The Randy Lerner thread

[Richard]

Which leaves me wondering, what exactly does McLeish offer?

A willingness to manage us under the restrictions imposed by Lerner

[Shillzz]

Spot on.

[John_Lerwill]

On the director of football debate, which other club in the league has one? Where does it work? You see it is just something that do not believe could be successful and the reason for that is that any manager worth his salt would not work for a club that has a DOF in place looking over his shoulder and having the remit to basically interfere. Sorry but we do not need a DOF, we need an owner that knows what he is doing and a manager who can get the best out of our players. The second bit of that is becomming more pressing as we move through the seaon by the way

You make a very good point, Richard (about a DofF). However, this came up in trying to think of a solution to the RL/PF decision-channel route through which AM emanated. What would be an alternative to a DofF? Perhaps a permanent (Villa-focused?) football consultant to be pulled in when a managerial appointment was in the offing?

[Richard]

On the director of football debate, which other club in the league has one? Where does it work? You see it is just something that do not believe could be successful and the reason for that is that any manager worth his salt would not work for a club that has a DOF in place looking over his shoulder and having the remit to basically interfere. Sorry but we do not need a DOF, we need an owner that knows what he is doing and a manager who can get the best out of our players. The second bit of that is becomming more pressing as we move through the seaon by the way

You make a very good point, Richard (about a DofF). However, this came up in trying to think of a solution to the RL/PF decision-channel route through which AM emanated. What would be an alternative to a DofF? Perhaps a permanent (Villa-focused?) football consultant to be pulled in when a managerial appointment was in the offing?

I think I have answered that in my last two sentences of the paragraph you have quoted John.

[chips'ngravy]

There are two things that stand in the favour of Lerner in any debate on his comparative performance at the helm to that of Ellis'.

Firstly, his willingness to listen to fans and subsequent implementation of fan backed projects have helped build up a reserve of goodwill towards him which has still not been fully eroded.

Secondly, he doesn't come out and patronise the fans in the way Ellis did. Yes, it might be frustrating the wall of silence, but I know which wound me up more.

[Bazdavies79]

I disagree with the charge that the club is 'in a mess'. We're on a down, not in a mess. We've appointed a poor manager, show me a club that hasn't. We have a manageable level of debt, we need to tighten our belts, show me a club that doesn't other than Citeh. Some perspective is needed.

[John_Lerwill]

... Sorry but we do not need a DOF, we need an owner that knows what he is doing and a manager who can get the best out of our players. The second bit of that is becomming more pressing as we move through the seaon by the way

You make a very good point, Richard (about a DofF). However, this came up in trying to think of a solution to the RL/PF decision-channel route through which AM emanated. What would be an alternative to a DofF? Perhaps a permanent (Villa-focused?) football consultant to be pulled in when a managerial appointment was in the offing?

I think I have answered that in my last two sentences of the paragraph you have quoted John.

[Houlston]

It's a nice thought but I'll need to see or hear more from the club to convince me we are being run by people who know what they're doing and can implement a plan that works.

But you'll only get the see bit by being patient. But you choose to dismiss any change in direction without giving it a chance. You might find that if we dont waste money on the likes of Beye, Cuellar, Davies etc and channel that money into other areas like youth we may prosper further down the line.

As for the hear bit well I dont know what this fascination is about. No other club continually makes statements and nor do they have to and to be honest it really makes little difference whether they do or dont especially as when they do its pulled apart to pieces and over analysed.

[John_Lerwill]

It's a nice thought but I'll need to see or hear more from the club to convince me we are being run by people who know what they're doing and can implement a plan that works.

But you'll only get the see bit by being patient. But you choose to dismiss any change in direction without giving it a chance. You might find that if we dont waste money on the likes of Beye, Cuellar, Davies etc and channel that money into other areas like youth we may prosper further down the line.

As for the hear bit well I dont know what this fascination is about. No other club continually makes statements and nor do they have to and to be honest it really makes little difference whether they do or dont especially as when they do its pulled apart to pieces and over analysed.

Perhaps the big problem is that RL set a standard in the first 3 or 4 years that the fans began to accept?

If you come in as a new owner and set your stall out so that it has all the image of a fans-orientated concern then the shock is that over the past 12 months+ those same fans have been rather shut out. Worse, that has happened in a time when Villa's competitiveness has substantially declined.

What other clubs do is up to them - what's happened at VP is the issue.

[Big_John_10]

Secondly, he doesn't come out and patronise the fans in the way Ellis did. Yes, it might be frustrating the wall of silence, but I know which wound me up more.

He doesn't because the general was put on bullshit duty.

[Bazdavies79]

What other clubs do is up to them - what's happened at VP is the issue.

I think it's good to look at other clubs and their recent history to get a perspective on where we are.

[Houlston]

Perhaps the big problem is that RL set a standard in the first 3 or 4 years that the fans began to accept?

Do you not think that sounds a little spoilt?

that has happened in a time when Villa's competitiveness has substantially declined.

6th to 9th is hardly a substantial decline?

What other clubs do is up to them - what's happened at VP is the issue.

You didnt seem to take that view point when you were discussing other clubs a few pages back.

[villa89]

I think Randy is a good owner to be honest. He has the club's interests at heart and values the history and traditions of the club. I don't believe he has bought the club to make a profit (nor do I believe that he bought it to make a loss). He initially subsidised the club under MON to try to get us into the champions league and increase our revenue so we could compete at the higher end of the league. We missed out on the CL and as a result have had to reduce spending and make the club self sufficient.

Its not right to expect Randy to continue subsidising the club especially with man city's owners subsidising their club with the billion they found down the back of the throne. He's not an ATM. Our average attendance of about 37,000 is about what we should expect and we do not seem to be able to attract big money sponsorships. We have to reduce our wage bill (thanks MON) and find our "normal" position in midtable, being a feeder club for the CL teams and a taker club from the littler relegation fighting teams. As money as all footballs about now this is the reality for us. If you want to blame Randy for appointing GH and Mcleish then that's fair enough, I agree that neither were good appointments. But I don't think you can blame him for not spending more money and trying to get the club back on an even keel. I also think its delusional to think that there is another billionaire owner out there who will snap us up and spend the money to get us competitive again. Everton can't find anyone like that and neither would we. For every Shiekh there's a Carson Yeung or Venky's.

[Risso]

I also think its delusional to think that there is another billionaire owner out there who will snap us up and spend the money to get us competitive again. Everton can't find anyone like that and neither would we. For every Shiekh there's a Carson Yeung or Venky's.

That's such a lazy, stereotypical argument. Just because City are owned by Arabs with billions to spend, doesn't mean that that's the only ownership model, and that there isn't middle ground between Mansour at one extreme and Venkys at the other.

Lots of people were predicting the demise of Liverpool due to the mess that Hicks and Gillett had made of things, yet along came a new set of Americans, who as far as I'm aware aren't oil billionaires, and are now ticking along quite nicely.

Well, Lerner has made a complete mess of things, and we could with him selling up and buggering off.

[blandy]

I completely understand the post made by Bicks, absolutely. A resolute defence of an owner that by someone obviously still believing he deserves that defence and looking for some positive reasons for some actions that otherwise may be bewildering.

But that's not what Bicks has done, is it? he isn't saying "I'm bewildered, and the only reasons I can think of are...XYZ". He's looked at the situation overall, and made his analysis. One which to my eyes is a lot more considered and which takes into account a wider range of circumstances than many others.

In terms of Lerner vs Ellis, I do not think Lerner is worse than Doug overall. I think Doug did some things worse than Lerner and Lerner some things worse then Doug, for me they are on a par and certainly if Ellis had done some of the things Lerner has he would have been lambasted , and quite rightly. For me my issue is just that though. Lerner gets the support Ellis never did and for me he does that because he is not Ellis, pure and simple.

This is IMO drivel. This thread is full of people lambasting Lerner It's not a plan at all, it's the emergency reaction to a situation that was allowed to spiral out of control due to piss poor management and decision making from that idiot Lerner. from this page. There's also been a fair bit of "bring back Doug" and at least Ellis didn't do...[stuff]". Which is frankly ludicrous. Talk about short memories. And as Trent said, comparison is pointless anyway. There's also been some "Lerner Out" posts and so on.

No-one, or almost no-one, as far as I can tell thinks the Club has done well in terms of managerial choices. Some people seem to think that the club is in a worse situation now than it was when RL took over, which to me seems bizarre, but each to their own.

It's true that things have taken a turn for the worse since MO'N left. It's not true that all this is Randy's fault or Paul Faulkners fault. Some of it is. But show me someone who doesn't make mistakes.

The club, for me, has stopped doing some of the good things it did earlier in RL's time - whether this is due to a waning of that initial interest on Randy's part, different personnel, or a different strategy, I don't know. They've sort of taken their eye off the ball in terms of the relationship with the Supporters. They've got ticket pricing wrong, they've picked a manager they really should never have picked for all kinds of reasons, and they've been all over the place in terms of consistency of vision, and they rarely communicate. All that is the opposite of what they did at the start and for the first few years.

My view is that (and this is consistent) all I've wanted is for the Club to do the best it can, to try, to give us hope and be something we value. Right now it isn't doing that, and some of that is down to Randy and Paul.

BUT, as we can't affect this situation, not in any dramatic way, really, I just ask myself - what wopuld I like to see happen, taking into account the world's financial situation, the way Football is generally and so on.

The answer really is I'd like RL to go back to doing the non-financial things they did at the start - the Comms, the kind of empathy there was with supporters and their concerns. Make us proud. If there's no money, then fair enough. We have no right to expect or demand that anyone puts money into the club, no right to expect or demand an ever richer series of owners to throw away and reject when they've dolloped a billion on the table.

I'd rather keep a good man, who has the best intentions, who needs to step up his performance, than chuck him out and see what turns up.

[VillaChris]

The ones at Liverpool are just doing what Randy was doing from 2007-09 though, spending huge amounts on domestic players. If Liverpool miss out on the champions league again this season, let's see how long it is before spending significantly decreases.

I do though think it's a bit pie in the sky to bank everything on the new tv deal being hugely reduced, we seem to think that every time it gets renewed and time and again Sky offer an increase as prmier league football is pretty much everything to their business model.

And if their offer is slightly reduced, then surely the worldwide rights deal will just make up the difference as premier league football remains hugely popular all across the globe.

I can't see their being a total football cash implosion for a while tbh. This reminds me of a time under Doug when we spent casually and just expected everyone else to go tits up, Leeds did but just them, all the top clubs just continued spending or taken over before they did a Leeds like Chelsea.

[juanpabloangel18]

I'd rather keep a good man, who has the best intentions, who needs to step up his performance, than chuck him out and see what turns up.

same here. but things do need to improve, soon.

[blandy]

Lots of people were predicting the demise of Liverpool due to the mess that Hicks and Gillett had made of things, yet along came a new set of Americans, who as far as I'm aware aren't oil billionaires, and are now ticking along quite nicely.

Well, Lerner has made a complete mess of things, and we could with him selling up and buggering off.

Really a poor comparison - The new owner of Liverpool has done exactly the same thing Randy did at Villa when he came in. Even Dalglish is following what MO'N did - overpaying for (British) players - 20 mill for Downing 35 for Carroll, how much for henderson. Look good away from home, struggle to get the wins at home. Yep. How you can say MO'N and Randy were terrible and then use LFC as the evidence is mind boggling, mart.

[villa89]

Well, Lerner has made a complete mess of things, and we could with him selling up and buggering off.

How can you be sure that the alternative is better? Lots of people were saying the same about Doug for years and now they have Randy and still aren't happy.

[Risso]

I'd rather keep a good man, who has the best intentions, who needs to step up his performance, than chuck him out and see what turns up.

Yes, but we're owned by Lerner. So for all the free scarves, there are £8m "management" charges and flogging off bits of land to nefarious offshore related companies. When are you going to realise that all the early gestures was nothing more than cynical marketing ploys?