Bad cop:
Football Genius wrote:Business response please... cut the bullshit.
Good cop:
Football Genius wrote:Saints will wipe the floor with what you can produce...
The beat goes on.
Anyway, since you insist on me telling you what I actually make of the figures and what they imply about how Liverpool is being run and where they are headed I'll tell you.
The most signficant thing is that Liverpool have the lowest revenue of all of the top four clubs, though obviously the figures are a little out of date but I doubt that much has changed in the intervening period. Liverpool at around £160 million are still among the very top bracket, but with Chelsea and Arsenal hitting 200 million and Man U streaking ahead with around 250 million there isn't a level playing field even up there on that top bracket.
The breakdown from 06/07 across the top four shows that while Liverpool's media income was virtually identical to Arsenal's it was a fair bit behind Man U's, though of course Man U had a more successful season so I'm assuming that includes prize money which ultimately comes from media revenues. The big difference is matchday income, where Liverpool lag so far behind Man U and Arsenal it's clear that a larger, more lucrative stadium is the way forward.
As a result, though Liverpool have invested massive sums in their playing squad they have had to sell significant numbers of players to finance much of this, and have the lowest wage bill (around half of Chelsea's and 3/4 of Man U's) of the top four. One might say Benitez is doing a better job than Wenger on a very similar budget.
Despite these struggles, the club itself still makes a modest pre-tax profit. Where the losses come in is with the debt of the parent club, the debt incurred by the Yanks so they could buy the club. It's not dissimilar to Man U's situation - a profitable club seeing those profit disappear to service the debts of the owners. Nonetheless, this is how most big businesses with steady revenues are run - they borrow against future earnings to enable whatever it is they want to do today. Indeed, our entire economy is based on this strategy.
However, the numbers for Liverpool aren't as bad as they are for Man U, the total debt is around half and the interest payments less than half, though losing over £40 million a year (on a business with an income around 4 times that) is not good news. As mentioned earlier, Liverpool have by some distance (approximately £40 million) the lowest income of the top four and therefore in theory the most room for expansion.
Refinancing the debt could prove very difficult in the current climate, though they seem to be paying a high rate of interest (not as high as the hedge funds who financed the Glazers buying of Man U, but still high) so maybe there's room for improvement there this summer.
What I would do in their situation is sell a minor stake in the club so they can either pay down some of the debt or get the new stadium ready. As things currently stand, Liverpool are borrowing money every year to cover the fact they can't pay the interest on existing debts. Obviously that cannot continue indefinitely, so they need to either reduce the debt or significantly increase revenue, or ideally both. I can't see how they'll manage that while retaining a 100% stake in the club. Even more so for the Glazers at Man U.
Home
wrote:Meh, all the big 4 are financially doped. It's like a body-building contest, "he's using more juice than me!" 
Oh wait..... 
I actually was writing that response forgetting for a second.
