And some will say sod of now, but I have to ask the question.
In the last 20 years our board has had to make 4 major football decisions. All of those have been in the last 3 years. They have failed 100% everytime. This makes me wonder just how good Curbs was as for the first 16 / 17 years the current board just sat back and worried about building the ground up.
Surley there must be someone at our club upstairs that has got some football savy? I beg to ask who? Looking at some of the managers who have been linked with us during this time, especially in the last few weeks before the dick known as Parkinson was put in charge, and seeing what they have done already (like Davies), surley we must have someone who can see through all this and advise the powers that be?
I see a club I've supported all my life going down a road of no return, and I realy mean no return. The dark days of us going to the wall are not that far away, and all because of 4 bad, no the worse footballing decision's made by any club I've ever seen.
0
Comments
............
The decision to take us back to the Valley was taken in your 20 year time frame. I'm pretty sure that was a success...
The decision to invest in club and ground and make sure that we owned both - that was a success, again that was in your 20 year time frame...
The decision to chase premiership football, invest in youth players, develop overseas academies, establish the club on a sound financial footing...all successes, as was the decision to keep the side together after relegation from the premiership in '99. That ensured we bounced straight back, another success. I wonder how many boards would have sanctioned the purchase of Darren Bent for £3.5m? Very few as allegedly he was watched by every club in the premiership. However when Curbs wanted to buy him, we were the only team who would take the risk on an unproven player who was thought to be a bit too lightweight for the division. Two seasons, nearly forty goals and a sell at £16m who was right? Yep another success for the board who backed their manager.
And which board was it that allowed a representative of the supporters's to sit on the board, success or failure? I'll go with the former...
Ok the decision to bring in Dowie didn't work out and the board erred in replacing him with Les Reed. But I don't know many fans who didn't welcome Pardew when he arrived on Christmas eve a couple of years back. Relegation that year was the problem - with our wage bill and players like Darren Bent, Luke Young etc on premiership wages we simply could not afford to keep the side together. Perhaps we should have said sod the consequences and gone heavily into the red to chase promotion? Maybe if we'd gambled it might have come off, I doubt it and if it had failed then we'd likely be in administration right now.
Our board don't walk on water and have made mistakes, notably after the Dowie/Reed fiasco I'm surprised that they didn't have a contingency plan to replace Pardew. It was obvious that he was going to leave either voluntarily or ne sacked, so to pfaff arounfd with the strategic review gave me the impression that the board were being reactive not proactive. Sadly also mistakes, especially in a high profile business like football are always more noticeable than successes, and it's quite evident that we haven't handled managerial change very well. But then lots of clubs have failed in that regard - quite a few Premiership clubs have sacked managers after poor starts and this year's relegated teams might include one or both of Spurs and Newcastle. And by the way the board you consider failures pumped in around £15m of their own hard earned money, the least we can do is keep supporting the club and put some faith in them without firing off badly thought through tirades such as yours.
he was exceptional and the demise of our club since he left prove what a magical manager he was for us.... but most don't like to be reminded of that thought every so often(or every post by me;-)
Leeds United's catastrophic decision to "chase the dream"?
Tottenham Hotspur's decision to hire Juande Ramos as manager? Or Jacques Santini? Or George Graham? Or Christian Gross? Or Osvaldo Ardiles? Or Peter Shreeves?
Or Tottenham's decision that they should sell three players whom they clearly did not need, namely sell Pascal Chimbonda, Robbie Keane and Jermain Defoe?
Or Manchester City's decisions to hire 15 managers over the last twenty years?
Or Crystal Palace's decisions to make 16 managerial appointments in those same 20 years?
Or Leicester City's decision to allow Peter Taylor to spend £23m, then sack him two months into a season?
Or Chelsea's decision that Claudio Ranieri was not going to be able to win the Champions League, so they should recruit Jose Mourinho who was obviously going to?
Then replace Jose Mourinho who was not going to be able to win the Champions League, and recruit Avram Grant who was obviously going to?
Then replace Avram Grant who was not going to be able to win the Champions League, and recruit Luiz Felipe Scolari who was obviously going to?
I find it hard to agree that those four decisions by Charlton are worse than any of these. And, I would certainly say that Charlton's board's decision-making over the last 20 years, good and bad, weighs very well against just about every club in the country.