It simply can't have happened like that. Levy has clearly stated that the stadium loans have a covenant that requires us to meet a minimum cash flow. Our transfer budget will be limited by that. Since we are a football club I think it is likely that we will spend every penny allowed on players. If we overspend then the loans will be called in and the club goes bust. It's a hard limit.
You've misunderstood me. The most plausible sequence of events is that we had X earmarked for a transfer budget, the DoF asked Levy for X, Levy hears that Everton are in ffp trouble, takes 65% of X and wastes it on a crippled pigeon, and then gives the DoF budget Y instead.
I think he very much did complain about it. Dropped multiple hints throughout the season and then that magnificent rant after the Southampton debacle.
I really dont get you guys. Only Spurs could sandwich a 4-0 drubbing of City at the Etihad, with a loss at home to Ipswich and a home draw to Fulham. You guys under Ange remind me of Chelsea circa 97-98 (without the trophies) when we won 20, drew 3, lost 15. Madness.
That rant after the Southampton game really resonates with me this season. The team are doing in Ange’s second season what they did with Conte in his second season.
That rant was simply a response to his failure as a coach to outperform. The problem with all the arguments about Levy is that during his time as Chairman our average league finish has been above our average position in the wealth table. The facts are entirely consistent with us being a very well run club that is doing better at football than we ought to be. If the Chairman knows nothing about football and is wasting money buying useless players then there must be some other compensating factor that allows us to outperform on the pitch. So what is it?
It's actually very logical. If you have the sixth strongest squad, which we have, and there is a big advantage to finishing third to fifth and no real downside to finishing seventh to ninth then the correct strategy is to play in a very risky way to maximise the number of wins and minimise the number of draws so as to increase the points total.
However we play our most likely finishing position is 6th. But the more risk we take we increase the chance of being 5th or 7th or 4th or 8th or 3rd or 9th.
Actually for similar reasons we ought to make very risky transfers and hire risky managers. If we sign ten players we would do much better with 5 great players and 5 terrible ones than with 10 average ones.
That tactic hasnt really worked for us (Chelsea) in recent years, or if it does, it will take 2-3 seasons, to weed out the chaff and get a solid XI. Also you have to be willing to spend a lot of money, and your chairman is notoriously frugal
We are an extremely well run club, no one can argue with that. Levy has increased our financial clout year on year and done so in such a stable way that things like dropping out of Europe or even a global pandemic don't appear to derail us. Very few clubs in the world can say the same, and most who do rely on blood money to do so. The secret to our "success" (which in my opinion is relatively small compared to what you seem to make of it) is that despite Levy's best efforts to the contrary, we have stumbled across three managers in the PL era who took us forward in a quantum leap. Now, I say 'despite' Levy because the plain evidence is that he didn't want to hire two of those managers and only did so after his picks - Santini and Ramos - performed so terribly that he had no choice but to give in. These managers succeeded because Levy has created a culture at the club whereby the manager has to punch above our weight or they are deemed a failure. All other managers have therefore failed. There is never enough money available for the manager to be truly competitive in the mainstream way, and what little money there is risks being wasted by Levy himself when he spots what he thinks is a genius idea to strike a bargain. This has been Levy's approach since day one, and in lieu of the lack of proper money, the only choice remaining is to grant the manager an equally precious commodity in modern football: Time. Time to develop a team steadily. Time to nurture youngsters and promote academy graduates. Time to sell senior players to turn a profit and reinvest that back into a longer term plan that will stretch beyond that senior player's peak. The record shows that Levy has only ever given time to one manager in his entire 23 year tenure, Poch, and even that is debatable. Sacking him three months after allowing him to spend £130m was insane. The rest were cut adrift at the first sign of not being able to pull miraculous rabbits out of very small and cheap hats. So he doesn't give his managers enough money to make us competitive. He doesn't give his managers enough time to make us competitive. But he sacks managers for not making us competitive. Can you see the dilemma? In my opinion, most of what we've achieved in the PL era is despite Levy, not because of him. We have 3 managers to thank for it all, two of whom he didn't want in the first place. We are as close to challenging for major honours now as we were around 13 years ago. Our off pitch progress has not been matched by our on pitch progress. It's as simple as that.
Actually I think the manager strategy is more logical than you do...as I've pointed out in other posts, for the sixth best squad to win something is very unlikely and the road to having anything better than the sixth best squad is very long given the financial strength of the competition. Most coaches seem to make very little difference and of the ones that do they are almost impossible to see in advance. So I have no difficulty in sacking managers who seem to be making no difference relatively quickly. Especially those like Mourinho and Conte who appeared to have some sort of edge but showed no evidence of it in practice. I think Jol and Poch were sacked too early but with hindsight neither has done anything special anywhere else since leaving us so perhaps it was the players we got lucky with, not either manager. And it's not a culture, it's simply a fact of life. Coming 7th or even 9th is no different to 6th in practice but 3rd, 4th or higher makes a huge difference. So unless the coach is able to deliver 4th place with the 6th best resources then it's worth trying someone else. I've only seen DoFs say that Levy gives them their head and delegates football matters to them...so I don't know where this claim that he goes off and buys rubbish comes from.
But then by this logic, you'd probably favour sacking Ange right now as he's made little difference here? There's a different style to Conte but results aren't better and this is despite a significant overhaul of the squad, plus in their first seasons, Conte finished 4th after taking over Spurs in a deficit too, Ange got 5th at a level beginning so there's even an argument to suggest Ange has actually been worse than Conte.
I can see what Ange is trying to do and he plays the risky style we need to maximise the chances of a high finish. Conte's actions were entirely inconsistent with his stated philosophy.
To be clear...I never favour sacking managers on results...it's when they start doing stuff that's inconsistent with their stated philosophy that I see no point in allowing them more time
Conte's philosophy is all about winning and doing so by any means. He just simply ended up failing to win by any means here and it was clear weeks before he was sacked that players had had enough of his personality too. Ange's philosophy is about only winning with style. We've had some excellent wins but I'd say the majority of our performances now are as dull as anything we've seen in the last few years. So what he may try do to or want to do is proving somewhat different to what he can do.
Ange has stated and doubled down on his claim to winning trophies in his second season. By this measure, would you sack him if we fail to win a trophy this season?
