With Christmas just around the corner, it’s more than just points and wins that will be at the top of Eddie Howe and the club hierarchy’s wish list.
For multiple seasons now, we’ve been wanting to secure a quality training ground sponsor for an additional revenue stream to help us with PSR.
But with the league’s stringent sponsorship rules still under intense scrutiny with the ongoing Manchester City ATP case, it’s so far limited the owners from securing the right deal.
And now the recently-appointed CEO David Hopkinson has provided some fresh clarity on just why it’s taking so long for us to announce a training ground sponsor.
Wait for training ground sponsor explained
Speaking at a fan event held at STACK on Monday night, Hopkinson discussed our wait for a lucrative training ground sponsor, revealing that the club is simply waiting for the right opportunity to emerge before signing a long term contract with any sponsor.
“We have to get the right deal. We haven’t had that yet.”
“We have to get our big block sponsorships right. It is a huge opportunity here.
“We know how to do this, we have a good team, we need to go and get it done.”
The main reservations seem to be that if we sign into a contract with any sponsor now, we could find ourselves trapped in a long-term deal that financially wouldn’t make sense for a club trying to double its commercial revenue goals year after year.
Manchester City’s deal with Asahi is the benchmark, whilst we’ve shown we can nail down big deals with the likes of Guinness and Red Bull: world-renowned partners are out there, it’s just up to Hopkinson to find them and for the right offer to arrive.
100-day review discussed
Since his arrival, Hopkinson has been hard at work understanding every aspect of the club, from its most-inner workings to embracing the fan culture, and even meeting Alan Shearer to gauge the legend’s thoughts on things.
The Canadian’s ‘100-day review’ is close to completion, with PIF set to receive the final report soon before changes are made across certain areas of the club.
“It has attracted some attention but I was always going to do a diagnosis. I said when I first arrived, I’d do some talking and listening.”
“The output of the 100-day plan, 85 days in, the plan is finished and submitted to the ownership for Monday. From top to bottom, people have contributed to what we want to see – a bright future.”
“I am here to focus on where we go here. Our success will be measured by trophies. We want more. We need to be focused on why we can’t, and why we can.
“We have to have a high-performance football organisation. We have to have a best-in-class business operation to support us.”
As cliche as it may sound, Hopkinson wants to maintain a truly united front in every aspect of the club. After a tumultuous few years at the top involving the likes of Darren Eales, Amanda Staveley and Paul Mitchell, Hopkinson’s ready to steady the ship and deliver only the best that the club can offer to the fans.
“We want the same things you want. Which is as much success for Newcastle United as possible.
“We take that duty seriously. It is a privilege we have to earn. Talking openly is how we will build that trust.”
