Internal Talks Planned

Good points Foxello. From my perspective, while you’re right, we have a lot going for us in terms of assets, the reason I’m so pessimistic right now is the way we are being run since Vichais passing. Having assets is key but how you manage them and financially maximise them is the all important part. For example we had two financially valuable playing assets in Tielemans and Soyuncu who remarkably are going to leave this club for nothing in the summer.

18 months ago we could have cashed in handsomely on both if they weren’t committed to signing new deals. In Soyuncus case we should have been actively trying to sell him anyway as he’s been struggling for ages. Letting those two players walk for nothing is just alarming levels of poor management

When I use the word skint - I don’t mean in the Derby or Bolton sense of the word. We’re not facing the administrators, however we’re skint from a PL perspective. You can’t hope to stay in this division without investing in the playing squad.

This squad needed seriously refreshing 2 years ago. The end of the title winning cycle has been on the cards since Puels days. Instead new contracts were given to aging players on relatively high wages and not enough was done to start building the next team. Let me put it another way - despite spending £220m in 3 years we STILL look like a team in desperate need of a refresh. That’s unacceptable

I believe there’s more to this than meets the eye. You don’t reach a financial cliff edge like this without things going wrong behind the scenes. We’re not just being prudent, we’ve financially gambled and have no room to give the squad the investment it needs. To be recording losses higher than Manchester United for a club our size is almost as bad as what Moshiri has done at Everton. At least Everton have got some decent players to show for it - we’ve recently been fielding a 36 year old striker, Daniel Amartey in defence, Soumare, Luke Thomas and Danny Ward!

comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 5 minutes ago
Agree with all of that Foxello. I don’t think we’re at risk financially, but we are at risk of sanctions and I think we’ve tried to adjust the finances to be sustainable and it’s backfired in the short term.

There was no reason why it should. We have enough quality to adjust. But for whatever reason it’s imploded.
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I think that’s a slightly revisionist assessment Mersey. We’ve spent beyond our means chasing European football while recruiting very badly. The perfect recipe for an implosion when you’re a small club.

We haven’t adequately addressed the refresh needed to the squad over the last few years, leaving a situation where over £220m has been spent on the playing squad and we still look like we need an overhaul in key areas. We don’t have a propert no.1 for goodness sake, no strength in depth in wide areas at all and absolutely no quality depth in centre back positions

I’m no saying that there isn’t quality in this squad and we are definitely better than relegation, but it’s threadbare in key areas and there’s nothing left in the kitty to do anything about it

I don’t disagree in the main 99. My view is we took a risk chasing European football and that risk backfired due to poor recruitment and poor integration of players like Daka into the squad.

Fans would have complained if we’d been frugal and not invested for growth after winning the league and qualifying for Europe. I understand why the mistakes were made. What I’m not understanding is why it’s gone so badly wrong so quickly. Some major things I don’t understand must have gone badly wrong behind the scenes. Whatever they are, we need to fix them quickly.

Mistakes were made and it’s quickly unravelling. We need to get a grip on the situation and quickly.

In terms of unravelling so quickly, there will be many theories on that, but for me it feels like we’ve been papering over some cracks for a while. I think the underinvestment into refreshing the squad, which should have taken place in earnest when Puel was here, has finally caught up with us. Basically we have no money left to keep plugging the holes. That’s what we’ve been doing with our signings really - Fofana aside, reacting in the market without fully addressing the needs of the squad.

We should have been looking to recruit a replacement for Vardy (which I know isn’t easy) long before Daka came to the club. We should have been thinking about the system we need to play as we phase Vardy out and how we are going to set up and what players we need to suit that system. Essentially we needed to be building a new team 2-3 years ago and we didn’t. We carried on looking for bargains, giving aging players new contracts, spending on luxury players like Perez and not focussing enough on the academy in my view.

The way we’ve been operating is just about sustainable while your recruitment is spot on. The moment it fails then it’s a domino effect and you’re left with average players, an underperforming team who fails in Europe, lost revenue and then you run out of money. It spirals from there

I’m not 100% aligned there 99. Outlets recruitment strategy was held in high regard only very recently with top European teams coming to understand what we do.

We had a strategy to let players go when we have a replacement. Maguire upgraded to Fofana. Ndidi in for Kante. Justin and Castagne when Chilwell left (lol, Chilwell). All whilst holding on to key players.

We never replaced Mahrez but otherwise I think we’ve done well.

Where it went wrong was last summer for me. We built an expensive squad of highly paid players on top of the first team to compete in Europe. And we either recruited duds in Vestergaard, or players that Rodgers just failed to integrate like Daka and Soumare.

Daka looks a top player, but like Vardy, in a Rodgers team he’s pointless. Vardy managed to somehow take his 1 chance every other game the last couple of seasons but that was never going to last.

So this issue was that our squad quickly became bloated with unhappy players. Then Rodgers started to isolate some of them. Then Rodgers started to drop good players to make a point. Then he changed tactics that didn’t suit Maddison, Vardy or Ndidi. 3 players you could argue are our most influential on form.

So for me, that summer of recruitment and then Rodgers’ handling of the situation has accelerated everything. But to me it feels quick, like something went on that broke a strong squad.

Hi all.

I agree with the constructive criticism of those at the top of the club, but in the main because they have not managed expectations.

TBF to Top, his reported wealth has dropped from £4.5bn to £1.5bn because of the effect of covid on the hospitality industry. King Power's business is underpinned by duty free shops and hotels in Thailand - all of which will have suffered catastrophic and unexpected losses due to the pandemic. I know Vishai was a great man and businessman but I don't think even he could have managed much better than Top.

Where Top, Whelan and Rudkin have erred in my opinion, is that they have not come out late last year or early this year and told everyone (and I include Rodgers and the team in that) that we need to be braced for some tough times, that they have suffered terrible losses in their core businesses, and whilst they will never abandon LCFC we are going to have to pull together and operate in a vastly different way. That would have managed everyone's expectations and maybe instigated a Dunkirk spirit to see us through the bad times.

Top is clearly not the massively experienced businessman his Dad was, but he's a loyal, dedicated and honest owner who I have every confidence will do his best to deliver the wishes of the fans and his father.

comment by Merseysidefox (U4842)
posted 2 hours, 30 minutes ago
I’m not 100% aligned there 99. Outlets recruitment strategy was held in high regard only very recently with top European teams coming to understand what we do.

We had a strategy to let players go when we have a replacement. Maguire upgraded to Fofana. Ndidi in for Kante. Justin and Castagne when Chilwell left (lol, Chilwell). All whilst holding on to key players.

We never replaced Mahrez but otherwise I think we’ve done well.

Where it went wrong was last summer for me. We built an expensive squad of highly paid players on top of the first team to compete in Europe. And we either recruited duds in Vestergaard, or players that Rodgers just failed to integrate like Daka and Soumare.

Daka looks a top player, but like Vardy, in a Rodgers team he’s pointless. Vardy managed to somehow take his 1 chance every other game the last couple of seasons but that was never going to last.

So this issue was that our squad quickly became bloated with unhappy players. Then Rodgers started to isolate some of them. Then Rodgers started to drop good players to make a point. Then he changed tactics that didn’t suit Maddison, Vardy or Ndidi. 3 players you could argue are our most influential on form.

So for me, that summer of recruitment and then Rodgers’ handling of the situation has accelerated everything. But to me it feels quick, like something went on that broke a strong squad.
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Not sure if you meant Rudkin rather than the word outlet but if you did then you’re placing way too much success on his shoulders. And who are these top European teams recently coming to understand what we were doing? Not sure where you’ve heard that?

We built a very very good reputation for strong recruitment built on data analysis, that was nearly 10 years ago and a system Walsh and Pearson put in place along with the sports science. The sports science techniques were certainly looked at by other clubs. I wouldn’t credit Rudkin on the recruitment or signing individual players if that’s what you’re referring to - it’s not his remit and never has been.

You’re right when you talk about selling assets and replacing them well, but that’s not what building a team is about. We did indeed upgrade the likes of Maguire to Fofana but meanwhile other areas of the squad were beginning to look threadbare and we missed out on CL partly because we didn’t invest in the areas required (strength in depth in wide positions for example).

So in my mind, because of the strength of our recruitment team, which is still very good, we’ve been plugging holes effectively. Losing a key asset and investing in a new one. What we’ve not been doing is planning for a major squad refresh which was needed some time ago. We not done enough basically

On top of that Rudkin made a serious strategic error by appointing Lee Congerton (on BRs recommendation) as head of recruitment two years ago. That’s where everything started to unravel and that’s what saw the worst recruitment drive in the clubs recent history last summer leading to, as you correctly say, a bloated squad of average highly paid players.

On top of that Rudkin has failed badly on the contracts side - a huge part of his remit. The wages paid to Rodgers, the extended contracts to aging players we needed to move on and most seriously - the failure to move on players coming to the end of their contracts meaning the club lose valuable assets for nothing

comment by For Fox Sake (U4263)
posted 35 minutes ago
Hi all.

I agree with the constructive criticism of those at the top of the club, but in the main because they have not managed expectations.

TBF to Top, his reported wealth has dropped from £4.5bn to £1.5bn because of the effect of covid on the hospitality industry. King Power's business is underpinned by duty free shops and hotels in Thailand - all of which will have suffered catastrophic and unexpected losses due to the pandemic. I know Vishai was a great man and businessman but I don't think even he could have managed much better than Top.

Where Top, Whelan and Rudkin have erred in my opinion, is that they have not come out late last year or early this year and told everyone (and I include Rodgers and the team in that) that we need to be braced for some tough times, that they have suffered terrible losses in their core businesses, and whilst they will never abandon LCFC we are going to have to pull together and operate in a vastly different way. That would have managed everyone's expectations and maybe instigated a Dunkirk spirit to see us through the bad times.

Top is clearly not the massively experienced businessman his Dad was, but he's a loyal, dedicated and honest owner who I have every confidence will do his best to deliver the wishes of the fans and his father.
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I don’t disagree with this but would go further and say that the hit to the finances would have been made more manageable but better decision making. After Covid, why were we splashing money we clearly didn’t have to chase european football - pushing the club to the brink of FFP. If they had come out and as you say, explained the situation to the fans, I’m sure we would have understood

Top financially is still worth a lot more than the owner of Forest for example, but for whatever reason he isn’t able to invest anymore in the club at this time. For me, he needs to seek external investment for the club to be able to keep pushing on with retaining its position in the PL (which means investment in the playing squad) and expanding the stadium. If he doesn’t have the money to do both then he needs to either get that investment or make some very difficult choices.

The way the club is being run right now (bigger losses than United ffs!), we’re going to have the best stadium the championship has ever seen

Sorry Mersey I have a habit of sounding like I’m dismissing what others are saying when responding - wouldn’t come across like that face to face!! You could be absolutely right on Rudkin, it’s just my personal take that the man’s a clown - I could of course be totally wrong