Middlesbrough rely on owner Steve Gibson to fund a return to the Premier League, but too often they have been the nearly men. This season they are in the second automatic promotion position, but only one point ahead of Millwall Outstanding away performances have been undermined by some nervous home performances against lowly clubs, exemplified by last night's defeat to Charlton. The Swiss Ramble has been conducting his usual forensic analysis of their 2024/25 accounts and his full analysis is available on his Substack page. Middlesbrough’s pre-tax loss slightly reduced from £12.4m to £11.4m, thanks to profit from player sales improving by £9.2m from £17.1m to £26.3m. Revenue was also a little higher, rising £0.3m (1%) from £32.2m to £32.5m, though there was a steep increase in operating expenses, which rose £7.9m (13%) from £62.5m to £70.4m, while net interest payable more than doubled from £0.5m to £1.1m. Since 2011 Gibson has put £176m into the club via loans, almost all of whic...
A group led by American businessman David Storch has been named as the preferred bidder for Sheffield Wednesday, who will start the 2026-27 season in League One with a 15-point deduction. ,The winning bid is not high enough to ensure that all of the club’s unsecured creditors receive at least 25 per cent of what they are owed, hence the points deduction. The Storch group’s bid of just under £20million beat rival offers for the south Yorkshire-based club from English retail tycoon and ex-Newcastle United owner Mike Ashley, a group led by former Charlton Athletic and Sunderland executive Charlie Methven and two undisclosed U.S. syndicates that made late bids. Ashley was seen as the favourite at one stage but did not bid high enough. Storch, 73, retired as chief executive of aircraft maintenance firm AAR Corp in 2018, before spending another five years as the chairman of the multinational’s board of directors. He is now managing partner of Illinois-based investment firm ...