Should we pay our players more ?

[tiger666]

In all businesses there is margin ... do you honestly think we can't afford to pay more ?

I don't know, I don't have access to our finances. I keep seeing this lately, we have to pay our players more or they'll leave. It's just people worrying now that we're good that something's going to go wrong. People seem to think they can spot these problems while the people running the club can't. As if we're deliberately being tight at the risk of throwing everything away.

I can't remember anyone leaving the club purely for more money and I see absolutely no reason it's going to start now we're challenging for the the title. People need to relax and stop worrying all our players are going to leave.

 

[bubble07]

Keep wages the same but give each player a loyalty bonus for staying at the end of each transfer window

 

[Yid-ol]

I voted no. We pay the player what they are worth to us in relation to our budget.

Once we get our new stadium and increased revenue we will probably see the wage cap increase. CL money is a good amount but can never be added into wages as might not always be there from one season to the next.

 

[arunspurs]

We are where we are due to our strict wage policy & discipline. We cannot do anything that will affect us long term. Until we finish the stadium & pay off the loan, we cannot be overexpansive & will have to live within means.
I know it sucks but its what we can do realistically

 

[worcestersauce]

Harry Kane is earning, in one week, over ten times what a pensioner gets in a year, is that not enough?
I actually believe Harry is a level headed guy but it would do no harm to remind footballers of things like that sometimes.
I imagine our wages will rise with increased revenue, I would hope so anyway as I figure that is sort of the point of the new stadium, to attract top players and compete.

 

[14/04/91]

The wages reported in the press are pure guesswork. Our players will generally be on more than most people think, if they perform well that is.
Pogba was on £250-£300k per week according to most of the media but the much-talked about book launched in Germany this week actually puts him at £160k pw.
Bonuses play a huge part in most contracts; basic wage p/w is never the full picture & it's too easy for journalists/pundits to throw numbers around without knowing jack.

 

[Japhet]

The wages reported in the press are pure guesswork. Our players will generally be on more than most people think, if they perform well that is.
Pogba was on £250-£300k per week according to most of the media but the much-talked about book launched in Germany this week actually puts him at £160k pw.
Bonuses play a huge part in most contracts; basic wage p/w is never the full picture & it's too easy for journalists/pundits to throw numbers around without knowing jack.

If Corbyn gets in (haha), Pogba will be on about £500 per week after tax.

 

[nicdic]

The wages reported in the press are pure guesswork. Our players will generally be on more than most people think, if they perform well that is.
Pogba was on £250-£300k per week according to most of the media but the much-talked about book launched in Germany this week actually puts him at £160k pw.
Bonuses play a huge part in most contracts; basic wage p/w is never the full picture & it's too easy for journalists/pundits to throw numbers around without knowing jack.

He also cost £89.3 million before this week, when we found out United also paid his agent £41m too.

 

[donny1013]

You only have to look at some of the players contracts that were leaked last year. Mata's at Chelsea was a real eye opener in terms of how many add-ons they get. Playing in the Champions League bumped up salary, loyalty bonuses in the millions etc. We do have players that are definitely underpaid, Toby being the most obvious, but I have always liked how Levy has gone about our wage structure.

However, the media seem to have got a real hard on the last couple of weeks in terms of our wage structure and how much our players are supposedly paid, even though Levy has always had this structure. Utd being linked with Dier for example, who is 'only' on £50k a week, he agreed to that contract 6 months ago, he didn't have to sign it.

Will be a long summer with no international football, would say near enough every first team player will be linked with a move away by the end of it.

 

[spursgirls]

We've already increased the wage bill twice this season with Kane and Lloris (both reportedly on £120k a week after bonuses), Toby will be next then Dele Alli...point is that if these guys weren't happy then they wouldn't be signing up in the first place.

This raises another question for me. Should Dele be on a lower salary because he is only 21? Personally I think if you're good enough you should be paid the same regardless of age. What do you all think?

 

[dontcallme]

When was the last time a player left us for money?

I think this is the most important point.

For years now I have read how our players will leave if we don't pay them more, if we don't win a cup, if they don't get CL football etc.

It hasn't happened. The only players we have lost in the last 6 years have gone to Madrid. That's because they became good enough to become coveted by the most attractive club in world football. Even Utd couldn't fight them off once the player's head was turned.

Wages will affect us buying certain players but how well we're doing should show that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Levy sees where we are and has run the club in accordance with that. If we make the mistake that so many others have made by paying top money when we can't afford it we will go backwards rather than forwards.

 

[dontcallme]

This raises another question for me. Should Dele be on a lower salary because he is only 21? Personally I think if you're good enough you should be paid the same regardless of age. What do you all think?

It can be dangerous paying a young player too much. Young, impressionable mind being paid in accordance with the top stars can change their mindset into thinking they have made it before they reach their peak.

But in today's world it is very hard getting round that.

 

[Shadydan]

This raises another question for me. Should Dele be on a lower salary because he is only 21? Personally I think if you're good enough you should be paid the same regardless of age. What do you all think?

I think Alli started on £10k a week but as far as I recall has had 2 contract extensions and will most probably get another which will put him amongst the highest earners at the club, not sure if age comes into it, I think it comes down to how you perform. Paying players too much too soon can have a detrimental affect on them, I trust Levy and Poch to manage him so when he deserves a pay rise they'll give it to him.

 

[mil1lion]

Considering all the new contracts done over the past year I'm guessing we're already paying them more money?

 

[spursgirls]

It can be dangerous paying a young player too much. Young, impressionable mind being paid in accordance with the top stars can change their mindset into thinking they have made it before they reach their peak.

But in today's world it is very hard getting round that.

Very true. Though there will always be a club that will pay the mega money for a young player, so it's a hard decision to make, whether or not to give him parity with older players.

I think Alli started on £10k a week but as far as I recall has had 2 contract extensions and will most probably get another which will put him amongst the highest earners at the club, not sure if age comes into it, I think it comes down to how you perform. Paying players too much too soon can have a detrimental affect on them, I trust Levy and Poch to manage him so when he deserves a pay rise they'll give it to him.

Yeah, if you are doing effectively the same job as someone older, it must be pretty hard to accept a lower salary. I';m confident Poch can keep him happy though, for a while at least!

 

[worcestersauce]

Does anyone know how players are paid? Presumably a fat chunk is paid into a pension fund and/or a trust fund for after they finish playing, I can't imagine players living on 5 million a year as a footballer being able to earn a fraction of that for the rest of their lives.

 

[TH1239]

Yes, look at our annual revenues. We're closer to Watford than we are Liverpool. Simple maths tells you why are currently at our upper limits in wage expenditure - and that's before you factor in paying for the new stadium.

Do you actually know what our annual revenues have been and are likely to be for this fiscal year? Do you know what our wage to turnover ratio is?

First of all, according to financial reports released for 2016, Spurs annual revenue was 209 million pounds. Liverpool came in at 302 million pounds, while Watford's total revenue was roughly 94.5 million pounds (so, no we weren't closer to Watford than Liverpool revenue wise last season). This season, we earned Champions League football, while Liverpool fell out of Europe, which was responsible for nearly 38 million Euros of their revenue last season (http://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/competitions/General/02/41/82/56/2418256_DOWNLOAD.pdf). That means the gap between us and Liverpool for this current financial period is likely to be around the 50 million pound mark (30 million pounds less for them in European revenue, with 20-25 million pounds more for us for CL revenue versus our 2016 Europa revenue and subtracting a bit of revenue for diminished WHL capacity), while our total revenue advantage over Watford, who has no European football to speak of, either, is likely to have increased to closer to 130 million pounds.

Second of all, we now likely have the lowest wage-to-turnover ratio in the entire league. We've operated well above 50% on this metric for years, but last season, we were at 48% (see this chart: https://twitter.com/SwissRamble/status/861501645871624192). With our massive revenue increase this season towards 290 million pounds, even if we handed out 15 million pounds of new contracts with renewals to our current squad (that'd be a 30K increase a week, on average, for 10 players), we'd still only have a wage bill around 115 million pounds (our wage bill for fiscal year 2016 was 100.4 million pounds per our financial report). That would potentially put our wage to turnover ratio at or below 40%, which is FAR below the norm for us as a club in recent years and far below many European and British clubs. That means we could potentially add 30 million pounds to our wage bill to bring it closer to 145 million pounds based on projected revenue and still be at or around 50% wage-to-turnover ratio (a 30 million pound wage increase would amount to roughly an additional 57K a week, on average, for 13 players in our squad).

So, the financial flexibility is there with massive revenue growth to significantly increase our wage bill in the coming years to keep players. I would posit if anyone takes a step back and looks at long-term growth trends of the league, it's obvious that the Premier League is in the midst of a massive boom cycle with no end in sight where television revenues will continue to grow unabated. The only global comparisons are the NFL, MLB and NBA, who have seen no backsliding in their revenues over the last two decades and the EPL is likely to be on par with the latter two in the coming decade. No team that remains in this league is going to "do a Leeds."

In the end, even if you consider stadium debt, it would make far more sense to up our wage bill to keep our already existing squad of top players together (if money becomes an issue for our top players), then to let players leave due to strict wage caps, only to believe that once the stadium has been paid off many years down the road, you can go out and replace said departing players by raising wages to buy replacements. It'd make more sense to pay more now for great players who we know can perform and love the club than to wait a decade to massively up our wage bill for players who may or may not cut it at Spurs. Plus, you have to factor in the serious opportunity costs of potential commercial revenue losses if our squad deteriorates heading into a new stadium.

Bottom line: increase the wage bill to keep our top players happy with incremental wage increases yearly for top performers, even if that means a bit of austerity in the transfer market. Capitalize on our new stadium and top squad to massively boost commercial revenue and brand equity heading in the next decade. I believe Levy will do all of this because he will look at the league's economic landscape and realize this is a low risk high reward proposition for the club, and the owners have so much equity built up with the rising value of the club, that they can be a bit more bold in the future with revenues (you wouldn't have seen Levy sanction a move for Sissoko 5 seasons ago).

 

[yido_number1]

In an ideal world we would have a European wide wage cap that was equal amongst all leagues. In reality that won't ever happen and we will never compete on revenue. Hopefully we can offer enough to the right players to keep them with us.

 

[CockOnBall]

I voted yes.

Looking at our last annual accounts is meaningless given:

1) It doesn't include the money made from CL
2) It doesn't include the revenue from the reported Nike deal
3) From next season onwards, our capacity will be at least 61K for the foreseeable future (Wembley as much as 90K)

I am not sure how much we're paying rent for Wembley but I'd hazard a guess we'll make more matchday revenue there than we are currently receiving at WHL. I think at the time of the deal being announced, Levy said the money would be the same (debunking the accusation that the Wembley move was financially motivated) but that was when the capacity was capped at 50K. It has since been increased to 90K and the ticket prices are effectively the same as this year.

I totally agree with people who say we should spend within our means but the above indicates that are means have increased. I am sure Levy already knows this. You can bet the players' agents will also be looking at that.

We still have a stadium to pay so rather than pay out fees and wages on numerous new signings to replace players we couldn't keep, I'd rather pay more to the existing lot.

 

[Gb160]

Does anyone know how players are paid? Presumably a fat chunk is paid into a pension fund and/or a trust fund for after they finish playing, I can't imagine players living on 5 million a year as a footballer being able to earn a fraction of that for the rest of their lives.

Not too sure, but going back a few years , Riise's payslip from Liverpool was found and leaked, its essentially the same as your average joes payslip...but for a truckload more money: