By Andy Baggott
October 28 2003

As expected, Leeds posted record breaking losses of just less than £50 million. The figures are staggeringly bad, but are up to the end of June. They are terrible figures, but after going through them, there is light at the end of the tunnel. The changes that have been implemented by the Prof will not show on this set of figures, and there have been many changes since his appointment. The losses include £5.7 million in compensation to Venables, the final part of O’Leary’s payment, and other settlement figures. This is a one off, and shouldn’t be repeated in the next set of figures. The wage bill has been trimmed by £13.1 million annually, (with the loss of Kewell, Mills, fowler, Woody etc). We are going to receive £4.4 million from Allan Leighton and some shareholders, in return for shares, and we have appointed ex Chelsea Chief Executive Trevor Birch to be our new C.E. as part of the board restructuring.
The figures are bad, make no mistake, but everything is out in the open now. The interesting thing whilst watching Sky this morning, was that they said our debt now stood at £77 million. Every time I hear how much we are in debt, I hear this figure, whoever we sell, whatever we lose in a year - £77 million is always the amount…