Meanwhile Fleetwood's signings just keep coming

We should (with our gate numbers) be big hitters in this league, even without investment from Brent we should be more attractive destination than say Torquay. Guess what, we aren't, whose fault is that? It certainly isn't mine.

The point is Iggy that budget is not necessarily dependant on gate money and that only plays a part. The rest is down to the owner putting hand in pocket and coming up with extra cash by way of some sort of sponsorship or other to boost the 55% limit. Also buying players out of his pocket and not the budget. Brent isn't going to do that and said so. Our budget therefore might be competetive but is not the budget of some other clubs whose owner will and can.

What I think Brent has said Jock is that the club must be self sufficient. He treats it as a seperate entity from any of his other business interests so it isn't going to gain anything from projects. I suspect he doesn't subsidise any of his businesses from his other ones. That is the sole reason I don't expect much from him. It isn't that I would not like much but am not holding my breath given his words. I suspect the local bookies won't be making a fortune out of Argyle this season either. It is only the hard of understanding who will be daft enough to chuck money at them backing Argyle. They can all hope for success but putting cash on it is another matter altogether.

Brent's Big Society is certainly uniting those who seek to wear the biggest hats.

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Had a good footie chat with my neighbour yesterday, who is a passionate home and away Gulls supporter, we both came to the obvious conclusion that the Gulls with less than 3 wks away to the start of the season, have a superior squad and in martin Ling a manager who is working wonders at Plainmoor. He said that a lot of gulls supporters are surprised at the lack of quality in our squad and that we are lacking any effective strikers. Need we say more!

Thinking about budget and living within the clubs means perhaps a fresh input of transparency and reality is needed from James Brent. Just as a remainder of how things are. If we are mssing out on targets because the club can literally not afford them he should say so. if the budget has been more or less used up resiging last year players he should say so. if he thinks supporters expectations are running away from them he should say so. He could clear an awful lot up if he wanted to.

I don't want to rely on tweets from the President or the occassional post when he put the Argyle masses to rights.

Dougie wrote:

Thinking about budget and living within the clubs means perhaps a fresh input of transparency and reality is needed from James Brent. Just as a remainder of how things are. If we are mssing out on targets because the club can literally not afford them he should say so. if the budget has been more or less used up resiging last year players he should say so. if he thinks supporters expectations are running away from them he should say so. He could clear an awful lot up if he wanted to.

I don't want to rely on tweets from the President or the occassional post when he put the Argyle masses to rights.

In his interview on BBC last month he did say that he thought the budget was sufficient to 'possibly' compete for the play offs.

Exciting innit.

Nobody, apart from the terminally tinted and the silly hat seekers will be interested.

You goin Fleetwood ? Errrrrm y'know............... no.

I have never felt such underwhelming feelings to the start of a new football season. I have no hope whatsoever other than staying out of a relegation fight.

I think I might have felt better if we'd folded and than started up again, then there might have been something to look forward to and even a united fan base. (OK the last comment is prob stretching things a bit too far )

Hope I am wrong.

This team is nowhere near the standard required to get us out of this division. We are light years behind the successful Sturrock and Warnock teams that got us promotion last time we were here. I don't think we are even as good as the mid table team that Kevin Hodges created.

We may be very good at pretending we are a good team but the reality is slowly sinking in. I don't think we will get relegated but I cannot see us bothering the top half of the table.

One classic post I read said that if we had more than one point after 9 games this side would be an improvement on the last. Whatever lights your fire I suppose.

Dougie wrote:

One classic post I read said that if we had more than one point after 9 games this side would be an improvement on the last. Whatever lights your fire I suppose.

Have a look at our first 9 fixtures on the Baggo. More than 1 point? Hmm.

Yep the first nine fixtures dont look easy at all......mind you neither do the next 37.

And our mural hero Purse is still commuting from London to Plymouth, as captain, despite Fletcher's statement that he only wanted players who wanted to play for Argyle and who would embrace Plymouth and move to the area.

Fletcher says one thing, while JB says another, and not even the captain erm ya know takes any notice of him. I suppose if you never had the dressing room you can't lose it.

Along with ourselves,Fleetwood Town are probably the club loathed by the majority of League Two supporters. What with the funds they have etc.

Like Crawley Town,Fleetwood Town are buying success [well for the lower reaches at least]. And good for them too,but let's see how long it takes before the bubble bursts and they start the downward spiral back to where they came from,or belong.

Crawley Town will find life in League One more tougher than League Two was,and if they ever get to the Championship,then that will be an eye-opener for them. ''The Big Boys'' of the Championship will crucify them

Fleetwood Town will probably go up,but that is to be expected i suppose.

We will be ok this season,no relegation battle for us !!.

Tringreen wrote:

In his interview on BBC last month he did say that he thought the budget was sufficient to 'possibly' compete for the play offs.

Or possibly not. I think it's statements from Corbett of having a competitive budget that have turned me right off the man, and his intentions. All that a competitive budget means is it allows the team to turn up, and kick off, and not run out of substitutes or wages.... no more.

And that feeling is not helped by his ever increasing murmurs of building desires in the Park that bear no resemblance to his pre purchase comments.

As for the ever decreasing PASB thing, I think many of us have long detected another game in town that isn't out in the open.... there's not one of the contingency bunch up for 'election'.... why's that then ?

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

The point is Iggy that budget is not necessarily dependant on gate money and that only plays a part. The rest is down to the owner putting hand in pocket and coming up with extra cash by way of some sort of sponsorship or other to boost the 55% limit. Also buying players out of his pocket and not the budget. Brent isn't going to do that and said so. Our budget therefore might be competetive but is not the budget of some other clubs whose owner will and can.

What I think Brent has said Jock is that the club must be self sufficient. He treats it as a seperate entity from any of his other business interests so it isn't going to gain anything from projects. I suspect he doesn't subsidise any of his businesses from his other ones. That is the sole reason I don't expect much from him. It isn't that I would not like much but am not holding my breath given his words. I suspect the local bookies won't be making a fortune out of Argyle this season either. It is only the hard of understanding who will be daft enough to chuck money at them backing Argyle. They can all hope for success but putting cash on it is another matter altogether.

Have Torquay been bought and are now bankrolled by Saudi billionaires as well now? I seem to have missed that news.

VillageGreen wrote:

We will be ok this season,no relegation battle for us !!.

I'm so happy

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

What I think Brent has said Jock is that the club must be self sufficient. He treats it as a seperate entity from any of his other business interests so it isn't going to gain anything from projects.

Well, he didn't view the club as a seperate entity when he knew buying it was the best way to unlock some very handy and very expensive development and investment opportunities long looked into.... and the Council always said that developments in Central Park must help the club as well. I'm just wondering how that help has been quantified, given the other deals done. perhaps the Council have a similar idea of a Plymouth price that the club always have, after all both have long had an inferiority complex.

While I had no problem about Mc666 deciding on the club's spending strategy, I really have a problem with Harry spouting off about "competitive budgets" "not cheating" etc. etc. because while Dan was deciding how his own money should be spent , Harry (I,m no sugar daddy, the club must be sustainable) is blithely deciding how to spend OUR money not his.

In fact, the most honourable thing he could do is to hand the club over to the fans, especially as he is adamant that it's only going to be our money going into the club while he's around

I still don't get this "our" money thing. If you frequent the theatre do you own it if you just pay to go in or are you just handing your money over to somebody else to own? I know how I view it but it seems others view paying an entry fee as something else.

All I was pointing out Iggy is that a budget can and often does consist of more than simply gate receipts. I didn't see Torquay get promoted albeit they ran it close. Teams can be better than their finances dictate also. If you get the right mix of lesser players who perform well as a unit then they can appear better, in some cases much better, than other squads despite themselves. I have always believed there is an element of luck in that as in Sturrock's squad the first time around. Right players with the right character at the right time. Blackpool were another example of that when they went up to the top.

Both Torquay and Blackpool had decent managers though for a start.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

I still don't get this "our" money thing. If you frequent the theatre do you own it if you just pay to go in or are you just handing your money over to somebody else to own? I know how I view it but it seems others view paying an entry fee as something else.

All I was pointing out Iggy is that a budget can and often does consist of more than simply gate receipts. I didn't see Torquay get promoted albeit they ran it close. Teams can be better than their finances dictate also. If you get the right mix of lesser players who perform well as a unit then they can appear better, in some cases much better, than other squads despite themselves. I have always believed there is an element of luck in that as in Sturrock's squad the first time around. Right players with the right character at the right time. Blackpool were another example of that when they went up to the top.

The success achieved by Sturrock's first squad certainly wasn't due to luck.It was because of his knowledge of primarily the Scottish scene [but also of the English scene to a lesser degree] which enabled him to bring players who were capable of playing at a far higher level than the one that Argyle were operating in at the time.Coughlin,Worrell,Hodges,Keith,Evans and Bent were all players of a much greater standard than the fourth division and had already proven their pedigree.The only way in which fortune played a part was the discovery of Friio and Larrieu through the trial system,but they were the exceptions rather than the rule.And those players weren't going to come here for peanuts either-although virtually no transfer fees were paid,it would have been interesting to see Argyle's salary bill at the time-i would bet very heavy money on it being one of the biggest in the division,bankrolled by Nick Warren,i believe,enabling a truly competitive budget to be set.

Blackpool's success was also heavily dependent on the backing of the Oyston family and his Latvian cohort.Remember how they outbid us for the services of Charlie Adam? That wasn't due to luck,it was ambition and money.They got Adam,we got Alan Gow,they progressed on gates which at one time were less than half of ours,we got relegated and started on the slippery slope.Says it all,really.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

I still don't get this "our" money thing. If you frequent the theatre do you own it if you just pay to go in or are you just handing your money over to somebody else to own? I know how I view it but it seems others view paying an entry fee as something else.

All I was pointing out Iggy is that a budget can and often does consist of more than simply gate receipts. I didn't see Torquay get promoted albeit they ran it close. Teams can be better than their finances dictate also. If you get the right mix of lesser players who perform well as a unit then they can appear better, in some cases much better, than other squads despite themselves. I have always believed there is an element of luck in that as in Sturrock's squad the first time around. Right players with the right character at the right time. Blackpool were another example of that when they went up to the top.

Put it this way,would people be happy to continue to attend the theatre if they thought that their money [earned through hard work in most cases] was being used in a way which would ensure that future acts would be of a far lower standard than previously was the case?

I wasn't answering a point on future entertainment Greenskin it was a comment on who owned the money once it was passed over. Once you give something to somebody else it ceases to be your's. I don't remember ever having a say on what happens to that money once it is no longer mine irrespective of where I've spent it.

I still believe that luck does play a part in the construction of a squad. It's my opinion and I don't believe Argyle had any stars in that squad as such either. They gelled very well and once they began to win they got very used to doing it. I have seen sides with stars all over the pitch who have bombed. Sturrock knew his stuff at that level also which played it's part and was also part of the luck at that time. Basically it all came together. It's football so it is all about opinion most of the time.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

I wasn't answering a point on future entertainment Greenskin it was a comment on who owned the money once it was passed over. Once you give something to somebody else it ceases to be your's. I don't remember ever having a say on what happens to that money once it is no longer mine irrespective of where I've spent it.

I still believe that luck does play a part in the construction of a squad. It's my opinion and I don't believe Argyle had any stars in that squad as such either. They gelled very well and once they began to win they got very used to doing it. I have seen sides with stars all over the pitch who have bombed. Sturrock knew his stuff at that level also which played it's part and was also part of the luck at that time. Basically it all came together. It's football so it is all about opinion most of the time.

Yes,of course once you give money over it ceases to become yours and no,you don't have a direct say in what happens to it.But where you certainly do have a say is in making a judgement as to whether the money which you've handed over is being used satisfactorily to the extent that you do or don't want to buy/watch/travel on/drink more.Do you not pass your money over in the expectation that it is spent in a way which you find agreeable?

Manchester City lucky? No way.Money and ambition are the key words in attributing their success.Southampton,Norwich,Palace,QPR,Coventry,Ipswich,Swansea,Blackpool,Hull,Reading etc were all luckier than Argyle in spending time in the top flight and in most cases actually achieving something in the game? Nick Warren's money didn't play the major role in the 2001/2 success? Do you seriouly think that Sturrock [or in an earlier era,Warnock] would have come down here without some indication that a decent budget was available? Not a chance is the answer to all of those questions.

If I pay to go into a theatre to see a thriller, I don't expect to see a tragedy or a comedy. If I did I would soon stop going.