Newcastle United's new chief executive, David Hopkinson, sees the club being one of the biggest in the world by 2030.
Three months to the day since taking on the role at St James' Park, Hopkinson outlined his medium-term vision in a wide-ranging interview that included fresh information on club's plans for a new stadium and training ground, owners PIF and the inner workings of the club he labels a "rocket ship" waiting to take off.
The 54-year-old, who previously held roles at global giant Real Madrid and US basketball greats New York Knicks, was joined in an in-depth chat by Newcastle's new sporting director, Ross Wilson.
Read on for Hopkinson's verdict, plus what Wilson said about the club's position this season, Eddie Howe and recruitment plans...
"By 2030, I see this club being in the debate about being the top club in the world.
"That's where I see us by 2030 - and that kind of progress doesn't take as long as you might think. What it takes is clarity of conviction.
"We need to be totally aligned about the fact that that's what we want to do. We have to have the courage to ignore those that doubt us, and even those that laugh at us. Because there will be some. I've been through this journey before.
"I've done it with a total underperformer, and that's definitely not what Newcastle is. Newcastle is already good. I've worked at a club that was really bad, lost all the time. In 2014, we lost just about as bad as you can. In 2019, we were having a parade. So, it's eminently doable, but it takes that clarity, conviction and commitment.
"I love the reference to 2030 because if it's not time-bound, then it's fantasy. It's where do we need to get to by the end of 2025? Where by 2026? 2027? Where are we ahead, where are we behind? What's our mitigation plan? How are we adjusting things?
"What I will not tell you is that we have written the plan for every granular element that's going to happen between now and 2030. But what we have got is a highly specific direction of travel and key milestones that need to be hit.
"We're not going to win by accident. We're going to win because we've been thoughtful and strategic about the organisation we've constructed, whose sole purpose is to win.
"We have some gaps. Very shortly, we'll be in the marketplace looking for a chief strategy officer. We'll be looking for a chief marketing officer. With Pete's (Silverstone, former chief commercial officer) departure, we're going to take the opportunity to think about whether we should have someone focusing exclusively on revenue. I want to make sure that we're recruiting world-class talent.
"I had two conversations yesterday with folks that are saying, 'Look, I see where this is going, I want to be part of it, it's a rocket ship, I see that, and I want to get on that rocket ship'. We're going to be very thoughtful and disciplined about some areas where we're not world-class today. I'll just use one example. Our digital ecosystem today is not world-class. We're not going to achieve our ultimate ambition without world-class digital and data capabilities."
"Yeah, of course. Why not? Our job is to set ourselves up to be perennial contenders.
"This is a tough league, and the correlation between points earned and revenue is undeniable. So, again, so much of this is self-help and doing everything we can to try to increase our ability to compete by driving revenues.
"It's also frustrating in some ways because we don't have play-offs. Most of my career has been in leagues where they have play-offs, which introduces luck. Every now and then, you'll just have a number eight seed that unseats a number one seed and surprises everybody. That means we've got to be even more focused on the business side of things to make sure we're doing everything we can to control the controllables."
"You're talking about a fund where, the last time I looked, it had £1.2 trillion of investments. This is a major, major global player. But I truly believe in my heart of hearts that we are their favourite investment. I think we take up so much of their shared mind and heart, way more than would be warranted given the size of the investment.
"I feel like we're a special investment to them. I feel that, not because they tell me that, but because they show me that. I'm talking to the PIF every single day.
"The question about PIF is a good one - it was one of my questions during the recruitment. There's always different types of ownership - some are deeply connected, at every single match, every single day, others are much more hands off and just see it as an investment. This group at the PIF is very much in the former camp. It's every single day."
"I want to be really clear on this. We have not taken a decision on what we're going to do. We're modelling a multitude of different scenarios.
"But even if we were to make a decision tomorrow, which we're not going to do, it still takes years of permits, planning, finance, construction etc. That's the case whatever we choose - reimagining St James' Park or building a new stadium. Either takes years and years. I lived through the total transformation of the Bernabeu. I was around through years of work. I love what they've built - I think we've learned a lot from studying what they've built - but these projects are years long.
"Even if we could wave a wand right now, and wake up tomorrow morning with a decision over a brand new stadium, those revenues would still not show up for five years.
"But if you look at something like global partnerships and global sponsorships, which I've talked about a lot, then we can do that today. We can literally wake up tomorrow morning and get cracking on closing some of those obvious and less obvious opportunities.
"So much of this is self-help, and so much of our ability to increase our revenues, and therefore our competitiveness, is within our purview right now. They're right in front of us, right now.
"I don't know to what extent that that will sustain us beyond 2030, without a major inflection - stadium renovation or rebuild, other major changes. But what I'm focusing on is what we do need to change between now and 2030? Our plan is to set us up to succeed in these next four or five years, and then it's also about what steps are we taking to make sure we succeed beyond 2030?
"But recognising that we are going to be at St James' Park in pretty much its current format for years to come is important. We're thinking through what improvements should we make in that intervening period? We could make tweaks and changes to improve the here and now."
"When you look at the facility you have today, it's probably a seven out of 10. It gets the job done. I don't think we have a lot of world-class talent that say: 'I want to stay here because of the training ground' or 'I want to go to Newcastle because of the training ground'.
"Even with the renovation we're doing, which will make it better, we probably only get to an eight. We don't get to a 10. We can't get to a 10 on the current footprint, which is the reason why we're considering - not considering, planning - a very big investment to go and build a 10.
"If you look at the arms race that training grounds have become - in the Premier League, in football, in North American sports - the players are spending an inordinate amount of time there and the expectations have changed and evolved from simply where we train to: 'Yeah, that's where I drop the kids off because they're being babysat while I'm training' or 'This is where the car is being looked after' and 'This is where I get my haircut'.
"This is what's happened in North American sports, and now there are changing expectations here too of what players are going to want in order to choose to come here or stay. Those are the investments we're going to have to make to get to a world-class level."
SportNews News' Keith Downie:
David Hopkinson's words are the type that should get the Newcastle fanbase excited, and rightly so.
The problem is they have heard it before and have been left frustrated at the speed in which their club has developed since the Saudi-led takeover in 2021.
On the evening the £300m sale of the club was pushed through, Amanda Staveley told me the plan was for Newcastle to be lifting the Premier League within the next 5-10 years. But here we are four years on and that dream seems a long way away. Staveley of course is gone, and the new day-to-day faces of the club are new Canadian CEO Hopkinson, and sporting director Wilson.
Both men have made positive starts, and appear to be good appointments. The club has also tasted success - winning their first domestic silverware in the shape of the Carabao Cup in March, and twice qualifying for the Champions League.
But the rate in which the club has grown has been an overall disappointment to most fans.
PSR rules have held them back in terms of recruitment, and there's a general feeling that the club could have worked harder to increase the club's revenue streams, which in turn would allow them to close the gap financially with the so-called "big six."
This season turnover is expected to have grown to £400m, but that's still around half of the likes of Man City, Liverpool and Chelsea. Until Newcastle are competing with those clubs in revenue, they will continue to lose players they have developed, and miss out on players they want to sign. Turnover after all, more often than not, is directly correlated to points on the Premier League table.
So to hear Hopkinson say he expects Newcastle to be in the debate about being the top club in the world by 2030 will be met with scepticism by fans. And for him to say "that kind of progress doesn't take as long as you might think" will leave the Geordie faithful asking why progress since 2021 has been slower than expected; according to Staveley they'd be competing for the Premier League title by now.
But the Canadian comes with a terrific CV - formerly the COO and president of Madison Square Gardens Sports in the US, where he led the business operations of the New York Knicks and New York Rangers. Both are among the most valuable franchises in the NBA and NHL respectively. He was also previously Global Head of Partnerships at Real Madrid, no less, so knows a thing or two about heading up commercial activity at the biggest football club in the world.
It sounds like this jump to 2030 wont coincide with a new stadium, with Hopkinson appealing for patience on that issue. And the current un-sponsored training ground, he admitted, isn't the sort that will make world class talent want to stay on Tyneside.
So if Newcastle are indeed to be in the debate about being the top club in the world, supporters are going to need to see movement and changes fast. The rocket ship needs to take off…quickly!
