Stadt

Comparable record with Steve Kean. He's a crap PL manager. Even in the championship he managed: 6th with Guehi, Gallagher, Andre Ayew 4th with Gyokeres, Rodon, Ayew, Hourihane, Conor Roberts, Gibbs-White but still.. Obviously those players were much younger then

#WhenTaken #374 (07.03.2025) I scored 861/1000🏆 1️⃣📍703 km - 🗓️2 yrs - 🥇177/200 2️⃣📍660 km - 🗓️8 yrs - 🥈169/200 3️⃣📍544 m - 🗓️0 yrs - 🥇200/200 4️⃣📍963 km - 🗓️10 yrs - 🥈156/200 5️⃣📍774 km - 🗓️11 yrs - 🥈159/200 https://whentaken.com

We're even bad at arranging loans. It's not an ideal proxy, but over the last 5 years we're probably 6-8th for academy profits which says we're doing something right, (Chilwell, Barnes, KDH alone c £120m). Then, there's barely any interest from top end League 1 and Championship clubs for our players? I just don't buy it. Our young players have to ladder loans up the league like we're West Brom or Coventry not a club with one of the best facilities in the world. Even the 3 aforementioned players had break through loans at 21 or so, they did have a few pottering around picking up a few appearances before their standout options but why does it take us so long? I can't prove it but it feels like if Alves and Braybrooke came through at Villa they'd have been at midtable Championship clubs at 18 or 19. Jacob Ramsey had a brief spell at Doncaster then started 6 PL games the following season. They also hawked some of their fringe youngsters for decent profits and PSR swindles too, something we never. Archer (after activating a buy-back clause) and Philogene went fro about £40m massively alleviating PSR concerns. Chukwuemeka went for £15m or so at 18 and he'd made 3 starts. Even just a couple of starts can massively inflate a fee. If Monga or Alves had put in Ayew, or Mavididi or BDCR's performances you;d have some people saying they'd never make it. Nwaneri has proved that age isn't a direct barometer of ability. Just play them. Even if it's for 20 minutes, we don't have a development ethos when we have the most influential academy director in world football - more proof he is useless.

Again, I’m almost sorry to labour the point but Rudkin has more influence at Leicester than an academy director/head of development does in world football. That he doesn’t actually use his influence for the academy’s benefit is just absolutely typical. It should be written into managerial contracts that you have to give x% of minutes to academy products.

It’s also why 09-15 was so enjoyable. It was a likeable, rag-tag bunch enjoying the apex of their careers with us.

At exactly the time demand was highest too. A lot of the footballing **** ups would be more tolerable if we were in a 40k ground, with a safe standing end, local beer on tap with reasonable matchday pricing. I'm glad Whelan has finally gotten heat this season because the treatment of fans has been shot for years an that's not Rudkin's fault.

Pretty good set of players. Weale in goal perhaps. Dyer on the other wing, Drinkwater and Hammond in the middle? Drinky perhaps less likely to do it. Fryatt, Izzet, Walsh, Elliott, Taggart, Richard Smith as bench options maybe.

Too young to have watched him play but you could see his affection for the club on the football league show. Him and Manish were a great foil for each other.

Getting your knee bent the wrong way as a 16 year old is hardly the same as just innate injury prone-ness

They are completely defensible signings - I agree with that. Soumare I wouldn't have signed as he played in quite an odd system and his pressure numbers (available via fbref at the time) were just too low for the type of position he plays. I said as much on here at the time. However, the weird thing is they were just completely supplementary signings, none of them were ever going to be first choice immediately. That was consciously our biggest net spend as we didn't sell anybody for the first summer in a while. Perez and Albrighton were our right wing options and demonstrably not good enough. They started 15 and 17 games respectively the season before - had we have signed a decent RW that summer instead of a second (or third) choice striker and fourth choice CM we'd have been in a far better position.

He had the opportunity for a rebuild but the head of recruitment he had installed signed Daka, Soumare, Vestergaard & Bertrand AND we didn’t sell anybody that summer. The recruitment under Rodgers and Congerton was largely shit. Justin and Fofana were the only outright successes in 4 years (Tielemans’ permanent signing doesn’t count). There were a few ok signings like Castagne too. If he’d have just played a side with more defensive responsibility we’d have been fine. Just dropping Ward after his 3rd bad game would have kept us up.

That’s surprising. Predictably the old town is crass and so far removed from what it would have been like even 15 years ago but the rest is great. Zizkov is up your street. It’s European Bar Guide’s favourite city for good reason and outside the central districts beers are sub £3 despite the impressive living standards.

On 20 May 2015, Simpson was found guilty of assaulting his then-girlfriend and mother of his child, Stephanie Ward, on 28 December 2014.[46][47] He was sentenced to 300 hours of community service.[48]On 12 May 2016, his sentence was reviewed in light of press intrusion into his community service, and replaced with a 22:00 to 06:00 curfew for 21 days.[49] Joined us summer 2014

I think it's the nicest big city in the world. The districts being distinct from one another is cool too.

#WhenTaken #370 (03.03.2025) I scored 873/1000🏆 1️⃣📍1.3K km - 🗓️6 yrs - 🥈158/200 2️⃣📍2.0K km - 🗓️9 yrs - 🥈137/200 3️⃣📍1.1 km - 🗓️5 yrs - 🥇195/200 4️⃣📍34.0 m - 🗓️4 yrs - 🥇196/200 5️⃣📍274 km - 🗓️4 yrs - 🥇187/200 https://whentaken.com I liked 2, proper chin-stroker

We didn't sack Simpson

Is your super secret Sunday idea Sundaes? Because that feels like it might have been done already

When did the Kings Heqd get the standard BCA refurb? Not as garish as the Salmon but the busy wallpaper, upholstery and carpet is too much.

The player power culture at the club is too strong and I think probably spearheaded by Vardy. When we have such a supine owner and DoF almost any manager is undermined by players that won’t do the bare minimum.

I think the opposite is true. Top is probably barely involved at all which leaves a decision making vacuum with Rudkin in de facto control - which he doesn’t seem to realise hence the dithering and haphazard approach.

Wallace writes a couple of critical articles a season. He wrote the best one during 22/23.

Vestergaard’s new deal was criminal. It’s like Rudkin just says yes to everything. We held all the cards, he’d finally worked his way into the side after two seasons of stinking up the place on big wages. Finally looks ok playing a division below most of his career at 30. New 3 year deal ffs.

I’d be cautiously optimistic about Wellens. For a front-foot side they adapted well to Man City, it’s just one game obviously but we need a manager that can coach a side with 60+ % possession and also to absorb pressure.

It’s appalling. We lose out on a player AND a fee AND we have to pay for a (usually) worse replacement. In a normal business if you had multi-million assets being sweated into a zero value, heads would roll. Rudkin has done it again and again because he routinely fails to sell anyone we want rid of. Normal clubs sell players with a year left - we don’t.

Roughly chronologically: - Signing Inler for circa £6m, left on a free the following season. - Signing a 28 year old Slimani for c. £30m when he’d play as the most advanced striker - that was Vardy’s position. Left on a free to Lyon after three loans. - Signing Kapustka for c. £5m on the back of the Euros. Made 3 apps, left on a free. - Signing Mendy as a Kante replacement. Totally different types of players, Mendy’s tackling stats were miles off. Then he was given a new 2 year deal in 2020 after starting 31 league games in 3 seasons. - Giving Matty James a 4 year deal in 2017 after injuring his ACL. He started 17 league games over those 4 years, left on a free. - Aforementioned Silva fiasco, 14 seconds etc. Signed for c. £20m - left on a free. - Appointing Shakespeare permanently, he did a stellar job to keep us up but by the end of 16/17 it was apparent he wasn’t the Roy fit. - Appointing Puel. Not a disastrous appointment in his own right but the process behind it is symptomatic of the lack of vision. He was cheap and known to us after being sacked by Southampton - we’d never have appointed him from Nice. Will add more soon.