Galway in financial turmoil

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Originally Posted by gufc2000

The club never over estimated gates this year, how could they given that crowds were well down last year. The problem stems from 2007 and 2008

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Don't get me wrong, i hope Galway get through this, BUT, a budget was put in place at the start of the season, everything would have been taken into account and a decision was made based on that. The club over estimated hence why there is a problem now.

It was quite clear that clubs would not be bringing in nearly as much money as they did last season or the season previous. Galway might have reduced their budget but simply by not enough, this is the fault of the man in charge - Nick Gleeson. Your cloth was not cut to size.

I know we have taken a lot of stick this season for our preformances on the pitch but the plain reason is that we have one of the smallest budgets in both divisions, we saw the massive problem facing us and took action. Not enough clubs do that.

We need to reach some deal with Murvue,Salthill and the Galway League.I don't know what we did to **** them off but we did.

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Originally Posted by Roo69

Don't get me wrong, i hope Galway get through this, BUT, a budget was put in place at the start of the season, everything would have been taken into account and a decision was made based on that. The club over estimated hence why there is a problem now.

It was quite clear that clubs would not be bringing in nearly as much money as they did last season or the season previous. Galway might have reduced their budget but simply by not enough, this is the fault of the man in charge - Nick Gleeson. Your cloth was not cut to size.

I know we have taken a lot of stick this season for our preformances on the pitch but the plain reason is that we have one of the smallest budgets in both divisions, we saw the massive problem facing us and took action. Not enough clubs do that.

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I understand your point, but our budget is very small. I don't know ye're budget but ours couldn't be that far ahead

From the ET article, I think that this is a very valid point:

"On a separate issue, questions too must be asked of the administrators who organise the fixture lists at the beginning of the season. With only two clubs competing from outside the Leinster area, surely it would have taken not a lot of common sense to realise that, after a mid-season break where a club which is known to have financial difficulties and has had no home fixture (or income) for four weeks, a more attractive proposition than Bray Wanderers (no disrespect intended but they are no crowd pullers on a Monday night) could have been scheduled."

How would they have known when the fixtures were drawn up that Galway would be in financial truoble come mid-season?

Should clubs who can't manage their finances properly be given preferential treatment?

And also, say the Bray game was 100 people down on what they could expect for, say, Dundalk. E1k doesn't sound like it'll magically fix all Galway's woes, especially as it's not E1k extra, just basically an advance.

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Originally Posted by pineapple stu

How would they have known when the fixtures were drawn up that Galway would be in financial truoble come mid-season?

Should clubs who can't manage their finances properly be given preferential treatment?

And also, say the Bray game was 100 people down on what they could expect for, say, Dundalk. E1k doesn't sound like it'll magically fix all Galway's woes, especially as it's not E1k extra, just basically an advance.

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I'm just thinking of the principal of the thing. Clubs like Galway and Sligo could have been given some consideration with the amount of extra travelling expenses involved this year which is a substantial figure I would imagine. Not preferential treatment, just a bit of forethought (albeit a slightly different issue!).
Absolutely doesn't excuse GUFC not budgeting properly and the example you give is valid.

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Originally Posted by gufc2000

I understand your point, but our budget is very small. I don't know ye're budget but ours couldn't be that far ahead

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Our budget last season was roughly 5k per week, it was more than halved for this season.

Well Sligo got the league leaders at home for their first game so how baised do you think they should be?

(and remember when the fixtures were drawn up that'd have been Galway v Cork, who are always one of the better draws/supported teams)

On the list of contributing factors to Galways current problems, the fixture lists wouldn't rank ion the top 50 I'd imagine.


Good luck to them, as I've a lot of time for any of the Glawy fans I know but given how pious Leeson and some board members have been in the past, I could understand anyone thinking they get wghat they deserve.

Shame the people there don't realise the greta facilities they now have

Am trying my best with the "attack the post, not the poster" on this thread !

Uniteds budgets is the 8th lowest in the PD this year, our weekly wage bill of €3,500 is relatively small. Two League of Ireland "stars" would have pocketed the same combined two seasons ago.

We reasonably enough expected a 1,000+ average crowd this season, instead it has been 700-800.

Reading the Extratime piece, even if Mervue and Salthill haven't taken away crowds, has it been more difficult for you to build up the squad numbers you need to compete with the rest of the Premier. It's always a hard blow to hear of clubs in trouble, but especially in areas like the West, where you need a strong club to promote soccer in the region.

From those figures - say 700 a game and therefore €7000ish per home game would more or less cover wages. So I guess it's the debt carried into this season that's killing you.

Harps are in the exact same position, although it hasn't come to a head yet and hopefully we can keep the heads above water.

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Originally Posted by dong

From the ET article, I think that this is a very valid point:

"On a separate issue, questions too must be asked of the administrators who organise the fixture lists at the beginning of the season. With only two clubs competing from outside the Leinster area, surely it would have taken not a lot of common sense to realise that, after a mid-season break where a club which is known to have financial difficulties and has had no home fixture (or income) for four weeks, a more attractive proposition than Bray Wanderers (no disrespect intended but they are no crowd pullers on a Monday night) could have been scheduled."

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Tweaking the cashflow won't balance the books. Not even close. That's a total red herring.

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Originally Posted by Mr A

From those figures - say 700 a game and therefore €7000ish per home game would more or less cover wages. So I guess it's the debt carried into this season that's killing you.

Harps are in the exact same position, although it hasn't come to a head yet and hopefully we can keep the heads above water.

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Remember that you only have a home game once a fortnight, so that basically just covers wages. Clubs' other expenses can be an appreciable percentage of that too, particularly clubs with small wage bills.

True yeah, I know I was being simplistic but the essential idea was that once the wages are covered by gates you should hopefully be able to cover the rest from other incomes.

proves you can never rely on crowds - we had a 1st division battle that saw 3500 turn out for dundalk - then the next season kept it above 2000 on average, then last year play better than we ever did with the taximan or jeff we were in midtable and the crowds dwindled. we won more games at home than the 2 previous seasons!!!

for whatever reason that downward attendance continued into this season - it appears to have nothing to do with the football exploits as a whole - its a combination of recession, apathy, confict with local junior football and over extending ourselves in the 07/08 period

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Originally Posted by Mr A

From those figures - say 700 a game and therefore €7000ish per home game would more or less cover wages. So I guess it's the debt carried into this season that's killing you.

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I think post 9 sums it up the best. Leaking that amount of money, coupled with a large debt to start with, will almost certainly result fairly quickly in the exact position Galway are in now.

What's really disappointing is that this is almost par for the course for Galway in the last couple of years. It's like learning from mistakes is beyond them. All of which must really frustrate the regular fans and drive away the occasional fans.

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Originally Posted by Roo69

Shocking how they could over estimate on their gates so badly. When will clubs start to learn?

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Galway United or the FAI couldn't have been reasonably expected to predict the collapse in attendances that has occurred. How can you tut-tut about a club budgeting for attendances to stay more or less the same? I'd guess that the revenue from punters paying at the gate every week is down a third from last year.

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Originally Posted by Mr A

...so it was very surprising when Connor was appointed and some very decent players signed.

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We are still on a very small budget. It isn't as if we went on a mad spending spree. Money is tight for most. At the time, it seemed reasonable to assume that we wouldn't see much of a rise or drop in attendances either way and our budget was formed on that assumption.

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Originally Posted by Mr A

It's a horrible time for any LOI club with debt problems- perhaps GUFC should consider the 'phoenix' route taken by Derry and others.

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Absolutely not. Disgraceful. As if there wasn't enough people in Galway delighted to hear we are in trouble.

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Originally Posted by pineapple stu

Sounds very much like overestimating gates to me. (Not that previous madness wasn't a factor either)

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Previous madness was a factor of course, but as I've said, it was a shock to all of us how much the attendances fell.

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Originally Posted by total hoofball

IIRC before the season started Galway were in this similar position before some local businessman came in to top up their budget for the season

Sounds to me they are leaking their troubles as an ultimate doomsday scenario in order to get another cash injection to make for their latest budgetory screw up

Any club with Nick ****in Leeson as their CEO deserves what they get

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If it wasn't for Nick Leeson putting in his own money into the club, it would have gone tits up long before now.

As for the budget being topped-up, it was more a case of keeping the club afloat than throwing money at players.

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Originally Posted by gufcfan

At the time, it seemed reasonable to assume that we wouldn't see much of a rise or drop in attendances either way and our budget was formed on that assumption.

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With the economy the way it is, the amount of people losing their jobs every month, unemployed, getting paycuts etc I thought every club would have expected their gates to fall tbh. The hardcore will still try to find the money but bringing friends, kids etc was bound to drop especially if the prices remained the same.

Now whether that's the only factor is obviously debatable but it's certainly a factor that should have been forseeable.

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Originally Posted by micls

With the economy the way it is, the amount of people losing their jobs every month, unemployed, getting paycuts etc I thought every club would have expected their gates to fall tbh. The hardcore will still try to find the money but bringing friends, kids etc was bound to drop especially if the prices remained the same.

Now whether that's the only factor is obviously debatable but it's certainly a factor that should have been forseeable.

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That analysis is trite. Of the ten Premier division clubs, only Bray, Bohs and Galway have significant drops from last year so far, and UCD's are in line with previous Premier seasons in spite of a ridiculous number of Tuesday games. Bray's figures are understandable given their circumstances and were likely anticipated.

Galway seem to be a sinking ship, who would have thought :p

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Originally Posted by John83

That analysis is trite. Of the ten Premier division clubs, only Bray, Bohs and Galway have significant drops from last year so far, and UCD's are in line with previous Premier seasons in spite of a ridiculous number of Tuesday games. Bray's figures are understandable given their circumstances and were likely anticipated.

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How many have dropped overall (I noticed you used significant). Could there be other factors i.e. UCD, Pats Dundalk all doing better than expected and holding top spot at some stage? You say UCd's are in line with other premier seasons but UCD are playing a lot better football and having better results than their more recent seasons. On form alone would you not expect an increase?Id imagine it would be different if they hadnt performed as well.I'd also be surprised if most clubs attendances didnt average out as lower than they currently are by the end of the season with the summer lull taken into account. I'd be surprised if there are more than a few clubs over both leagues with higher averages than last year, due to numerous factors.

Im not trying to claim the economy is the only reason for a drop in crowds, but it would certainly be a reason to budget for a drop in crowds, because if you combine the economy with a few disappointing results, then you'l find people will find better things to do with the 15euro they're finding tough to come by. or the extra few tickets for the kids.

Sales in everything is down, why would the league be any different? Why wouldn't you budget for them to be down? Even if you are lucky enough to avoid them dropping for other reasons?