Phoenix Ownership - Rob says FTFFA (Part 2)

I don't know what to believe to be honest. Does anyone? 

Does the SMH have a history of dubious reporting?  There has been so much untruthful media reporting out of Oz lately, that you surely can't not question the article.

I just don't see Welnix as dodgy operators. That is not their history in commercial world.

However if is true, obviously hugely disappointing, as -

A. end of the Nix, and 

B. Yes Welnix have lied, or at least worst received such a good offer at $15M, they have completely changed their minds about not selling.

What do know is Welnix have not lied about any meeting with South-West Sydney, as they basically have not commented on the meeting - as is their right. Especially as will involve lots of commercially sensitive stuff at this point.

But yes need to get a coach signed yesterday, and a squad together. Some positive news is sorely needed.

Once that's done Morrison can focus on pushing for an Independent A League. Get that up and going, is still hope for NZ's only professional football team. I'm an optimist. This can be turned around 6-12 months.

Re all this untruthful reporting, is it not turning out that perhaps it wasn't untruthful?

And, ALL clubs are losing money as the governing body takes 50% of the TV revenue and all sponsorship money to be used for ???? and can only be generated because there are 10 teams making losses.

But NZ Rugby ain't meddling in Australian rugby, seeking to undermine.

I will definitely be supporting the Socceroos. This garbage from FFA, ain't got nothing to do with the average Australian football player or supporter. 

Met a few Aussies after Bahrain game in 2009, and they were ecstatic that we had also qualified. Genuinely happy for NZ. From living in Australia, others have told me that NZ should join them in Asia. Most Oz football fans don't give Phoenix much thought (bit like CCM), but it's not like there is any real hatred towards the Phoenix - more a general antipathy. 

But that's not the end of the world. Doubt Bournemouth FC, get a lot of attention from Man U fans or whoever.

Yeah but isn't it a case of the boy who cried wolf? Some of the Oz media outlets have blatantly published untruths. Dome's reading out of some emails from Brisbane Strikers on air, highlighted some of BS coming from Australia regarding meetings etc - when plainly none had been held.

So if there is a recent history of very dodgy reporting out of Oz, you have to at least question now what you see published. 

Not for Sale due to FFA blockade - Dom Bossi

Stuff jumps in - But its to early in 442 Oz and SBS  to jump on the "Flogging Train"

So if Wellnix had been successful in flogging the club for 15 million, how much money does everyone think they would have made/lost bearing in mind other revenue streams?

The realistic part of the article for me is the reason the FFA rejected the sale. Also the "formally reject" suggests it's not  bullshark.

"The FFA is understood to have informed both parties it will not allow the sale to go through while other entities are bidding for expansion to a 12-team competition. The FFA is set to formally reject the proposal in the coming days."

They still want to see if someone else comes up with a better bid for entering a team in the league. 

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/soccer/ffa-set-to-rej...

That's all folks...

If a sale of our current license was to go ahead, I wonder what would happen with the conditions around metrics and renewals that apply to it? 

The fact these two words are in the same sentence make me question the validity of the entire story. Plus its from Bossi who is a known FFA stooge. 

But the FFA will have to come out to offer the rejection or its bullshark and they look like shark-stirring idiots. 

Jason Pine comments on the Herlad article.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=12052267

Without looking at financial accounts for last 7 years, simply impossible to know. 

But if continually told need crowds of 10k to break even, but in truth averaging 5-6k, someone smart with numbers could have a stab.

My guess is still a loss.

phew we were all worried there for a moment

So we could be left with a crippled club, rudderless, going through the motions for another two seasons, with owners unwilling to put more money into a venture that is publically on life support. 

What does the club do? Spend two seasons playing meaningless games in a mostly empty cake tin with just a handful of Nix tragics watching?

Or, alternately, having been rebuffed by the FFA, and with nothing much to lose, do the owners throw everything into ripping the league away from the FFA with a view to ending up with an entity which might be worth something in an independent league?

Or do the owners do nothing, not spend any more funds, close the academy, dont field a  handy prem team next season, and not field a team in the A league but refuse to give up the licence, or field a cash starved depleted team in the A league.

Just did a back of the envelope based on the attendance figures for games at westpac on Ultimate A-league. I couldn't be arsed bringing in the travelling circus games.  

Assuming:
10k attendance is break even &

$15 is the average revenue per ticket

Welnix would have lost $3.2 million since September 2011, or $40k per game. Lifting the average ticket to $20 would bring the loss up to $4.3 million so the numbers are very rough.

Interesting back of the envelope stuff. Found an old article where Welnix state they funded a $2M shortfall in their first year 2011/2012, which dropped to $1M in their 2nd year of ownership.

Terry S apparently tipped in $1.5M a season, when paying the players first over the IRD.

 https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/9673284/Th...

just thinking aloud:

Has  Welnix, the FFA's most hated club, been used as vehicle to highlight to FIFA how democratic

the current management of the A-League is.

The press are lapping it up.

Value of $15 million and FFA won't allow owners the opportunity to sell.

$15m sale will still result in a massive loss for the owners after all the years of "investment".

Impossible to say for certain without looking that the companys financial statements, but I think the "10k attendance is breakeven" applies to the business as a whole. 

I think Dome mentioned on the podcast that it was $50k just to open the gates at Eden Park, and he implied that that was higher than Westpac. Assuming the cost of Westpac hire is 50k, and average per ticket revenue of $15 attendance of just over 3.3k would be required to break even on the stadium hire. 

The remaining 6.7k tickets at $15 would bring in $100k which would be available to cover all the other costs. This would imply that the remaining costs to Welnix are about 1.3-1.4 million, plus whatever the other revenue (advertising, merch etc) they receive would cover. 

Please note however, that this analysis is based on pretty much zero real information and has a number of large assumptions that may or may not be accurate and there are a lot of moving parts which we don't know about (advertising revenue, spend over salary cap, other costs). 

David Dome if you read this feel free to set me straight. 

The licence is with NZF so FFA is not in a position to take over running the club without engaging with NZF who have remained coy.

Given that the Nix playing performance since Welnix took over has been largely disappointing, and not all of that can be attributed to the uncertainty of the future beyond 2020 (#metrics), what indicators are there to suggest that the nirvana of an independent A League will miraculously lead to the Nix all of a sudden being better on the park?

My concern is that there has not been enough focus on creating a winning football team, and more on the "we're a sustainable club, look how bad the rest of the league is"

Unless they are still willing to wait out a year with a view to sell to an unsuccessful expansion outfit, I think we might see Welnix hand the license back in the next few weeks.

Well I'd suggest that's been brought about due to having to focus on the metrics imposed.

So the only reason the team has performed poorly in the last few seasons is because they have metrics to reach? Surely having a team that performs well would equal better metrics, eg better crowds etc

Options now appear to be:

1. Close the door, turn the lights out, thanks for the ride folks 

2. Foreign investor sugar daddy

3. Shoe string limp along while looking for (2) above and considering (1) above 

Beginning of the end 

But the playing performance shouldn't remotely be related to the licencing, unlicencing of a club.  That's a management level issue.

The issue with a crap team, is crap attendances, meaning crap money.  If the owners can and are willing to absorb those costs, the league should be overjoyed.

Every league has losing teams.  Every year every league has a lot of losing teams.  A formula to calculate it can be seen below:

Number of teams in league - 1 = number of teams that lost.

We are shark, but that shouldn't be anything more than a punchline.

If the league was actually super concerned with teams losing, we wouldn't even be the first ones kicked out, because we didn't come last.

Maybe that why all this shark is going on, FFA may want to boot us out using a promotion relegation system, but we keep being just good enough to not be regulated if that happened.

I'm not disputing that. Surely fans would prefer their team to be winning more often than losing, and the owners have some responsibility for that. All I'm saying is that under Welnix ownership, team performance has been poor, so what suggests that will change just because the A-League is run differently?

• You would think so, but across the league attendances dropped more than 10% and TV viewership dropped even more - all those teams performing well off the pitch have not resulted in increased "metrics". 
• Also, if the 'Nix had a long term licence and some of the owners wanted out then it would be potentially viable for other investors to come in, with club staying in Wellington. 
• No team in the HAL has had sustained success, for every Newcastle that went from 9th to 2nd you also can get a WSW that went from 2nd to 9th (with only 18 points) - performance is cyclical, if a cyclical down turn in on field performance unluckily fell when the next licence extension rolls around, that could be it for the 'Nix.
• It also goes against any long term planning, such as trying to create a competitive advantage with the academy - that is only starting to really show its worth just as its about to be snuffed out (and potential revenue stream).
• And the problem with continued debate in the media of the licence and "metrics" it creates a spiral of negativity that turns off fans, sponsors and players. Even if we scrape through this licence extension period, what happens in the next one? 

I'm starting to giggle every time I see forum members say a source has no credit. I think we're up to about 37 untrustworthy news sources, all saying the same thing.

We have an ownership group who have been caught lying.

We have zero recruitment, no player renewals and no coach.

The club is losing money and under the current climate has little hope of ever making money.

It makes financial sense for the owners to try to recoup every cent they can from this venture; therefore offering the licence for sale and potentially challenging the legalities of not being allowed to do so would be acting in the best interests of the shareholders.

Conversely, the FFA would be acting in their own best interests if they blocked this sale, so that they can instead get their hands on the money from a new franchise.

The writing's on the wall folks. Our best hope is that a New Zealander with an ego comes along and buys the licence.

Barber shops, please extend opening hours

I believe a big reason is that the FFA currently negotiate broadcasting revenue for the A-League and reserve a very substantial portion for the running of the FFA - money which in it's entirety should go to clubs (like I'm sure it does in every other league), rather than propping up the national association.

To be fair it sounded like we had a coach untill he walked onto the pitch and got slappy.

Could maybe argue that a differently run A League could provide the Nix with more stability in regards to their future, which could lead to a greater impetus for investment by the Club in long term planning on and off the park for the future, building a stronger playing squad, helping attract new signings and and even possibly making them a more attractive proposition for another potential investor to buy into? Don't think anyone is saying it would be an immediate effect. At present there is no 'big picture', it's all short termism, for obvious reasons

Have the Nix come out with a statement yet? Are their any journalists over this side actually investigating any of this?

The minimum we need is that statement from the Nix. A clear statement of where to from here!