Set the budget and play out scenarios

Every figure in the budget comes from the contracts you've recorded, so there's nothing to type in beyond the cap. What you do choose is the assumption behind it. Result bonuses are real money, and a title run costs more than a relegation fight, so the budget asks which season you're pricing. That's what scenarios are for.

You need a roster set up for the season. The Budget card sits at the top of the Roster tab, and the Wage bill card closes the tab below the squad table. Contracts drive both, so the budget is only as current as your deals.

A roster Clubhouse has just created has no cap, and nothing to price yet: $0 signed, 0 of 0 players under contract. The card says how the competition limits the squad, if it does. A League One Womens roster reads Capped in points, not dollars — this competition limits the squad to 460 points. Either way the first move is Set a budget cap, with the number the board approved. It's covered under Set or change the cap below.

Harbourview's Women's side, the week it set up its first season, entered $90,000. The card now measures against it: $90,000 left to spend, with an empty bar that fills as deals are written.

dashboard.clubhouseapp.com.au

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The pay line is already filled in from the rule set, here Pays 7 Mar – 4 Sep 2027 · 26 paid weeks, so check it against the published draw rather than setting it yourself. Scenarios can wait until there are result bonuses to price.

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The card leads with two figures, and they answer different questions:

• Signed cap spend · full season prices every player now under contract as if they were on for the whole season. It's your run rate against the cap, and the cap line underneath measures from it. On Harbourview's 2027 roster in the pre-season, $312,600 across 16 of 23 players.
• Signed, to date prices each signed deal only for the dates it actually covers, and keeps what departed players earned before they left. Despite the name it isn't a to-today figure. It sits above the full-season number when players have left mid-season and below it when a lot of deals start late. Before anyone has left or joined late, as at Harbourview now, the two agree.

Both count signed contracts only. Under the bar:

• Player budget cap shows the cap and what's left to spend, or how far you're over cap. The bar turns amber at 90% of the cap and red once you're over.
• The estimate line prices everyone not yet signed, such as Plus $120,000 estimated for the 7 players not yet signed, and warns you when those estimates would take you over the cap if they all sign. The bar shades them in lighter so you can see the room they'd use.
• The pay line, such as Pays 6 Feb – 3 Sep 2027 · 30 paid weeks, is the span of weekly wage the squad is guaranteed. There's more on it below.

When money sits outside the headline figure, four figures reconcile it: Off-cap wages, Signed player spend, Staff wages and Total wage bill. With nothing off-cap and no staff recorded they stay hidden.

Not every competition caps wages in dollars, and the card tells you which kind you're in. An uncapped competition says No salary cap for this competition — the forecast tracks total wage commitment only. A points-capped one, such as the FNSW women's competitions, says it caps in points and names the limit. Either way, Set a budget cap gives you a club figure to plan against, and the bar then works exactly as it does under a dollar cap.

The scenario picker at the top right of the card sets the assumed win, draw and loss record. That record prices every result bonus in the squad: appearance, win, draw and loss payments. Base wages don't move.

The list is grouped, and what you see depends on where the season is:

• Rest of season appears once the league is under way. Results already played are paid as they were earned, and only the games left are projected. It opens on Continue current form, alongside Win every remaining game and any title or finals finish still in reach. Custom rest of season… takes your own split of the games left and tells you if it doesn't add up.
• Historical targets are Title contention, Finals contention, Mid-table and Relegation battle, each drawn from past seasons of your division. A target is marked limited history where there isn't much data behind it.
• Your scenarios holds the ones you've made, with New scenario… at the bottom.

Mid-season the picker opens on current form. Before a ball is kicked it opens on your default scenario (or your first saved one), and with none saved, on the finals target.

New scenario… opens New scenario: a name such as Mid-table finish, then Wins, Draws and Losses. If the total doesn't match the season's rounds you'll see a hint, but it won't stop you. Tick Use as the default scenario for this program to make it the one the picker opens on.

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Scenarios belong to the programme, not the season, so one you write this year is there next year too. That cuts both ways when you delete. Delete scenario? removes it from every season of the programme, any forecast using it falls back to another scenario, and it can't be undone.

The pencil beside the cap opens Change the budget cap (or Set a budget cap where there isn't one). There's one field, Player budget cap, and one thing to know first: you can change the cap whenever you like, but once it's set you can't remove it, because the forecast would lose the figure it measures against. Setting your own cap on an uncapped competition is normal. It's the club's budget, not the competition's.

The Wage bill card breaks the signed money down by position, then lists staff. Add staff opens Add staff wage: a Role such as Head coach, the Season amount and optional notes. Staff count in the Total wage bill but never against the player cap. They're a flat amount for the term, so scenarios don't move them.

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Staff wages belong to one roster, so a new season starts with none. When there's somewhere to copy from, the empty list offers it as one button that shows the number of roles and the total, usually from last season. On a Championship campaign it offers your league staff pro-rated to the shorter campaign, with the arithmetic on the button before you tap it. Remove staff wage? takes a line off the budget for good.

The pay line is the base wage the squad is guaranteed, and it isn't the fixture list. A league's window closes at the last regular round, because finals aren't extra weekly wage. A knockout campaign's closes with the group stage, because going further is paid as stage bonuses.

The pencil opens Change the pay window (Set the pay window until the club has chosen its own dates), with First paid day and Last paid day. Moving the dates normally moves the paid weeks with them. When the extra rounds are paid as bonuses instead, tick Keep paying 30 weeks (it shows your current count) to hold the weeks where they are. Use the published dates instead puts the competition's dates back.

If the published fixtures fall outside your window, a check above the Budget card says The season runs outside the window you are paying for, with Adjust the pay window. Nothing changes on its own, and it isn't a breach, because contracts still pay exactly what they say. Vary the deals, pay the extra rounds as a bonus, or leave it: that's the club's call. For one player's figure looking wrong (stage bonuses, part-season deals, a signed player with no wage), see Why doesn't a player's wage look right in the budget?

The Forecast / Actuals switch in the squad table swaps the money columns without changing the list. Forecast shows Contract, Weekly base and Season forecast for each player, with a note naming the scenario it assumes. Actuals shows appearances, results, goals, clean sheets and spend to date from Dribl. Clean sheet, goal and assist bonuses only ever appear in actuals, because no scenario can predict them.

For programmes entering the Australian Championship. A campaign budget works the same way, with three differences.

• Outcomes instead of history. The picker's group is How far we go, six finishes running from Champion through each knockout exit to going out in the group. It opens on Champion, your ceiling. Group stage — winless is your floor: the least this squad can cost, because a win bonus earns nothing there.
• Stage bonuses. A campaign contract can tie a bonus to reaching a stage, and the outcome you pick counts every such bonus up to that point as a one-off payment. Writing a deal covers setting them.
• Whether you're going at all. Above the Budget card, Clubhouse reads the premiership ladder and says where the federation place stands, such as Your place in the Championship is secured. Once it's secured the button is Confirm our entry; while you're still in the running it's Record our intent to enter, which claims no place. Either way, contract money written against the campaign then reads as committed rather than conditional, and the section shrinks to a line at the foot of the roster with Undo. We're not entering opens Not entering this campaign?, and Confirm we’re not entering archives the campaign. Nothing is deleted, but draft and offered contracts aren't withdrawn for you, so the confirmation counts them. The archived campaign stays in the Season picker with Restore campaign.

• The full-season figure sits under the cap, or you know exactly which unsigned estimates would take it over.
• The scenario showing is the one you'd defend to the board, and mid-season it's current form unless you've chosen otherwise.
• Staff are recorded, and the Total wage bill is the number you'd give the treasurer.
• The pay window matches what the squad is guaranteed, and if the season has moved outside it you've decided what to do about it.