Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 9:44 am  

Stu M wrote:

We've been through this before. Saints and Leeds suffered more than anyone through Covid for the simple fact that they were unable to use their stadiums for non matchday activities

We now have the deal with Liverpool which will help each year in terms of income all year round. We've already seen the state of the art pitch that they paid for. I'm pretty sure that at some point we will go back to holding concerts again to generate more income

McManus has categorically said that losses won't affect player investment and we will continue to spend full cap.

Wigan are in a very fortunate position with Danson but hardly self-sufficient. Similar to City in that regard, if he for any reason pulled out they would be as royally f****d as Saints and Leeds

One thing I forgot to say Stu is that although EM stated that Saints would spend the full cap that doesn’t mean that they will pay salaries that massively exceed the marquee allowance (although I think they have done with Feldt) which could reduce the quality of non-federation players arriving at the club. Interesting times ahead.

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 9:44 am  

Zig wrote:

What did McManus have to say on BBC Radio? Have you any idea where the cuts will fall?

I've listened to the full interview (14 mins) and he makes no reference to cuts.

Also how is fully utilising the salary cap not investing fully in the playing squad? He does mention on the interview that by not investing in the team creates a false economy as a poor product on the pitch results in less fans attending

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 9:47 am  

NickyKiss wrote:

They were going to go electric but were banned by the National Grid for fears it would lead to power outages around the rest of the country

Have some of their players been affected by the winter fuel allowance cut?

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 9:47 am  

Zig wrote:

One thing I forgot to say Stu is that although EM stated that Saints would spend the full cap that doesn’t mean that they will pay salaries that massively exceed the marquee allowance (although I think they have done with Feldt) which could reduce the quality of non-federation players arriving at the club. Interesting times ahead.

Which is why we continue to invest in youth evidenced by the Reserves GF win and the Academy coming top of the league for the 3rd successive year and a SF next week

We've never been rich but that hasn't stopped success. I doubt many clubs if any will be recruiting overseas players in their prime. That stopped a while ago

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 9:54 am  

Stu M wrote:

Which is why we continue to invest in youth evidenced by the Reserves GF win and the Academy coming top of the league for the 3rd successive year and a SF next week

We've never been rich but that hasn't stopped success. I doubt many clubs if any will be recruiting overseas players in their prime. That stopped a while ago

Interestingly he didn’t mention investment in the juniors but I take your point regarding that. No club invests in non-federation players in their prime, we simply can’t afford them, but Saints have thrown money at players who earned a fair wedge in the NRL prior to them signing e.g. Feldt and Mbye. My point was will Saints look to cut back even further?

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 10:05 am  

Stu M wrote: I've listened to the full interview (14 mins) and he makes no reference to cuts. Also how is fully utilising the salary cap not investing fully in the playing squad? He does mention on the interview that by not investing in the team creates a false economy as a poor product on the pitch results in less fans attending He does here https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-leagu ... 8d91d1z22o It also depends what the definition of ‘playing squad’ is and the term fully utilising could mean spending £2.1m or spending for example £3m. For example he could spend £250k on Jack Welsby’s contract, which would only count as £50k on the cap, or choose to pay Welsby £150k and save £100k. I am not having a pop at Saints but I never accept anything that CEOs say at face value.

Stu M wrote: I've listened to the full interview (14 mins) and he makes no reference to cuts. Also how is fully utilising the salary cap not investing fully in the playing squad? He does mention on the interview that by not investing in the team creates a false economy as a poor product on the pitch results in less fans attending He does here https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-leagu ... 8d91d1z22o It also depends what the definition of ‘playing squad’ is and the term fully utilising could mean spending £2.1m or spending for example £3m. For example he could spend £250k on Jack Welsby’s contract, which would only count as £50k on the cap, or choose to pay Welsby £150k and save £100k. I am not having a pop at Saints but I never accept anything that CEOs say at face value.

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 4:24 pm  

Stu M wrote:

We've been through this before. Saints and Leeds suffered more than anyone through Covid for the simple fact that they were unable to use their stadiums for non matchday activities

We now have the deal with Liverpool which will help each year in terms of income all year round. We've already seen the state of the art pitch that they paid for. I'm pretty sure that at some point we will go back to holding concerts again to generate more income

McManus has categorically said that losses won't affect player investment and we will continue to spend full cap.

Wigan are in a very fortunate position with Danson but hardly self-sufficient. Similar to City in that regard, if he for any reason pulled out they would be as royally f****d as Saints and Leeds

Didn't Saints have a good deal with the NHS in that the stadium was used as a base for delivering covid jabs to the public. I realise that won't cover all the losses but it must have been a decent deal to help out in hard times.

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 4:29 pm  

leg_end wrote:

Didn't Saints have a good deal with the NHS in that the stadium was used as a base for delivering covid jabs to the public. I realise that won't cover all the losses but it must have been a decent deal to help out in hard times.

We broke even as morally (and something I agree with) we didn’t want to be seen to be making money out of a national pandemic so we just covered our costs.

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 4:43 pm  

That's fair enough.

Re: Saints (h) : Wed Sep 11, 2024 5:16 pm  

Stu M wrote:

We broke even as morally (and something I agree with) we didn’t want to be seen to be making money out of a national pandemic so we just covered our costs.

So no MPs or anybody from the House of Lords was involved then?