The Randy Lerner thread

[ozvillafan]

Common sense should tell you a club that just finished 6th, offering a good wage and allowing the clubs transfer record to be smashed is not going to be short of options.

 

 

Indeed, we had plenty of options.

 

But the job wasn't quite as rosy as you painted. Consider:

 

- being 6 games into the season

- having a squad that just got smacked 6-0 by Newcastle

- a closed transfer window

- no guarantee of funds ("smashing the transfer record" came some months later and was not certain by any means)

- facing high expectations from fans/board

- requiring compensation for poaching a manager

 

and you might find that common sense would tell you that a majority of the supposed "options" would be:

 

- uninterested (e.g. Martinez)

- risky (e.g. lower league managers)

- poor (e.g. Hughes)

- just downright dumb (e.g. Di Canio).

[Big_John_10]

Mon left on the 9th August so your first few points are irrelevant.

And of course there would have been guaranteed funds in January.

Facing high expectations from the fans? Don't a lot of premiership jobs come with this? I doubt this would really put an ambitious manager off the job.

[SikhInTrinity]

 

I love how some of our fans are mentioning Roberto Martinez, when Randy went for him, the outrage on here was evident. Martinez turned us down, the man wasn't stupid, he looked at our squad and thought nah I'll be better off at Wigan.

 

We never offered him the job. We turned him down if you want to phrase it that way. Same as Liverpool.

 

Whelan wanting to big up his manager by claiming the opposite doesnt make it true.

 

 

The season when Houllier left, Martinez was the manager we wanted however he turned it down. When it came about we wanted Martinez, the reaction on here was he's rubbish, we want Ancellotti, Moyes etc.

[DelboyVilla]

The thing that really bothers me about Lerner at the moment is his total indifference towards the club. I think all he does is get his cheque book out and pay the losses that he has made by his mistakes. I don't think he cares about whether the club is successful or not.

 

We had the future King of England at the club on Saturday and he couldn't even turn up for that?

 

As BJ10 has stated  there is one constant during our current demise and that Lerner himself.

 

We had MON buying overpriced and overpaid players but at least we had 3 of those players give back a hansome return. He then made the most baffling appointment I had seen at the time bringing back Houllier into top flight football after faffing about for weeks. He French fool then tried his best to send us down and we made no return on the players he brought. He then trumped himself on baffling appointments and paid our rivals to bring in a relegation specailist who again made poor signings who we are still lumbered with for a couple more years on big money?

 

Now it seems that he has appointed PL purely for his ability to spot a bargain every once in a while.

 

People say we are building for the future? What futures that? A future of playing dour football with mostly second rate players with the odd gem every now and again who will look to leave us after a season?Brilliant legacy Mr Lerner!

[ozvillafan]

Mon left on the 9th August so your first few points are irrelevant.

 

Di Canio got the sack this year. His replacement didn't come for 2 weeks. If you think we could sign a manager by then, you are living in denial.

 

MON left 5 days till kickoff. We lost to Newcastle in our second game. My points are entirely relevant.

 

 

And of course there would have been guaranteed funds in January.

 

Why? Because you say so? If results had of been better, I doubt we would have spent anything.

 

 

Facing high expectations from the fans? Don't a lot of premiership jobs come with this? I doubt this would really put an ambitious manager off the job.

 

No it certainly wouldn't. There are plenty of ambitious managers. McLeish is ambitious. Holloway is ambitious, too.

 

The good ones? They are smart enough to smell a club in decline and, knowing the difficult job ahead, thumbed their noses at us. Martinez, anyone?

[BOF]

I really can't make it any simpler than I already have.

You've put it very simply but it doesn't make it correct.

You can't seem to accept that a league with 10 billionaires in it might be a harder landscape for someone to run a Premier League club in than a league that only has 1 billionaire. That's the long and the short of it.

[Dodgyknees]

Mon left on the 9th August so your first few points are irrelevant.

Di Canio got the sack this year. His replacement didn't come for 2 weeks. If you think we could sign a manager by then, you are living in denial.

MON left 5 days till kickoff. We lost to Newcastle in our second game. My points are entirely relevant.

And of course there would have been guaranteed funds in January.

Why? Because you say so? If results had of been better, I doubt we would have spent anything.

Facing high expectations from the fans? Don't a lot of premiership jobs come with this? I doubt this would really put an ambitious manager off the job.

No it certainly wouldn't. There are plenty of ambitious managers. McLeish is ambitious. Holloway is ambitious, too.

The good ones? They are smart enough to smell a club in decline and, knowing the difficult job ahead, thumbed their noses at us. Martinez, anyone?

Smart owners smell it too. And put it right before the shit hits the fan. They don't wait till the ship hits rocks and don't carry more passengers than they can afford.

[Zatman]

In fairness I dont think anybody expected MON to throw a hissy fit and leave 5 days before start of season. He cant be blamed for that

[Tomaszk]

Don't ever imagine that was anything other than calculated from O'Neill.

[Shillzz]

In hindsight, it wasn't a bad decision by O'Neill. Though even he probably failed to fully anticipate the frugality that would be imposed upon the club. I can't imagine he regrets leaving when he did, and I don't particularly blame him. Though the timing could have been better.

 

The fact that his career went on a downwards spiral there-after is a separate issue.

[Dodgyknees]

In fairness I dont think anybody expected MON to throw a hissy fit and leave 5 days before start of season. He cant be blamed for that

There were reports/rumours he resigned after the Chelsea game and about two weeks before he actually did, plus his previous history of jumping ship, I'd say it was a possibility.

[Zatman]

at Leicester and Celtic he had honoured his contract I believe and jumped ship at Norwich back in early 90s. I dont blame the board for not reacting since pre-season was over and he worked with the players so Im sure they imagined he was going to be manager come 1st game

[Dodgyknees]

It was always in the back of my mind he might jump ship and any board should always hold a back up plan, ours was 'panic' unfortunately.

[Big_John_10]

I really can't make it any simpler than I already have.

You've put it very simply but it doesn't make it correct.

You can't seem to accept that a league with 10 billionaires in it might be a harder landscape for someone to run a Premier League club in than a league that only has 1 billionaire. That's the long and the short of it.

That's fine but that doesn't explain why it was easier for Doug. I could understand that point if Doug was the one billionaire that you mention but he wasn't.

[Big_John_10]

Di Canio got the sack this year. His replacement didn't come for 2 weeks. If you think we could sign a manager by then, you are living in denial.

MON left 5 days till kickoff. We lost to Newcastle in our second game. My points are entirely relevant.

So no clubs ever manage to bring a manager in a bit quicker?

Why? Because you say so? If results had of been better, I doubt we would have spent anything.

No not because I say but because that's actually what happened.

No it certainly wouldn't. There are plenty of ambitious managers. McLeish is ambitious. Holloway is ambitious, too.

The good ones? They are smart enough to smell a club in decline and, knowing the difficult job ahead, thumbed their noses at us. Martinez, anyone?

Maybe some might have turned us down but I can't believe houllier was the best we could have expected.

[BOF]

That's fine but that doesn't explain why it was easier for Doug. I could understand that point if Doug was the one billionaire that you mention but he wasn't.

I get that it's a lack of understanding. I've tried to help.

[Big_John_10]

That's fine but that doesn't explain why it was easier for Doug. I could understand that point if Doug was the one billionaire that you mention but he wasn't.

I get that it's a lack of understanding. I've tried to help.

I understand fine it's just a rubbish point.

You're talking in general terms about the two different times which is pointless when we're specifically talking about Doug and Lerner and this club.

[LondonLax]

That's fine but that doesn't explain why it was easier for Doug. I could understand that point if Doug was the one billionaire that you mention but he wasn't.

I get that it's a lack of understanding. I've tried to help.

I understand fine it's just a rubbish point.

You're talking in general terms about the two different times which is pointless when we're specifically talking about Doug and Lerner and this club.

No one would have to keep pointing it out to you if you didn't keep insisting Doug was somehow better than Lerner for the club.

[DelboyVilla]

 

 

That's fine but that doesn't explain why it was easier for Doug. I could understand that point if Doug was the one billionaire that you mention but he wasn't.

I get that it's a lack of understanding. I've tried to help.

I understand fine it's just a rubbish point.

You're talking in general terms about the two different times which is pointless when we're specifically talking about Doug and Lerner and this club.

 

 

To be honest I don't think our problems are anything to do with whether Lerner is a billionarire or how many billionnaire owners there are in the league but our problems stem from mis-management of the club and it's finances. To many expensive mistakes have been made in the purchase of players, compensation to clubs and compensation to managers. No wonder people like Steve Stride walked away from the club as it must have frustrating to say the least seeing a bunch of rank amateurs coming in and running the club into the ground.

 

And now nothing, plenty of meaningless sound bites from the club but unless things improve on the pitch pretty sharpish then I can only see the revenue decreasing again. Football is unfortunately in an entertainment sector and performances like Saturday are far from entertaining.

 

We are one of the greatest clubs in the history of the game and Lerner is trying to turn us into the next Notts County or Forest and comitt us to the history books as a once great club. People talk about a long term project don't see it myself.

[VillanousOne]

Randy came in and pumped huge sums of money into the club to get us into the Champion's league, in the last years where the Billionaire's tea party wasn't in full affect.

 

That attempt failed and every since he's had to fork out millions on failed managers, failed signings and huge wages. He has had to learn the most brutal of lessons.

 

Now he knows that the league is a different proposition entirely, even if he spends 50 mil on players and 10 mil on wages over one transfer window the return on that is dubious and uncertain, it might get us Europa league at best and bankruptcy at worse.

 

We can't spend ourself to success, so he's just decided to go in for the long game, the long game promises very little, with a bit of luck we might become a dull mid table team. Most of the time it will just be about us keeping our head's above relegation. But teams like Swansea and Everton have managed to become much better teams than us without massive spending.

I don't know if Randy cares that much about the club now, but no-one can dispute that he hasn't committed huge sums of money already.

The approach now is admirable and logical, but extremely tedious and it will be years before any real progress or excitement, unless..............

 

Edited December 4, 2013 by VillanousOne