"If you want some accessible but informative insight into football then I suggest you couldn't do better than the Political Economy of Football website, which is not only intelligible but comes with the added bonus of being written by Addicks fan Wyn Grant." Ben Hayes - Charlton Athletic programme
Huddersfield Town have come up with an innovative marketing idea, offering fans a pre-paid funeral package. It includes a coffin in the club’s colours and bearing its crest, or with a home shirt and name on the back. A blue and white floral bouquet is provided with a condolence card from the club. The club song is played at the funeral.
Swansea City AFC may yet retain their place in the Premier League, but they face considerable financial challenges in doing so. Data provided by the author of the Swiss Ramble blog demonstrates that the main factor is a constrained revenue base with a huge reliance on broadcasting income.
Regardless of the results of today’s games Greek shipping magnate and former Olympiacos owner Evangelos Mariankis is set to complete his takeover of Nottingham Forest. This will end the controversial five year reign of Kuwaiti businessman Fawaz al-Hawasi who has managed to get through eight managers. Let’s hope it’s not a case of out of the frying pan into the fire.
The Association of Millwall Supporters are to run a candidate in the general election in one of the Lewisham constituencies. They have the necessary funds.
It follows a falling out with the local Labour council and mayor after an attempt to acquire land owned by the club through a compulsory purchase order so that a redevelopment, effectively a gentrification project. could go ahead.
A correspondent sent me some interesting questions about investors who get involved in non-league football and I thought it would be worth reproducing them and my answers here.
Talks for a takeover of Charlton Athletic by an Australian football consortium have stalled, but may yet be revived. Unpopular Belgian owner Roland Duchatelet is willing to consider offers.
The consortium were prepared to pay £25m, a substantial sum for a League One club, but had difficulty in raising the money. They are now looking at alternative ways of securing the required funds.
A takeover offer for relegated Port Vale has been made by the owners of Burslem-based IT company Synectics Solutions. The company has an annual turnover of £13m and its headquarters are near Vale Park.
The offer is for £1.25m which is the amount owner Norman Smurthwaite paid with his then business partner when taking the club out of administration in 2012. However, he claims to have ploughed in £3.7m since then.
Sunderland face big financial challenges following their relegation to the Championship. Their latest accounts to July 2016 show a loss of £33m up from £26.6m. Only Chelsea and Aston Villa had higher losses and they had exceptional items in their accounts.
Chelsea are planning to stay at Stamford Bridge until the end of the 2019-20 season because of delays to the start of structural work at their new stadium. They are confident of being able to return in three years and open their new 60,000 seater stadium in the summer of 2023. However, there is a possibility, given the scale of the project, that building work could take four years rather than three.
Leeds United co-owner Andrea Radrizzani is negotiating to buy out the 50 per cent share of the club held by Massimo Cellino. He had an option to buy the shares at the end of the season.
Cellino has been a controversial figure at Elland Road and has been the subject of various bans by the football authorities. His replacement would give the club some much needed stability.