Interesting Graham Potter Interview

[Darran]

Former boss opens up on alarming '£100m black hole' he found at Swansea City

Graham Potter was tasked with leading the Swans following their relegation from the Premier League in 2018

www.walesonline.co.uk

 

[Neath_Jack]

Former boss opens up on alarming '£100m black hole' he found at Swansea City

Graham Potter was tasked with leading the Swans following their relegation from the Premier League in 2018

www.walesonline.co.uk

Nothing to do with this but I started watching a podcast last night where Jonjo Shelvey was the guest. He stated talking about the time that he offered a Swans fan out after the Oxford game. It was quite amusing, but I fell asleep due to his extremely boring tone of voice. I will go back and listen to the rest.

 

[bakajack]

Former boss opens up on alarming '£100m black hole' he found at Swansea City

Graham Potter was tasked with leading the Swans following their relegation from the Premier League in 2018

www.walesonline.co.uk

I read this interview earlier this morning

Surprising but not surprising that he came here expecting he had all that parachute money to build a squad with. What wasn't surprising at all though was the massive financial black hole that the mismanagement of the owners had left which made that impossible

£100m is an eyewatering amount of debt to have to deal with. Can't clear that with an IVA

 

[JackSomething]

I do query his suggestion that he didn't realise the financial situation before signing his contract. He seems a smart enough bloke and I would expect his agent to have some experience, so it sounds like a manager trying to inflate his achievements. Not really necessary, we all know the financial mess the club was in at the time.

 

[Swansea93]

Doesn’t help what money he did have he wasted on dross signings.

 

[bakajack]

Doesn’t help what money he did have he wasted on dross signings.

Of the seven signings that Swansea City made for Potter one was on loan and two were free transfers, only two of those were above 750k.

Celina was quality and the last player we have had who was a natural number 10 attacking midfield player. For whatever reason Cooper couldn't get a tune out of him and he was moved on, Asoro never produced with us but has had goals and assists everywhere else.

Asoro career stats: 264 apps 44 goals 23 assists
Celina career stats: 369 apps 63 goals 46 assists

Now just how many of those were "Graham Potter" signings and not club signings only Potter could tell you.

 

[Londonlisa2001]

I do query his suggestion that he didn't realise the financial situation before signing his contract. He seems a smart enough bloke and I would expect his agent to have some experience, so it sounds like a manager trying to inflate his achievements. Not really necessary, we all know the financial mess the club was in at the time.

I agree to an extent. What may not have been known and what really utterly killed us, were the number of player contracts that didn’t include relegation clauses because the people running us were absolute idiots. That wouldn’t have been public knowledge and may have been disclosed after the event.

 

[SwanseaBoy123]

Doesn’t help what money he did have he wasted on dross signings.

Goes very under the radar that does and its always suprised me how it isn't talked about as our worst window in years. 4mill on Celina 2mill on Asoro 1mill on McKay 1mill on Declan John.

Its worse then the summer window we had under Paul Watson and that is saying something.

 

[bakajack]

I agree to an extent. What may not have been known and what really utterly killed us, were the number of player contracts that didn’t include relegation clauses because the people running us were absolute idiots. That wouldn’t have been public knowledge and may have been disclosed after the event.

The lack of relegation release clauses or relegation wage reduction clauses was absolutely criminal I agree. In just two players (Bony and Ayew) we had over a hundred grand a week in wages and neither player was easy to move on. In fact both of them wound down their contracts as far as I can remember.

For a non basket case club that's enough wages to support half of the 23 man playing squad.

 

[Londonlisa2001]

The lack of relegation release clauses or relegation wage reduction clauses was absolutely criminal I agree. In just two players (Bony and Ayew) we had over a hundred grand a week in wages and neither player was easy to move on. In fact both of them wound down their contracts as far as I can remember.

For a non basket case club that's enough wages to support half of the 23 man playing squad.

The two of them were well over £150k a week. Ayew alone was £90k ish. Insane. Plus we had Clucas, Mawson, Fab, Fernandez, Ki, etc etc etc all leave for sod all. And multiple players we had to loan out.

 

[Swanjaxs]

The two of them were well over £150k a week. Ayew alone was £90k ish. Insane. Plus we had Clucas, Mawson, Fab, Fernandez, Ki, etc etc etc all leave for sod all. And multiple players we had to loan out.

Didn’t Stoke pay 5 million for Clucas?

 

[bakajack]

The two of them were well over £150k a week. Ayew alone was £90k ish. Insane. Plus we had Clucas, Mawson, Fab, Fernandez, Ki, etc etc etc all leave for sod all. And multiple players we had to loan out.

Even more than I remembered, I thought I remembered Ayew on 60k and Bony on 50k
Those kind of salaries are crazy to pay in the Premier League, let alone in the Championship

 

[J_B]

Undoubtedly the decisions made in the relegation season removed the advantage of the parachute payments.
I don't know how much say managers have over signings. Some appear to have very little with no veto and some have a massive say like Emery at Villa.
I don't know what the situation was when Potter was here.
I do know that those young players benefited from his coaching because they've said so. Dan was a fast runner but a football wasn't his friend at all at the start of Potter's season. His development after Christmas was remarkable.

 

[Andrew - North Hill]

I'm not having it that he had no inkling he wouldn't get the parachute money. That's a load of crap. We had started flogging players before he even came.

Now if he'd have come out and pointed out the really weird thing - that for some bizarre reason the Chuckle Brothers decided to loosen the purse strings in year two under Cooper, when the parachute money had dropped, instead of giving it to him in year one - then I'd have more respect for that. Jack Something has it about right I think. This is a bloke retrospectively polishing his reputation.

 

[Frankie Burrows Cap]

I agree to an extent. What may not have been known and what really utterly killed us, were the number of player contracts that didn’t include relegation clauses because the people running us were absolute idiots. That wouldn’t have been public knowledge and may have been disclosed after the event.

This, this and this again.

And Huw Jenkins’ quote of only a fool would spend more than 70% of income on wages and not have relegation clauses… 12-18 months later both were happening!