Became The Premier League’S Youngest Manager [EN]: Chapter 97

97. Preparing for the Future

“No. No. No.”

Burnley’s Football Director, Jonathan Landris, firmly rejected Hyungmin’s question as soon as he heard it.

“Bringing in Luca and Anel this time stretched our resources to the limit. You know that, right? And what sensible club would loan out a starting-caliber left-footed left-back at the end of the transfer market?”

“It’s because Jamal and Mika are taking longer than expected to build up their stamina.”

“I’m sorry, but it’s too much to ask me to solve that for you.”

Jonathan gave an apologetic expression but answered firmly.

From the beginning, left-backs are rare in any team.

That’s why only the top clubs in each league have enough resources to rotate sufficiently.

However, the top clubs in the Premier League don’t want to loan to Burnley, and he isn’t confident how quickly players in other leagues can adapt to England.

In fact, even Jamal Lewis, who spent the last few seasons at Norwich and Newcastle, is struggling to keep up with Burnley’s training system…

“And decisively, there’s no money. The wage budget is completely squeezed, and the transfer funds are all spent.”

“Then is there no other way?”

At Hyungmin’s question, Jonathan shrugged and raised his finger towards the ceiling.

“Ask the one above.”

“Are you telling me to just shut up and pray?”

At Hyungmin’s words, Jonathan looked dumbfounded.

“No. The one above. Helena.”

“Ah… her. She’s been cold to me lately too…”

At Hyungmin’s muttering, Jonathan looked puzzled.

“Really? Why is that?”

***

Helena hadn’t been feeling well lately.

She couldn’t pinpoint the exact reason why she felt bad, but she was certain that several clear factors and some unknown factors were combining to make her feel unwell.

Perhaps ordinary people would drink heavily, binge eat, or go on a trip or vacation to change their mood in this situation.

However, true to the Cartwright family’s encouragement of workaholic tendencies, she decided to relieve her mood by solving the biggest and most serious problem she was facing.

“The income is too low at this level. It’s impossible to compete with other clubs.”

A club working meeting to discuss aspects outside of football.

Since Helena, Mike Garrick, and John Banaskiewicz are practically responsible for the club’s management, it’s no different from a club board meeting.

John Banaskiewicz protested at Helena’s grumbling as she reviewed the marketing and game revenue and expenditure figures that Mike Garrick and John Banaskiewicz were in charge of.

“This is really great for our level! Thanks to Kim [referring to Hyungmin], interest in Burnley has increased in Korea, so Korean companies have bought up a lot of billboards in the stadium. And although inquiries came too late this season, inquiries have been made about the possibility of purchasing uniform and training wear sponsorships or even stadium naming rights next season.”

“Uniform orders have also increased in Korea and Asia. In fact, we are recording the highest marketing and merchandise sales in the past few years since I got involved with Burnley,” Mike Garrick added.

To be honest, Burnley Football Club was recording the highest sales in its history, excluding game revenue.

The experienced two directors protested and gave a light rebuke to the club’s owner representative who had been grumbling, but Helena shook her head.

“If Burnley were just a normal company, it would be a really great achievement. I’m not disparaging your efforts. But we have to compete with other clubs, right? Then our performance has to be evaluated relative to other clubs.”

“…You’re saying we should do a relative evaluation, not an absolute evaluation.”

Helena nodded at Mike Garrick’s sigh.

“If I hadn’t squeezed 10 million pounds out of my father this time, there could have been serious problems in the summer transfer market. But honestly, it’s too much to ask Jonathan to work more magic here.”

Manchester City spends £460,000 a week for just Erling Haaland, while Burnley operates all 22 first-team players with £1 million, only about twice that amount.

And yet, they are expected to play on the same level.

Helena, who knew very well that Hyungmin had opened another bottle of whiskey in his office a few nights ago, shook her head.

“Last season, Manchester City recorded an income of 260 million pounds from advertising, marketing, and merchandise sales alone, excluding game revenue. Manchester United made 220 million, Liverpool 200 million, and Chelsea 150 million. Even Tottenham, who were just above us, had an income of 140 million pounds. But what about us?”

“…We didn’t even earn 18 million pounds.”

Mike Garrick, who is in charge of the club’s merchandise revenue, replied gloomily.

“How about we try to strengthen our advertising and marketing revenue? Interest in Burnley has increased tremendously in Korea these days, so let’s expand into the Asian market based on that.”

Helena shook her head slightly at John Banaskiewicz’s suggestion, who was listening to the conversation.

“Expanding advertising and merchandise revenue is good, but it may not be a long-term solution. The reason why Burnley looks attractive in Asia is honestly because of Hyungmin, right? What happens when Hyungmin leaves Burnley? Maybe the fans and advertisers will all move with Hyungmin.”

The two elderly British men fell silent.

Unlike fans in Europe, especially in the UK, who choose their team to support based on their birthplace from a young age, fans who come from new markets such as Asia or the United States must be provided with other factors that they find attractive.

The history of a historic club, an interesting story, or brilliant results.

At least they should be able to present a cool uniform and logo.

Like Venezia in the Italian Serie A, which was acquired by an American entrepreneur a few years ago, swept SNS with its fancy and luxurious uniform design.

But even that is difficult to sustain interest.

The most unstable thing is when a fan base is formed based on interest in a specific player or manager.

In the short term, the club’s revenue increases explosively, but in the long term, after the player or manager transfers or retires, fans’ interest fades, so it cannot be seen as a continuously maintained income.

“There is also income from player sales.”

Helena shook her head at John Banaskiewicz’s point.

“I’ve been thinking about that too… We have to rely on that in the short term, but in the long term, it’s not a way to maintain stable finances either.”

Helena turned the laptop she had open and shared the screen with the other two.

“Look. This is the ranking of net transfer fee income for European football clubs in this summer transfer market and the cumulative net transfer fee income ranking for the past 20 years.”

The names of so-called big league clubs such as LOSC Lille, Olympique Lyonnais, and AS Monaco in the French Ligue 1 [French Football League] can also be seen, but except for South American clubs, the top ranks are filled with the names of Portuguese and Dutch clubs.

“I investigated why these clubs in Europe can consistently generate a lot of transfer fee income. If possible…”

“…You were wondering if we could do the same.”

Mike Garrick sighed.

Helena looked at the two of them alternately and nodded.

“And then I realized.”

“…That English clubs can’t do this.”

Mike Garrick, who knew the essential situation of how the football scene works much better than Helena, who conducted the investigation, sighed once again.

Basically, the Portuguese and Dutch leagues have a large difference in size and finances between the top and bottom teams, so the difficulty of maintaining league rankings is not relatively high.

In addition, the country’s visa structure is very favorable for recruiting foreign players.

And the know-how of youth academies that have nurtured world-class football players for decades, and the capabilities of coaches and coaching staff who lead the tactical trends of the times.

A large number of promising foreign prospects are recruited, nurtured well, and then the players who seem to have the highest potential are given first-team opportunities in relatively easy games against lower-ranked teams, raised, and then resold.

It is completely the opposite of the situation that Burnley and other English clubs are in.

Although the financial gap is large, the competition for rankings in the Premier League is so fierce that even the team in 1st place is often tripped up by the team in last place.

The English work visa, which is said to be the most difficult to obtain in the football world.

And the tactical capabilities of English coaches and coaching staff, which are gradually improving, but are still so far behind that even most Premier League clubs are hiring foreign managers.

It is almost impossible to recruit foreign prospects under the age of 18, and there are many doubts about the capabilities of the coaching staff who nurture them, but even after nurturing the prospects, it is not easy to give them opportunities because each game is so crucial.

There are countless cases of promising players who eventually left England and blossomed in overseas big leagues, such as Manchester City’s Kevin De Bruyne and Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah.

Both were recruited by Chelsea during their promising years, but they were not given enough playing opportunities in the midst of urgent results and were classified as failed recruitment cases, and then transferred to the German Bundesliga [German Football League] and Italian Serie A [Italian Football League], respectively.

After that, they blossomed in each league and showed great performances, and then returned to the Premier League and became the best players in the midfield and striker areas, respectively.

Just last season, Tammy Abraham, a Chelsea youth player who transferred to AS Roma in the Italian Serie A and brilliantly blossomed, and Manchester City’s Jadon Sancho, Arsenal’s Serge Gnabry, and Birmingham’s Jude Bellingham, who spent their youth in the Premier League but blossomed in the German Bundesliga.

There are countless cases of failed youth development by the league’s top teams.

Last season, Burnley stepped up to fill the need for youth development that those top teams had, and leased a large number of prospects.

However, as the easy-going Burnley grew rapidly to the level of winning European spots, it began to be checked again.

“Then what kind of method are you thinking about?”

Helena also sighed at John Banaskiewicz’s question.

“I don’t know yet either. But if we just go on like this, it’s obvious that we’ll hit a wall again in the long term, so I think we should start thinking about it now.”

For now, this season has started, and unless a special situation occurs before the summer transfer market closes, the club’s cash flow will flow as planned until the end of the season, so there will be no major issues.

Burnley is not a club that uses large funds in the winter transfer market.

“So, you’re saying we should start preparing not for this season, but for the next season.”

John Banaskiewicz muttered as if he hadn’t thought of it.

Although the first month of the 2022/23 season was not over yet, the other two men nodded with stiff faces at the words of the young CEO who claimed that they should already be preparing for the next season.