Financially Stable FC

With the transfer window about to snap closed and no likely deals in the pipeline it's probably necessary to take a look back on the current window and why it isn't as bad as it seems.


We have shifted alot of the deadwood from the rather unexciting Deila era.
Players out:

Stefan Johansen, £2m to Fulham
Darnell Fisher, undisclosed to Rotherham United
Aidan Nesbitt, (loan) to Greenock Morton
Scott Allan, (loan) to Rotherham United
Paul McMullan, (loan) to Dunfermline Athletic
Michael Duffy, (loan) to Dundee
Stefan Scepovic, £1m to Getafe
Carlton Cole, released
Colin Kazim-Richards, free to Curitiba
Anthony Stokes, free to Blackburn Rovers
Charlie Mulgrew, free to Blackburn Rovers
TBC - Jozo Simunovic, £3.5M to Torino

So at present total money-in = £3, potentially rising to £6.5 depending on the simunovic transfer.

Another factor to consider here - wages.
Now, it is obviously impossible to know exactly how much these guys are on but my estimations would be that the above list are on a combined total of around 40-70k per week.
All of that is money saved.


Players in:
Cristian Gamboa, £1.0m from West Bromwich Albion
Dorus de Vries, £500,000 from Nottingham Forest
Scott Sinclair, £3.5m from Aston Villa
Kolo Toure, free from Liverpool
Moussa Dembele, £500,000 from Fulham
All in a total spend of somewhere in the region of £5m

Key point to remember here however is wages:
Again, impossible to speculate however, considering their previous salaries in England, Kolo & sinclair are likely to be on somewhere around 50k between them with De Vries, Gamboa and Dembele all likely on between 5-15k.
Meaning an overall increase in wages.


What has yet to be considered is the change in managers - Deila was rumoured to be on close to 8k per week which doesn't seem too low a figure considering his lack of previous sucess/experience.
Brendan is rumoured to be on around 6 times that amount, a huge increase in the wage bill of over £2m a year.


Now, looking at last year accounts.
Expenses:
We had a net expenditure of £53M and an overall loss of £4M.
Now remember that the Van * sale wasn't included in this so don't get too worries about the loss.
We have also incurred additional expenditure on finishing the Celtic Way and the contruction of the new safe standing area of the stadium.


Revenue:
The big one, European football - we are rumoured to have made "£30m" from our participation in the champions leage this year. Whilst this might be true we have not made £30M more than last year. Europa league football for a club like celtic is still fairly lucrative and the difference between the two is likely only around £10-£15M.

Remember these are only revenue numbers, not net profit numbers and we are unlikely to receive all of this money for quite some time, it's not just an instant wire transfer to the Celtic bank account as soon as qualification is secured.

Champions cup - another big one with our total income from this rumoured to be approx £5m, again these are revenue figures and in previous years we have had many "glamour" friendlies with the big clubs which we benefit from financially so it's again not £5m more than last year.

Increased season ticket sales/merchandising - again selling 5-6000 more season tickets might seem like a large increase but given how cheap concessions, child and student tickets are an average price of £350 is only likely to give us an increase of around £2m.

Something which needs to be considered for the current year aswell is the lack of a £10m sale of a player. This year we havn't had a Wanyama, Forster or Van * to sell to the rather flush EPL.


I'm not saying that we shouldn't be spending more or that the actions of our board are acceptable for a club of our size however the media constantly peddle nonsense about how much more money we are making this year compared to last which quite simply is not true.

Overall, we are a club who are in a sound financial position, we have a solid capital structure with the majority of business activities being financed by equity (the little long term debt we hold has benefits as interest payments are tax deductible).

We are not "cash rich" as many seem to think and we have an extremely high wage bill for the league which we play in.


It's obviously frustrating when Celtic get linked with all the world class players under the sun during the transfer window but we only have to look across the city to realise the dangers of speculating in the transfer market to chase success in Europe.

 

It has been a good window so far, but the icing on the cake today has to be getting one more midfielder in.

We're going to be badly exposed in Europe if we don't.

 

Thanks for some decent perspective on our finances. I agree we could maybe do a bit more in the transfer market but I would rather we built a team with BR's vision rather than spending on an overpriced player that will never guarantee CL progression. I think if we continue the way we are going then CL qualification next season will not be as nerve wracking as in previous years because BR is building a good side and we will also add to his squad in the next 2 windows. Good times ahead and the reason....we have spent a lot of money on a good coach. Patience is a virtue that most of us don't have but we might just have to be.

 

Wasn't it stated yesterday that Gamboa only cost £400k?

 

Is Brendan Rodgers going to be happy with stable club finances or would he rather build a team that can actually compete in the champions league? MON and Lenny both got fed up when they felt that the boards ambition didn't match theirs.

 

Maybe they're planning ahead for the new CL qualification process coming into play, so get as much money and keep as much back before then.

 

Perspective is something a lot of people are missing here, it wasn't expected that we'd qualify for the champions league and that this was a season too soon, now that we're there it's still a season too soon Rodgers can't get every player he wants in one window it doesn't work like that at any club, next summer we will be going into the champions league with a squad ready for it

 

No we don't ffs. We're talking about £5/6mill on a couple of players not £50mill odd. Geez peace.

 

What like with a 36 year old CH? Scott Brown another year older? Ambrose another year *? And as seems to be the norm, we'll sell another of our previous POTY - Griffiths?

 

Have to say if you offered me the players out players in before the window I would say that's a fantastic window

 

Disagree, tbh, unless a Roberts, Sinclair or Forrest is getting papped out the team, he's made 2 new players for the team, Gamboa and Dembele are back-up.

Not to sign a CM whether it be a creative player or for me it should be a DM is criminal.

Regardless of how things might be a bit more attacking with Brendan, one thing hasn't changed and that's the total weakness of the defensive side of that midfield. Add that to the constant woeful defensive displays recently, most certainly with crossballs.

 

Nice figures but a expected better from celtic to be honest this year we should turn over 100 million, considering 4-5 years ago we roughly turned over 70 mill- when we made the cl we got half of whats on offer now, add that to the money we have brought in, ie the glamour friendlies and new sponsor with player sales and we should have our most successful year on record. especially as we made over 20 million on season tickets as well.


The money is there to go out and get quality in, if we had any sort of ambition they would already be in, rodgers has made amazing progress but were still way to short in the middle of that park, after that performance in israel were we couldnt hold on to the ball for 20 seconds a expected a centre mid who could hold that ball up.

 

With a new centre back a new centre mid and a new striker

 

Aye to replace Toure, Rogic and Griffiths or Dembele (if he turns out to be a hit).

It's Celtic we're talking about.

 

You've still got agents fees and loyalty payments to players who've been let go,plus this CL £30 mill everyone says we've made already this year we won't receive till the end of the season

 

This is one of the few windows in which I've been content to sit stump. We've a huge squad with not just depth but lots of talent. If we can sign a special player like McCarthy, sure, but I'm not going to panic.

 

quite shocked we havent strenghtened the midfield and we will have to hide behind the couch when we play the three away ties in the champions league .

 

And you're point is?

They like gonnae say "Sorry, we were only kidding, you cannae have you're money?".

FFS, * you being a mortgage advisor.

 

The thing is though that the bulk of revenue is the TV money, the SPL used to get a lot more money via that channel and Rangers going down only lessened that pot massively after it already got cut. The only way for Celtic to make that kind of money is to be competitive to get into the champions league and to do well in Europe, the more established the brand is the greater the demand for people to watch it, markets outside of Scotland aren't interested in a non competitive SPL. Money can only be increased by more Scottish teams being more competitive in Europe, more competitive league, pushing the brand in foreign markets like the EPL, or join the EPL. It's not overnight but investment is needed to work towards this stage and the lack of investment devalues the brand and makes less and less money each year (unintentionally) whereas building a competitive strong team takes time and money but also creates far more financial opportunities.

Sad fact is that Rangers and Celtic aren't the teams they once were.