Is This Best Position West Ham Have Ever Been In?
So we are in the best position that we have ever been? According to the accounts published this week this could easily be your conclusion. That’s subject to opinion of course but after all we retained our Premier League status, invested £80.8m in the first team in the 16/17 season. Achieved the highest income in our history for the 4th successive season.
I have only this season lost my patience with the board and I am not happy with the new stadium but I was in favour of the move and with some changes it could be at a point where I’m happy again. But the profit on Upton Park was £8.7m, £8.7M?! We have wasted more than that on absolute shite. Savio was £10m and we sold our home for an £8.7m profit. What happened to the rest of it because I remember a figure much larger than that being thrown about at the time, or was that all part of the appeasing people enough so that we don’t kick up to much of a fuss until it’s too late?
Lets move to the money taken out of the club, directly taken out. In the summer how long did it seem we chased Carvalho, I was sure he’d be ours it seemed like it was certain, he wanted to come, we wanted him. He was hopefully that ‘next level’ type of player. What happens next in the middle of August, a critical time in terms of player recruitment. £10m is paid on 18th August to shareholders. Maybe if that had of been used towards actually buying Carvalho we might not have the gaping hole in the middle of the park where Obiang/Kouyate are expected to be. In a clearly unrelated point profit on players sold/loaned is £28,419,000.
One thing that did slip under the radar for me personally is the addition of J Albert Smith to the board last August. He injected £9.5M in to the club (INTEREST FREE DS!!) only to be repaid in the event of a change in control at the club. Maybe we have the man to take over a lot closer that we thought. In total the interest on DS + DG’s loans come to in excess of £12m, I did stick up for them when the whole interest thing became public but after seeing Brighton’s owner loan £90m interest free to help improve their ground, you know to further the club and even being cynical you could say he could improve the value of the club and make himself a few quid.
That I would say is acting in the interests of the club you are in charge of. NOT taking out £10m during a transfer window and then trying to penny pinch on players even after making a profit on players sold in the previous period. Even though it is common place in business NOT charging 6% interest on the £45m you have leant to the club.
Do you know what the hardest part to swallow in all of this was, all this profit being made, how much better we have done and look to keep doing, this line taken directly from the accounts is a kick in the bollocks even for someone who was happy to move.
“It is worth noting that the club would have made a similar profit had it remained at the old Stadium”
So what the F*%K have we gained?
I have no idea, if you have a clue give me a try because I can’t see it @myWHUopinion on twitter