They could all be telling the truth. Trying to piece the speculation and the public statements etc together I get something like this: When Nigel P started the season he'd been given a competitive budget (in Adam P's words), and the big earners (Ghilas, McShane, Olofinjana, and Bullard) weren't included as the Allams were going to subsidise those contracts for us. At this point the Allams, who know nothing about football must think that their football staff (AP and NP) have put together a squad that's good enough to get in the playoffs, and that's a reasonable expectation if that's what you've told them to do. Once Bullard is gone they say there's millions available to spend in January, expecting us to just go and sign one or two high profile players to take us over the edge and signal a real intent (like Reading with Roberts). If it's a loanee it's the money saved from Bullard, and if it's Sharp (or similar) then it's the Bullard savings for this season, and the removal of the likes of Harper and Kilbane for next season. NP buggers off, Barmby asks if there's money and he'll keep his best players and the Allams say yes so he signs. When it gets to January, Barmby and NP hand over a list of the 5 or 6 good players that we need, but not headline grabbers as we've got a limited budget. The Allams don't want to pour more money after what's already gone on "averagely good" players, so don't sanction the small deals as they want to know why we need to overhaul the supposedly good enough squad first. You've now got the Allams feeling that AP and NP have failed them, and that they've honoured their side by being prepared to fund the marquee signings they thought they would be. But they've decided not to fund any non-marquee signings until the summer and have told Barmby that and he's told them he doesn't want to sign anybody high profile. Barmby on the other hand feels that he's been diddled as he thought the money would just be generally available for him to spend rather than being for high profile transfers only. And didn't see the point in spending the money on one or two players when he knew the squad was too thin, one unfortunate injury would end our season and the pressure would still be on for him to get promotion or get sacked. Because Barmby thinks he's been diddled in January he tries to use the media to pressure the Allams into honouring their promise to him, and the Allams get pissed off by it because they feel they have honoured it but that the goalposts were moved on them by AP (as the man responsible for assembling the squad with NP) who's now saying we need several players having previously been saying we had a competitive squad. They sensibly wait til the end of the season to avoid the carnage being played out while we've got games and then suspend NB for his comments questionning their integrity and sack AP for failing (along with NP) to do what they asked last summer and giving the impression that they had achieved it.
I speculated something very similar on CI the other day. It seems more likely now a few statements have been made, but it's all still speculation. http://www.hullcityindependent.net/?page=forum&forum_id=4&thread_id=11595&&selpage=0#10 What flagged up with me was the interview in question from Nick, where was specific about price and the fact it was Sharpe, but said it wasn't who he was after. Whatever else happens, the Allam's really need to get their media skills sorted.
Not just them, Barmby as well. They've all been bloody terrible at it. I know Brendon Smurthwaite (former press officer) was made redundant, but I didn't think that role meant controlling all the output as heavily as it seems to have done given the decline since he left.
is it true does anybody know that the allams needed the offside rule explaining to them when they took over? the fact they will be making all the decisions is a big worry, they may know there way round a diesel generator, but footballs a bit different...
They should have given the work to Gareth Griffiths if the role is responsible for that kind of stuff. I don't know how much experiance he's got of handling the media himself, but he's not daft and he's a City fan himself so he'd know how we'd react to things, and he coulldn't do any worse than who ever has been advising them all on what to say and do.
He deals with the running of the website and things like that, unless he's gone in one of the rounds of cuts as well. When he first started he was always hanging round with Brendon (being shown the ropes) so he's probably picked up some things about the other parts of Brendon's work as well. He'd certainly know the media bods a bit more than anyone else, and like I say he couldn't be any worse than the person who is managing these things.
The theory about money being 'available for players' while seemingly not being spent by anyone is certainly explained by that....... it also explains why both 'sides' are pissed off with each other right now. But did all this have to be done in public? I think not. The other thing you mention which I have been thinking myself for a few weeks now, is that Adam Pearson has not delivered - again! He actually deserves the bullet. He screwed up our chances of premier league survival by sacking Phil Brown and bringing in that gobshite Dowie, and he's done a crap job as director of football (ops) since then, as we have missed out on the play-offs under his stewardship and operating with a squad he oversaw with a wages budget he requested. He's paying the price now. (As I said on another thread earlier today!) As for Barmby - he's shown he's not ready for football management and has demonstrated a very bad lack of judgement in the way he's handled himself in the media and the way he's treated the Allams. Sorry Nick - but it's true. Local hero or not. As for the Allams - I don't like the way they have conducted themselves throughout this. They are not media savvy in the least! But they should be judged on what happens on the pitch next season. As in, hold fire people. All this hysteria - is plainly just that. No it's not apathy on my part. It's just I'm not a short tempered loon. Oh, and by the way - it's only football - ffs. Neither Barmby or Pearson will be sleeping on the streets tonight. Count on it.
I think Ricardo's post is probably the best post I've seen on the subject. I tweeted a few weeks back that I hope Ehab hadn't forgotten what he said at the beginning of the season. He obviously hadn't. When it comes down to it, AP obviously failed in his task of getting a top 6 side together, for that he had to go. He can't keep living off his first spell here and the Allam's have realised that.
Most of this adds up, but the idea that Barmby didn't want marquee signing isn't right. He might not have wanted Sharp but there are several other equally big names that he did want to sign. I also think this credits the Allams with more football knowledge than they would even claim to have. I really dont think they would be aware of the need for squad depth during March. I wonder who hounded him out? That Jethro bloke?
It wasn't so much that I was suggesting he didn't want a marquee signing, it was that he didn't want a marquee signing unless he could make a couple of other signings to cover the squad as well. If the Allams put the money in for the marquee signing and he didnt get promotion because Rosenior broke his leg the next game that'd be his job gone. And if the Allams thought that signing more players meant it was more upheaval and we'd be better waiting til the summer and doing it properly with players out of contract it would explain nothing having happened and deals being cancelled after they thought about it. (another element of it that would make Barmby feel cheated, approving it and then cancelling it later on) I'm not really crediting the Allams with much knowledge at all. It was Barmby not the Allams that I was saying would have seen the lack of depth ahead of March. For the alternatives to be marquee signings in the eyes of the Allams they'd have had to have heard about the players. They'd heard loads about people saying we should sign Sharp, how much had they heard about Hamill? To us Hamill is probably a slightly bigger name, but to the Allams I bet he was a far less prestigious signing. I'm not aware of him being hounded out, I just know he left and a few weeks/months later joined Rovers in a similar role. I think he was one of the first out the door, and it's probably a case of "we need to keep the worker drones to do the work, but there's way too many managers so cull some of the higher ups"
So Nick picks his targets, AP takes them to the Allam's, the Allam's reject them and that AP's fault? Only you could come to that conclusion.
Its very hard to get marquee signings in this league. Put it this way, we was prepared to pay David Beckham 200K a week so the wages was there, we had Sven Goran Eriksson as manager a world wide known manager and yet the biggest names we could attract was people like Yakubu, Curtis Davies, Kasper Schmeichel, Gelson Fernandes etc All very good players but not the massive names like we was trying to get (Keane, Henry, Beckham, Owen, Hargreaves, Wright-Phillips) So if we had all that and still couldnt get the massive names what chance did you have with a relatively unknown manager and not as much financial clout as us Plus as we proved having the bigger name players dont work
Correct, signing big names doesn't generally work. Those big names are usually over hyped, overpaid and past it to some extent!
David Beckham would be a marquee signing for most PL teams. At this level you only need it to be someone like Yakubu, or Jason Roberts, or Kevin Nolan (unless you're West Ham with a squad full of them, or you being linked with the ridiculous ones) for it to be considered marquee. It's just someone who's too good to really be playing at this level, and who you really shouldn't be able to sign. I'd consider Koren one at the time we signed him, less so now we're stable, but it was a signing that made people (mainly our fans in this case) look at what was happening on the pitch a lot more positively and gave everyone a lift when it was needed. I've even counted Sharp as one because of the buzz just the hope of signing him generated.
