I mean, one way of looking at it, is Gao never got involved in football matters. He didn't sign players, he didn't appoint managers. He left the staff on the ground to so to speak. He was very hands off, and gets credit from me for that.
We can then halve his ownership era into 2 seperate eras; Reed/Kruger and Semmens/Crocker.
The Reed/Kruger era is where it ultimately started going downhill for me, and we spend many years trying to shake off the shackles of this. A poor managerial appontment in Pellegrino, and a poor summer of 2017 in signing the likes of Hoedt & Lemina. Pellegrino gets sacked later that season, and Mark Hughes is appointed to keep us up. Job done by the skin of our teeth. Time to reset? Nope. We give Hughes an extended contract, lose Tadic and sign more dross in the likes of Gunn, Elyounoussi & Vestergaard. Results dont improve, and this is where the first era of the Gao ownership changes. Reed is shown the door, followed by Hughes a couple of weeks later.
So then we go into the Ralph Hassenhuttl era. Ralph keeps us up comfortably playing much better football, Semmens gets a promotion at the end of the season. Big changes are promised in the summer of 2019, but ownership challenges mean we have to sell to buy. And yet, the 19/20 season was an improvement on what went before. Yes, we lost that game 9-0, but the covid lockdowns and the run we went on was fantastic and full credit to all those involved.
We top the league the following season, following another blistering start. But we falter towards the end of the season, and the next 18 months or so we're bounding around, treading water and going on streaky runs.
And then SR come in in the January of 2022, with great intentions and fanfare. We enter a relatively good run of form, and then that Villa game. We haven't been right since. What happened in February 2022 that caused Ralph to lose his mojo, and our form to nosedive? Was that the time that they started interfering?
We know the previous regime were very much left to their own devices, so can very much see them being put out if SR are trying to get things done their way. Break what isn't broken and all that.
I know people say that the previous regime squandered money as well, and made bad decisions. Yep, they did. Diallo, Salisu etc were horrid buys, we lost Ings, but that regime were making other good decisions off the pitch whilst trying to improve us with hands tied behind their backs ... the appontment of Ralph was a masterstroke for example. The playbook was a fantastic philosophy that embodied everything about our club and way we like to play. Yes, ultimately we probably would have gone down, but we'd have gone down fighting, not waving the white flag by game week 3.
I just can't see how SR are good for this club. Every big decision they make ****s us up even more. We're somehow worse than we were 2 years ago. How have we got here? Yes, they got us promoted last season and full credit to them for that, but they're now on course for a 2nd consecutive relegation finishing bottom of the table with no fight and a record low points tally. Did they not learn from last time?
There's just nothing to defend there. They're making us a complete laughing stock with their utter mismanagement, bad judgement and decision making.
We all know there's a gap there between the divisions, I don't think any of us expected us to be pushing for Europe but I think we just want to see a team with fight, trying to win games. Not this.
Perhaps if SR had come in, and not undermined and dismantled the old structure (and not just the board) we wouldn't be in this mess?
Edit; and just to add to this, they seemingly had it right going into the summer just gone. Fans and club were pretty together. And they've ruined all their hard work and ruined that relationship ...
