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Players wages
A question to all you experienced managers,what percentage of turnover should
Be on salaries.
My finances seem to suffer on most days due to Players wages -even when I have a home fixture I only seem to make a tiny surplus.
Any thoughts ??

I'm not very experienced but I presume the percentage of turnover should be as much as possible,,, if this is lacking then there's a multitude of ways to improve it but it's not an instant fix and it will take time, whichever route you take

I began my only club from scratch, from the bottom division and quickly learned that a multitude of factors are entailed with club rating- club value and everything which comes with that

Within the next 2 seasons I'm expecting a big decrease in my rating, fan base, results, ticket prices and percentage of income and outgoings as I have many of my higher rating players retiring so for me it'll be a patient race against time and I'll need to keep my club value as close to the 80-100mil mark as possible so spending big to help remedy this won't be an option

I understand why maybe some should do the relegation method because "club hopping" can sometimes be risky as you are taking the helm of a club which was already in decline and this decline can be very difficult to stop if losing half your games and spending big, reducing club value and then (like many clubs) you are stuck in a quagmire that is very difficult to get out of,,, in regards to all the multitude of factors which make a successful profit making club

Like I say I'm not very experienced and maybe some of my observations are wrong and some may know different and wish to add to this or dispute this

I can't believe I'm giving advice and tips to a long serving manager on IAG but you have 4 options in my opinion, and again I could be wrong? But...

1. Improve your club rating and club value together with average player rating whilst winning more than half of your games to improve ticket prices and fan base, alongside the obvious thing of negotiating contracts to the minimum that you can.

2. Do the relegation method and sell a +90 fixed player or two to generate finances and re-invest it wisely to re-invegorate the club you are at

3.Club hop until you're lucky enough to get a club which is in good shape and then keep it in good shape

4. Begin a fresh club from the bottom division and press all the correct buttons Like the good ol fashioned way


Like I say, none will be an instant fix but all 4 options you have will be possible eventually

I find it hard to get players to take less than their asking, Youth i tie to a 5 year contract at the start so that helps but rest of the squad i seem to have to give them what they want more or less except the yearly wage % increase which i can get them to take a bit lower. With my home gate attendance i am still losing 195k so an away fixture am losing around 360K. I usually have to sell to get back into the black again.

You've got three main day to day sources of income:
-Ticket sales
-TV rights
-Merchandise

And five main day to day costs:
-Player wages
-Bonuses
-Maintenance
-Policing
-Staff wages

My approach (although I haven't given it as much focus in the last couple of seasons as I'd like) is to get them to balance out over the season, possibly with the inclusion of cup prize money. Then the league prize money is your profit.

Player purchases/sales and stadium improvements are a separate issue in my book.

Have you been making a profit or a loss over the last few seasons? This isn't a game where you're going to make 10M profit in a season, unless you sell someone and don't reinvest - and then you lose a big chunk of it in tax. If you're making 1-2M a season then I'd count that as a success.

As a specific piece of advice: you could get a bit extra on each match day by fiddling with your ticket price.

Edit: I forgot about the youth academy, which isn't quite a day to day cost but is recurring, so you need to consider that too

Thanks to all for your observations:-
I did make profit one season but only by selling a superstar youngster for 40 million plus(profit that season £25 million- I spent a small amount on the Stadium to avoid a higher tax bill)
Kane - I?m not too good at this game(I?m better at Top Eleven)but I don?t want to go down the relegation route.
Silkstone - I find myself in a similar position with contracts,try to negotiate a lot lower than wanted but that only works occasionally.
Another question for everyone:-
What annual percentage rise do you normally negotiate on a new contract??
I find I usually settle at 8%(is this too high?)

I'm sure you were on of the bitter ones that watched me relegate

Bitter? No, Ridicule,, Yes... In all honesty when I first joined the game I reported you and a couple of others for cheating as I didn't know the relegation method was allowed and after certain things were pointed out to me i now realise why the method is tolerated

Yet, I don't think the relegation method is a good way, especially to the extent of nearly 4 real life years when just getting a fresh club from the lowest division and playing the game normally and pressing the correct buttons can get a manager and team to a similar level and stature as yourself within less than 1 real life year

But yes, I do understand the one cycle relegation method now after seeing what I've learned and seeing other clubs and managers in certain predicaments

each to their own way. i'll take this as a partial apology

just need to wait to hear re from firesilver and maybe I can retire in peace

That might take a little time......

I?m at work at the moment, but you can be assured that I will be making fun of euro later?

On topic, I shall offer some good general financial advice to help you get back on track when I get home

Oh good, another thread has ended up on the forum's favourite topic. The Godwin's Law of IAG

Anyway, I looked back at my old records and if you exclude transfers and stadium upgrades I've made a profit every season bar one. So in my opinion you should too.

Look at your contracts and your ticket prices - they're the biggest levers.

Why is it only your youths that you give a 5-year contract to?

With the exception of older players who are retiring within five seasons and some less-loyal players who may only accept 4 seasons, you can offer any player a longer contract. During negotiations, players seem to quite like a longer contract which means you can then also offer a lower wage and still keep them satisfied.

You can learn a lesson from this. Next time you have a superstar youth that you decide to sell, give yourself time to invest most of that money in improving your squad before the end of the season tax bill arrives.



Try a bit harder, maybe try some other options that you haven't tried before. You should be able to negotiate lower wages for the large majority of players, it's only players that plan on retiring soon who are difficult.




No, it's not too high. it's actually way too low if you want a good way of reducing your wage bill. It's been mentioned in the forums many times before, so it's no secret. Give players a high annual percentage rise, then, if next season you think you're paying them too much, try talking with the player again.
It takes more time and effort but it's an effective way to reduce wages, which are the largest day-to-day expenses of any club.

To me, this seems like a simple question of maths. If you assume that your income from media rights and merchandise covers most if not all of your other daily outgoings (like stadium maintenance, bonuses, and staff wages) then you have around 20 home matches a season to cover 56 days of wages. Therefore you should aim to have 3 times your wage bill coming in from gate receipts, or 2.5 times if you don't mind spending your prize monies on topping this up.

This is not easy to achieve, but you have to be realistic in your aspirations. If you continue to not meet this consistently you will end up losing money forever and eventually you will find yourself unable to sustain your club anyway. Ask yourself if you really need your highest earner, or could you sell him to both cut your wage bill and reinvest in some lower-rated but higher-potential players instead?

Players expect their wage demands to be met one way or another. I personally do not offer my players a matchday bonus at all unless I know they won't be playing regularly, and I never give them a sign-on fee. Instead, I offer them longer-term contracts than they want with high seasonal wage rises so that they think they're getting what they want over the entire duration of the contract. Then I renegotiate their contracts as soon as that seasonal wage rise kicks in, back to the original contract they were on. This will save you a LOAD of money on wages, assuming you don't forget to negotiate with them every 56 days.

You cannot use this trick on older players because they will start asking for shorter contracts as they near their retirement age, thereby limiting the "potential" total contract amount you can give them. So I just start selling players once they reach about 31 years of age. By this point they are often starting to decline in rating anyway and some managers will pay good money for older, pre-trained players. I then replace them in the squad with youth players who are cheap to bring on board for what they can offer the club in the long term- and they start off with low wage demands, too!

In summary, aim to make sure your gate receipts are at least 2.5 times higher than your daily wage bill. Sell your highest earners if you can't make this happen and replace them with younger players you can train, or negotiate your players' wages down using contract negotiation tricks. Good luck.

I haven't seen any flying pigs today I'm afraid euro, so my disdain for your failed strategy will remain I'm afraid.

At least you've finally learned how to draw all your games instead of losing them all. One more big push and you might even learn how to win.

There's plenty of advice in the thread, but here's one other way of looking at it: I've no idea how much of a loss you're running at on average , but improving your position by 1M credits per season means less than 20,000 credits per day. Drop your ticket price to 14 and you might get a full house - you'd be over halfway there already.

It's not about finding one big win; it's lots of little ones all together.

Hi Roland
They come back with The contract is longer than i want at this time but then again i have not tried this with all players so will definitely be looking at this again cheers

How many seasons were they asking for? How many seasons did you offer?
Unless, as I mentioned above, the player is getting closer to retiring they will accept two seasons more than they are asking for.

So you may not be able to get all to accept 5 seasons if, for example, they only ask for 2, or even 1 season, but in those cases they will sign for 4 or 3 seasons which still boosts your contract negotiations.

If you want to discuss any player in particular, you can always send me a message.

Thanks to all for your advice-some really good tips to work on.