete with the local rugby club for support and not alienate fans who have loyally stuck by the club in the most horrendous of seasons that just passed.

For the next couple of years gate receipts will not be the main source of revenue, given parachute payments of £8 million per season. On the face of it Latics will have a significant financial advantage over the other 23 clubs in the division, none of whom have parachute payments. However, FFP protocols differ greatly between League 1 and the Championship. The Salary Cost Management Protocol (SCMP) system, operated in League 1, allows owners to inject funds in ways that would not be possible in the Championship.

League 1 winners Bristol City have been losing money steadily over recent years. In 2013-14 they lost £3.9m after being relegated to League 1. They had lost £12.9 million in the Championship the previous season, with big losses in the years prior to that. In January 2014 their major shareholder, Steve Lansdown, turned £35 million of debt into equity to keep the club afloat. Despite their lack of profitability they have been able to put funds into the redevelopment of their Ashton Gate ground, due to be completed in 2016-17.

In contrast Yeovil have not had that kind of financial support from their owners. Sadly they have suffered successive relegations and will play in League 2 next season. In March chairman John Fry claimed that their budget of £1.4 million was the 14th highest in League 1, the highest they had ever had in that division. They had started the season with a loss of £5 million hanging over them from the previous year in the Championship division. Fry has repeatedly stated his view that the SCMP penalises smaller clubs like his own, whose gate receipts cannot compete with those of bigger clubs.

David Sharpe continues to reiterate his desire to get immediate promotion back into the Championship.  Parachute payments notwithstanding, is he willing to give Gary Caldwell the kind of financial backing that his grandfather gave Paul Jewell more than a decade ago?

If he is then maybe we will see a young striker coming into the club who can make a difference in the way that Nathan Ellington did from 2002-2005.

 

Throwing in the towel – Brentford 3 Wigan Athletic 0

Posted by JJ (Tony) in Match reactions and tagged with , , , , , ,

Towel

When a boxer is too beaten up to continue, his coach throws a towel into the ring to signal that the fight is over.

Gary Caldwell might have wanted to throw in the towel at various times during an awful performance at promotion-chasing Brentford. The unfortunate deflection of a Pritchard free kick after 25 minutes was the precursor of the nothingness that followed. Latics had dominated the game up to that point, at least in terms of possession. But a team with such brittle confidence was unlikely to be up to the task of getting back into the game following such an unfortunate goal.

What was to follow was merely a replay of the football we have seen so often this season.  Toothless in attack, woeful in defence, passing awful

Gary Caldwell set up his stall with a 3-5-2 formation. It worked well for the first quarter of the game with the wing backs getting into advanced positions, particularly Gaetan Bong on the left.  The team pressed forward to harass Brentford’s passing game. Wigan’s passing was neat and their interplays led them into the Brentford box on various occasions. One had a feeling that something positive might happen, even of the incisive final pass was lacking. It looked like Caldwell had got the team playing the kind of football he was seeking.

But as the game progressed following that first goal one got the feeling that Latics could be in for a drubbing. The Latics back three looked like they had never played together before, fragile and vulnerable to the movement of the Brentford midfield and wide players. Wigan’s midfield was both pedestrian and predictable. The forwards found it hard to stay onside.

But then again, what did Latics have to play for in the last match of a catastrophic season? The majority of the players who made the starting lineup are unlikely to be at the club next season. But at least Caldwell had taken the opportunity to give Billy Mckay his first start, together with bringing the 18 year old Louis Robles and the 19 year old Jordan Flores off the bench for their first senior appearances after 64 minutes.

The breath of fresh air that Caldwell’s appointment has brought into the club was not enough today. The Scot has inherited a poor team that was never going to be good enough to beat promotion chasers like Wolves and Brentford in the last two games. But if that deflection had not beaten Lee Nicholls half way through the first half, perhaps a goalless draw might have been on the cards  today?

The social media and message boards have been packed with fans asking which of the players whose contracts are expiring next month should be offered new contracts. On the basis of today’s performances alone the answer would quite simply be “none” except the goalkeeper. The highlight of the afternoon for Wigan was Lee Nicholls’ late penalty save. With the impending departure of both Ali Al-Habsi and quite probably Scott Carson it is no surprise to hear strong rumours that the young keeper has been offered a contract extension.

It is a measure of how far Latics have fallen over the past months that Brentford could so easily carve holes into the defence as the game wore on. The kind of football they played today is something that Caldwell might well aspire to. The Scot has a mountain of a task ahead of him to get Latics back to that level of performance.

Meanwhile we will continue to play our guessing games as to who is to stay and who is to go.

It is going to be an interesting summer!