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    At least united and Liverpool have......

    Dickhead american owners to show for it

    How on earth have real and barcelona run up such enormous debts. their tv deals are absolutely enormous, they haven't had the dubious privilege of LBO's and are run on a not for profit basis.

    I'm expecting marble and onyx baths filled with asses milk etc. Don't board members have to put up a chunk of cash to ensure they won't leave the club in debt before elections.

    #2
    At least united and Liverpool have......

    How on earth have real and barcelona run up such enormous debts







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      #3
      At least united and Liverpool have......

      "Owner" is a curious word to use there. I mean in the sense of I like to think I "own" my house, but if truth be told, the Cheltenham and Gloucester "own" more than half of it. I think when it comes to the Glazers and the Branston Pickle Brothers, if their creditors came in, they'd be lucky to escape Lancashire with any more than the scarves they were given for their initial photoshoots.

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        #4
        At least united and Liverpool have......

        but they generate such enormous amounts of cash, and only have signings and wages to spend it on. I mean how the fuck have they managed to spend so much money.

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          #5
          At least united and Liverpool have......

          We have one of their owners on here...

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            #6
            At least united and Liverpool have......

            The clubs have been in debt throughout the modern era, mostly for the reasons that VS summarises quite well.

            Like the shareholders of any limited liability enterprise, the socios aren't personally liable for those debts, nor are they required to pay them off before elections.

            The terms of the debt are also almost certainly less burdensome than the LBO debts, and the ridiculous television deals mean that they are better positioned to sustain them than their English counterparts.

            And that's before one gets to the question of whether the banks who have extended the credit would ever actually attempt to enforce their rights aggressively. La Caixa's relationship with Barca and Catalonia is rather more inter-dependent than Wells Fargo's with Man United.

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              #7
              At least united and Liverpool have......

              Ah ha!

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                #8
                At least united and Liverpool have......

                aiatl, you also have to remember that they are very large multi-sport organisations, that run professional clubs in more than a half dozen sports (as well as maintaining multiple facilties, etc.).

                The basketball teams, for instance, don't come near to supporting themselves, and that's before one gets to the likes of roller hockey.

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                  #9
                  At least united and Liverpool have......

                  I was at the Nou Camp three years ago for a game against Valencia, and remember being slightly surprised that the stadium was mildly delapidated in parts (paint flaking off, bits of structuring looking a little rickety, certain stairway areas not very clean, etc).

                  Perhaps the money just isn't there to give the place a good overhaul. They spruced it up a lot for the 1982 World Cup but, since then, the only real changes have been the introduction of seating behind the goals more than a decade ago.

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                    #10
                    At least united and Liverpool have......

                    I was there just over a year ago and I thought the same. It's a fucking dump.

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                      #11
                      At least united and Liverpool have......

                      aiatl, you also have to remember that they are very large multi-sport organisations, that run professional clubs in more than a half dozen sports (as well as maintaining multiple facilties, etc.).

                      The basketball teams, for instance, don't come near to supporting themselves, and that's before one gets to the likes of roller hockey.


                      ahahahaha. Are you serious?

                      Its what, 8 years since Real Madrid sold that training ground, so they've been losing on average £66 million a year on top of the enormous sums of money they've been earning. I wonder how chilled out can any bank be that has lent so much money, that these clubs shows no sign of ever paying back.

                      Like the shareholders of any limited liability enterprise, the socios aren't personally liable for those debts, nor are they required to pay them off before elections.

                      not the socios, the board of directors. Don't they have to put up a lot of money in case they do something very stupid or something.

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                        #12
                        At least united and Liverpool have......

                        I saw them against Valencia three years ago, and my impression of the stadium was that it was a dump. Was it that Cope del Rey match in which Ronaldinho got sent off?

                        Anyway, the irony here is that in 1990, everyone agreed that the debts the clubs had run up were ridiculous and something needed to be done. The proposal was to convert from members' clubs into special sporting companies (SADs). The state would wipe out the debts to them (tax mainly) if the clubs agreed to pay some off and recapitalise. The only ones who didn't have to do this were the four clubs at the time who weren't indebted, and now remain the only members' clubs left - Real Madrid, Barcelona, Athletic de Bilbao and Osasuna).

                        Fast forward, and the brave new world of recapitalisation is about 20 times worse than it was. The problem isn't the corporate vehicle, it's the attitude of the people who have lent the money and the failure of the national association to take action to help clubs tackle costs.

                        The root cause is that in year 1, someone will lend money on the assumption that year 2 will see greater income. It's the same here, and the same bet underpins the house price inflation in the UK and USA - lenders cared less and less about the ability to repay because the asset value was ever-increasing. In this instance, the asset value wasn't increasing, but TV and other revenues were, and hoped to continue rising. Which is another way of saying 'will broadcasters have as much to spend on TV as they have previously, and I don't know a single soul who thinks that that is the case.

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                          #13
                          At least united and Liverpool have......

                          I think that's backwards though nhh, for most clubs it's not costs, and it's not the size of the tv pie to be shared, it's the way the tv pie is shared.

                          the 18 other clubs are trying to compete with two clubs that each earn more from their domestic tv deal than all the others put together. In financial terms spain is probably about as unequal as the SPL, and the spanish FA had to let clubs spend what they wanted if they didn't want the league to turn into an spl style farce.

                          Broadcasters have lots more to spend on football. The premiership deal of £500 million a year generates subscription revenue of over £2 billion for sky. I suspect it would be similar in spain. They can pay a lot more to avoid losing it.

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                            #14
                            At least united and Liverpool have......

                            I saw them against Valencia three years ago, and my impression of the stadium was that it was a dump. Was it that Cope del Rey match in which Ronaldinho got sent off?


                            No, it was a 2-2 draw in the league. David Villa scored twice, a penalty and a ridiculous deflection (Valdes kicked the ball against his arse).

                            It was the quietest 85,000 crowd you'll ever hear.

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                              #15
                              At least united and Liverpool have......

                              I don't think its even the SAD structure either, because if it wasn't for the sweetheart property deal Real madrid would have debts of over €1 billion all by themselves.

                              Actually the members club nature of real madrid may be a massive part of the problem. Because there is no profit motive, the only real motive for the people running the club is the personal glory of whatever short-arsed, small cocked comb-over gobshite is president, and the various vain-glorious promises he makes to the fans. It's not his money, what the fuck does he care. "Yeah sure we'll sign fabregas, robben and Kaka, oh and we'll sign ronaldo too. We're the biggest club in the world, I mean look how much of other people' money we're spending on players." (If I were a bank I would be terrified by this kind of statement)

                              They use their enormous institutional power to bend every financial rule in their favour along with their closest allies and best buddies Barcelona who are every bit as bad, because they do exactly the same thing.

                              Members clubs themselves are a great idea, just as long as the rules binding them are very strict, and apply to everyone. I'm also looking at you Bayern Munich.

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                                #16
                                At least united and Liverpool have......

                                I don't remember Barcelona being state-subsidised.

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                                  #17
                                  At least united and Liverpool have......

                                  vennegoor strokes wrote:
                                  I don't remember Barcelona being state-subsidised.
                                  I don't remember Real Madrid being state-subsidised.

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                                    #18
                                    At least united and Liverpool have......

                                    Do you think the council/training ground deal was done on an arm's length basis?

                                    aiatl, the directors don't have to post a bond, and yes, other sports really do cost money (though not as much as transfers and wages).

                                    I'm trying to find the original article/study, as goal.com is not exactly the most reliable source in the world.

                                    NHH, I thought that there was some question as to whether Madrid and Barca were really debt free at the time of the transition. I'm pretty sure that any conclusion of that kind was based on "creative accounting" (especially in Madrid's case).

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                                      #19
                                      At least united and Liverpool have......

                                      Here's the original article from La Vanguardia.

                                      Goal have done their usual job of sensationalising it, but the figures are the same. Liebana attributes 1.33 billion of the overall debt of 2.78 billion to player-related expenses, which does raise a question as to what the rest is supposed to be for.

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                                        #20
                                        At least united and Liverpool have......

                                        Insert witty username wrote:
                                        vennegoor strokes wrote:
                                        I don't remember Barcelona being state-subsidised.
                                        I don't remember Real Madrid being state-subsidised.
                                        The training ground being sold to the local government for €500 million, thus clearing Real's massive debts, then being sold back to the club for a token fee.

                                        You don't get much more state-subsidised than that.

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                                          #21
                                          At least united and Liverpool have......

                                          First of all, the city council is not the state.

                                          Secondly, that type of cuddly relation between city governments and football clubs is (unfortunately) too common in Spain

                                          Thirdly, you will find that, when they moved from les Corts to their current home, FC Barcelona got the same kind of deal, which paid off their debt, this time from the state, not the city council. Guess who signed personally the ad-hoc decree that changed the zoning laws to taylor-suit Barcelona? You guessed right - a certain General Franco.

                                          To (nearly) quote Aristotle, I love to have a dig at Real Madrid, but I love the truth even more, and I find all this adolescent simplism frankly tedious.

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                                            #22
                                            At least united and Liverpool have......

                                            Ah well, if they got their free half a billion from the Madrid council instead of the national exchequer, then that changes everything completely.

                                            If only more big clubs could foster the same close links to their local communities.

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                                              #23
                                              At least united and Liverpool have......

                                              vennegoor strokes wrote:
                                              Ah well, if they got their free half a billion from the Madrid council instead of the national exchequer, then that changes everything completely.

                                              If only more big clubs could foster the same close links to their local communities.
                                              I think you missed the "unfortunately" bit.

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                                                #24
                                                At least united and Liverpool have......

                                                ursus arctos wrote:
                                                Liebana attributes 1.33 billion of the overall debt of 2.78 billion to player-related expenses, which does raise a question as to what the rest is supposed to be for.
                                                Subsidising fans' pumpkin seed consumption?

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                                                  #25
                                                  At least united and Liverpool have......

                                                  I'm not supposed to tell you this, but socios get gold-foil wrapped bocadillos at the Camp Nou.

                                                  Insert, you really don't need to go back a half century for your examples. Barca has benefited from direct and indirect support from the Generalitat and partially-state owned or funded institutions like La Caixa and TV3 during your lifetime.

                                                  Not to a comparable extent as Real Madrid, I'd argue, but no rational Barca supporter can claim that we are completely pure in this regard.

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