A higher wage bill and the exceptional gain last year following the sale of Shaun Wright-Phillips were the key factors behind the £4.3m loss. The Wright-Phillips cash last year allowed the club to declare a £16.7m profit in last year's figures.
Turnover was down nine per cent to £25.7m, mainly due to due to fewer concert nights being hosted at the stadium last summer. Matchday ticket sales also fell by £1.5m, largely as a result of one less home games being played in the comparable period.
On a more positive note, conference and banqueting business income was up 21 per cent year on year. Net interest payable, before stadium finance lease charges, remained static at £2m.
Chairman John Wardle said he was "delighted" with the "excellent" response to the club's £95 children's season ticket deal.
What do you make of the figures? Have your say.
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Anyone should read David Conns story on The Guardians website. Great article and expressing my feelings for the club and English football in the last 3 or 4 years.
PS MEN - What happened to the laughable 'It all adds up to a Happy Blue Year' review of the accounts you did at Christmas? Objective journalism or gratuitous spin dictated down the phone by Alistair Mackintosh? I think we should be told!!
PPS - Bertie Blue Nose, Eastlands, Stockport?? So not only do you have a posting name that is one of the Rag's pet nicknames for City fans, but you also seem to be from Stockport, where the Rags delight in claiming all City fans live. Time to come clean Bertie - you're a Rag indulging in some typically sad half baked fantasy of winding (in your own head only) real City fans up, aren't you?!
This club of ours despite the hollow optimism from Mr Wardle is slipping fast into deeper debt and the danger is the un nanamed investors might not follow up their proposed bids.A higher wage bill? smal wonder signing players such as Hamann on a reputed £30K a week contract and hasn't completed a single match yet, YES another bad signing by our manager!To think last summer a lot of City fans were laughing and gloating over Glazers takeover at THE SWAMP but they have got stronger on and off the pitch MCFC are blundering and plundering their way to nowhere or perhaps the Championship certainly to SMALL club status and its all down to poor management at EVERY level.TAKEOVER FOR CITY? Iam having doubts and suspect it has something to do with the beginning of the season ticket sales for next season - CONNED again??????
I have logged in repeatedly this morning, but keep getting dumped back to the log-in screen everytime I try and submit anything. If you're gonna have a new site, for heaven's sake make sure it works!!!!! (Sorry about the teething problems, we're trying to sort them all out, Ed)
Fourth and last time of trying.
OB1 - If you're out there, can you let me know if our half year deficit is 4.3m as this paper reports or 7.1m as everyone else reports, and if the latter whether this means our annual trading losses are likely to therefore be in the region of 14m? If so, then we are in deeper shtuck than even an old doom and gloomer like myself expected. Bye bye TV money in one fell swoop. Also, I am near speechless that we have allowed the wages bill (a monkey on our back for years now) to increase by 1.8m. Only City could pay wasters like Dabo, Hamann and Dickov more than James and Cole! How can this club continue to be run this badly, by supposed experts? A joke from start to finish
Thank you Ed, and my apologies for stropping!
Rix 76 - Good call re David Conn's article. An excellent read
I have just bread Davids Conn's article on the Guardian website - it says it all. A must read for all true blues.
Dont worry its not just city who are paying average???? players unbelievably high wages.
Dear oh dear! I say get the yanks in and as much I like Pearce and although he has had no money to spend we need a fresh wind running through this club to hoist our sails up!
This new site sucks and its a pain in the backside having to log in. and the way the comments are displayed - why not revert back - or at least take away those huge speech marks
Finally some figures that accurately predict were the club is heading! Why would anyone wants to buy a club that has an operating loss of approx 14M a year, along with falling revenue and higher costs! It beggers belief how badly this club is being run. If this was a real business it would have been wound-up along time ago!!
For Rix76. Thanks for the link to the Guardian article. Very telling and couldn't argue with most of the points made. As others have now printed following the release of the half year results the General Management of our Club needs a major shake up. Whether or not an American consortium can achieve this is debatable but we cannot continue with the Status Quo.
Blue John,
The bottom line for the six months is a loss of GBP 7.1 million. I estimate the full year will be between GBP 10 million and GBP 12 million but could go higher. Basically the club is still horribly unprofitable. If you are interested in more of my thoughts on that subject, take a look at the Supporters' Trust blog. Not sure if I've just duplicated a message or not thanks to this new MEN site.
Cookie, Droylsden
The reason someone would by the club is because the potential for increasing income is considerable and will get a major boost next season if City stay up. Anyone buying the club will believe that they can do a better job than those currently running it. This club can be run profitably, of that I have no doubt.
For all of those who have been rubbishing the news of takeover talks as just a diversionary tactic by the Board then this is your proof that the talks are genuine. And those who have rubbished the work of Wardle and the Board then take a long look at their record - over £105m debt when they took over and now reduced to about £55m. That deserves our thanks not our cynicism. Ok - so they don't have the necessary funds to clear the debt without selling all our family silver (Richards, Sturridge, et al) and they can't make the sort of year-on-year investment we need so we should be grateful they are prepared to relinquish control for the long-term benefit of the Club rather than do what some would do and sell off the youngsters in order to retain their grip on the Boardroom. Overall, Wardle and the Board have done well for us - I for one will wish them all the best once they have found a buyer with the long-term commitment we need.
Blue John, Yes, I do live in Stockport, but why that's on the site I've no idea - blame the Manchesteronline website meisters! But, er, you live in London, don't you? Isn't that where all the United fans live? On a more serious note, the MEN have swallowed this PR spin from the club hook, line and sinker. Why should one fewer match result in a shortfall in revenue of GBP1.5m? We apparently have 28,000 season-ticket holders, all of whom have weighed in the entire cost of their ticket before the first ball of the season is kicked, meaning the match-by-match revenue is comparatively small. The concert income is also a red herring, judging by what Lancs CCC make from their concerts. The shortfall in revenue of 9% can be ascribed to fans voting with their feet and staying at home. Are they the same fans bemoaning the lack of money spent in the transfer-market? Just a thought...
So, despite a sustained period (3 seasons actually) of austerity, the club is still managing to post half-yearly losses of 7 million GBP. Add to that, the wage-bill has actually risen again, despite purging people like Fowler, James and Cole. Now we know why super-mac earns 250k/yr. I thought this financial-genius was trying to structure wage-levels to performance? Where do we go from here with this lot? Magnificent failures from the board-room to the boot-room and we can only hope, that anyone planning a takeover is looking to make a buck or two, because someone needs to shake this amateur-outfit up. I bet JW cried like a baby when Chelsea refused to stump up 18 million for Richards. Come back PoD - worst-run club in the country? I couldn't disagree with you now mate.
Blue John , Spot on mate I also smell a RAG on this site !!!!
Alan Williams,
Wardle and co have not reduced the debt from GBP 105 million to GBP 55 million (or whatever figure you posted); I think you will find that you are mixing up debt and loans.
7.1million 6 month loss. Genius !
How on earth have the club, whilst trimming the playing staff, actually managed to increase the wage bill when the whole point of the exercise was to keep the costs down!