Randy Lerner: a good owner? The case for the prosecution

[hilts_coolerking]

The two biggest decisions he has had to make since he's been here he has ballsed up.

I don't question his sincerity or his integrity but I do very strongly question his judgment.

[villan from luton]

For the defence, I would suggest that Houllier made a rod for his own back with his comments at Liverpool and the team he put out at Man City, but there were signs of a team coming together by the end of the season. As for McLeish, who knows, give the guy a chance. Who did you want in charge and do you know whether they were available?

[Toronto Villa]

And another one:

 
Don't think it'll be long until we start to see the same.

History repeats and it's painful
Each time Randy hires a coach

Hmmm...

By each time, you mean that in the 9 years he's owned the team, the two that he ever had a say in hiring. He acquired a bad expansion team and once he got rid of that staff in 2005, he's had two coaches since, one who was an assistant for arguably the best coach in NFL history. His team also plays in one of the toughest divisions in the NFL, where two of the four teams are incredibly strong. It's not remotely a balanced view of Lerner's time as owner of the Browns, and that fan sounds like some of the drama queens we've had on here of late.

[hilts_coolerking]

for McLeish, who knows, give the guy a chance. Who did you want in charge and do you know whether they were available?

Come on, we're not going down the 'he was the best manager available at the time' route are we?  I didn't buy it with Houllier and I certainly don't buy it with McLeish.

I'd like to know how hard we tried get Ancelotti, why talks with Benitez broke down, why Hughes wasn't considered, why McClaren was ditched, and who else was considered / turned us down before I'd even dream of proclaiming McLeish to be the best available.

[not3bad]

I'd like to know how hard we tried get Ancelotti, why talks with Benitez broke down, why Hughes wasn't considered, why McClaren was ditched, and who else was considered / turned us down before I'd even dream of proclaiming McLeish to be the best available.

The McClaren thing is certainly the weirdest.  I mean, arranging an interview and then canceling it...

[citizenDJ]

for McLeish, who knows, give the guy a chance. Who did you want in charge and do you know whether they were available?

Come on, we're not going down the 'he was the best manager available at the time' route are we?  I didn't buy it with Houllier and I certainly don't buy it with McLeish.

I'd like to know how hard we tried get Ancelotti, why talks with Benitez broke down, why Hughes wasn't considered, why McClaren was ditched, and who else was considered / turned us down before I'd even dream of proclaiming McLeish to be the best available.

To be honest, I really don't think it would matter 'how hard' we tried to get Ancelotti; I doubt very much he would be interested. I know in the past you've argued that if you don't ask, you don't get, but I would imagine that even if we did ask, and offered bags of money, he and others of his standing would say thanks, but no thanks. Just my opinion.

I've no idea what happened with Hughes (does anyone?), and frankly it does seem a bit strange but truthfully I'm not sure I'd expect him to do any better than McLeish, or Coyle, or McClaren etc.

I don't think this appointment has diminished my view that Lerner is a good owner for the club. I am in a minority I know, but I don;t honestly think this whole process has been as disastrous as some make out.

I agree it took a longer time than others, but it wasn't that urgent - pre-season has yet to begin. And I can see that the club would do well to consider it's PR side of things (although I seem to recall that Lerner has very strong views on this for personal reasons).

But aside from the actual choice of manager (which is a different discussion!), I don't see what they've done wrong. Dave Whelan revealed we'd asked about Martinez; if he hadn't, I suspect we'd never know. Is that the club's fault? I don't think that it is, really.

I happen to think that the McClaren situation has been spun this way and that and the truth has been lost in the spinning. If we did indeed 'cancel the interview' (and I have reason to believe that this is not the case), then maybe it doesn't look good to some, particularly if you're looking for a stick to beat the club with, but it's not all that unusual.

So, they took a while (at a time where urgency wasn't an issue) and another club's chairman bleated to the press. They released a couple of official statements that didn't say very much at all (which is standard, in my view), and then they appointed a new manager. I expect they'll back him in the transfer market, too.

It just isn't that bad, in my view. So yes, I think Randy Lerner is 'a good owner'.

[Eigentor]

If you discount everything reported in the media, then you're free to construct your own reality where the board does nothing wrong. However, some facts remain: we've spent the last weeks searching for a manager, and when McLeish became available we jumped on him like flies on a turd. Whether that was an act of opportunism or an act of desperation is debateable.

But surely we didn't spend the weeks prior to McLeish's resignation eagerly awaiting his availability? Either we spent them discounting decent candidates, or we spent them discovering that decent managers won't touch us with a six foot bargepole. None of the explanations make the board come out of this with any credit.

[citizenDJ]

I don't think I'm creating my own reality, just looking at the same things with a different point of view. And I really don't claim that the board is perfect. Honestly, I have no idea at all about the internal workings of a football club. I simply think that the process that they have gone through isn't unreasonable.

As I said, the choice of manager is a different matter. I don't believe that the like of Ancelotti, Flores would have come to us and particularly not if the budget is less than it has been. I didn't really believe that Moyes would leave Everton for us. I suppose the point I'm trying to make is 'what if' the board has spoken to a number of candidates? What if there were others, like Martinez, who didn't fancy it - for whatever reasons, be they financial constraints, not wanting to swap 'like-for-like' clubs, wanting to continue their own work where they are? What if Hughes has an agreement with Chelsea? Perhaps those 'big names' assumed that Lerner would continue to spend as he has done? And if he feels that to do so would jeopardise the club itself, then I back his judgement.

There's an awful lot of 'what if' on both sides of the argument, and maybe we'll never know for sure. My own opinion is that Lerner was looking for a 'quality man' rather than a quality manager, and I'm not sure if that's the wisest move but I can see where he's coming from.

[Eigentor]

I wasn't accusing you of creating your own reality, even though we all are to some extent (eg, consider the departure of MON: we don't know what happened, yet we are happy to blame MON as it fits with our perception of the board as decent, competent people and MON as a highly-strung egoist).

I don't doubt that we have spoken to other candidates. In fact, I'm fairly certain that McLeish was well down on our list (we were searching for managers for weeks before he became available). And I can't understand that the sole reason why the top candidates didn't want to come was that they were so happy staying put (in the case of Ancelotti, Benitez or Flores in unemployment). It's conceivable that working for Lerner and Faulkner at Aston Villa didn't seem an attractive proposition.

[pablopicasso_10]

hes done a lot of good for our club, and i thank him for that...

he has made a couple of huge mistakes recently though...

[Villa'Zawg]

I think he has been a reasonably good chairman. He can’t be and shouldn’t try to be all things to all men. He is after all the man carrying the financial can and he has to do the things that make sense from his financial perspective.

There is no doubt in my mind that there was a definite change of policy last year. To sum up the change as I see it, I would say that we changed from a sporting club focus that measures success on accumulated points in the league and competitiveness in competitions, to a business focussed on discounted cash flow, with the expectation of PL security and a corresponding overall wage level.
I’ve no idea if that change was always planned and intended or if it was simply a sudden change of philosophy brought on by circumstances. Either way, I don’t think many people saw it coming. The fallout from that change is something Lerner should accept some responsibility for.

I’ve never put Lerner on the pedestal that some others have because I take a measured view of the level of investment that has been made. Of course his investment is higher than ever before in numbers but it isn’t anything special in relative terms. Randy’s investment in the playing squad and infrastructure is comparable to the level of investment the club made under Doug Ellis at the time of the Share listing and NTL deal. It is significantly lower than the investment made by several other clubs both in historic and current terms.

Alex Ferguson hit the nail on the head regarding McLeish. This appointment makes sense when you recognise that he has proven himself adept at making do with what he inherits at a club that is not investing significant money, which is where we are at right now. I’m sorry to say that he might actually be the best man for the job. It’s just that the job they want him to do isn’t the one I hoped for as a supporter

So Randy Lerner is a decent chairman, which is better than most of them.

Paul Faulkner is a different kettle of fish. His tenure since he was appointed CEO last May has been nothing short of disastrous. It has to have been his responsibility to make the change of policy work in the best way possible. I don’t care if he is unlucky or incompetent, either way he carries responsibility and should be judged on what has actually happened, rather than whether he is a nice guy or not. Too many things have gone wrong during the short time he has been in charge.

[eamonn]

I think that there are two possible reasons why we appointed McLeish:

1. The board reckon that he's a MON prepared to work within a budget and will provide safe top half finishes without causing trouble.

or

2. We were searching for manager since the season ended. Everyone that we approached rejected us. Fortunately Alex McLeish resigned last weekend as we were planning to contact Avram Grant.

Sorry, but that's the second or third time you've mentioned Avram Grant. I know we've been sniffing around in the Premier League bargain-basement of managers but do you really think Grant would have been approached after Martinez and McLeish?

[Eigentor]

I'm not sure, I was just trying to make a point: as we moved down the list from nearly-relegated managers (Martinez) to relegated managers (McLeish), what would have been the next step if McLeish had said no? Following the same path it would have been Ian Holloway (who has slagged us off in public) and Avram Grant.