WHEN Darren Pratley announced that relegated Bolton required sweeping changes in the wake of relegation to the Championship, he knew what he was talking about.
After all, with a contract that runs until 2018 and a weekly wage of £14k, the former Swansea midfielder is part of the problem.
“Let's not kid ourselves,” said the 30-year-old. “Serious changes need to be made next season. It needs a whole new start, probably a whole new squad.”
That is clearly the plan. The average annual salary for a League One footballer in 2015 was £90,000 a year. Yet Pratley is just one of several players whose deals blow those kind of figures out of the water.
Mark Davies, once the subject of a £4m offer from Swansea, is on £16k a week with a contract that expires in June 2017. Jay Spearing – currently in limbo because his next appearance will trigger a £100,000 payment to Liverpool – is on similar terms.
Ben Amos, Liam Trotter, Derik Osede and Dorian Dervite all earn north of £400,000 a year and have a year or more to run.
This is the reason Bolton were losing £1m a month when Sports Shield, the consortium led by Dean Holdsworth, bought the club from Eddie Davies in February.
“If a club is losing money, it's because of player salaries,” said Ken Anderson, Bolton's new chairman and the man who brokered the sale of Southampton in 2006. “That's true right across the 92.
“The only real way we can change the cost structure here is by changing those salaries. That's what makes or break the profit and loss sheet. I think it is obvious which players I'm talking about.”
Obvious, perhaps, but buyers won't exactly queue round the block for players who stunk out the Championship this term.
That is is what makes a repeat of Wigan's current revival unlikely. Relegated from the Premier League in 2013 and subsequently sucked into the Championship dropzone, owner Dave Whelan spent January 2015 running a high-class car boot sale.
Ten players departed, slashing a potentially catastrophic wage bill from £30m to £20m almost overnight. The rebuilding this allowed has provided the foundation of what now looks a certain League One title.
Yet Wigan's players were easy to shift. Shaun Maloney was a Scottish international, Ben Watson and Callum McManaman both FA Cup winners. Buyers were happy to meet their demands.
As Bolton discovered when they attempted to flog Davies to Sheffield Wednesday in January, that is not the case at the Macron.
Bear in mind, too, that Wigan – like Wolves before them – still had £16m worth of parachute payments winging in.
Not only did this provide an element of insurance, it also helped the Latics meet League One's Salary Cost Management Protocol, which stipulates clubs spend no more than 60 per cent of income on player wages. Bolton's parachute payments stopped this season.
Unlike Financial Fair Play, SCMP places no restrictions on benefactor input if Sports Shield do have money to chuck around. So far, however, details of their funds are unclear.
Further complicating matters is the demise of the emergency loan system, which until March allowed lower league teams to borrow young players for up to 93 days – a change Accrington chairman Rob Heys said would “seriously hurt” hard up clubs.
All of which is food for thought for Chris Wilder, the Northampton boss rumoured to be Bolton's No.1 choice to replace Neil Lennon in the dugout.
The 48-year-old knows knows all about financial strife. Halifax went bust on his watch in 2008, while Northampton came within hours of being wound up this term.
He once said that all he's ever wanted was a fair shot at a decent club without fighting fires off the pitch. Now, under close friend Kelvin Thomas, that's exactly what he's got.
Would he risk losing that? Because whoever takes charge at Bolton, they are in for a very tough summer.
