Fans forum

[Eric Pollard]

A Facebook group called “Aplerton Out”. Is this a joke with the spelling? Don’t get it. ('cos I'm well out of touch)

Slappy - as you're a member, is this a joke? (I mean the spelling as much as the group's apparent aim).

I'm wondering if the "Wilder Out" FB crew will transfer en masse.

Some fans just don’t get it. 2 wins on the trot and he’ll be a hero again, and that person over on the other side will be gloating about his sign off of “BELIEVE” which I’m sick of seeing.

The problem is not on the pitch, FFS.

91st in the pyramid might suggest otherwise!

[Snake]

And why 91st?

Finish there in May and this time the club will be done for. There isn’t a non-league club in existence with no ground and circa £10m of debt.

[GodalmingYellow]

unusual in the modern world for a wealthy financier to be so philanthropic towards a football club .

Indeed, so philanthropic he's been prepared to set up a tyre company just so it looks like we have sponsors.

I think you are being a little too cynical here.

IIRC, Eales was previously involved with an F1 team and so is clearly into motorsport, and the tyre company is a fairly natural spin off from that.

[Kernow Yellow]

Agree with Slappy's analysis here. Eales is funding the club and taking the attitude that since he's the only one risking anything (financially) he doesn't have to explain or justify his motives. Which is kind of fair enough as long as he is held to his word of not wanting to recoup his losses if it doesn't go to plan. But it doesn't really add up - Lenagan explained the sale of the club almost solely in terms of a property deal in the changing planning landscape. Was he just lying? Is Eales lying now? Was Eales just stringing him along to get the deal for OUFC done?

And Neil's question of how much money he's prepared to throw at it is very pertinent. The overall debt must be increasing at a huge rate of knots at the moment and the only thing that will change that is a dramatic upturn in results. How long can/will Eales sustain such a massive hit to his bank balance? I don't really buy the 'passionate fan' argument either - barely 6 months ago he was a passionate fan of Birmingham City and trying to buy them.

And the AGM is really mysterious. All I have gleaned is that Lenagan chaired it. No-one has said anything more than that. And what of Lenagan anyway? He still holds a big stake in OUFC. What's he thinking when Eales is making statements that directly contradict what he was saying only a few months ago? Have they fallen out or is he complicit in the charade? Many more questions than answers even after a pretty open and successful fans forum.

This may all be none of our business. But what really does affect us is that the new regime's decisions don't seem to be working. All the investment in new players, coaches, scouts and the manager will take time they argue. But we're already very close to having to write off this season and worry about a relegation scrap. That's not the product that fans want, and it will cost Eales and co big money in terms of lost attendances. And it's something they're going to have to get used to hearing complaints about. Because results, at the end of the day, are what most fans are interested in.

[tomoufc]

unusual in the modern world for a wealthy financier to be so philanthropic towards a football club .

Indeed, so philanthropic he's been prepared to set up a tyre company just so it looks like we have sponsors.

I think you are being a little too cynical here.

IIRC, Eales was previously involved with an F1 team and so is clearly into motorsport, and the tyre company is a fairly natural spin off from that.

Perhaps. But let's say I as an Oxford fan noticed Black 'n' Rounds sponsership of us and thought 'I need a new tyre; I'll give these lot a go'. Then I go on their website and see a picture of a man humping a tree and no price list or catalogue for tyres, and that even if I wanted a tyre I would have to drive to Silverstone. Oh wait... Unless there's some F1 owners among our support base, in which case where the hell have they been!

[GodalmingYellow]

Indeed, so philanthropic he's been prepared to set up a tyre company just so it looks like we have sponsors.

I think you are being a little too cynical here.

IIRC, Eales was previously involved with an F1 team and so is clearly into motorsport, and the tyre company is a fairly natural spin off from that.

Perhaps. But let's say I as an Oxford fan noticed Black 'n' Rounds sponsership of us and thought 'I need a new tyre; I'll give these lot a go'. Then I go on their website and see a picture of a man humping a tree and no price list or catalogue for tyres, and that even if I wanted a tyre I would have to drive to Silverstone. Oh wait... Unless there's some F1 owners among our support base, in which case where the hell have they been!

Hang on, your previous post seemed to be suggesting the company has been set up purely to give the image of a main shirt sponsor for OUFC when there isn't one, which was clearly not right.

If you are now saying you don't like the sponsorship either because the company is in its infancy, or because the connection to the directors is too close and blatantly obvious, and probably done to set OUFC losses against BNR profits, then you might have a point.

[GodalmingYellow]

Some interesting points from KY.

For me priority number 1 is winning and playing pretty football without losing large sums of cash.
Acceptable, albeit slightly distasteful, variants include winning ugly without losing large sums of cash and winning pretty or ugly whilst losing large sums of cash provided it doesn't have to be repaid.
Unacceptable variants are losing ugly, AND losing pretty.

At present we are in unacceptable mode.

[tomoufc]

Hang on, your previous post seemed to be suggesting the company has been set up purely to give the image of a main shirt sponsor for OUFC when there isn't one, which was clearly not right.

If you are now saying you don't like the sponsorship either because the company is in its infancy, or because the connection to the directors is too close and blatantly obvious, and probably done to set OUFC losses against BNR profits, then you might have a point.

That's right. Obviously I don't know. It's at the very least a poor sponsorship because it's a small company, but there may be more to it. Effectively Eales is sponsoring his own team. Would it not be better to try to get some money from a company that he has not financed, so the sponsorship would be 'real'? The other point I'm making is: how does the sponsorship benefit B 'n' Rs? If they are selling anything then our fans are not its market.

[GodalmingYellow]

Hang on, your previous post seemed to be suggesting the company has been set up purely to give the image of a main shirt sponsor for OUFC when there isn't one, which was clearly not right.

If you are now saying you don't like the sponsorship either because the company is in its infancy, or because the connection to the directors is too close and blatantly obvious, and probably done to set OUFC losses against BNR profits, then you might have a point.

That's right. Obviously I don't know. It's at the very least a poor sponsorship because it's a small company, but there may be more to it. Effectively Eales is sponsoring his own team. Would it not be better to try to get some money from a company that he has not financed, so the sponsorship would be 'real'? The other point I'm making is: how does the sponsorship benefit B 'n' Rs? If they are selling anything then our fans are not its market.

Its not a poor sponsorship because it is a small company. There is no value to OUFC in having Aviva on their shirts rather than my own company if both are prepared to pay the same for the rights. There is little or no kudos in having a higher profile shirt sponsor other than for high profile teams.

Lets assume just for this purpose, that Eales is genuine in his promise to write off his debts when he walks away, if he has to do so. If that is the case, then I think it would be somewhat unreasonable to try to prevent him from minimising his losses, by using a fledgling company as sponsor to gain the tax benefits of doing so.

I agree with you that it would be better for the club if an independent company were to want sponsorship, not so much for the transparency point, but from the point that the club could get Eales money and money from a third party. But if no such companies are coming forward with the requisite cash, is it better to have no sponsor, or reduced sponsorship money, than have Eales money at the higher level? I think you would be hard pushed to argue such a case.

[tomoufc]

Hang on, your previous post seemed to be suggesting the company has been set up purely to give the image of a main shirt sponsor for OUFC when there isn't one, which was clearly not right.

If you are now saying you don't like the sponsorship either because the company is in its infancy, or because the connection to the directors is too close and blatantly obvious, and probably done to set OUFC losses against BNR profits, then you might have a point.

That's right. Obviously I don't know. It's at the very least a poor sponsorship because it's a small company, but there may be more to it. Effectively Eales is sponsoring his own team. Would it not be better to try to get some money from a company that he has not financed, so the sponsorship would be 'real'? The other point I'm making is: how does the sponsorship benefit B 'n' Rs? If they are selling anything then our fans are not its market.

Its not a poor sponsorship because it is a small company. There is no value to OUFC in having Aviva on their shirts rather than my own company if both are prepared to pay the same for the rights. There is little or no kudos in having a higher profile shirt sponsor other than for high profile teams.

Lets assume just for this purpose, that Eales is genuine in his promise to write off his debts when he walks away, if he has to do so. If that is the case, then I think it would be somewhat unreasonable to try to prevent him from minimising his losses, by using a fledgling company as sponsor to gain the tax benefits of doing so.

I agree with you that it would be better for the club if an independent company were to want sponsorship, not so much for the transparency point, but from the point that the club could get Eales money and money from a third party. But if no such companies are coming forward with the requisite cash, is it better to have no sponsor, or reduced sponsorship money, than have Eales money at the higher level? I think you would be hard pushed to argue such a case.

Actually I don't think we disagree much. To the extent that we do it's probably due to my lack of knowledge of accounting.

Here goes a question, then: would it potentially be more beneficial for Mr Eales to get the tax breaks that may be involved in the current deal then, say, getting the highest, but very low offer? Let's say the highest bid possible was the Blackbird pub and it was prepared to chip in £3000 for the season.

The thing that confuses me is that much smaller teams seem to get sponsorship from a local employer, trade union or whatever. Why can't we?

[Snake]

My cat just pointed out this link to me. OV are on the ball in getting it out so quickly.

http://www.intouchwithmembers.co.uk/lib ... ep2014.pdf

[GodalmingYellow]

Its not a poor sponsorship because it is a small company. There is no value to OUFC in having Aviva on their shirts rather than my own company if both are prepared to pay the same for the rights. There is little or no kudos in having a higher profile shirt sponsor other than for high profile teams.

Lets assume just for this purpose, that Eales is genuine in his promise to write off his debts when he walks away, if he has to do so. If that is the case, then I think it would be somewhat unreasonable to try to prevent him from minimising his losses, by using a fledgling company as sponsor to gain the tax benefits of doing so.

I agree with you that it would be better for the club if an independent company were to want sponsorship, not so much for the transparency point, but from the point that the club could get Eales money and money from a third party. But if no such companies are coming forward with the requisite cash, is it better to have no sponsor, or reduced sponsorship money, than have Eales money at the higher level? I think you would be hard pushed to argue such a case.

Actually I don't think we disagree much. To the extent that we do it's probably due to my lack of knowledge of accounting.

Here goes a question, then: would it potentially be more beneficial for Mr Eales to get the tax breaks that may be involved in the current deal then, say, getting the highest, but very low offer? Let's say the highest bid possible was the Blackbird pub and it was prepared to chip in £3000 for the season.

The thing that confuses me is that much smaller teams seem to get sponsorship from a local employer, trade union or whatever. Why can't we?

As you say, when push comes to shove we probably don't disagree by much.

On sponsorship, your £3,000 is out by a factor of at least 10, and probably a lot more than that. I would guess home shirt sponsorship comes in at about £50k per year.

To give you an idea, my local team here in Surrey, Godalming Town, play in Southern League South Central div 1, which is 4 divisions below League 2. They charge about £3,000 a year for home shirt sponsorship, and are sponsored by Trade Direct Insurance.

That should tell you why places like The Blackbird do not sponsor the OUFC home shirts. But the Blackbird could sponsor a single home match at OUFC for possibly £3,000.

It costs a lot of money to run OUFC in League 2 (without looking it up, I would estimate about £4m a year) and that is why sponsorship fees are high and why the club loses a lot of money.

[Kairdiff Exile]

It costs a lot of money to run OUFC in League 2... and that is why sponsorship fees are high and why the club loses a lot of money.

Yes, but if you're struggling to sell sponsorship, reduce your prices. You might not get £50k, but you might get £30k - either way, that's money in the bank and a recognised, local name on your shirts.

(incidentally, I don't think Tom's "£3k/Blackbird" suggestion was a serious one - I think it was just an example of whether OUFC would be better taking a small amount from a local business rather than giving a tax-dodging excuse to a Director's company who seemingly don't do very much)

[GodalmingYellow]

It costs a lot of money to run OUFC in League 2... and that is why sponsorship fees are high and why the club loses a lot of money.

Yes, but if you're struggling to sell sponsorship, reduce your prices. You might not get £50k, but you might get £30k - either way, that's money in the bank and a recognised, local name on your shirts.

That depends on what else is on offer. Full price from a directors company is better than a heavily reduced price from someone else. If it were a relatively small price differential, I would agree with you. But I am sure the club has explored all available options. Unfortunately the club isn't a great sponsorship prospect at the moment.

(incidentally, I don't think Tom's "£3k/Blackbird" suggestion was a serious one - I think it was just an example of whether OUFC would be better taking a small amount from a local business rather than giving a tax-dodging excuse to a Director's company who seemingly don't do very much)

These points have already been dealt with above.

[slappy]

I think people are getting very muddled up here and scared by their own paranoia.
Birmingham City may have been owned by a Cayman company, but here we have a takeover by a UK registered company (Ensco), with the share ownership clarified at the fans' forum as being real people (98% Eales and Ashton) rather than offshore companies.

Also "tax-dodging". If GY happened to put an advert for his business in the match-day programme, and claim a tax deduction as advertising, would that be tax dodging?
I'd guess the cost to the three kit sponsors are pretty small, and if they get tax-relief for legitimate advertising, it's hardly in the realms of a Double Irish Dutch sandwich. Not dissimilar to Animalates last year - in the absence of a decent paying sponsor, keep it in the family if the 'value' is more.

What is of concern was Neil's unanswered second half of the question of how long Eales would support the losses. It was very admirable to say that he was the only source of finance and so no-one else would be owed anything. But if Eales walked away today even writing off all debts, the club would have no money and significant ongoing costs, players and bills to pay, the new Championship-esque infrastructure put in place. So how long could or will Eales fund the club? I think it's been said the budget is for £1.5MM loss, and on our current low crowds that could easily be £2MM per year. Very worrying.