The results have been disspointing, no doubt but there seems to be a lot more wrong with the club at the moment. Dwindling support resulting in a half empty stadium most games, a manager that seems to stumble from one disaster to another and an owner that seems to unable to sort it out. I can tell you guys are getting really down about it now and your suffolk punch is draining away as the club faulters and stumbles form one disaster to another. It's been Roy Keane and then Paul Jewell, but the problems remain this indicates to me that it may not be a simple managerial issue and that the problems may lie deeper than simply staff. Do you think it would be better if ME sold the club? Or is it Clegg? It reminds me of how I felt about NCFC just before our relagation to league 1. It's sad to see you guys so dejected and whipped. You need a few good results and to start climbing the table, hopefully then we will see some of that Suffolk punch back again.
for me it all comes down to clegg. without evans' support who knows where we would be. yes he appointed clegg so must take responsibility but until he (clegg) goes the club will remain without any sort of heart, local pride, optimism, call it what you want! He is clueless in his role and comes across as a pompous, arrogant little wretch whenever someone dares to question or criticize him. somehow he thinks he is always right and will never honestly admit to his mistakes. his track record is dreadful and I for one can't think of anything he has done at this club that can be deemed a categoric success.
The only thing I would say in PJ's defence, which is a reason I havent given any vitriol against him is I dont see how the club can withdraw £1m a month from our wage budget in the space of 3 seasons (6m a year current from £17m a year in 2009/10 season) and not make an open statement to the fans about the direction the club is taking. Belt tightening is fine but losing 2/3's of your wage budget seems extreme Clegg and Jewell have both made mistakes and probably massive ones but with ME being in overall charge and our main sponsor, therefore the majority of income, for me the issues lay mainly at his door.
You raise a very good point Tractor Bhoy and one that I thought of at the the start of the season.. Why is Marcus Evans our sponsor?? The obvious reason is so that he can flog his name on every shirt, billboard and advertising hoarding associated with the club but in reality if he is tightening his belt then why the hell don't we look down the road to some local businesses Greene King for example and ask them to throw in some cash just to have their name emblazoned across our shirts. It just seems odd that our owner who seems a little frivolous at the moment is still sponsoring us, if he was splashing it around then it is more understandable as it is another avenue for him to pump money into the club with less restrictions but surely now it isn't beneficial to the club anymore and in fact reducing our possible income* *Speculation in the purest form as I have no idea how much ME pays to have his name on the shirts and clearly he can do what he wants - it's his club but worth thinking about the possibility of him potentially sponsoring us for free and therefore robbing us of a sponsors income...
Its one of the things that does get me KOPR and the reason why ME is top of my 'hit' list Tighten your belt if you want but what about exploring other revenue streams. We can have back of the shirt sponsorship, stadium sponsorship, stand sponsorship (neither of which would bother me as I would still call it PR or Churchmans regardless of the offical name) I cant see how we are meant to compete on a monthly wage budget of £500k or £150k a week for an ideally 20-22 man squad plus coaching staff etc. I wouldnt even care so much if the club didnt come out and say our spending has been out of control for years and we are now on a very tight budget but the silence annoys the hell out of me. I acknowlegde that ME probably originally saved us but for me that does not mean he is now removed from blame for the current issues.
pretty sure it should be possible to find out how much he sponsors your club chaps - won't it be included in the accounts?
Him pay us, thats a strange one! sometimes i think we are paying him for the pleasure to have his name across our shirts!
ME has to take the majority of the blame, but I do not neccessarily think he should go, as the case is with most things, will the grass always be greener on the other side? I like the fact that he has always backed the manager, given the manager time and not interferred on the pitch (as far as I am aware). Far too often you hear benefactors coming in to clubs signing players and interfering on the pitch and sacking managers after a very short period of time and he does not seem to do this. He also (perhaps I'm being naive) appears to be here for the long term!! But he has to take the blame in that he appointed Keane and Clegg, he gave/has given managers license to spend alot of money on transfer fees and wages, he has failed to communicate to fans his vision for the club or a long term plan. I'm not sure how much of the blame can lay at Cleggs door, he doesn't seem to endear himself to fans (which is a problem considering his position) but how much of him is just working under the orders of ME? I'm sure if ME didn't think he was doing his wishes he would say so or get rid of him!! The 2 biggest mistakes the club have made over the past few years IMO have been: 1) the appointment of Keane, this was completely the wrong decision it was blatently obvious that at the time we needed an experienced manager to come in lift the current players we had and add a couple of quality players to the squad dare I say it a PJ type character. The reasons why Jim i believe was fired in the end was because he was inexperienced, he was still on a deep learning curve, he spent alot of money on average players who didn't really improve us and his fiery temperament/stubborness caused issues, so ME appoints someone who has all of those traits but to a much bigger extent!! I think ME really made the wrong decision there, he like many fans got excited by the prospect that Keane would manage our club but didn't think about what the club actually needed!!! 2) not having a consistent long term vision/plan (or a realistic/sustainable one) backed up with realistic short term decisions which means managers are unable to manage expectations as was the case initially with Jim and last season with PJ's buy experience transfer policy and also means fans aren't really in the know and also have unrealistic expectations meaning we've lacked patience as a club!!! I bought the whole get to the PL at the first opportunity to start with, if we would have appointed that experienced manager I think we could have done it but during the Keane fiasco and when Jewell first came in it was clear we needed a long term plan in place but yet we still hear 'PL at the first available opportunity'!! I think since January the club have become clearer in the direction of which they want to take the club in but without really communicating this to the fans. I honestly believe that if we had the current set up ME, Clegg, PJ and with the financial constraints and direction they appear to be going toward (young, hungry, low wages) when ME first came in or when Jim left we would be alright and maybe even in the PL. I just think now with all the mess which has gone on before with spending high transfer fees on average players, having so many players come in and out of the club, spending high wages on experienced players that suddenly having real strict financial regulations on us has almost like the economy starved off our recovery. Bad decisions have been made by all but the lack of a consistent plan and direction for me has been the main problem and when things have gone bad a few decisions that wouldn't perhaps normally have been seen as bad under the circumstances have been the wrong ones for that current situation!! Apologies for the essay... Lancs if you wouldn't mind
I have to say I'm kind of fed up with the whole regime and would like Marcus to sell up and get the **** out of town. Clegg is just a puppet who cleverly deflects criticism away from ME and is probably being micro managed by Marcus. Cleggs only task at PR seems to be cutting costs everywhere and we feel like a small business on the brink of bankruptcy rather than a club backed by a wealthy owner. Sorry Marcus, you helped us out financially at a difficult time but you have so far only succeeded in taking our club backwards since your arrival. You can take your invisible self and your now invisible money and give me my club back.
ptc, well, actually anyone; would love to know where you think you'd be in terms of league status had evans never taken over. do you think you'd be better off, roughly the same or worse than where you currently are? all guess work of course but interested to hear thoughts...
We could've been relegated, re-built and come back up again by now supers. It's astounding how a club with such financial backing is in the state we are in. Unless it's some kind of long term masterplan that means we will have our house in order before FFP cuts in and we will magically leapfrog other teams I can't understand our current spending strategy. Whilst other teams appear to be splashing out one last time, we are jumping the gun and cutting costs already.
We would be similar to Palace or Derby County..... Now that's not necessarily a bad thing at the moment, they have a decent manager (although not amazing) a strong(ish) unit of players assembled from championship cast offs in need of a new start and young players stepping up from League 1 I think we would have flirted with the play offs and relegation but ultimately been a mid table side and sold off some good players and replaced them with some other decent up and coming players and about on an even keel financially about now and looking to push for promotion
Supers, probably the same position or a bit worse (without another major backer). The difference being that without the whole ME debacle we most probably wouldnt have beeen promised the earth, promised instant promotion, promised world class manager, promised this, that and everything else. Under the Royle, early Jim years then we had no money but no expectations, a set of unheard off players but those that wanted to play at their best and give their all every week. We had dedication, commitment, a sense of a family club and one that was trying its best. I dont mind about the lack of success, I care about the lack of dialogue from the club, a lack of passion, a lack of effort, a lack of a clear plan. I care about the fans having a constant go at the managers, coaching staff and players because a lot of them havent realised that the club has withdrawn 2/3's off our budget WHICH is purely because we only hear from the club at Season Ticket renewal time when they come out with the same old bullshit about 'operation premiership' - our instant push for the top of the league.
I'm not too sure, I thought Jim built a decent squad on very little money, we were playing very good attacking football and may well have finished in the playoffs the season ME took over. But after that who knows, we were on a very poor footing financially and were struggling to buy the players, so no doubt we would of had to sell players like Walters etc. We may have done better initially, we were certainly going in the right direction on the pitch, which is why I believe ME initially invested. I thought we just needed a bit of money to come in so we could add a little bit of quality and then ME came in and it seemed a given that we would get promoted....unfortunately not the case. Looking back at the squad we had when ME first came it was certainly better than anyone since, I do believe we have more quality now but back then we had leadership on the pitch and the players had been together longer.
We don't have quality players otherwise we would get decent results ffs. Martin is an attacking mid with the goal return of a defensive and our stikers are only that in name on the player profile page. Whilst a lot of blame has to lay at PJ's door for recent results it's the players on the pitch who are making it (or not as the case may be) happen and so need to share the blame. I'm fed up of hearing how we have quality. Sure some may be a bit more technically gifted but they don't have a final product, step up Chops, JET and Martin.
I think that's a bit of a simple argument SD!! Because Liverpool lost 3-0 to WBA does that mean they have no quality in their team?? Because if they had quality they would have won that match!!! We genuinely do have more quality in our squad than we've had for years in terms of technical ability, unfortunately we do not have enough leadership in the team and we do not have the most balanced team!!
More technical ability but less passion, spirit or ability to get a decent result doesn't equal quality. What is quality measured on? I would say a quality player is one who can get the job done, not one who showboats around the park but achieves nothing. So Liverpool lost one game, where do you think they will finish this season? If they truly have quality they will climb the table as will we, would back 'pool to end up top ten but not Ipswich. You're basing your argument on one Liverpool result and I'm basing mine on past results (last season included) and you call my argument simple.
I think parts of both your ideas are correct PTC & SD. The technical ability of our current side is a lot better than it has been for years but if your only going through the motions and not willing to give your all for the cause then it doesnt come off and your ability counts for nothing. Our pre Evans team can be compared with Norwich last season. With all respect to them they probably had one of the less gifted teams in the league but with workrate, team spirit and a never say die attitude its amazing how much you can achieve. We dont have players ready to run through a brick wall for the badge and that lack of fight has been evident.
