Dons warn of crisis if supporters locked out
Aberdeen chairman Dave Cormack has issued a stark warning that the club faces losing £5 million in revenue if fans are not allowed to return to Pittodrie for the remainder of the 2020/21 season.
The Dons, who have pub - lished their annual accounts for the year ended 30 June 2020, have suffered a £1.59m decrease in turnover from £15.928m to £14.335m, along with an operating loss of nearly £3m – close to three times the previous year’s figures.
At the same time, wages have risen from £9.24m to £9.77m, increasing the wages-to-turnover ratio from 58 per cent to 68 per cent. That figure could reach 90 per cent if supporters continue to be locked out of matches, with C or mack braced for turnover to plummet to just £10m and an operating loss of £5m.
Stressing that the club’s main dilemma is remaining competitive on the park while at the same time “facing a total collapse in income from gate receipts, corporate hospitality, and sponsorship on matchdays”, the Aberdeen chairman branded the club’s position “unsustainable”.
C or mack continued :“We were planning for an operating loss of around £2 min the 30 June 2020 accounts due to our strategy of continued investment in a competitive team and in fan engagement to increase support in the future.
"This was with a view to building a long-term, more sustainable future based on investing in young talent and developing players through our academy to sell on at the right time to balance the books.
“The unforeseen but devastating impact of the coronavirus crisis on the latter part of the 2019/20 season increased that planned loss to£2.9m with projections for the current financial year showing an even more significant loss of £5m due to the effect of Covid-19 on the full season.”
Cormack believes that “further, painful measures” are a distinct possibility to safeguard the future of the club
Cormack added: “Despite a fur ther£1.1m cash injection from our investors last month and a record player sale [Scott Mckenna to Nottingham Forest for a rep or ted £3m that could rise to £6m], our financial gap, due to the ongoing pandemic crisis, is widening.
"We are sustaining losses for every home game we play without fans.”
Cormack warned that the lack of a clear pathway for spectators returning to football grounds could be “catastrophic” for some teams.
He explained: “The knock-on impact of no clear plan for the return of fans to our national sport, as we enter the second half of this season, will be catastrophic for many Scottish clubs. At Aberdeen this could require us being forced to scale back our operations, which would have an impact on the supply chain which depends on our match day operations."