Leeds want promotion, but how much do the 49ers need now?

Leeds United v Southampton last weekend was not a game to miss – until it emerged late in the day that his miss might not matter after all.

Events elsewhere left two clubs with broken models in automatic promotion back to the Premier League to go through the motions, but long-distance travel plans had been made in advance and the directors’ box at Elland Road was packed regardless: there was no the will. Ferrell (that day will come), but the 49ers Enterprises investment group turned out in numbers for the final day of the 2023-24 Championship regular season.

An executive dinner was held in Leeds the night before, and the club’s hierarchy are in a position of having plenty to talk about, but no word yet on where they go from here. It could be the Premier League for them next season. It could be the Championship again. They will know for sure in 18 days, after 11 months to reach the play-offs.

It goes without saying that Leeds and 49ers Enterprises, the venture capital arm of the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers, both want the promotion to materialize in the next few weeks. Either they need to happen—at this precise moment, the first time you ask—is a separate matter.

The 49ers did not categorize their first year of Leeds ownership as promotion or relegation. They have been rational about the possibility of having to play the longer game and privately talk about potentially controlling the club for a decade or more. But there’s no denying that failure to win these play-offs would lead to some tough decisions.

The club had one of the biggest playing budgets in the Championship this season, a legacy of the Premier League wage bill that saw them relegated last May, the Premier League’s first parachute payment injection and the 49ers’ desire to spend on the transfer market. .

Actor Will Ferrell is now co-owner of Leeds United (Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)

The combined price of their investments in Ethan Ampadu, Joel Piroe, Glen Kamara and Ilia Gruev came to just under £30m – although not all of that money was paid up front. Although the £12m-a-month wage bill from last season has been cut considerably, wages at Elland Road still sit comfortably at the top of the division. That’s why Leeds was one of the strongest teams in the championship.

All the while, their finances have remained within profitability and sustainability (PSR): not easy, and not without Luis Sinisterra’s season-long loan at Premier League side Bournemouth being turned into a permanent exit, but Leeds indicated a few weeks ago that they would exit this season without breaching the PSR.

Year two back in the Championship would change the landscape.

The standard annual parachute payment for a club’s second year after relegation drops from around £44m to £35m. Leeds’ “acceptable loss” limit under the PSR would change from £83m to £61m over a three-year cycle, on the basis that annual losses allowed are lower in the EFL. The room for movement becomes considerably smaller.

Domestically, Leeds are realistic about what this would mean for squad formation and transfers.

The club do not believe that failure to go up through the play-offs would require an unrestricted sale, but, in the face of meeting the PSR alone, there would be no escaping the pressure to cash in on certain players: to ensure agreeable accounts while retaining. the squad as competitive as possible and funding matters such as transfer payments due, of which there are many at Elland Road.

Some players may actively ask to move on if Leeds are not promoted. Some, like league player of the year Crysencio Summerville, offer a path to big fees and substantial amounts of profit, a key factor in balancing the books under PSR limits. 18-year-old midfielder Archie Gray is Leeds’ most valuable asset, but there is no PR advantage in listening to offers for the best academy graduate they have produced in years. Gray, however, recently signed a new contract until 2028.

As for manager Daniel Farke, the most likely approach to his future if Leeds do not go up can probably be gauged from the track record of those running the 49ers’ NFL franchise: they are not prone to judgment or ever rushing to break. the models in which they have invested. They don’t tend to tilt or turn suddenly in new directions.

All the players brought to Elland Road since Farke’s appointment in July have been signed at his behest or direct approval. He is said to have a strong relationship with the Leeds board and chairman, Paraag Marathe. The 49ers have warmed not only to the results under him, at least in the main, but also to his public persona and knack for speaking in a way that avoids messy headlines.

Having seen him take Leeds to 90 points this season, it will be tempting to believe that Farke can do the same next season – and that, in line with the average Championship run, 90 points again in 2024-25 would automatically promote them.

The German signed a four-year deal when he joined Leeds last summer. PSR’s picture at Elland Road would not be helped if they have to pay him and it remains the case that he has not made promotion a fixed target for his first year as manager of the club. He simply put the table in his interview saying that his previous two Championship titles with Norwich City were proof that he could do the same – and at the end of the last international break in March, it looked like he could.

Farke took Norwich twice – but neither was via the play-offs (James Baylis – AMA/Getty Images)

Farke said last week, as automatic promotion slipped away, that he and his team had paid for the time it took to get going in the first two months of the season. On the face of it, though, it was the last month that found them out.

As for the 49ers’ investment group, its structure, as it was when they bought Leeds from Andrea Radrizzani, hasn’t changed much. It was forced to change following relegation as certain parties who were ready to back the 49ers’ purchase of a Premier League club were no longer interested once Leeds dropped down a division. But the appeal to the glitterati has not diminished.

Over the weekend, it was revealed that Ferrell had become a minority investor in the 49ers fund. He already holds a major stake in MLS team Los Angeles FC. Fellow Hollywood actor Russell Crowe announced a short time ago that he was also financially involved at Elland Road. None of these injections represent the most serious funding behind Leeds, but the interest should it happen in the long term is very much intact.

There is obviously a simple way to avoid any of the more awkward considerations.

Winning the play-off final on May 26 eliminates a number of logistical headaches. Farke and the 49ers are still hoping that will happen, with Leeds starting the first leg of their semi-final away to Norwich on Sunday.

But it would be very different from Marathe or the 49ers if they were unprepared for the possibility that it might not.

(Top photo: MI News/NurPhoto via Getty Images)