The Rabona Chronicles #10: An important step forward

Key season in the club's development. The long-awaited goal of expanding the stadium arrived. It will still take a couple of seasons to be completed and that will mean that next season we will forget about finishing the season in the black, but we have to lay the foundations for the future and there are a couple of players that we must renew and face a small imbalance in the accounts next season. Without further ado, let's review the season at the Real Valladolid headquarters and what projects we have in mind in the short term. Welcome to chapter 10 of The Rabona Chronicles.

The time came, midway through the season, to undertake the biggest investment to date in Real Valladolid's facilities. The time has come to expand the stadium to level 9. In 12 days' time we will be able to open the new 6,000 capacity stadium, which will give us an important economic advantage and the capacity to improve the squad without compromising the financial future of the club. It may not be enough to get us promoted to Division 1, but we are certainly one step closer to achieving it.

Improvements to the facilities this season have been as follows:

1.- Stadium to level 9. 12 days to complete.
2.- Completed upgrades to level 8 of the Parking Lot and the Hotel.
3.- Building Yard upgraded to level 6.
4.- Office Building upgraded to level 7. Two days to complete.

In the short term the club's objectives are to bring the Parking Lot, Hotel, Building Yard and Office Building to level 9. The Youth Academy is already at level 8 and upgrading is a secondary objective at this stage.

Last season Pokorny and Kraan joined the club from the youth academy. Two players who have not developed as expected of them and who have not gone beyond a very secondary role despite having a short squad this season. In fact Pokorny will be one of the departures at the end of the season. Three players finish their contracts and this will be their situation:

1.- Faustino Cruz - Defender - 15713 RBN - Not Renewed
2.- Marek Pokorny - Midfielder - 4679 RBN - Not Renewed
3.- Ignacio Sánchez - Forward - 8806 RBN - Renewed

With these moves we are left with a squad of 12 players. That is too few. We will look for a defender among the free players who can complete the squad at a moderate salary cost.

The wage bill is now RBN 80,000 per day, which makes a total of RBN 2,400,000 per season without the addition of this defender. An amount that will make us end next season slightly in the red. But it was necessary to make an effort to renew Ignacio Sánchez.

Another season in mid-table without the danger of relegation. We have slightly improved our numbers compared to last season, especially on the defensive side. If last season the club finished in 10th position with 42 points, 49 goals for and 51 against, this time we have finished as you can see in the image below with only 36 goals received:

Economically we have squared the balance of income and expenses ending up with a small loss margin. The expansion of the stadium and the specific need for a player in the squad has meant that there has been no investment in junior players on this occasion. The good news is that we have increased the income from ticket sales by almost 200,000 RBN which has meant that the numbers have been better than initially planned.

Spending on salaries has exceeded two million and, as we have already planned and explained in the previous section, will be even higher next season. A season in which we will almost certainly end up in a slight loss.

An important season that ends today. In sporting terms, we are still in a similar situation to the last few seasons. Financially, we are still in positive territory for yet another season. But, despite that, it has been a key season for the future of the club. The expansion of the stadium will give us an important leap forward in the financial aspect and lays the foundations for the medium-term growth of the club. In addition, the roadmap with the rest of the facilities will allow us to make a new leap in the stadium in the near future and, then, yes, it will be time to prepare the squad to seek promotion. In the meantime, we must continue to work step by step and learn the ins and outs of Rabona.

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All images credited to rabona.io. Cover image made in canva.com and headers with cooltext.com