Top of the big era

This summer window, Manchester United's rival Manchester City continues to make lavish purchases in the transfer market and has spent 65 million euros, the most in Europe.

Ferguson publicly spoke out about this, saying that Manchester City's approach was digging its own grave!

Of course this is an angry comment.

With the strong strength of the Abu Dhabi consortium behind Manchester City, as long as Manchester City spends heavily in the transfer market every year, it is estimated that they will become the top team in Europe in less than five or six years.

In the final analysis, football is about money.

Whoever has more money is more powerful.

Serie A in the 1990s, known as the "Little World Cup", was so powerful that it could not be compared to the Premier League, Bundesliga, French Ligue 1, La Liga, Portuguese Liga and other teams put together.

But it’s no longer possible in the past few years.

The core reason is that there is no money.

Without money, there is no core competitiveness.

Therefore, Zhou Buqi attaches great importance to the development of Manchester United at the commercial level. The football environment in the UK is also very good, close to the United States, and more market-oriented, which is accepted by everyone from the football world to the fans.

This past season, Manchester United's commercial revenue reached 172 million pounds, which is a brilliant achievement. Before Zhou Buqi took over the team, in the 2007-08 season, Manchester United won the Premier League and Champions League double crown, and its commercial income was only 60 million pounds.

In the Premier League, the common revenue structure is "442", that is, 40% of match day revenue, 40% of broadcast fee sharing revenue, and 20% of commercial revenue.

In the 2007-08 season, Manchester United's total revenue was 230 million pounds, with commercial revenue accounting for 25%. In other words, Manchester United was a better team in commercial development in the Premier League at that time.

Now two seasons later, Manchester United's total revenue has exceeded 400 million pounds.

Comparing various data, we can find that the growth of match day revenue is slow. The Old Trafford stadium is so big, even if it is expanded, it will only add more than 10,000 seats at most.

There is a clear upper limit.

The ceiling of this sector is obvious. If you want to increase the revenue of this sector in the future, you can only rely on increasing the price of tickets to generate revenue.

The revenue sharing of broadcast fees is controlled by the Premier League, the FA and UEFA, and Manchester United cannot change it even if they want to.

The only business that Manchester United can truly control independently and rely on itself is the income from commercial operations. This is the core lifeblood of Manchester United's steady increase in revenue.

This past season, Manchester United's commercial revenue reached 172 million pounds, accounting for more than 40%. To use Ferguson's joking words, Manchester United's financial reporting structure is the same as the team's tactics, from "442" to "433". That is, 40% of commercial income, 30% of game day income, and 30% of broadcast fees.

However, Zhou Buqi is still not satisfied with this, and his goal is "532".

Now, he is more confident in speaking.

After he took charge of Manchester United, the club's operations have undergone earth-shaking changes. There is no debt and there is no need to repay huge interest payments. Not only has the stadium been repaired, but huge transfer fees are guaranteed to be invested every season.

As long as Ferguson is willing, there is no problem in investing another 100 million pounds in the transfer market this summer window!

All these changes came from Boss Zhou.

Such an achievement gives Zhou Buqi enough authority to speak internally, and he can confidently and boldly make his strategic decisions without having to carefully maintain the relationship between David Gill and Ferguson like last year.

Zhou Buqi is now the real boss of Manchester United.

At such an executive meeting, Zhou Buqi once again reiterated the importance of commercial development to the club, not only now but also in the future.

Zhou Buqi pointed out: "Manchester City has strong financial support behind it. They have a grand blueprint and a big plan, and they have the ambition to dominate Europe. All this comes from financial supply. If Manchester United wants to keep the throne of Manchester, they must Richer than Manchester City!"

Some people in the athletic department present seemed not to agree with this point of view.

Can you play football well if you have money?

not necessarily!

Real Madrid spent 240 million euros last summer to buy the best players in the Premier League, Serie A, and Ligue 1. So what? Aren’t all four elements empty?

Zhou Buqi said decisively: "Real Madrid is Real Madrid. As long as there is continuous investment, it will definitely succeed. In the past few years, I have felt more and more that if you persist, you will definitely succeed, even if you say you want to Landing on the sun by rocket, you can succeed as long as you persevere.”

This remark caused bursts of laughter, and I thought he was joking.

Unexpectedly, he looked serious.

Everyone stopped laughing.

It feels like the structure of thinking is very different.

Even a little absurd.

Manchester United is just a football club. It is not appropriate to discuss such a big topic here. Zhou Buqi brought the topic back and said slowly: "In the 1990s, Serie A dominated Europe. What is the reason? Is Italian football very good? It is very good, but Germany, France, Brazil and Argentina are not bad either. Why is Serie A a mini-World Cup, far ahead of other leagues?"

Santokuzi discussed this topic with him and seconded it, "In the final analysis, it is economic reasons. Serie A was the first to use television broadcasts on a large scale and promoted it all over the world."

Zhou Buqi said: "Yes, this is thanks to Berlusconi, the club chairman of AC Milan. In my opinion, he is an epoch-making club chairman. He is not a football professional, but he is the person who changed the football industry. Just like Florentino, the chairman of Real Madrid. The person who changed the mobile phone industry was not a person who made mobile phones, but a person who sold computers; the person who changed the aviation industry was not an astronaut, but a person who sold cars; it was not the military that made the final say in World War II. home, but a physicist. The same goes for football. Berlusconi is the king of Italian television and the Prime Minister of Italy. He promoted Serie A broadcasts to the world through television, allowing Serie A to have an income that far exceeds that of other leagues. This That was the reason why Serie A was able to recruit talented people and dominate Europe at that time."

Santoku said: "It's a pity that Italy's economic downturn has been affected by the European debt crisis. Berlusconi is also disappointed with football, saying that he will not invest another penny in AC Milan. He seems to be selling football." Team."

Zhou Buqi waved his hand, "Italy's economic downturn is due to external factors, not the main reason. Italy's economy is not good, and Spain's economy is even worse, but Real Madrid and Barcelona are the best clubs in Europe. France's economy is good, and what kind of giants are there in France? Team? There is only one Bayern Munich in Germany. The national economic situation has an impact, but this is not the most critical thing. The most critical thing is the club's own strategy."

He now has the confidence to say these words.

He wants to change the atmosphere inside Manchester United.

Manchester United's sports and business are separate. Sports take priority and are not subordinate to each other. This is nothing, but many people who work in sports seem to be superior to others and have a condescending attitude towards people who work in business.

This will definitely affect the mentality of the employees in Manchester United's business department.

No one wants to be discriminated against at work.

Zhou Buqi must speak clearly today and set the tone. Don't engage in internal discrimination! For Manchester United to achieve today's results, competitive results are of course very important, but commercial results are also important!

Success in athletics belongs to the past and is highly contingent. Only business success is malleable and can burst out with continuous vitality.

Teams such as Nottingham Forest and Leeds United that once achieved brilliant competitive results have now been relegated to League One and League Two and have become small teams.

Why?

A very important reason is that they are too constrained by competitive factors. Once the competitive results are not good, the club will be finished. It's not like Real Madrid, which loses all four majors in one season, but this is still the most popular top club in the world, and its earning power is still the leader.

The same goes for Manchester United in the previous life. The competition level has been declining year after year, but Manchester United is still a giant and has not fallen behind because of its commercial success. If the business is successful, there will be money. If you have money, you can buy excellent players, and you will have the basic conditions to succeed at the competitive level again.

In the final analysis, football is about money.

Whoever has money is powerful.

Zhou Buqi said: "Real Madrid failed to achieve anything last season, but I'm sure that with Real Madrid's investment, they will be able to gain world-renowned competitive success in the future! At the beginning of the 21st century, both Real Madrid and Barcelona fell into trouble one after another. Financial difficulties, they almost went bankrupt. Two businessmen, Florentino and Laporta, appeared. They led Real Madrid and Barcelona to transform into commercialization, which gave these two giants their peak status today. Rich , this is the fundamental reason.”

After a pause, he continued: "Why did Serie A decline? First of all, TV broadcasts of the Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga and other leagues have also been promoted to the world. Serie A's economic advantage at this level is gone. At the same time, in the 1990s, Serie A was the strongest Big time, their strategic decisions went seriously wrong.”

Everyone in the conference room was silent and listened carefully.

It's like Boss Zhou is a one-man show.

There were several Chinese people present, such as Zhu Jun, Chen Wenhao, and Lang Weiyi, and this scene shocked them quite a bit. Especially Lang Weiyi, who had mixed feelings in his heart.

We were all friends who played football together back then, but times have changed, and now we can already teach the arrogant British guys at Manchester United like they are lecturing their grandchildren in high-level meetings at Manchester United.

Zhou Buqi is just like giving a speech——

"So many years of experience in doing business tell me that success is difficult to copy, but the lessons of failure can be summed up. Where did Serie A go wrong in its strategic decision-making? This will play a vital role in the future development of Manchester United. In my opinion Come on, the core reason for Serie A’s failure is not the decline of Italy’s economy, but Serie A’s own mistakes. This is the main reason.”

"There are mainly two mistakes."

"First, commercialization failed. At that time, Serie A had only two major income sectors. One was match day income, which was made by buying tickets. The other was broadcast fee income, which was made by TV media. Just like AC when they won the Champions League. Milan, 50% of its revenue comes from television broadcast fees. This is a deformed business model."

"However, Serie A at that time was too traditional. Football people controlled everything. They rejected commercialization and supported pure football. We have all seen the subsequent results."

"At the same time, the English league launched reforms, established the Premier League, which was independent of the control of the Football Association, and gradually accepted investment from foreign capital. The most important point is to promote commercial operations. 20 % of commercial operating income is additional income compared to Serie A. With more money, you can buy more good players, which can produce a compound interest effect. This is the fundamental reason why the Premier League is more popular than Serie A today. Reason. The longer the time, the more compound interest, and the greater the gap between the two parties will be."

"The second reason is infrastructure construction. When Serie A was the hottest, they made a lot of money. But after they made money, they squandered it in the transfer market. There was too much internal strife and too many sky-high prices. Transfer. And they have neglected the construction of infrastructure. Today's Serie A teams do not even have their own home stadiums, they all rent stadiums...The youth training facilities are even more outdated."

"Infrastructure is the foundation of football. At its peak, Serie A failed to further expand its commercial influence and improve its infrastructure. The backwardness of infrastructure will inevitably affect the emergence of young players in Serie A in the future. Don't look at Italy's four years We won the World Cup before, but with such infrastructure conditions, Italian football is doomed to decline in the future.”

"To sum up, Manchester United must adhere to two points. First, continue to adhere to the line of commercial operations. Only by making enough money can we buy good enough players; second, we must persist in investing in infrastructure, including Stadiums, training grounds and youth training centers. Only with good infrastructure can we cultivate excellent football players. Only with more excellent players can we have the best competitive results."

"There is no contradiction between business and sports. They are two legs of a person. No one can walk on one leg! The pursuit of good sports results is the core of Manchester United, but business development is the basis for providing good sports results. There is a lack of both. Not even one!"

“I heard some not-so-good things this past season.”

"I don't believe that going to the training ground to take a few photos or taking a short video will interfere with training! To put it seriously, this is job discrimination in the workplace! Starting from next season, I don't want anything like this to happen again!"

Zhou Buqi said this last sentence categorically, full of chilling and warning.

This matter is related to the new media work that Zhou Buqi is going to arrange for Lang Weiyi.

The so-called new media work is to use new media on the Internet to spread and promote Manchester United, enhance Manchester United's global influence, and earn part of the new media's advertising revenue and subscription revenue.

The main way is to open accounts on platforms such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Ucgram, YikYak, Weibo, Manchester United's official website and Goal, a fan community product owned by Ziweixing Digital Media.

Then, take care of these accounts and maintain a good relationship with fans.

Use new media to generate revenue and enhance brand image.

If you want to manage these accounts, of course you have to take a lot of internal pictures, such as the appearance of the locker room, interesting pictures of players during training, or photos of players on airplanes, eating, or in the gym.

However, many football workers are very repulsive and feel that the locker room and training ground are sacrosanct and non-footballers are not allowed to enter. Don't disturb me, let alone take random photos!

So much so that the previous person in charge of Manchester United's new media business and most of the team have resigned. This is Britain, there are more jobs than people.

What kind of job are you not doing?

Why are you being insulted here?

Zhou Buqi was very angry when he heard about it.

Depend on!

I'm used to your faults!

This time, he will arrange for Lang Weiyi, a close confidant, to run the business. He wanted to see who dared to be so arrogant and self-righteous!

Last night while watching the match between Manchester City and Crystal Palace, a Dubai tourism promotion video appeared on the stadium billboard. I don’t know if it’s the first time, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him. It feels like we are getting closer and closer to a promotional video for a Hollywood movie.