Good news from Hadjuk’s last Supervisory Board session in 2015
Last session of Hajduk’s Supervisory Board in 2015 was held on December 16, 2015, and for once, everyone involved was very optimistic in terms of what the year ahead will bring. During a marathon 4 hour session. there was no mention to the press about the drastic punishment the President of the Supervisory Board Ljubo Pavasović Visković recieved just a few days earlier, instead they concentrated on very good financial results.
Ljubo Pavasović Visković spoke to the press after the meeting and stated: “We’ve focused mostly on the overview of our results in 2015 and budget projections for 2016. Our net profit in 2015 is approximately 11 million kuna and this is the key indicator that things are indeed getting better. Of course, we have to deduct depreciation later on, but to put it in very simple terms, we made 11 million kuna more than we spent and this is something that hasn’t happened in the history of this club and I believe that should be respected”.
Then he added: “We’ve met our budget, exceeded it, in fact. President Brbić estimated a profit of 10 million kuna so we’ve topped it by a million or 10%. Our total budget is approximately 60 million kuna and we expect a profit increase of 10% in the next year”.
When asked how are they planning to achieve that increase, Pavasović answered: Our intention is to lower the percentage of profit achieved from transfers and to finance the club entirely from its net profit. Our goal is to make transfers an item that is not included in the budget. We should achieve that in 2017 or 2018 at the latest. Most football clubs in the world are financed this way“.
Even though a profit increae is indeed great news, this doesn’t mean Hajduk is ready to spend a lot on buying new players. According to Pavasović they are very careful when it comes to spending money since the club still has some inherited debts even though new management has drastically lowered them, and until they are all resolved there are no plans to spend the money Hajduk doesn’t have since it is very easy to get back into the downward spiral and financial fog again.
Pavasović also noted that the players are now paid on time, workers get their full pay with a slight delay, but the most important thing is that this management successfully resolved the mess they found 4 years ago when they took over.
When asked what his expectations from Hajduk in 2016 are, Pavasović said. “I personally think the most important goal we have is to get the club to stand on its own two feet and to turn it into a self-sustainable organism, we must never find ourselves in the situation where its existence is brought into question. It is equally important that it remains the “club of the people”, it cannot become someone’s private toy. Responsible management is the only way for Hajduk, and since we’ve been in a market economy this is the first time this club made more than it spent. We are going in the right direction. Time for adventures is behind us”.
And last but not least, members of the press wanted a comment from Pavasović on the vast amounts of money the club is spending for fines caused by the behavior of its fans:”I would be very happy if fans would stop throwing flares because we end up paying the fines. The main way to achieve that is to educate them since repression is out of the question. That is the one thing you can’t expect from us”- he concluded.
