Badly run clubs eventually get relegated

[MattW]

The initial post is persuasive.

Would you have any confidence that if Lambert was sacked they would appoint a decent manager and support him sufficiently? No. What decent manager would look at Villa and consider it a place where he could build a successful career? Martinez took a look and saw better prospects with Wigan.

The manager is not the issue. In fact, like the players the manager has probably lost his confidence a little bit.

So where does the ultimate responsibility for leadership lie? The board. I reminded myself of the make up of the board:

Randolph Lerner - Chairman
Paul Faulkner - Chief Executive Officer
Robin Russell - Chief Financial Officer
General Charles C. Krulak - Non-Executive Director

A board packed full of Lerner's men.

Lerner himself, having sold the Cleveland Browns after a similar period of non-success. Check out this article for example, which describes his succession of poor managing appointments. Or this one, which describes the Browns as having 'rebooted' their coaching staff and team management every 2.8 years under the Lerner family.

Faulkner, young, previous professional experience 'Relationship Manager' at a bank-holding company also run by Lerner, with an arts degree.

Krulak, who made a fool of himself on here, a former marine with previous professional experience working for Lerner.

There is no football nous on the board, nor independence. It is ostensibly Lerner and some yes-men. It's Lerner's team.

There are two possibilities for positive change from here.

Firstly, Lambert succeeds. Avoids relegation, ships overpaid/poor players over summer, and gets money to buy new ones who play well.

Or, Lerner relinquishes control. Either by selling or by making himself the chairman of a board of independent people with experience running sports teams successfully. To do that, he would himself have to move out Faulkner and Krulak. What chance in a four member board. Has anyone come across, or have an idea as to how to find, the club's constitution? 

[brian green]

It depends on what you mean by the consumer being "happy" to be provided with a service run at a loss.   I would like my milkman to charge me under the odds for his milk but I have the intelligence to realize that if I want a milkman he has to survive.   I might get cheap milk for a week or a month or two but without him I would finish up having to drive two miles to and from the village Co op.   

The Premiership is bloated with the hot money of sheikhs and oligarchs.   It will morph into show business.   A super jumbo plane will fly eight clubs around the world to play mini knockouts.   The level of actual sport will be somewhere between Indian limited overs cricket and the Harlem Globetrotters.

[Whiney MacWhineface]

@StanCollymore You can't go from A (paying 60k a week) to C (paying 15k a week) without doing B, which is what Villa have tried to do

Yup. At the time the cut-backs started, pelty came on here and gave a fair tilt at putting Randy's point of view, i.e. he couldn't keep pumping money in at the rate he was having to, but he agreed that, in his opinion, it was ll too abruptly.

That abruptness convinced me (wrongly) that the cut-backs must be temporary and that we'd go again (sorry to use that phrase) once a course correction had been made.

The above and the capricious managerial appointments have been a perfect recipe.

[Greg N'Ash]

I wanted Doug out probably from soon after he came back, but one thing about him is he was here. Like him or loathe him he knew what was going on around the club and wasn't thousands of miles away. If a manager had a problem he could go round his house and talk face to face, not conference call him. I'm not sure you can get a feel of how things are going from a monthly report e-mailed from your manager or CEO. 

And thats the problem. Villa was Doug's life, its not even a hobby for Lerner. Whether he's ploughing a fortune in or cutting to the bone he seems to have no real interest or enthusiasm in the club - we're just an expensive  toy he bought one year which he's grown bored with. I really don't think he cares if we go down or if he loses a fortune. I think he'll sell, take the massive financial hit and put it down to experience but for now i don't think there's much we can do about it. He's always been a driver asleep at the wheel, we just didn't notice until the road went round a bend.

[Dave Clark Five]

What well run club with its fans having endured the excruciating humiliation at the hands of Bradford just three days before would put the name of that club in huge black letters on the television screen at the game on every conceivable opportunity?

It is almost like we are in the Southern League and Bradford are in the Fourth Division. I don't need them to harp on about great nights against Chester, Blackburn and Tranmere. We know all about those games and how we got in that predicament. 

[Dave Clark Five]

I wanted Doug out probably from soon after he came back, but one thing about him is he was here. Like him or loathe him he knew what was going on around the club and wasn't thousands of miles away. If a manager had a problem he could go round his house and talk face to face, not conference call him. I'm not sure you can get a feel of how things are going from a monthly report e-mailed from your manager or CEO. 

And thats the problem. Villa was Doug's life, its not even a hobby for Lerner. Whether he's ploughing a fortune in or cutting to the bone he seems to have no real interest or enthusiasm in the club - we're just an expensive  toy he bought one year which he's grown bored with. I really don't think he cares if we go down or if he loses a fortune. I think he'll sell, take the massive financial hit and put it down to experience but for now i don't think there's much we can do about it. He's always been a driver asleep at the wheel, we just didn't notice until the road went round a bend.

Correct. All made worse by his representative on here who promised the earth, then fucked off when the going got tough.

[Trinitymiddle]

Faulkner, young, previous professional experience 'Relationship Manager' at a bank-holding company also run by Lerner, with an arts degree.
 

You can imagine seasoned football administrators, twice Faulkner's age running rings round him.

As soon as John Williams (a VERY well respected Football Administrator) resigned from Blackburn, Man City couldn't hire him quick enough. They might have a shitload of cash, but they are also very astute. They recognised the need for someone like that, with the contacts and the experience.

We dont.

[Risso]

I wanted Doug out probably from soon after he came back, but one thing about him is he was here. Like him or loathe him he knew what was going on around the club and wasn't thousands of miles away. If a manager had a problem he could go round his house and talk face to face, not conference call him. I'm not sure you can get a feel of how things are going from a monthly report e-mailed from your manager or CEO. 

And thats the problem. Villa was Doug's life, its not even a hobby for Lerner. Whether he's ploughing a fortune in or cutting to the bone he seems to have no real interest or enthusiasm in the club - we're just an expensive  toy he bought one year which he's grown bored with. I really don't think he cares if we go down or if he loses a fortune. I think he'll sell, take the massive financial hit and put it down to experience but for now i don't think there's much we can do about it. He's always been a driver asleep at the wheel, we just didn't notice until the road went round a bend.

Correct. All made worse by his representative on here who promised the earth, then fucked off when the going got tough.

....and took that nauseating "Proud History, Bright Future" bollocks with him.

[Trinitymiddle]

I wanted Doug out probably from soon after he came back, but one thing about him is he was here. Like him or loathe him he knew what was going on around the club and wasn't thousands of miles away. If a manager had a problem he could go round his house and talk face to face, not conference call him. I'm not sure you can get a feel of how things are going from a monthly report e-mailed from your manager or CEO. 

And thats the problem. Villa was Doug's life, its not even a hobby for Lerner. Whether he's ploughing a fortune in or cutting to the bone he seems to have no real interest or enthusiasm in the club - we're just an expensive  toy he bought one year which he's grown bored with. I really don't think he cares if we go down or if he loses a fortune. I think he'll sell, take the massive financial hit and put it down to experience but for now i don't think there's much we can do about it. He's always been a driver asleep at the wheel, we just didn't notice until the road went round a bend.

I was sick of hearing Doug on the radio and TV, but I don't even know what Lerner sounds like!!

[Dave Clark Five]

The General still has his name in the programme as a board member. Blokes like David Targett had his name in there as well. He died after coming back from a game at Middlesbrough. I can associate with men like David Targett and regret every bit of heckling I gave him and others at AGMs. Sorry for glorifying the days of Doug Ellis but, in my opinion, they were happier days.

[ROBBO]

Not long sold my last business and in fourteen years the longest holiday i took was ten days, and i had brilliant staff. Nobody runs a business better than the owner but to run it you have to be on site watching who goes where and who does what. Once Lerner decided to go part time and work by email and conference the game was up. We will only recover when he has gone.

[Risso]

The General still has his name in the programme as a board member. Blokes like David Targett had his name in there as well. He died after coming back from a game at Middlesbrough. I can associate with men like David Targett and regret every bit of heckling I gave him and others at AGMs. Sorry for glorifying the days of Doug Ellis but, in my opinion, they were happier days.

No need to apologise, you're quite correct.  He had his faults but nothing feels as bad as this.  At least he tended to learn from his mistakes.

[pauliewalnuts]

The General still has his name in the programme as a board member. Blokes like David Targett had his name in there as well. He died after coming back from a game at Middlesbrough. I can associate with men like David Targett and regret every bit of heckling I gave him and others at AGMs. Sorry for glorifying the days of Doug Ellis but, in my opinion, they were happier days.

That whole disengagement procedure just said it all, really, showed how superficial and cynical it was.

Three years of telling us "don't worry about the money" as if we were witless children (when, it turns out, it was getting critical) and telling us "we're here through thick and thin", then the very moment thick turns to thin, they were off faster than a rat up a drainpipe.

Not only did they disappear from here, they couldn't even be arsed to drop a three line message telling us they were finished with us, which made the entire process look like a one-way marketing exercise which was dumped the minute it got awkward for them.

It may not have actually been that, but they quite clearly didn't give a shit about us thinking it was that.

[pauliewalnuts]

Oh, and the same bullshit marketing slogan they used here, the General then re-uses in his new job.

What a fucking swindle.

[Risso]

My boss had half a notion of buying Rangers last year, might see if he fancies a cheeky offer to Lerner.  £1 should swing it.