IT WAS another disappointing weekend on the pitch for Newport County AFC and the revelation that the club made a loss of £350,000 last season meant there was plenty to be concerned about off the pitch as well.

The publication of the club’s accounts for the year up to June 2017 showed a loss of £351,456, which is clearly unsustainable for most clubs in League Two and especially for one with no wealthy financial backer.

It has to be said that the 2016-2017 season was a crazy campaign for County with not one but two managers having to be paid off and a total of 36 players signed on permanent or loan deals.

Many will argue that the club gambled by investing heavily to ensure that their all-important Football League status was secured.

And it worked. Just about.

Manager Michael Flynn claimed this week that Shawn McCoulsky’s winning goal against Leeds United in January’s FA Cup third-round clash had “saved the club” but Mark O’Brien’s last-gasp strike against Notts County last May was surely more important.

Where would the Exiles be now if it wasn’t for that magical moment?

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Operational chairman Gavin Foxall estimated that relegation would have cost the club around £400,000 and you only have to look at the fate of Hartlepool United this season to see that it really was a Great Escape for County.

Glass-half-full fans will point to the profit of £339,522 posted for the year to June 2016 and to the expected profit from this season due to the memorable FA Cup run.

But the profit from 2015-2016 was solely down to the sales of Regan Poole to Manchester United, Aaron Collins to Wolverhampton Wanderers and a hefty sell-on fee as Conor Washington moved from Peterborough United to Queens Park Rangers.

Without that money coming in, all £723,000 of it, the accounts show that the Exiles would have reported a similar loss to last season.

This season’s FA Cup cash, added to another payment from the transfer of Lee Evans to Wolves back in 2013, have eased any immediate financial worries but there is unlikely to be much extra money for Flynn to spend in the transfer market.

The club said in a statement that they have “prepared strict budgets for the 2018-2019 season with a view to reducing unnecessary costs and increasing revenue streams.”

And the (heavily-redacted) minutes from the most recent board meeting revealed that “approximately 65 per cent of the budget is already accounted for with existing contracted playing staff.”

The minutes also noted that “the viability of the Trust ownership model was discussed, and it was agreed that more detail around this would be communicated to supporters at the May open meeting.”

Put simply, the club cannot rely on player sales or cup runs to dig them out of a hole as they have in the past few years.

As Flynn pointed out last week, that is not sustainable and the losses prove that the club needs outside investment.

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“That goal from Shawn McCoulsky against Leeds was priceless,” said the manager. “It allowed us to draw Tottenham and save the club.

“That’s what it comes to when you’re losing that amount of money with no big benefactor.

“The supporters do what they can but it’s not enough to sustain the amount of losses that we’ve had.

“Budgets are already strict,” he added. “It’s a League Two football club and most are losing money hand over fist. I think it shows that you need investment.”

It is encouraging that the club is putting steps in place to ensure that the cup money is used wisely and to correct past mistakes.

Shaun Johnson told the supporters’ meeting last month: “We are setting up a separate bank account and the money (£700,000) is going into that separate bank account. “We are trying to avoid what we've done in the past, especially last year, which is spend the money to stay in the league.”

And Alex Tunbridge, who will depart for Stevenage this summer, has done great work behind the scenes in his 18 months as chief executive officer but his replacement will still have a difficult job on their hands.

The likes of Exeter City and AFC Wimbledon have shown that fan-owned clubs can prosper and tonight’s opponents Accrington Stanley have proved that you can win promotion with one of the smallest budgets in the division.

But without outside investment it will only get harder for the club to match the ambitions of the players, the manager and the fans.