So Cellino is settling into life as President of Leeds United, and he sees a "massivo" job ahead to make Leeds a footballing force once again. The Club - living beyond its means with a rudderless staff who need guidance, and a club "spending like its in the Champions Lge not in the Championship" ... he feels GFH did not manage its people or finances properly, so now he has to cut back on costs drastically to start bringing Leeds back to break even ... after the last financial year's figures reported a £9m loss, this will be a huge task to complete quickly, so may take a bit longer than expected The Stadium - Cellino is now looking at buying back Elland Road by November, giving himself six months to sort out the finances to be in a position to do so, saying "Leeds should not have to be guests in their own stadium" ... ok, so he did not deliver on his "next day" promise, so let's see if he can meet his new self-imposed deadline The Academy - he revealed it costs £600k per year in rent alone, so you'd think he will be targeting buying back Thorp Arch as well ... Carbone has been installed to help Cellino with feedback "in Italian" to help ensure nothing gets lost in translation, and in return it helps Carbone to begin learning about coaching (being groomed as a future Leeds Head Coach/Manager is a possibility) ... on the Academy players, Carbone reported back that he feels there are up to TEN players who excite him as future first teamers ... interesting that Carbone was shut out by the Academy management to start with before a couple of friendly games were finally arranged so that Carbone could run his eye over the players and report back to Cellino ... we need to produce some more players for the first team quickly to encourage Cellino to keep investing in improving the Academy The Players - Cellino is uncertain about the current squad because of their inconsistency, and he feels a bit bewildered by their "I'll turn up when I feel like it" attitude (a lot like how we've been feeling then) ... one thing he is absolutely clear on is that the players are, in his opinion, hugely overpaid for this division (not sure if he means in general or according to ability) ... there will be a cut back on the wage bill, and players will be brought in on the correct money, "humble" players ... he wants to focus on English players, preferably Yorkshire lads who will play with the "Leeds energy", and to do this he must lose at least half of his Italian identity and embrace English football played the English way, and that probably needs an English coach/manager as well ... guess this means we won't be seeing a big influx of Continentals then, but probably more Luke Murphys and Matt Smiths next season as Cellino looks to steady the ship financially on the wage front The Manager - McDermott is not being blamed at all, which is very interesting considering Cellino's track record when it comes to patience with his "coaches" ... Cellino feels that McD was badly mismanaged by GFH, and they put him under severe pressure to win promotion this season, an impossible task ... GFH also "abandoned" the club and left McD to try and deal with the day to day stuff as well, something Cellino is adamant won't be allowed to happen again, "because the coach must concentrate on the field" ... he plans to sit down with McD in no later than ten days time to discuss the future and decide if they can work together, but McD has to fit in with Cellino's policies, one of them being that Cellino will buy and sell players ... so McD may well be here next season, because as Cellino put it he was "the right manager at the wrong time" for Leeds under GFH, which implies he may well be "the right manager at the right time" under Cellino Promotion - Cellino is preaching patience, and bucketloads it seems ... he holds up Leicester as an example, and says "they spent heavily for three years and did nothing, then last year they spent nothing and now they go to the Prem" ... he believes that you don't have to spend loads to get promotion, you just have to spend wisely ... he is dead against committing big money to "achieve the dream" (where have we heard that before) and then have to use the Prem gold to pay off the debts instead of building Cagliari - he has clearly fallen out of love with Cagliari, and now just wants them sold, saying "when I last stood in the ground at Cagliari I felt nothing, I now only have love for Leeds" ... one thing is clear, we need him to sell the club quickly, because it will probably mean some of that money coming here to help reduce the debt and help fund the repurchase of Elland Road ... at least Cagliari is self sufficient so Cellino isn't pumping money into them, and he will boost his bank balance when he sells McCormack - our Captain has now gone on record saying Leeds have to go for promotion next season, or the chances of him continuing at the club are very slim ... he wants to see clear intent from Cellino that we are spending to build a team capable of challenging for promotion right away, not the season after ... McCormack wants to play in the Prem, but he can't afford to wait another two seasons, citing his age as starting to count against him if it doesn't happen soon, and he has a point ... with clubs like West Ham having been keen on signing him, and the likes of Leicester, Burnley and probably Palace and such like bidding for him in the summer, it seems likely that McCormack may well be the one big sacrifice Cellino makes to help fund the club's debt to bring it back to profit a lot quicker ... a £6m bid is not to be sniffed at, and at 28 is McCormack worth keeping or is it wiser to take the money and invest it in the club? Cellino is starting to set expectations, with the key one being that the club needs to become self sufficient first before anything else can happen ... we are not going to see high profile megabucks transfers, that's for sure ... the probable (but not yet committed) focus on English players and home-grown talent is commendable, but is it the right one ... will English players play with the pride and passion for Leeds that Cellino seems to suspect they will, and will this mean we sacrifice the chance to bring in more skillful European players ... Cellino is not going to very easily raid his personal bank account to fund player signings, and you get the feeling that his initial investment has been a lot more than he hoped it would be, and any money he sticks in will only be to help wipe out the debt so that the club can start generating its own transfer monies ... regardless of what he decides in the way of promotion, next season is going to be interesting, every single day!! "For the sake of Leeds United he would break himself in two"
Ross comes over as far too demanding, yes what would we have done without his goals but if he wants Cellino to go for it next season I too would say on your bike to Ross? Getting us financially stable is far more important at the moment
Seems as though there's a bit of Papa Smurf in Cellino - building the club and not the team. But I think what he appears to be doing is buying back that which was pawned out to pay for iffy hotels and clearing up the "living the dream" era. I think we will get the odd talented Italian. But I don't think we'll be bringing in vast numbers of players. Will still be an interesting pre-season. But not quite what some may be expecting. Let's hope Ross stays. At least he'll give us plenty of goals next season.
If Ross goes, I will be extremely worried. What will it cost to buy another striker capable of 28 goals in a season and still in his prime? A hell of a lot more than the expected 6 million. We all hope to shift the rubbish and keep hold of whatever class we have. Selling mc Cormack, regardless of where the money is spent, will be simply a continuation of the bullshit of the past ten years.
Ross won't repeat this season, he has never got so many before, we need to create and score goals through the whole team not just rely on one player. I don't want him to go but creating a profit that can keep us afloat without pumping money in must be priority. Buy back ER get in a few exciting players and show the fans you are going in the right direction and the gates will return
Eire and ristac both make very valid points for/against a Ross sale ... one thing I do agree with is will Ross be able to repeat? If he doesn't he becomes unsaleable and then what? For me £6m and above should be snatched at and rather get in four quality players to help rebuild the team ... we will find another goalscorer ... it's a tough one, really tough, but I think Cellino will cash in to help him rebuild ... hopefully Allardyce comes in with £8m and then we're laughing "For the sake of Leeds United he would break himself in two"
Hope you're right but removing 20 to 28 goals from this team and finding replacements, midfielders or forwards to compensate could prove a very dangerous tactic. Even with McCormacks great season, we still finished uncomfortably in the bottom half. I would hope to at least see a new squad in place and see what they're made of before discarding Ross. Far too often we've sold our best first and either not replaced them properly or replaced them with ****
We should not begrudge Ross Mc moving to a Prem club. He deserves a chance to play at that level. However, the club needs to line up/sign a replacement before letting him go and needs to ensure it gets a fair price for him (seems like £6-8m is the right amount). Quite simple really.
I would have liked to hear him say that there will not be payments to off-shore companies/members of the Cellino family until such time as the club is not running at a loss/has bought back Elland Road/some other milestone. Previous ownersips have bled the club of too much funds.
Massimo wants to be in the Premier League for the fun of it, he wants Leeds to do well because we are his big boys toy. Bates and GFH wanted us because they wanted to make money, Bates nearly bled us dry, GFH drained us for their investors. Selling Ross now and I am confident it would be reinvested. Bates would have sold Ross for peanuts, Massimo won't sell unless it is a bite your hand off offer.
No disagreement on any of that Ristac except I want the replacements found first, then sell Ross, not the other way round as we usually do
How many of you would be happy with selling Ross for £6-8m and getting Becchio back for £1-2m? Becchio's stats for Leeds United: Season Appearances Goals 2012 - 2013 31 20 2011 - 2012 43 11 (injury season) 2010 - 2011 44 20 2009 - 2010 47 17 2008 - 2009 56 19
Bechio brought nowhere near as much to the team as Ross. Ross drops deep and is sometimes the play maker. Not a good comparison.
Not really meant as a comparison between them. Becchio was a playmaker who laid many on for Beckford. He was a scorer and a provider. If the club can have a net of £4-5m and can bring in another striker, would that work for us?
Not IMO. He chose to leave and year sat on his arse will not have improved an average championship player.
Hard to see the point in bringing Becchio back. If he can't get a run out in that piss poor Norwich team, can't see what benefit he would be to us
Money is the stumbling block. Becchio chose money over us, & there's no way he'd take a drop in wages to come back to us. And let's face it, with Celino in charge now, he'd be doing well to even get what he was earning before. Not going to happen. No point in speculating.
I think in recent times Southampton's model re academy player's has to be admired, they seem to always be bringing through a few young good lad's constantly and it's paying dividends now for them. It is important that Leeds has an identity and young local players will bring that identity with them by playing like it means something to them, their has to be plenty of young talent out there now it's up to them to go find it and bring them through with the right coaching and right man management to keep them grounded. I hope he delivers on these sentiments as I feel it is of utmost importance. What he say's is basically we steady the ship and then set sail and I have to agree, stability first then we can push on from there it sounds practical and I hope he commits and follows through with it.
I'm assuming you didn't actually hear the interview because thats not really what he said. The interviewer asked him if Cellino doesn't show intent in the summer will he go. Ross responded saying he isn't in any position to make demands, he wants to win promotion with Leeds but also sees it that he will be entering the decline of his career soon. He can't afford to wait for more than a season in his eyes, never once demanded spending and such. He just wants to see leeds at least challenge next year, another season in mid table and he'll start to think about his career but if we are going for play-offs and lose he seems content with that. I don't think I can fault anything Ross has actually said to the media especially in reason weeks, he seems spot on to me.
