During a Q&A for the Chronicle, Chris Waugh has attempted to explain why we may have seen so little activity in the transfer window so far – admitting that the club may be waiting to do deals until they receive a £40m payment from the Premier League next month.
It doesn’t make a great deal of sense to leave things so late in the day and it’s infuriating to hear, but given Ashley’s statement stating he’ll give Rafa ‘every penny generated’, he may well be waiting to spend until he receives our next lump sum of Premier League cash.
Getting straight to it, here’s what he had to say on the lack of spending so far when asked the following question by Twitter user @BenArfaChance:
Q2: The only thing selling Mitro, Mbemba and Merino will do, is fund their replacements. Where is the rest of the money? Where is our TV money?? Where is our sponsor money??? Where our 10th place prize money???? Can you answer this question?
“Judging on the accounts for the 2016/17 campaign, seemingly Newcastle are still being negatively affected by their season in the Championship. The Magpies received more than £123million in prize money from the Premier League last season, and once other revenue streams are taken into account they probably had a turnover of about £160m in 2017/18 (again these are figures I am deducing, other than the £123m which was confirmed by the Premier League).
“But their wage bill remains inflated, Newcastle spent a net £46m on transfers last season, and they were also covering the huge losses of the season before. The key part of the two statements Mike Ashley has released in each of the past two summers is that Benitez can spend “every penny the club generates”. Ashley is unwilling to put any additional funds into the club in the short term, so Newcastle are having to use the money they have at their disposal at the moment – which, given the losses and Premier League-level budget which has been maintained throughout, does not leave too much disposable income to spend on transfers. Newcastle spent around £40m last summer, which just so happens to be the amount they received as a lump sum from the Premier League last July.
“The same will probably be true this summer; once the first lump sum for the 2018/19 campaign arrives in United’s bank account next month – which is between £40m and £50m – we will probably see greater movement from Newcastle in the market. It is a frustrating strategy – but it seems to be the way United are approaching things.
Does that cut it for you are or does that potential explanation still make no sense in our current position?
Either way, let’s hope that we finally start to see new signing arrive next month – even if it’ll be a few weeks later than Rafa wanted them in preparation for the new season.
They didn’t have net spend of 46m last year, just over 11m
Jack(Quote)
Well the simple answer is don’t get relegated
Darren(Quote)
When did Chris Waugh become an authority on anything?
He struggles to publish anything more insightful than “5 things we learned…..” and appears to aim his articles just north of kindergarten – playing to the masses, as they say, as long as the masses in question have just been let out of kindergarten.
Personally I would argue that he has no idea what he’s talking about. I would do that most days, but in this particular case I’d think Ashley would recognize the value of making cash available early to the club and would not hesitate to advance 40 million to get bargains, if payment of the tv money was all we were waiting for. After all it’s not like there’s any risk involved. The TV money will be paid so if it meant we got players at a better price, could sign a deal with Rafa and he got his money back in a month, he’d be a fool not to – even for Ashley.
Brrrian(Quote)
None of it is credible for me because I doubt Chris Waugh has any inside information at all
mactoon(Quote)