So are there no unqualified chairmen in football, or is it the totality of the moves made by Katerina Liebherr since taking an active role (amounting almost entirely to the appointment of Krueger) that convince you that she has made a sound decision?
To be honest.....all the chairman that "know something about football" unfortunately do not have much money! Where as most of the new ones that come in know nothing about football or it's fans. They do have that magic ingredient though....namely money! So we have to go along with it until they do one of two things spend money to make the club prosper or they sell all the assets and then go broke and bugger off.....(Pompey comes to mind)
I dont get all this about him not knowing anything about football... as somebody pointed out above,cortese didint know anything about football and he did a good job
He is being employed to run a business, which is what Southampton FC is, and looking at his experience he seems to know the ins-and-outs of several large businesses. It has been said by more erudite posters than me that employing a football-man as a chairman sure has worked out fine for several rival clubs hasn't it? Sometimes it has though. In the 70s when Delia Smith used to burst down the wing for Norwich City and pump crosses into Saints penalty area I never envisaged her being the successful Chairman of that same club. Wasn't Bill Kenwright a successful centre-half for Bolton back in the day?
And Dave Whelan was a pretty good player in his day. He once broke his leg during the FA Cup final but doesn't like to mention it....
Best I am aware: he has never run a business before, nor been involved in large-scale financial management of any kind. My opinion would be quite different if he had.
I think as long as he can persuade Poch to stay, he won't be making any rash decisions about selling or buying any players. Poch, at the moment, is one of the most valuable/important assets this club has.
I have some sympathy for this point of view. Generally a chairman should either be a business person or a football person. Cortese wasn't a football guy but obviously was a business guy. Krueger doesn't appear to be either.
I get the concern, but I think some of the criticism is a little harsh. The dichotomy of "must know football" or "must know finance" is a bit cherry-picked in terms of one being rather specific and one being rather open-ended. It sounds reasonable on the surface, but what if we flipped it to say "must understand pro athletics" or "must have been the CFO of a football franchise?" That also seems reasonable, but now the scales tilt in Krueger's favor because he has tons of experience in the field of athletics, talent evaluation, and coaching whereas Cortese has none and hasn't ever run a football franchise. Krueger lacks NC's business experience, but he has been a professional athlete, an assistant coach, a head coach, an international coach, and a talent evaluator/advisor. Surely some of those experiences across fields just as Cortese's did. Think about it this way-- when Cortese left the thing most people talked about was "his vision." Not his financial acumen. Not his understanding of talent/sports. It's a leadership position. The major skills required are planning, and managerial. They can hire a CFO to do the business side of things, Les Reed handles the talent development, Pochettino coaches the team. Krueger's job is to get the most out of those three people, not to try and do those things himself.
But he has never been in an executive or managerial role on the operations side of an organization, either. The idea that leadership transcends industries, such that you can drop a 'good leader' anywhere and they'd succeed, is very popular with the MBA crowd (heh, the types that Krueger has made a living giving speeches to, perhaps not coincidentally), but I certainly haven't seen much evidence of that in practice.
It may have. And perhaps Krueger will work out. But we have a guy who, per DTLW's article, is (heh, somewhat favourably) described as controlling and unable to accept not being the top dog, being parachuted into a situation where we'd prefer that he took a more hands-off role and let the people who actually understand the sport and business get on with it. That makes me exceedingly nervous.
For what it's worth, I still think John Williams will be at the club at the end of the summer, a Chairman had to be appointed soon and I'm glad the step has been taken. There will be plenty of old white dudes who know about football and running clubs on the board. Also it's been said they wanted a more democratic decision making process. Kat is not replacing Cortese with another dictator (though he was a great dictator) so really I see no cause for alarm here.
I think the one area we will see improvement is in interaction with the fans (who let's not forget are important customers) and the media. The Daily Echo have already reported the difference after they were invited to meet with Krueger. Nicola was great for us (and we will never forget it) but he could be just a tad difficult . Not saying that we will get everything our own way, but I think little niggles will be responded to.
As James G says, Krueger isn't going to be calling the shots like Cortese did, he's a charismatic public face and knows how to get the best out of his staff. He will be part of a board of football and business experts.
For those criticising the appointment: Is it possible that Katharina Liebherr knows this guy significantly better than you do and, as a major European business leader, she has reasonable judgement of ability and character? Let's show some faith please...
Wouldn't there be a better role for that than Supreme Overlord And Chairman? How about like, head of HR?
That's the point though, the role is no longer one of supreme overlordship. He's not a Cortese-style autocrat, he's just another member of the board, albeit in a more public-facing role than the others.
Katharina was obviously unhappy with Nicola's style...he was running SFC as if he owned it. In fact, some people in the media seemed to think he did. Perhaps she was even unhappy with some of his decisions...we have no idea about how things were going financially. She wanted a board more answerable to her. Krueger remarked that she had not expected to be in charge so early when her father died unexpectedly. He said she has a family and other things to do...I suspect NC was left to carry on because there was so much else for her to attend to...finally she turned her attention to us and decided to shake the club up. Nicola felt he couldn't accept a more limited role at the club...understandable bearing in mind his character. Krueger is not in the Nicola role, so his lack of relevant business experience doesn't bother me so much. I hope he does well...let's give him a chance.
Possibly, but we were in need of a Chairman, some clarity and some direction. We have in Krueger a gold standard leader and organiser. The 'football knowledge' will be elsewhere on the board. There was talk Williams would not be available until the post season due to his other commitments. Could be Krueger takes a different role later on. As I said, the proposed structure of the board is a method to encourage a more open, democratic, accountable leadership. Les is still there, and Krueger is not some insane Woodward-esque self-promoter; there will be sound, reasonable, sensible decision making. The idea that Krueger is now solely in charge of everything is simply not realistic.
