Bradford survive

Wednesday 6th December.

Sad to say that the financial scaremongering of the last few months might have a little more substance than we realised. The Annual General Meeting was held today with the true extent of Town’s pecuniary problems being made public and it does not make pleasant reading. The harsh reality is that we have just turned in a record loss of around £4.5 million most of which is attributable to the high wages being paid to the players.

The actual playing staff pocketed around £6 million out of a total wage bill of £6.7 million! This is ridiculous for a club of our size and Steve Bruce (who himself earned around £200,000) must shoulder much of the blame for bringing in players on Premiership salaries who haven’t performed namely Monkou, Sellars and Donis. Apart from the wage situation most other aspects don’t look too bad with respectable increases in gate receipts, radio/television revenue, merchandise and sponsorship/advertising. Transfer dealings only resulted in a £23,000 loss, which in the context of the high fees paid currently, is a mere pittance in football terms.

Whilst the figures don’t make joyous reading, the Chairman himself must also accept much responsibility as he is the astute (?) businessman who has allowed this situation to develop. I can understand that steps are being taken to rectify these problems but it is even more important now that Town retain their division 1 status or the income will fall further making the financial problems worse still. We need to get rid of the pretenders on the pitch with their exorbitant salaries and get some grafters into the side who will pull us off the bottom of the table.

There is some better news from the long absent Clyde Wijnhard, who following his serious car accident a few months ago has returned to the McAlpine following his recuperation at home in Holland and is hoping to get the OK to resume training quite soon. Following his poor early season form I didn’t think I’d be saying this but it would be good to have him back.

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