The Takeover Thread - Recon Group - NOW WITH NEW POLL

[aj2k77]

Let's face it Randy did something we all dream of (well I do) owning the club he's a fan of. Yes he made mistakes and got given some bad advice along the way.
The one thing you can't accuse him of is bleeding the club dry or loading the club with hundreds of millions of debt.
And his apparent loss of interest in the club coincided with a fair bit of turmoil in his private life.
I say thank you Mr. Lerner at least you achieved something I can only dream about.

I wouldn't say he's achieved anything really at Villa. Inherited lots of money, buys football club, doesn't get professional advice, throws money at old rope, can't break into the elite, loses money, could get relegated, 4 times, pulls out.

His actual achievements at Villa have been off field, those he does deserve thanks for.

[aj2k77]

Dave,

It wasn't an accusation, I'd say its more fact. He invested heavily with the hope of getting us to the top of the english and european game(The General said it himself)
Much like building a new house and finding out from the estate agents its worth less than you have put in. He made a poor investment.

It may be a sad fact, but if you want to compete, you have to spend money. 

Do you want a new owner who doesn't invest?

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

[The Laughing Policeman]

Let's face it Randy did something we all dream of (well I do) owning the club he's a fan of. Yes he made mistakes and got given some bad advice along the way.
The one thing you can't accuse him of is bleeding the club dry or loading the club with hundreds of millions of debt.
And his apparent loss of interest in the club coincided with a fair bit of turmoil in his private life.
I say thank you Mr. Lerner at least you achieved something I can only dream about.

I wouldn't say he's achieved anything really at Villa. Inherited lots of money, buys football club, doesn't get professional advice, throws money at old rope, can't break into the elite, loses money, could get relegated, 4 times, pulls out.

His actual achievements at Villa have been off field, those he does deserve thanks for.

What I was trying to say in my post is that he seemed to run the club with his heart and not his business brain.
If it was the other way round who knows what could have happened?

[aj2k77]

That's why I don't think he is a natural business man. How many decisions made have been based on trust or friendship?

[Holte Sweet]

I read the posts praising Lerner as good for the club with a wry smile.

When he first bowled up at the Villa I went onto the Cleveland Brown's website and what I read certainly brought me back down to earth.

The fans were hoping that his new Soccer club acquisition would mean they would see the back of him and his inept ownership.

Frankly I took the view the if he couldnt make a go of a sports franchise in his native country it was making a massive leap of faith to think he would here.

Some supporters are still making that leap with regard to the sale,

Good luck with that.

[aj2k77]

I read the posts praising Lerner as good for the club with a wry smile.

When he first bowled up at the Villa I went onto the Cleveland Brown's website and what I read certainly brought me back down to earth.

The fans were hoping that his new Soccer club acquisition would mean they would see the back of him and his inept ownership.

Frankly I took the view the if he couldnt make a go of a sports franchise in his native country it was making a massive leap of faith to think he would here.

Some supporters are still making that leap with regard to the sale,

Good luck with that.

Hard to disagree, virtually every article written about him and the Browns mentions he didn't mind splashing the cash but got costly managerial decisions wrong all the time and didn't have the tools to run a nfl franchise. Most articles read almost word for word what we would say ourselves about him. Nice guy, sucks at running sports clubs.

[dave.woodhall]

Dave,

It wasn't an accusation, I'd say its more fact. He invested heavily with the hope of getting us to the top of the english and european game(The General said it himself)
Much like building a new house and finding out from the estate agents its worth less than you have put in. He made a poor investment.

It may be a sad fact, but if you want to compete, you have to spend money. 

Do you want a new owner who doesn't invest?

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

Maybe you could have spent that much but to get any sort of success you'd have to get every decision spot on. Every transfer would have to be a Milner or Young, with no room for Heskey, Beye et al. One thing Randy's profligacy did was to provide space during the O'Neill era for the mistakes to still allow for success.

[kippaxvilla2]

Dave,

It wasn't an accusation, I'd say its more fact. He invested heavily with the hope of getting us to the top of the english and european game(The General said it himself)
Much like building a new house and finding out from the estate agents its worth less than you have put in. He made a poor investment.

It may be a sad fact, but if you want to compete, you have to spend money. 

Do you want a new owner who doesn't invest?

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

What you need are less totally autocratic, autonomous managers being allowed to fritter away £4m on the Marlon Harewoods of this world and then not play them notwithstanding their skill limitations.

[Malandro]

Dave,

It wasn't an accusation, I'd say its more fact. He invested heavily with the hope of getting us to the top of the english and european game(The General said it himself)
Much like building a new house and finding out from the estate agents its worth less than you have put in. He made a poor investment.

It may be a sad fact, but if you want to compete, you have to spend money. 

Do you want a new owner who doesn't invest?

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

Maybe you could have spent that much but to get any sort of success you'd have to get every decision spot on. Every transfer would have to be a Milner or Young, with no room for Heskey, Beye et al. One thing Randy's profligacy did was to provide space during the O'Neill era for the mistakes to still allow for success.

As you say, a  manager cannot be successful with every signing. I still think O'Neill did assemble a good squad - and the money spent was par for the course. (I know its an astronomical sum, but what was Chelsea/Man united squad worth at the time?)

My lack of sympathy stems from the fact that Randy was aware of everything - the clubs finances, the transfer fees paid, the wages and lengths of contracts.
His money did provide us with a good fight at the right end of the table but ultimately he knew he couldn't sustain it.
So we are back to where we started.

I'm not saying his intentions were bad. But his judgement has been.

I don't crave a Saudi prince or a Russian chap. I'd just like a team that can compete and perhaps I'm wrong - I still think we are a big club.
We should really be in the top eight (regardless of a sugar daddy)

[5ft811st2 Durham]

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

I think what's currently happening at Southampton suggests that this isn't true, given that the gilded elite will have taken their 3 best players as well as their manager by the start of next season. The only way they could have kept their squad together was by convincing them of their "ambition" by going on a massive spending spree this summer.

Sadly given how the game is now structured  if we aspire to any kind of significant  lasting success it has to be by virtue of an extremely benevolent billionaire, otherwise no matter how much ingenuity we have with regard to coaching, scouting and player development we'd still  only ever be a feeder club for the aforementioned elite.

[Malandro]

Dave,

It wasn't an accusation, I'd say its more fact. He invested heavily with the hope of getting us to the top of the english and european game(The General said it himself)
Much like building a new house and finding out from the estate agents its worth less than you have put in. He made a poor investment.

It may be a sad fact, but if you want to compete, you have to spend money. 

Do you want a new owner who doesn't invest?

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

Maybe you could have spent that much but to get any sort of success you'd have to get every decision spot on. Every transfer would have to be a Milner or Young, with no room for Heskey, Beye et al. One thing Randy's profligacy did was to provide space during the O'Neill era for the mistakes to still allow for success.

As you say, a  manager cannot be successful with every signing. I still think O'Neill did assemble a good squad - and the money spent was par for the course. (I know its an astronomical sum, but what was Chelsea/Man united squad worth at the time?)

My lack of sympathy stems from the fact that Randy was aware of everything - the clubs finances, the transfer fees paid, the wages and lengths of contracts.
His money did provide us with a good fight at the right end of the table but ultimately he knew he couldn't sustain it.
So we are back to where we started.

I'm not saying his intentions were bad. But his judgement has been.

I don't crave a Saudi prince or a Russian chap. I'd just like a team that can compete and perhaps I'm wrong - I still think we are a big club.
We should really be in the top eight (regardless of a sugar daddy)

Sorry for quoting myself, but the other O'Neill fact that is overlooked is that his net spend was £81.85million. The squad he left behind also had Milner (soon to be gone obviously) Downing and Young in it.
It was a good team, although like any, we all could point out certain weaknesses and managerial mistakes.

The reality of the situation, of course, is that the club didn't have the money for the transfers or the wages - again I can't find sympathy - it was a calculated investment.

I'm not sure of the combined wages/transfers that he made in that period - but would you say it was in fact the reality of getting a team from near the bottom of the league to challenging for fourth?
I would.

[aj2k77]

A new owner could come in and invest a quarter of the money Randy has and we'd be in a much better position. What we need is more brains than cash.

I think what's currently happening at Southampton suggests that this isn't true, given that the gilded elite will have taken their 3 best players as well as their manager by the start of next season. The only way they could have kept their squad together was by convincing them of their "ambition" by going on a massive spending spree this summer.

Sadly given how the game is now structured  if we aspire to any kind of significant  lasting success it has to be by virtue of an extremely benevolent billionaire, otherwise no matter how much ingenuity we have with regard to coaching, scouting and player development we'd still  only ever be a feeder club for the aforementioned elite.

Say Southampton receive £50m ish for Shaw, Lallana and Lambert, if they spend it the way we spent our Downing, Milner, Young money then theres no doubt the only way is downwards for a few years. If they have a decent manager in by that time then you'd expect them to do more with it than what we did.

I wasn't suggesting that for a quarter of Lerners outlay we could be up there and challenging, but with a more responsible attitude and building something a bit more sustainable he could probably have come in, spent a hell of a lot less, realised he hasn't the nous or knowledge for it and not have an outlay of £300m to try and recoup.

[dave.woodhall]

I'm not going into an extended quotation but I believe that with the money O'Neill spent he did just about the minimum he should have to be regarded as a success. However, he was always going to have his best players cherrypicked, as is any manager who doesn't have the resources to add world-class stars regularly and any club who can't pay Galactico wages to keep them.

[Toronto Villa]

Unless your club is at the very top of the tree then you are always going to subject to losing your best players. And even then Man U sold Ronaldo, arguably at the time the best team or at least top three team in the world. And the further down the tree you go the more vulnerable you are. The "system" does not allow for teams to adequately protect its best assets. It will always allow players to have their heads turned and manufacture a move. It doesn't mean it always comes to that but in almost every case it at the very least starts the process.

I don't get fussed about it anymore. We got solid money for all of the key players we lost, more than solid in a number of cases. What we failed to do was reinvest that money wisely such that we created more saleable assets as and when the time came. Instead we were left with players that we discarded and are still discarding as opposed to selling to our benefit. Wenger, especially early on was superb at that. It is an art to know when to sell your players at the right time and get maximum return.

Unless the next Sheik Mansoor takes over then we will always be in this position. What we need to ensure is that the next owner and manager put in place measures to protect assets as best as possible, and when needed sell at the peak of their value with an immediate eye on the next group players that we will be successful with. For a team in the middle bracket of clubs which our size and history suggest we are, it is the only way to maintain success in the face of odds that we simply cannot compete with, at least financially. Many teams have shown it is possible; Sevilla and Atletico Madrid just this season. You don't have to have everything to win things.

[Malandro]

I'm not going into an extended quotation but I believe that with the money O'Neill spent he did just about the minimum he should have to be regarded as a success. However, he was always going to have his best players cherrypicked, as is any manager who doesn't have the resources to add world-class stars regularly and any club who can't pay Galactico wages to keep them.

Agree with that. I'm not having a pop at Randy for cutting his losses just that he knew what he was getting involved in.

Just out of interest, what do you think the club needs now? And that isn't a dig I'm interested.

In a fantasy world, I'd happily have similar to what we had under Brian Little. Spent money, but not outrageously compared to others, but have players who can actually pass, dribble, excite.
Its a shame that such a simple game has got so complicated.