MO'N on Goals on Sunday

[tomd2103]

The thing i remember a lot about MONs time, is that we were always successful signing players.
Historically we would be linked with players but they never materialised (Carlton Palmer, Benni McCarthy etc'), under MON they always came. I can't remember us missing out on anybody at that time.
Obviously it was the massive wages we were paying them, highlighted by the example of Luke Young turning down Liverpool.
It was the same scenario that Leeds found themselves in, paying over the odds for mediocre squad fillers.
Trouble was the massive wages bill vs turnover was not sustainable unless you had Champions League income, we tried to break into the top 4, and only reached 6th, and the plug had to be pulled.
The rub really came when Man Citeh waded in to take up one of the champions league places with ManU, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, it was obvious Randy would not be able to compete financially with these clubs turnovers, and decided to cut his cloth accordingly. This didn't fit in with the plan that MON had been sold so he walked.

I am just grateful that now relegation is a reality, we shouldn't be crippled by the big wages, and we will not become the new Leeds.

That is where his transfer policy really fell down.  Again speaking with the benefit of hindsight (though it was said by many at the time), he should have used the cheaper foreign market (certainly in terms of wages) to build the squad and also shown some faith in the young players coming through.  His treatment of Cahill still really sticks in the craw.

[brian green]

CBs post about Martin O'Neill was not in the least bit "strange".  What I find strange is that O'Neill still has those whose excuse what he did and the way he did it. Premeditated spite it was and premeditated spite it will always remain.

[Percy McCarthy]

CBs post about Martin O'Neill was not in the least bit "strange".  What I find strange is that O'Neill still has those whose excuse what he did and the way he did it. Premeditated spite it was and premeditated spite it will always remain.

Fair enough, but the first paragraph read as a rant against everything Randy did wrong. Then the second paragraph blamed O'Neill for it.

[Dave]

CBs post about Martin O'Neill was not in the least bit "strange".  What I find strange is that O'Neill still has those whose excuse what he did and the way he did it. Premeditated spite it was and premeditated spite it will always remain.

Fair enough, but the first paragraph read as a rant against everything Randy did wrong. Then the second paragraph blamed O'Neill for it.

Maybe if there was a short segue between the two paragraphs along the lines of "Lerner should have employed better people and made better decisions than he did. And the reason that he needed to employ better people is because Martin O'Neill... (second paragraph)"

[eamonn]

Cahill and Davis (anyone else?) are two players he didn't give enough game time to who have gone on to play for better sides than us in the same period.

[joe_c]

Cahill and Davis (anyone else?) are two players he didn't give enough game time to who have gone on to play for better sides than us in the same period.

On Cahill you won't find much disagreement, but Fulham and Rangers were far worse than us in the period Davis was there and he joined Southampton when they were newly promoted with little expectation of success beyond survival at that time. A solid player rather than the first name on the team sheet.

[Dave]

Cahill and Davis (anyone else?) are two players he didn't give enough game time to who have gone on to play for better sides than us in the same period.

On Cahill you won't find much disagreement, but Fulham and Rangers were far worse than us in the period Davis was there and he joined Southampton when they were newly promoted with little expectation of success beyond survival at that time.

Yup - if we're including Davis because he has been playing for a side higher up the table than us while we've been shit, we can include Sidwell, Gardner, Routledge and Sorensen as well.

But I'm not sure any of them would have made a huge difference (apart from they wouldn't have been able to score the few goals that they got against us).

[eamonn]

It was more that he had the talent to play long-term at a top-half team and I don't think that's just revisionism. He was our great white hope in O'Dreary's last season (linked with ManUre during that time) but O'Neill never got the best out of him.

[Fred]

Wait for his book for it to come out or maybe we will just never know why he left?

[Brend'Watkins]

Wait for his book for it to come out or maybe we will just never know why he left?

See Brian's post further up.  I doubt very much that he'll confess in any book he might ever write.

[avfcpg]

Wasn't the general feeling at the time that he wanted the Milner money to spend straight away but was told to reduce the wage bill first by offloading players he signed on big contracts and then wasn't playing...toys out the pram and stomped off?   

[The Edge]

Wasn't the general feeling at the time that he wanted the Milner money to spend straight away but was told to reduce the wage bill first by offloading players he signed on big contracts and then wasn't playing...toys out the pram and stomped off?

There's a big difference between a general feeling and what actually happened. A book would be very interesting reading as I doubt he would open himself up to a libel charge so we would finally hear the truth. My take is a mixture of him wanting more money for transfers and Randy losing his nerve. And the sheikhs buying Man City effectively ruled us out of the champions league gold rush.  As Leicester have shown it can be done on a budget but this involves some clever long term thinking. I don't think Randy wants to do it. He's given the running of the club to a chosen few and will do what the rest of us will have to. Just wait and see and hope for the best.

[Villa in Denmark]

Wasn't the general feeling at the time that he wanted the Milner money to spend straight away but was told to reduce the wage bill first by offloading players he signed on big contracts and then wasn't playing...toys out the pram and stomped off?

There's a big difference between a general feeling and what actually happened. A book would be very interesting reading as I doubt he would open himself up to a libel charge so we would finally hear the truth. My take is a mixture of him wanting more money for transfers and Randy losing his nerve. And the sheikhs buying Man City effectively ruled us out of the champions league gold rush.  As Leicester have shown it can be done on a budget but this involves some clever long term thinking. I don't think Randy wants to do it. He's given the running of the club to a chosen few and will do what the rest of us will have to. Just wait and see and hope for the best.

I can't quite work out if that's a criticism of he employing a CEO who genuinely has that mandate or not, including putting a management structure in place around him as he ses fit. (Rather than the role it felt like Faulkner had, which to me seemed like Lerner's underling who had to get everything signed off from above)

Given that just about the only thing you can get the majority of people to agree on on this site is that Lerner is appalling at running sports teams, handing the day to day running over to someone empowered to do it makes sense.

If he can find the right person to operate as chairman even better, that removes him completely from the running of the club.

Then his only role remains that of shareholder. Hire & fire the chairman and in this instance CEO and agree or decline requests for extra capital or alternatively in his position act as lender of first resort instead.

Time will tell whether we've got the right people in the right places.
Even if we drop drop, as we most probably will, I'd be hesitant to point too much at Fox straight away.

He'll have potentially made 2 duff decisions, Lambert's extension and Sherwood, in 12 months whilst trying to perform the equivalent of a handbrake turn in an oil tanker. Personally I think Sherwood was a direct consequence of Lambert's new contract in terms of who was available, who he knew he could get quickly given the timing.

That doesn't necessarily make him bad at his job, just not perfect.

Personally I will always have a suspicion that the Lambert contract reeked of Lerner's "loyalty the likes of which I've never known" statement about Lambert at the end of the previous season. Pretty much every job I've taken has started with a "whilst your finding your feet, he's a couple of things to get sorted" list from the new boss. I think the contract was one of Fox's "welcome to B6" list.

[amfy]

Can anyone find an example on any of the MON threads over the years when anyone on one side of this debate has changed their minds due to the well constructed arguments of the other?

(Actually - anywhere on the entire message board!)

[conman]

Can anyone find an example on any of the MON threads over the years when anyone on one side of this debate has changed their minds due to the well constructed arguments of the other?

(Actually - anywhere on the entire message board!)

just had a look , and i cant