It Just Doesn't Make Sense

lancashire lad

RD's perceived support of our academy.

If I have it right he wants to build a new academy at SL and raise it to a Cat 1 youth system which will allow it to compete with the "big" clubs for youngsters, develop these young guns for the first team and then either sell them or use at other clubs that he owns. This way the income will keep the club out of dept and it alleviates the need to pay agents fees.

right got that

What I don't understand is if the club is relegated to League One it will not attract the best youngsters no matter what facilities are at SL. At present if the rumours are to be believed we have a coach of questionable ability and a team that is descending towards relegation with one of the lowest goals scored in the Leagues.

It just doesn't make sense especially as RD is meant to be a clever businessman.

Or does he have another agenda that might involve different uses for the land at The Valley ?

CafcWest

Really don't think he wants League 1. Makes no sense. He is on record (I believe) to have stated that this year will be a 'consolidation year'. Key objective is Championship survival (that's what Peeters was told as his main objective) and that next year will be a growth year (maybe). Think his strategy (I'm sure there is one - might of changed a bit with the FFP changes) is long-term. Think the whole Guy Luzon thing is about shoring up defence, keeping clean sheets and not conceding as the first step to not losing (apparently Luzon teams are all about defending). Try and score a goal on the break - but mainly not lose and stay up. Optimistic that next year will be a growth year, but with RD who really knows - I think only him!

MountsfieldPark

I read SL as Standard Liege at first and thought wtf?

Anyway, the Southampton academy seems to have gone on producing talent, even when they dropped to League One. And we would be able to march in to non-Cat 1 academies and demand to speak to any of their players we fancied (for the good of English football). We might still be able to sign up some good players, even if we couldn't compete with the Premier League clubs for the best players. And, of course, they wouldn't be able to poach our youngsters.

That's about the best I can do as a devil's advocate.

sam3110

On my opinion people are reading way too much into motives and alternatives etc. All RD wants to do is create a farm of young, mostly English footballers that can be nurtured alongside European footballers, whose technical skill is usually higher than their British compatriots, for profit.

He isn't interested in rebuilding on The Valley imo, or on making us a premiership superpower, he just needed a decent sized team in England that was going on the cheap and had good resources already in place. Being in the South East within easy reach of a train from Belgium just cemented our desirability in his eyes.

As we all know, the value of young talented English players is ridiculously sky high at the moment, and I think that is RD's main motive behind being our owner

thenewbie

sam3110 said:

On my opinion people are reading way too much into motives and alternatives etc. All RD wants to do is create a farm of young, mostly English footballers that can be nurtured alongside European footballers, whose technical skill is usually higher than their British compatriots, for profit.

He isn't interested in rebuilding on The Valley imo, or on making us a premiership superpower, he just needed a decent sized team in England that was going on the cheap and had good resources already in place. Being in the South East within easy reach of a train from Belgium just cemented our desirability in his eyes.

As we all know, the value of young talented English players is ridiculously sky high at the moment, and I think that is RD's main motive behind being our owner

I think you're probably right - RD's primary interest in the club is always going to be the academy and running up a profit on the youth prospects, with the potential money of television rights etc a bonus on top of that. If he is going to push for any of the network teams to be a football 'name' in it's own right it will almost certainly be Liege, with the rest of the network subsidiary.

Granpa

He isn't interested in rebuilding on The Valley imo, or on making us a premiership superpower

If you are correct about the Premiership, he will be the weirdest money making multi millionaire that ever heard of.

Swisdom

If we had won at the weekend we would be 12th

12th place

Perfectly mid-table.

Small margins in this division.

He doesn't want us to get relegated and will be signing at least a striker on loan - maybe two.

It's not going perfectly to plan but it's not also going to shit - despite what many fans seem to be indicating at the moment

tangoflash

Swisdom said:

If we had won at the weekend we would be 12th

I was 3 numbers away from a potential £14m jackpot on saturday. Small margins.

Those who seem to defend this regime seem to always think the issue fans have with him is all about results. It's what he's doing to the club on the whole and the complete disregard he has towards us.

To me, a football club isn't the players or staff, or (this bit might upset a few) even the stadium. The fundamental ingredient in Charlton Athletic is us, the fans. Take that away & you're left with nothing...............

colthe3rd

tangoflash said:

Swisdom said:

If we had won at the weekend we would be 12th

I was 3 numbers away from a potential £14m jackpot on saturday. Small margins.

Yeah nice analogy.

scabbyhorse

All about results really and i think your right Swisdom if we had won just two or 3 more games would we have the same level of dissatisfaction as we are seeing at present, personally i would say no BUT i still think it would be good for the club to be a bit more transparent in where they see us moving forward.
There has been some school boy errors from the clubs communication dept in the last month which has done them no favors at all so its really not surprising that the trust is gaining popularity.
I am just praying it does not have a detrimental effect on the players ( It could get worse) if we do not show our support for the team and coach when they cross that white line on a Saturday.

Swisdom

tangoflash said:

Swisdom said:

If we had won at the weekend we would be 12th

I was 3 numbers away from a potential £14m jackpot on saturday. Small margins.

Those who seem to defend this regime seem to always think the issue fans have with him is all about results. It's what he's doing to the club on the whole and the complete disregard he has towards us.

To me, a football club isn't the players or staff, or (this bit might upset a few) even the stadium. The fundamental ingredient in Charlton Athletic is us, the fans. Take that away & you're left with nothing...............

As Scabby says - If the league position were better there would be a lot less discontent. Unfortunately the fans are mutually depressing the club and players whilst the players are dragging us downwards too. Something needs to change - I know this - but I honestly believe Roland wants to make us a success and this just a challenging time for all concerned.

WestCountryAddick

Surely if he wants to move players around within his network they have to agree to this? I can't see too many parents who would want their talented young kids shipped out to Europe to play football. It's not like they'd be going to top European clubs to train with world class players. So it's likely that parents would not want to see some kind of clause in their kids contract that states the club reserve the right to use the player as a network player if it sees fit. We would lose out on many young players for these very reasons as given a choice, they might opt for a different club.

tangoflash

His parents probably live in Gravesend anyway............

Oops, wrong thread. Carry on.......