The Qataris are coming

[Juicy Sushi]

If Spurs are left the only team standing when the reaper comes for all the irresponsibly over-leveraged teams, then there's not going to be a Premier League left to win, and what fun is that?

There will be a League left, there are plenty of other teams in the pyramid to take their rightful places.

This happened in Italy, it will happen here. It's better to fight the impossible battle than kill the club for a chance at a couple of cups which may not be achieved in the end, anyway.

 

[FightingIllini]

But they exist. And in doing so, make your claim that there is no other route than the helicopter demonstrably false.

That's a strawman.

The other routes besides a helicopter presumably involve some modicum of squad investment, some modicum of patience with management, and some modicum of control vested outside of the chairman.

Spurs sell themselves as David to hide the fact that they are nothing but a drunken, incompetent Goliath.

 

[Anthony Beale]

If Spurs are left the only team standing when the reaper comes for all the irresponsibly over-leveraged teams, then there's not going to be a Premier League left to win, and what fun is that?

Do you suddenly think we'd be the only club left in England?

We've just taken the opposite approach to Chelsea and city. They've got a load of money and are using it to instantly improve the club in the hope it'll sustain them for the rest of existence. We on the other hand, are improving the club, in order to make more money, in the hope it will sustain us for the rest of existence.

Essentially, we're doing things internally and they are doing things externally. Ours is arguably less risky, as the likes of Portsmouth, Leeds, Anzhi makakakalsjalkdcljalahchaka, malaga, and i guess Monaco, will all attest too.

 

[Tucker]

Man Utd actually did grow organically, no sugar daddy involved. Woolwich have done so as well, but suffer from their choice of manager.

Woolwich grew organically? Are you sure? The pioneer of franchise football that bribed their way into the 1st division?

 

[FightingIllini]

This happened in Italy, it will happen here.

What happened in Italy? Looks to me like the same clubs that drove that league into bankruptcy are the same ones sharing the title today.

 

[FightingIllini]

We've just taken the opposite approach to Chelsea and city.

The business practices at Spurs look exactly like those at Chelsea and City, except for a steadfast refusal to invest in the squad. The same enormous ticket prices, the same bulldozing of history in search of revenue, the same "global branding", the same high-priced race for mercenary players, the same massive expectations on management, just no trophies to show for it. That's the only difference.

 

[Juicy Sushi]

That's a strawman.

The other routes besides a helicopter presumably involve some modicum of squad investment, some modicum of patience with management, and some modicum of control vested outside of the chairman.

Spurs sell themselves as David to hide the fact that they are nothing but a drunken, incompetent Goliath.

No, they really are a David. 10th largest stadium, 6th largest budget, but fighting for the top 4 and twice making it in a decade. No other club has managed that in England, and we have a massive (minimum 50%) gap in revenues to the smallest club above us.

The squad has been invested in. Those kinds of investments are always a risk, with some pay-offs, and some failures. The club has been heavily invested in with a new training centre, academy program and stadium being attempted. That's a very long-term plan which has taken even longer thanks to the nature of trying to get something built in London.

It's bloody hard work, but is actually possible, and will enable us to compete with the Goliaths without having to go down the sugar-daddy path.

Now, trying to claim we're a goliath who is incompetent is some way from the truth, but if you want to have a go at that: We're the 6th biggest club in the land. In any other country in the world, we'd being the 3rd or 4th largest, comfortably. There are over 80 professional teams below us in the football pyramid. Many of whom engage in massive debt-spending to try and reach where we are. Being the 6th largest doesn't make us a small club, but the scale of difference between Spurs and the immediate rivals above us is about the same as the difference between Spurs and the first 20 or so teams below us. The teams above us monopolize the trophies due to their size advantages, making us either the largest of the minnows, or the runt of the goliaths. But we have fought from near bankruptcy in the early 1990s to take this position while the other teams which have tried the same have all suffered massive mistakes (Villa, Wham, Leeds, Portsmouth, Everton, Newcastle, etc). By the measure of what our rivals have done, we are demonstrably the most competent. By the measure of those above us, the only people who weren't there before we experienced difficulty needed to use unsustainable debt spending which leaves the club facing potentially fatal consequences were the owners to pull out.

Your argument has no merit.

 

[FightingIllini]

If the results have been good enough, the managers that got us those results should still be here. Period.

 

[Juicy Sushi]

What happened in Italy? Looks to me like the same clubs that drove that league into bankruptcy are the same ones sharing the title today.

Yes, the Milan clubs are really fighting for titles and competing for the best talent in such a showy way. Serie A was, until the 2000s, the biggest league with the richest clubs and the biggest transfers. It was based on the same sugar daddy model, and suffered a rather nasty implosion when those families didn't have the cash to keep the party going anymore.

Will the next generation of Sheikhs, or Roman's daughter, have the same stomach for spending on football clubs?

 

[Juicy Sushi]

Woolwich grew organically? Are you sure? The pioneer of franchise football that bribed their way into the 1st division?

In the sense that they upgraded the stadium and revenue base. Not in the sense that they don't have plenty of footballing crimes to be sorry for.

 

[Anthony Beale]

The business practices at Spurs look exactly like those at Chelsea and City, except for a steadfast refusal to invest in the squad. The same enormous ticket prices, the same bulldozing of history in search of revenue, the same "global branding", the same high-priced race for mercenary players, the same massive expectations on management, just no trophies to show for it. That's the only difference.

Some things on the face of it are bound to be similar, we're a top club competing under the same conditions in the same league. We have a smaller stadium so need to charge more for tickets. But tbh what you've said just seems to demonstrate a lack of understanding.

Firstly, if you think the club don't invest in the squad, you're very, very wrong. You don't need to be run at a loss to invest in the squad. Your view of that aspect seems incredibly naive.
The ticket prices are what they are. They're higher than we'd like them to be obviously, but for a top 6 club, with a small stadium, in the most expensive city in the country, it'd be foolish to expect different.
What you call bulldozing of our history is where i really lose you. You want cheaper tickets and more investment in players... but you don't want the club to maximise the value of the brand? Every top club in the world does this to some extent. Why do you think there are kids around the world wearing Real Madrid shirts? Clubs need to make money. And what history are they "Bulldozing" for revenue? if anything, it seems to me like they're playing up to the history in search of revenue. "Come and support a traditional english club with great success and history"
I mean, its not like they can say "come and support tottenham we're going to win the league".
"Global-branding" is about as vague as you can get. Yes, they're attracting overseas revenue.. but you yourself have made it quite clear you want the club to spend more money, where the fucking bloody hell is this money supposed to come from?
"High priced mercenary players". Ok, lets go after cheap, shit players instead. See how far that gets us.

What you say sounds good on paper but really, is massively contradictory. Either you want a hugely successful club winning trophies all the time, or you want a plucky, underdog club that everyone loves, and only plays local lads. We can't have both. At the minute we're somewhere in between. Its a happy medium.

 

[Furball man]

Apparently Lewis is working on this & he's keen to sort it .

Doesn't mean that it won't fall flat on its arse though

 

[FightingIllini]

What you say sounds good on paper but really, is massively contradictory. Either you want a hugely successful club winning trophies all the time, or you want a plucky, underdog club that everyone loves, and only plays local lads. We can't have both. At the minute we're somewhere in between. Its a happy medium.

It's not a happy medium, it's a slapdash, ad-hoc combination of both.

I would be happy as a Moyes-era Everton fan, a present day Man City fan, or even just a fan of some well-run lower league club doing the best they can on a shoestring budget. Those three things have something in common: an articulated, stable, and well-executed plan.

 

[Juicy Sushi]

It's not a happy medium, it's a slapdash, ad-hoc combination of both.

I would be happy as a Moyes-era Everton fan, a present day Man City fan, or even just a fan of some well-run lower league club doing the best they can on a shoestring budget. Those three things have something in common: an articulated, stable, and well-executed plan.

We actually have one. You're choosing to ignore it. And City's plan is rather poorly executed, given the level of success that's expected by their paymasters...

 

[Astro]

These guys though could say here's £50 million for Schweinsteiger, £150 million for Messi so on and so on, the fans would love it but we would never get the likes of Harry Kane come through again, they just wouldn't be able to compete.

Mate I'd take Harry kane any day.

That game where he ended up in goal..... priceless

 

[Anthony Beale]

It's not a happy medium, it's a slapdash, ad-hoc combination of both.

I would be happy as a Moyes-era Everton fan, a present day Man City fan, or even just a fan of some well-run lower league club doing the best they can on a shoestring budget. Those three things have something in common: an articulated, stable, and well-executed plan.

I don't know what it is you're seeing in a moyes era everton that you're not seeing in us. We're actually better run than them in my opinion. Apart from the consistency of sticking with the manager. which we'd all want but we're still waiting for the right man.

 

[Furball man]

We actually have one. You're choosing to ignore it. And City's plan is rather poorly executed, given the level of success that's expected by their paymasters...

To be fair to city's owners they are pumping , for whatever reason, a hell of a lot into the area .

"Our 5 year plan" , to quote our man Danny boy is 13 years old

 

[FightingIllini]

We actually have one. You're choosing to ignore it.

I understand the plan, in the way that you're talking about it. And I fully support it. You have to keep up with the jones' in terms of facilities and revenue streams. But remember, that's all it is. All of our competitors will have their gleaming stadiums and state-of-the-art training facilities and marketing operations in the US and Far East and fully-invested academies as well.

We will always, however, be stuck with a chairman who won't give his leadership the latitude, the funding, or the patience they need to maximize those attributes.

 

[Juicy Sushi]

To be fair to city's owners they are pumping , for whatever reason, a hell of a lot into the area .

"Our 5 year plan" , to quote our man Danny boy is 13 years old

I think the plan was overly optimistic, and there was no way in hell that it was going to be do-able in 5 years. London is too much of a bureaucratic nightmare. If they had put a 2 in front of the 5, they might have been more honest.

 

[Juicy Sushi]

I understand the plan, in the way that you're talking about it. And I fully support it. You have to keep up with the jones' in terms of facilities and revenue streams. But remember, that's all it is. All of our competitors will have their gleaming stadiums and state-of-the-art training facilities and marketing operations in the US and Far East and fully-invested academies as well.

We will always, however, be stuck with a chairman who won't give his leadership the latitude, the funding, or the patience they need to maximize those attributes.

Ah, but they actually don't. City's training facilities aren't as good as ours, nor are Chelsea's. And Chelsea have the same stadium capacity issue we have, and are even further away from solving it.

You simply want ENIC to spend more money, which is fine, but no one is under an obligation to funnel cash into their business and take a massive loss for someone else's gratification.