From what Alan Pardew has said today, it seems that he is a big admirer of the Chelsea Football Club.
Roman Abramovich – Chelsea owner
Alan has spent much of his management career in London, managing teams like Reading, West Ham and Charlton, and it seems it was convenient for him to visit Chelsea to learn how the club has been so successful since Roman Abramovich came in with all his money.
90% of the success of Chelsea since 2003, is because they were able to spend hundreds of millions of pounds on their players – let’s not be too naive about that.
And it’s what Manchester City have been doing that since August of 2008, and that’s the major reason (only reason?) they are now at the top of the Premier League.
Alan talked about Chelsea today:
“Is it a good time or bad time to play Chelsea? It has to be a bad time in terms of where they are.” “Chelsea have been galvanised by the managerial change and the senior players clicking into gear and producing their best form at the right time.”
“Over the years, they’ve managed to get themselves in and around trophies and they’ve got a great opportunity of getting Champions League football and two trophies.”
“Those players are naturally hungry whatever they earn, and we’re going to have to be on our guard, because they’re really on top form.” “But with three games left we’re vying with Tottenham and Chelsea, and I don’t need to reflect on the season to know that isn’t bad.”
“We have to go into this game and take that belief into it.” “The whole of the Chelsea team has momentum, and that’s a key ingredient of success,” “But like us, it can just bite you every now and then, as Man United found out when they traveled to Wigan and got beat 1-0 and Tottenham found when Norwich beat them at home.”
“We’re not the only good team that has come unstuck. It happens from time and time, and the most important thing is that you react to it. We’re looking for a big reaction and a reaction against a good side. I don’t think there’ll be any problem in the psychology of our team at Chelsea.”
“I know Chelsea well. Before I got this job, Chelsea was perhaps the team I visited most,” “I did a big study of Mourinho, how he played and how he got that record at home. I know those players very well, they’re icons of the Premier League.”
“They’re re-motivated now and the fact it was reported that they needed to be replaced because they lacked legs has now worked on the other side of the coin.” “They’re proving everybody wrong, and that’s what great players do.”
“I took in the training ground at Chelsea a couple of times, but it also just happens to be the team that was closest for me to get to. Their record at home, particularly under Mourinho, was just incredible, and I wanted to get my head around that.”
“You need great players that are highly motivated and at a confident level. All that goes hand in hand. They must have gone two-and-a-half seasons without losing at home, and Jose had done that at Porto before that. It wasn’t just about great players, there was obviously something else going on.”
Most big clubs in England are still in big debt, and it’s shown by this graph on profit and loss for last season (before taxes) from the impressive Swiss Ramble web-site.
Notice that both Chelsea and Manchester City are big spenders but are nowhere near balancing their books over the last financial year.
They’ll have to do that over the next few years, with the UEFA Financial Fair Play rules coming into effect, slowly but surely.
We always thought there was something fundamentally wrong with football allowing Billionaires to come in and buy a team with unlimited money being poured into the club – and it has nothing to to do with the revenue the club is generating.
That will stop with the Financial Fair Play Rules, which are the first attempt to stop that kind of financial suicide, which has ended up in a number of clubs going bankrupt over the last few years.
It’s true that Chelsea and Manchester City are good teams, in fact they are literally the best teams money can buy.
Comments welcome.
14 comments so far
nimo
May 2, 2012 at 10:25 AM
Comment #1gaz i heard we was linked to a player with the same similar name in January the lads Portuguese and plays for porto i think only a young en.. its from the same gay who told me about afamilitio in the summer too.. may hold substance although he’s told me many wrong ones also.. anyway how’s things on here just moved to Canada so not been on for a while
tarie4
May 2, 2012 at 10:25 AM
Comment #2http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/17828785
tdt
May 2, 2012 at 10:25 AM
Comment #3——————-Krul——————
Simpson–Coloccini–Williamson–Santon
——-Gutierrez–Tiote–Cabaye——–
——–Ben Arfa–Cisse–Ba———–
Subs: Harper, Perch, Ferguson, Guthrie, Obertan, Marveaux, Sh.Ameobi
Reserves: Elliot, R. Taylor, Tavernier, Vuckic, Abeid, Gosling, Best.
Indian Magpie
May 2, 2012 at 10:28 AM
Comment #4http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliaquim_Mangala
AussieTom
May 2, 2012 at 10:34 AM
Comment #5What I don’t understand is when Manure fans say that city or any other team that has become weathly, are buying the tropies buy spending big amounts of cash on players. but dont manure do the same thing as them?
GeordieToon89
May 2, 2012 at 10:35 AM
Comment #6We were linked with Mangala back in jan because he aint getting games for Porto, thats the fella a was on about in the last post supposed to be a cracking player
paulparker
May 2, 2012 at 10:35 AM
Comment #7Hi Ed,
You’ve been away a while 🙂 Reading is not in London! And the chart you show is profit/loss not debt otherwise Man Utd would be way down the list
check the toastie
May 2, 2012 at 10:36 AM
Comment #8tdt – you are probably right, however should bring in Perch for Simpson and Guthire for Jonas or Ba, moving Jonas over. As previously stated we need to keep the ball and guthrie gives us that. Bring Ba on for Cisse after 60/70 minutes, needs a kick up the ar5e for me anyway.
tdt
May 2, 2012 at 10:36 AM
Comment #9Or (pretty much the same, but against Wigan we were very narrow, which allowed Wigan to dominate the wings)
——————-Krul——————
Simpson–Coloccini–Williamson–Santon
——————Tiote——————
———Gutierrez—-Cabaye———-
Ben Arfa—————————Ba
—————–Cisse—————-
Subs: Harper, Perch, Ferguson, Guthrie, Obertan, Marveaux, Sh.Ameobi
Reserves: Elliot, R. Taylor, Tavernier, Vuckic, Abeid, Gosling, Best.
gaz 44
May 2, 2012 at 10:40 AM
Comment #10maybe fair bit of substance to it as Carr watched tiote while in Belgium too didn’t he so maybe picked up on him then..
Shearer260
May 2, 2012 at 11:58 AM
Comment #11Aussie Tom. I got sick of united fans saying that city just bought their team so after the derby I worked it out. This is just on players that are still involved with the squads and I feel play a big enough part to be counted. Man united- £235.5m on 16 players (£14.71m per player on average). Man city- £291.55m on 19 players (£15.34m per player on average). There really isn’t that much difference, it’s just city bought all theirs recently, whereas man united have always spent big . I mean £18.6m on Carrick can’t be justified 🙂
LooneyToon41
May 2, 2012 at 12:15 PM
Comment #12Ferdinand cost ManU over £30m… and that was about 10 years ago. What’s that in todays money?
Cheik_n_Bake
May 2, 2012 at 1:10 PM
Comment #13are we the most profitable football club in the league then?? obviously not the one that makes most money but income compared to expenditure….
my business knowledge aint the best..
someone confirm this please, major bragging rights!!!
LooneyToon41
May 2, 2012 at 2:56 PM
Comment #14Cheik, i posted the full link a few weeks back.
http://swissramble.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/newcastle-united-life-in-northern-town.html?utm_source=BP_recent
Very interesting read, regardless of your understanding of business/finance.
In year 2010/2011 yes, we made more profit than any other club (although this includes the sale of AC to Liverpool). Excluding this sale, we made a small (but very comendable/manageable) loss of £4m.
It’s worth reading just to understand where we really are against the competition. Our revenues are half that of Spurs/Liverpool, so there’s no way we should be able to compete with them….. on paper! And that’s the key, and put’s into context just what a great job Pardew and co are doing!