Nottm Forest ARE Magic

Vidal, you need to hate the game (EPL, Sky etc) and not the players (Forest).

Forest needed to invest to stay up. An ageing squad and loan players they couldn’t re-sign.

Those who spend the least by and large don’t survive in the EPL. In fact seven of eight of the least spending clubs that have played in the EPL (over the last 5 years) are in the Championship.

Every year the gap gets bigger, revenue and associated spend increases.

Forest has a value of 330m in players, 40m of which is down to Henderson and Lodi. Remove those players and we have the 18th most expensive squad in the EPL at 290m…our previous relegation rivals:

• Forest - 290m (around 70m of that in the 21/22 season)
• Southampton – 400m
• Leicester – 440m
• Leeds -320m
• Everton – 355m

We could finish as high as 15th, with an average injury list of ten players a game, with the same 25-man squad as the rest of the league…plus 3 U21 players.

Over the last five years we have seen the following spending:

• Southampton had consistently spent around 60m per year. That has proven to be a bad strategy, as in year 5 a spend of 145m couldn’t keep them up. Despite all their EPL experience.
• Leeds sacked the manager who got them to the EPL, lost their two best players in Phillips and Raphinha and spent all their money (and then some) on largely unsuccessful youthful gambles this season.
• Leicester spent 220m in their first two seasons. You could argue a failure to re-invest the Fofana money has led to their likely relegation. An ageing squad and spending less year on year is beginning to pinch.
• Everton are paying for years of overspending, which will likely result in a points reduction.
• Brighton spent 215m in their first three EPL seasons.

Only Brentford are truly sustainable.

Looking at the above, then Forest have invested wisely:

1. Without all those players signed, we wouldn’t have been able to put out a full squad or been competitive.
2. The young players we have gotten in have been successful; Henderson (26), Lodi (27), Niakhate (26), Danilo (22), Mangala (25), MGW (23) and Awoniyi (25). All starters. Sure there have been a few mis-steps, but when have spent big we have players who will all now add significant resale value.
3. Three of our best performers; Navas, Aurier and Felipe cost less than 10m between them.
4. Three of our starting XI are homegrown; Worrall, Yates and Johnson.

So, looking at Forest we have seen that you need to spend big to stay in the league. That they have largely purchased well when the biggest fees have been laid out. That their is potential and re-sale value in abundance.

Compare this approach to our relegation arrivals and it is a smart, well thought out approach that has looked at their mistakes and learnt from them.

Brentford are an anomaly, not the rule. If you follow their approach then you will never get out of the Championship.

Debate away Vidal, but things have moved on significantly and the gap will continue to grow.

Sure, Forest could have spent nothing and gone straight back down, but what would that have achieved?

A prolonged stay back in the Championship, losing Cooper, a fire sale at the end of the season and an unhappy fanbase.

Based on our acquisitions we are building for the future. We didn't gamble at all in reality, we competed.

If it all goes wrong? We have enough re-sale value to not worry about FFP.

If it all goes right? It's going to be a horrible future for Derby County and everyone else who wrote us of.

Well you have done a lot of fact-finding there. It’s hard to know the truth of the figures you read around transfer fees and “worth” of a squad. It’s estimated by most press outlets that Forest spent around 150m on players which is fourth or fifth in the league. Fulham hardly spent anything. So it isn’t necessarily the case that huge spending is required though I think you are arguing that there without the huge spending Forest would definitely have been relegated. We don’t know the answer to that of course. Similarly on wages (though again you need to take the published figures with a pinch of salt) Forest have a vastly higher annual wage bill at around 75m, almost twice that of clubs like Brighton who will have a top 6 finish.

I don’t think you want to accept at all that there is any danger of over-reaching financially. Obviously we are both biased in our viewpoints towards Forest so maybe the discussion should be about another club or clubs. Should Sheffield United, say, spend like Forest have done on transfers and wages? Some clubs spend in a limited way, with the idea that if they DO go down it doesn’t harm the club quite so much because it is easier to bounce up again as Burnley have done.

At the end of the day it probably comes down to the quality of recruitment. In Forest’s case you are confident about the re-sale value of players but if Everton go down I can’t see them recouping what they have spent in the last few years and they will have players on massive wages that they can’t afford to pay.

Accepting that you think Forest are now in a very good position, what do you think would have happened if they had been relegated? Would it have been an utter disaster financially or not so bad? That’s what I was trying to discuss in a non-partisan way - how big is the risk of a big spend?

I wouldn’t use Burnley / S.United as an example, but more so Coventry / Luton. Both the latter clubs have had no parachute payments and so are more inline with Forest’s achievements.

If Coventry / Luton want to stay up, they’ll have to. They won’t and they’ll go down. As all the clubs who don’t spend money do (excluding Brentford as the anomaly).

Had we gone down?

No Aurier, Henderson and Lodi for starters.

Dennis won’t play in the Championship, that’s why he left Watford. Freuler would go back to Italy. Johnson would have been sacrificed for £60m (see Anthony Gordon).

That’s £70+ million in sales and 40+ in parachute payments and 15 in Championship revenue. A total of £125m.

75m in wages (which I don’t believe) minus 125m = +50m. I see no issues if we were relegated in year one. Failure to go up and yes…we would have had to sell more players in year two / start of year 3.

Fortunately we’re looking at a best case scenario 🥳

Buy young, sell higher at ever increasing player prices. The EPL is a very rich bubble.

Based on our 23 year absence, getting their without parachute payments is practically impossible. In the last five years just one team has managed it…want to guess who?

Note* figures are from Transfermarkt. I figured using one website for all kept my points impartial 👍

I think we tend to believe or disbelieve the figures we read depending on what we want them to be.

Your figure of "+50m" doesn't include the 160m or so spent in transfer fees in the season just finished so when you say you see no issues, surely there would have been all of that debt to contend with? And the expenditure is actually 195m according to the Transfermarkt you have said is your source of information which would bring the debt on relegation to nearly 150m. Obviously there still is that debt going forward plus whatever new signings are made. As you allude to, the only way a club can survive when it spends more than it generates in income is to become a selling club which often isn't popular with fans. "Buy young, sell higher" is easier to say than it is to do! It assumes that the players bought are going to increase in value. I don't know if Neco Williams is still worth the supposed 20m he was bought for for example, or Dennis the 15m, or O'Brien the 9m.

But I agree with you that parachute money definitely gives a competitive advantage in the Championship. However it's no guarantee. West Brom for example are in a horrific financial situation having not bounced back. Although you talk about a "very rich bubble", in fact the vast majority of Premiership clubs continue to operate at a huge trading loss. Forest will be very near the top of that particular league at the moment.

I know you will dismiss this as all being anti-Forest but clearly none of this is sustainable. With all of the money that the Premiership generates, clubs still accumulate more and more debt. I don't see it changing though unless a club like Everton were to go under or the external regulator actually imposes sensible restrictions on the financial outlay of clubs. It really was far better when teams could go up and down with relatively little financial impact as when Derby and Forest were in their heyday.

Year 1:

£125m EPL Money

Year 2:

£125m - Johnson / Parachute / Sales

Total: + £250m

Purchases £150m Year 1
Wages £75m Year 1
Wages £50m Year 2

Total: £275m

Permitted Losses over 3 seasons in the EPL £105m (not sure about yo-yo seasons).

Either way, we break even.

The £150m was your figure, so I was answering your question on your figures.

By the way…I don’t see what I want to see re numbers?! 😂 I’m not guesstimating stadium worth here!

Nor am I sat here with all consuming fear about what if’s / worrying that the world’s richest shipping magnate has forgotten how to run a football club.

Looking at the above, as we stayed up. It’s £250m revenue over two years, plus £70m permitted losses, plus say £40m in sales = £360m.

£75m in wages = £150m
£150m in signings so far.
£60m to spend.

This is not taking into account amortisation of signings e.g. Chelsea / the Danilo deal.

Or, increased revenue elsewhere and upcoming sponsorship.

I think you are seeing what you want to happen, rather than what is happening.

O’Brien was £10m with Toffolo, Dennis was £10m with add-ons. I think Williams was £15-17m with add-ons.

Williams was cracking at RWB. 50+ EPL appearances, International,
O’Brien - £7m for a midfielder with EPL experience.
Dennis - someone will take a punt, even at a loss.

Honestly, your worrying about nothing…and if we do get smashed by FFP one day in the future…who cares?! 😂

Just as your lot are loving League One…I’m loving life in the EPL. And long may both continue 😉