Randy Lerner

[MarkM]

I must go to work.

For me targeting Lerner exclusively can be compared to a boss whose office building is on fire.  His secretary rushes in to tell him they are ablaze.  He tells her to throw the sprinkler switch.  Sprinklers not working. Now, is that the fault of the maintenance engineer sitting in his shed reading girlie magazines or the boss off at Royal Ascot?  My personal answer to that question is. Both.

If the boss needed telling that the offices were on fire, it sounds like he hasn't bothered fitting smoke alarms? In which case it's probably not a bad analogy.

Also, if anyone died, I'm pretty sure that corporate responsibility would be his as owner / director of the company

[Villa in Denmark]

Randy MON was like a child who got locked in the local sweet shop, ate all he could and thought he was the dogs gonads, then when he the owner realized realised^* he had ate eaten too much of the stock and started projectile vomiting leaving shit everywhere wanted to blame everyone but himself, ably assisted by putting incompetents in charge of his guts recovery. didn't know what to do and appointed a bizarre mix of people to try and get the shop running properly without really thinking about what that meant and was therefore unable to see what was required.

^*None of that American bollocks on here thanks.

[dave.woodhall]

When I say "easy targets" I don't mean Lerner per se, but the myths that have been allowed to grow - O'Neill being forced out due to underfunding, the scandalous treatment of Sherwood, the implication that somehow he's coining it in from player sales. None of these are true and they obscure the things he should be getting taken to task about.

It's like Michael Moorer. He does some good stuff but 95 pieces of unarguable evidence is never enough for him; he has to go for the extra five that are either spurious or inaccurate, but which enable his detractors to rubbish the good stuff.

[pauliewalnuts]

The general thrust of that article is correct, but it totally neglects the fact Lerner invested huge amounts to start with.

Don't get me wrong, his piss poor leadership combined with five years of under investment are the two major reasons we are getting relegated, but to act as if he didn't have a free-spending spell at all is to ignore the evidence.

As a slight aside, I also don't get the point in throwing in the sales of Delph and Benteke as examples of moving players on and pocketing the cash - both those players had release clauses, what on earth are we meant to do about that?

Benteke's was for £32m which is a gigantic sum of money, and Delph's was £8m - the amount we paid for him, which was clearly a "make sure you get something for me" figure.

[RussellC]

The general thrust of that article is correct, but it totally neglects the fact Lerner invested huge amounts to start with.

Don't get me wrong, his piss poor leadership combined with five years of under investment are the two major reasons we are getting relegated, but to act as if he didn't have a free-spending spell at all is to ignore the evidence.

As a slight aside, I also don't get the point in throwing in the sales of Delph and Benteke as examples of moving players on and pocketing the cash - both those players had release clauses, what on earth are we meant to do about that?

Benteke's was for £32m which is a gigantic sum of money, and Delph's was £8m - the amount we paid for him, which was clearly a "make sure you get something for me" figure.

I agree with the overall gist of your post, but it did seem (from the outside looking in, admittedly) that we were negligent in allowing Delph's contract to run as far as it did before renewing it. The (apparent) enthusiasm with which he signed it certainly suggested that we could have done a deal (and probably not had to include such a pitiful release clause) much, much sooner had we pulled our finger out.

[SamTheMouse]

In years to come, I can see "How did the Villa come to be relegated in 2016" being a GSCE history question along the lines of "How did World War One start?"

The only difference being that three hours won't be enough in the exam.

[1_Pablo_Angel]

When I say "easy targets" I don't mean Lerner per se, but the myths that have been allowed to grow - O'Neill being forced out due to underfunding, the scandalous treatment of Sherwood, the implication that somehow he's coining it in from player sales. None of these are true and they obscure the things he should be getting taken to task about.

It's like Michael Moorer. He does some good stuff but 95 pieces of unarguable evidence is never enough for him; he has to go for the extra five that are either spurious or inaccurate, but which enable his detractors to rubbish the good stuff.

?

[itbrvilla]

When I say "easy targets" I don't mean Lerner per se, but the myths that have been allowed to grow - O'Neill being forced out due to underfunding, the scandalous treatment of Sherwood, the implication that somehow he's coining it in from player sales. None of these are true and they obscure the things he should be getting taken to task about.

It's like Michael Moorer. He does some good stuff but 95 pieces of unarguable evidence is never enough for him; he has to go for the extra five that are either spurious or inaccurate, but which enable his detractors to rubbish the good stuff.

?

That's the guy.  He did Bowling for Columbine.

[Risso]

I must go to work.

For me targeting Lerner exclusively can be compared to a boss whose office building is on fire.  His secretary rushes in to tell him they are ablaze.  He tells her to throw the sprinkler switch.  Sprinklers not working. Now, is that the fault of the maintenance engineer sitting in his shed reading girlie magazines or the boss off at Royal Ascot?  My personal answer to that question is. Both.

In this analogy, the boss must have started the fire himself in a corner of the office, after dousing it in petrol and then dropping his lighter onto it.

[LeeB]

I must go to work.

For me targeting Lerner exclusively can be compared to a boss whose office building is on fire.  His secretary rushes in to tell him they are ablaze.  He tells her to throw the sprinkler switch.  Sprinklers not working. Now, is that the fault of the maintenance engineer sitting in his shed reading girlie magazines or the boss off at Royal Ascot?  My personal answer to that question is. Both.

In this analogy, the boss must have started the fire himself in a corner of the office, after dousing it in petrol and then dropping his lighter onto it.

Without realising.

[ChicagoLion]

As owners go Randy Lerner has had a lot of faults. Nobody disputes that.

But on a measurement of competence I would put at least five others who have been worse at doing what they are paid to do, McLeish, Lambert, Sherwood, Faulkner and Fox.

I do not challenge the view that Lerner's was the final say, but I do challenge very strongly that everything is his fault.

Yet there has been one common denominator, one constant.Without Lerner you don't get the disasters the above have been.

[not3bad]

As owners go Randy Lerner has had a lot of faults. Nobody disputes that.

But on a measurement of competence I would put at least five others who have been worse at doing what they are paid to do, McLeish, Lambert, Sherwood, Faulkner and Fox.

Who's responsible for the fact all these people were hired?

[cheltenhamlion]

If I were straw clutching I would point out that Sherwood wasn't his call!

[pauliewalnuts]

The general thrust of that article is correct, but it totally neglects the fact Lerner invested huge amounts to start with.

Don't get me wrong, his piss poor leadership combined with five years of under investment are the two major reasons we are getting relegated, but to act as if he didn't have a free-spending spell at all is to ignore the evidence.

As a slight aside, I also don't get the point in throwing in the sales of Delph and Benteke as examples of moving players on and pocketing the cash - both those players had release clauses, what on earth are we meant to do about that?

Benteke's was for £32m which is a gigantic sum of money, and Delph's was £8m - the amount we paid for him, which was clearly a "make sure you get something for me" figure.

I agree with the overall gist of your post, but it did seem (from the outside looking in, admittedly) that we were negligent in allowing Delph's contract to run as far as it did before renewing it. The (apparent) enthusiasm with which he signed it certainly suggested that we could have done a deal (and probably not had to include such a pitiful release clause) much, much sooner had we pulled our finger out.

I don't disagree about Delph but that article specifically focused on us selling him as a sign of our determination to flog our best players. They'd be saying the same (wrongly) if his release clause had been 30m.

[Ian.]

If I were straw clutching I would point out that Sherwood wasn't his call!

Nearly every man and his dog wanted Lambert, although the Bomb Squad, young and hungry and lengthening of the contract must lie at Randy's door.