MikeMcKenna

Rubbish. At no point did I say "Villa park would vanish" - do you specialise in talking crap? I was responding to CI's point was that in the first year down "financially it wouldn't be to bad" Conversion over you talk out your arse!

What's your point? I am saying that in that first year we would be financially worse off - a lot worse off.

Sorry cannot agree with your first sentence. The "massive" parachute payment of £16 million in the first year is dwarfed by the £60 million we would lose on TV rights.

To me (without being overly sentimental) it's an important part of my family history.

Ok my misunderstanding but I still maintain that what others did or didn't doesn't affect our history - apart from Small Heath who are shite and whose very existence brings shame to the name of our City! :-)

I agree BUT as much as I hate Man U you cannot say they have "no history" . In any case I don't think we have to compare ourselves to our others to be proud of our past - it is what it is.

Absolute crap! You may not give a shit but I and many others do. I can only assume that you have never experienced anything that makes you proud of our past. Pretty sad really...

FFS There is already a Bannan thread do we have to read about him here as well?

Tragic, that ANY Villa fan can think being relegated wouldn't be a bad thing. I have experienced it several times over the decades and its devastating. More worryingly I believe that its not inconceivable that at some point in the not to distant future after we have been relegated the Premier League may seek to change the 3 down/3 up rule. IMO if we go down we will stay down for some years. The most infuriating thing is that we should never have been in the situation. Whoever is to blame, they have managed to totally f*** one of the most historic clubs in the world and ultimately the real losers are the fans! Lerner, the manager and players will all move on but we will be the ones freezing our bollox off in some far flung dump watching Aston Villa scrapping against the likes of Huddersfield or Barnsley, fast forgetting the days when we won the league, were ever present in the premership or even finished in the top 6. If you think watching Villa amounts to a day out or a good piss up with lads you're welcome to it but for me it was always about the hope and belief that we could compete and win things at the highest level.

Bannan is crap

Feel totally down!! We didnt have a clue in the 2nd. Really dont know how or when or if we are going to break out of this shit cycle. We are so dodgy under pressure

Disagree it's. shit article which many of us could have dine

This is a "blog"and there is as absolutely nothing that is new and lots of people I know could have produced this article. I know why, who and when? All I want to know now is what happens Now?

I think Richard's avatar is a reminder that things could be much worse. Thatcher & Ellis - the stuff of nightmares!!

Reading another thread which quoted a player from a rival club I have realised how crap things really are! I've been here before several times and to an extent I'm resigned to the fact that its happening again! BUT Fosters comments made me really, really **** angry!!!!!! He is absolutely right!!! WTF is going on? I hear Blandy and various others arguing against the state of the "arms race" and I basically agree - football finances must change. However I will be dead & buried before then :-( Foster: "Just driving down the motorway, you see the big stadium alongside and to think they could be playing Championship football is just unthinkable," says Foster. "If you'd said that three or four years ago, you wouldn't have believed it. But times change." Makes you want to scream!,,,

It's all academic really. Whether he is worth a $billion or $700 million or $100 million it is obvious that his appetite for big risks has gone. He he has shot his bolt and he is never going to compete financially with the major clubs again. It's now all about survival and the hope that we can claw our way back to being a mediocre mid table team. He will then spend the next five years trying to recoup his loans & hoping that a richer billionaire will take AVFC off his hands. I am now past caring whether it's really his or any of his managers fault, in reality analysing the past will only make him very cautious. I am sure that he is also dreading relegation as his chances of getting his investment back will recede even further. But you have to wonder about his financial acumen. This is the guy that invested $40 million in a hedge fund to only find out after 3 years that he had been "had" and was the ONLY investor in the fund!!

Dont know why i missed WBA Plenty of reasons to be gloomy but like every Villa fan I hope I am completely wrong and will happily have people telling me so if we get more than 4 points!! :-)

Surely business planning & having financial controls in place is good business practice & not "interfering" ? That "to a fault he let O'Neill get on with it," means Lerner was ultimately responsible for allowing MON to gamble with his millions - showing how Lerner is a terrible gambler himself. If in my business I gave my managers no guidelines on spending, salaries etc and they subsequently gambled recklessly it is ULTIMATELY my fault and loss. O'Neill and subsequent managers spend on transfers and salaries was sanctioned by Lerner. I accept that Lerner would not have been able to determine whether said spend was effective but people in 2007/8 were strongly advising him that there needed to be budgets and limits. He ignored them, "took the gamble" and by the time he realised they were right in May 2010 it was too late. Despite this he then gambled again allowed Houllier to do much the same as MON had. Then he "gambled" again by appointing a manager who had just relegated our closest & despised rivals! Everybody but seemingly Lerner (&Faulkner) knew it was another massive and even crazy gamble. Lerner has undoubtedly displayed some of the traits of an addicted gambler, albeit a very wealthy one; Impulsive behaviour, ignoring the voices of experience & reason; "he knew better", possibly "feeling lucky", then chasing his losses and even down to his introverted personality. Had he been professional gambler or listened to the "voices of reason & experience" he would have learnt about probabilities and odds, adhered to solid money management rules. Avoided unnecessary risks or gambles (i.e. allowing MON Carte Blanche on salaries!) Known when the odds were in his favour or against (i.e. signing Habib Beye on £50k p/wk (?), appointing Alex McLeish!). He would have known that rolling the dice again in January 2010 when we were riding high could have resulted in the massive pay off of CL qualification, but that refusing the bet would almost certainly mean failure. But he bottled it and has been sitting on massive losses ever since! Edit: To add to my gambling analogy; of the little we know about Lerner, before he joined his father as a director of MBNA in 1993 he ran his own investment company for 2 years which specialised in "arbitrage" i.e. "the practice of taking advantage of a price difference between two or more markets: striking a combination of matching deals that capitalize upon the imbalance, the profit being the difference between the market prices." In other words a form of Hedge Fund which can be very high risk if you do not do the odds. Get it right and you can make a fortune! Get it wrong and visa versa - RL's only known personal business venture lasted from 1991-1993 - surprise, surprise! or as they say in the USA "Go figure"

While I accept some of your points about player quality, fees & salaries paid etc I actually do not think the CEO or even owner need to know that much about football itself. They do however need to first and foremost be very good business people, have a business plan, appropriate financial controls and be good negotiators - UNLESS the owner is a Multibillionaire Arab or Roman Abramovich where money is no object. FWIW I don't think either Lerner or Faulkner meet any of these criteria Daniel Levy at Spurs however is a great example of what we need.

TRO how then do you square that with the fact that Lerner still had total faith in MON at the end of the 9/10 season?. I don't accept the generalisation about MON buying players who lacked quality but lets say I accept a very good argument can be made; Lerner clearly didn't agree when he told us : "Martin will be back next year managing. It has already been settled. [...]Yesterday I dragged him out of a series of meetings with chief executive Paul Faulkner trying to get plans for the summer underway" If what you say is true Lerner should have been questioning MONs ability to bring in the right players at the right prices and right wages. Don't forget the salaries were already out of control.

I accept that he didn't select players but he must have had an inkling that not everyone MON (etc) signed would turn out to a good signing or did he believe at the time like many fans that MON was the "Messiah" and capable of miracles? Personally, joking aside, I do think he was carried away by MON. At the end of the 09/10 season he still had complete faith in him saying: "Martin will be back next year managing. It has already been settled. He and I spoke on a number of occasions in person and over the phone. Yesterday I dragged him out of a series of meetings with chief executive Paul Faulkner trying to get plans for the summer underway. We feel very good about that because it represents continuity for the players and in many other ways. He was totally clueless, had no idea of the storm about to break.

But running a football club successfully is not just about giving managers unfettered backing and having no plan beyond qualify for CL or bust. There has to be a business plan which allows for various eventualities and financial controls. It didn't take a genius to realise that we would be in the shit if salaries exceeded income. Yes the managers sign the players but Lerner signed the cheques. In many ways Ellis and Lerner show how their two extreme & opposite approaches were equally flawed. Ellis interfered constantly and controlled every aspect of money down to petty cash but put in no money of his own. He ran the club to boost his own ego and failed to invest when it was needed. Lerner who acts like a recluse spouting stuff like "i'm just the custodian and the fans really own the club", started well by appointing a very professional executive board, took a very hands off approach but told them they had nothing to do with the main financial outgoings: player fees & salaries. When things on the pitch were going well he allowed MON to offer crazy salaries, then woke up one day to realise he was down £150-£200 million and realised he couldn't allow it to continue. Then he appoints a novice as CEO, in a panic brings in strict financial controls and watches us spiral down to the current position.

Yes I forgot him! Given his prior experience it really does make you think; CFO of The FA, CEO of Wembley!! On paper we had two very accomplished execs yet both lasted around a year, which further illustrates the incompetence of Lerner and maybe the power he entrusted in MON. However I still do not blame Faulkner. If as a 32 year old I was offered the role of CEO of AVFC I would have jumped at it. The responsibility lies fair and square with Lerner. Which brings to mind the saying; "A rich fool and his money are soon parted." Sadly he f****d our club in the process!

So funny, sums it all up!!!!!

I posted this in another thread but as it is primarily about Randy Lerner i think it should be here also..... In my opinion the rot started back in 2007 and had fully set in by January 2008. Things were very rosy on the playing side but off the field it wasn't so good - there was no business planning or financial controls. The then CEO was a very accomplished guy; Richard Fitzgerald. Prior to Aston Villa, FitzGerald worked for 18 years in various senior roles at IMG. They included chief operating officer and head of New Media of TWI, the world’s largest independent producer and distributor of sports TV programmes. In other words he had experience and a great track record as a senior executive. However in January 2008, after just 13 months at Villa, having been appointed on merit etc, he suddenly "resigned". I was told by someone who was definitely ITK at the time, that Fitzgerald was trying to bring in proper business planning and financial controls. However MON saw it as "interference" - Lerner agreed, Fitzgerald "resigned" with immediate effect receiving £775,000 in compensation. FitzGerald on leaving Villa for several months worked as a consultant to the owners of Manchester City FC. In August 2008 he was appointed as CEO for Racing UK where he is still now. Lets be clear, Lerner needed a commercial guy like Fitzgerald for business & financial planning, as he didn't (still doesn't) have this experience himself or the neccessary business skills. He should have had a joined up plan that forecast various outcomes however..... He decided to wing it and hope that MON could achieve CL qualification. He had no Plan B if the gamble failed. As late as April 2010 in an interview with The Independent he said: "The way Martin [O'Neill] has developed the team, though – and the investment we've made in our training ground – should give us an honest shot at competing." Very shortly after we were out of the FA Cup and had failed to achieve a CL place. In May Lerner appointed the 32 year old (then) Paul Faulkner, the former MBNA Relationship Manager, who described himself as a "football geek" but had no experience as a senior board level executive or track record that merited his appointment other than being someone of whom Lerner said: ""Paul was someone I could talk to about ideas and who could then go about putting those ideas into action," says Lerner. "He enjoyed the abstract: thinking about how to grow and how to develop a culture within a business." So he made him boss of his plaything Aston Villa FC and then reputedly MON was informed that Faulkner would work with him on future player financial dealings, setting budgets and negotiating fees and salaries. And that players had to be sold but that only a limited amount of the proceeds could be used for player purchases. The rest is history; MON walked claiming constructively dismissal due to breach of contract and was paid a sizeable amount of compensation. If you believe it was MON irresponsible spending, in reality it was all about the monetary controls or lack of them which was all down to Lerner. With hindsight he realised Fitzgerald was right but it was too late and he had blown hundreds of millions! We are now suffering because Lerner had loads of money but not enough and BECAUSE he had absolutely NO business acumen.