inckley fox

You can have an opinion on any entity without wishing to be part of it, especially if it's supposed to represent you. I'll never join the Tory party, but I have the right to have an opinion on the decisions that their members make when those decisions determine the country's next PM. And that's definitely not a party political statement! At some point in time it will apply to Labour too. People can have all sorts of opinions about all sorts of organisations that they choose not to be a part of. As a Leicester fan, I don't think I'd be an appropriate member of the Trust, given my circumstances and the time I could devote to it. Many others could say that for all sorts of reasons. But the Trust claim to represent us, and I expect their language to reflect that. There are many valid ways, beyond joining the Trust, in which a City fan can voice his or her concerns. Publishing your thoughts on social media is arguably one of them. What you say on matchday another. You can't take the view that those voices should be ignored by the Trust because they didn't sign up.

What leverage have they had? It certainly hasn't been employed to any effect. If, in the current climate, the Trust pushes just a little more and the club violently resists, I think LCFC would be extremely unwise to do so. I don't think any body representing the voice of the fans should be emphasising the decency of the board right now more than they're emphasising the questions that need to be asked of them. If they are doing this (and, not for the first time, they are), then I don't see how the leverage they aspire to have could, in any way, be productive. I'm not asking for scorched Earth stuff, and I wasn't the last time that one of the Trust's statements came across as benign as this one does. I'm expecting their rhetoric to reflect the gravity of the situation if they're expecting the fanbase as a whole to feel it's voicing their concerns.

In the context of what's been going on recently, I'm not sure they can lay claim to representing the fanbase if the emphasis remains on how thankful they are to KP. Dropping in one diplomatically querying adjective doesn't help either. That said, unless they have a great deal more information than any of us do, I don't see how they can demand resignations, because we don't know who's to blame. Even so, it would be completely reasonable to insist (far more forcibly) that the club reach out a lot more, establishing new points of contact with local media / fan groups, and acknowledge the need to address - over time, but also openly and humbly - some more serious questions. I don't think the Trust comes across at all well when its proverbial tongue appears to be searching so hungrily for the club's rear end.

You'd prefer a season of misery in the PL, followed by god knows what sort of season the year after in the 2nd tier...? Is that better than simply getting that season of restructuring in the 2nd tier (which should have happened this year, perhaps) out of the way next year? Maybe our future would be more secure in the first of those scenarios, in which case I'd welcome it, but if we're simply putting off the inevitable readjustment at a lower level, then personally I'd rather do that sooner, not later. I'd have thought we were all fed up of short termism.

Alternatively, they could keep recruiting in the way they have done for the past half decade or so, and accept that they'll have to develop those players and sell on their costliest talent. As they have done up to now. Why change? And why did we change?

I'm sure Rudkin and Whelan also have a team working beneath them. So maybe they're the problem. Maybe Top, Rudkin and Whelan can all hide behind Jon's PA, or Whelan's head of staff. Or maybe those guys can hide behind their subordinates too. I've always been a bit uncomfortable that people look at Rudkin - the only person in that executive team with any sort of footballing background, the only one who's served the club over decades, and one of the few with no financial responsibility - and assume that he is to blame for everything that's gone wrong. And with absolutely no evidence to back any of it up. People are grasping for anyone who they can blame, other than Top, because they don't want it to be Top. Yes, it would have been reassuring to see heads roll when it all went wrong. But maybe heads didn't roll because those people weren't to blame in the first place. Maybe, if we're blaming JR for everything that's gone wrong, he should also be given credit for much of what went right. Maybe his statue should be standing there! In all seriousness - clearly not. And it would have been reassuring to see Top respond to our collapse by making changes which reflected the gravity of the situation, which may have spelt the end for Rudkin. I, like you, suspect he's one of many incompetents in leading roles. But I don't think Rudkin should distract from tha fact that Top has the ultimate responsibility for the financial catastrophe that we've sleepwalked into. And I don't think people should feel an undue sense of gratitude to our owners.

I'm not sure whether that's hypocrisy, or just a case of people expressing opinions about things that they can't possibly be appropriately informed on. They don't have a clue what's likely to come out in next year's accounts, nor the ins and outs of the behind the scenes conversations, so they take a viewpoint which suits the very limited picture that they're getting of things. I.e. let's invest in this team because as far as I know the money's there / let's change the boss because as far as I know the money's there / let's not sell Barnes or Youri or Maddison / let's forget about FFP because nobody ever does anything about it anyway. It's a similar principal to someone like Junior Lewis not being good enough at PL level. Clearly that's down to a manager who had worked with him for years, saw things that we didn't in training and, based on that wealth of information, should have known better - rather than to the fans who heartily cheered his debut and wondered for a minute whether we'd uncovered another bargain. You could hardly say 'well, you silly sods said he was alright' when he turned out to be rubbish, because they didn't have the same information in front of them as the manager, and they weren't amply reimbursed as experts contracted to deal with those matters. So you heard nothing more, nothing less than you'd expect to hear from them when (a) Junior Lewis had a good game and (b) he ended up being awful. It's not really hypocrisy, and it's not always negative either, because clearly a lot of the support for KP and their sound financial management in the past has also been a consequence of us not seeing the full picture. If these fans were paid to be on top of that sort of information, it'd make sense to be annoyed with them.

Normally you'd say 'thank god they weren't being paid seven figure sums to look after our finances', but on this occasion it barely made any difference.

What level of ****ed would we be if we didn't go up? (It may well be a dumb question, by the way!). Clearly there'd be a fire sale if we could offload players, and probably no incomings, not to mention a deduction. But beyond that might it also be a chance to start from scratch, become equitable(ish) again and avoid legal action from clubs that claim we achieved promotion thanks to an illegal advantage? I doubt there's a scenario where two separate bans are imposed, with the PL one lingering over us in the event of promotion for years to come. So there is an argument that, if we come through this, we might actually be able to start afresh, rather than fighting fires constantly for the next few years. I do wonder, as we stare play-offs in the face, whether the board might at some stage regret not encouraging a faster process, and a deduction this season. For me I'd happily forego automatic promotion, and even promotion all together, in exchange for a chance to face our reality, and rebuild. Or is all of this insanely optimistic? Is the financial situation so grave that the future of the club is at stake? I'd not got that impression, but it could well be the case for all I know.

It's interesting that you say this, because my biggest criticism of the Puel and Rodgers era was that our recruitment over-emphasised technicality. It was a shift which I especially noticed over the course of the Rodgers tenure, as he clearly preferred technical, ready-to-go acquisitions in their early-mid 20s, instead of developing younger projects. Unfortunately, our budget doesn't bring in the cream of the talent when you're looking for established, technically-gifted players as opposed to raw pace or unpolished physicality in emerging players. Someone pointed out earlier that you have to question the mentality of those players who have been here throughout the past five or so years, and I thought there was a case to make that the problem here was not so much Vardy, Justin, Ricardo, Ndidi, Kelechi and those who have been here over that time. Instead, I thought you could argue that, across different regimes, the club had recruited the wrong sorts of characters. At all levels.

You could be right, though there are other potential factors too. For instance, the sorts of qualities that we tend to look for in our recruitment of players and managers, so that even newer players don't have the characteristics that successful and resolute teams tend to have.

If he really said that, he's either consciously lying (I have no idea what he thinks he'd gain from such a lie, because it's so comically and demonstrably a lie that nobody could ever take it seriously) or a complete lost cause.

And only one idea, with a violent aversion to any others creeping in.

Don't forget Faes and Fatawu. I mean, Fatawu didn't get a single thing right all game long. Neither winger has been any good for ages. Vardy also had a nightmare. And our defence, and its lack of positional discipline or physicality, is astounding. Especially when you have Ricardo, Coady, Souttar, Doyle as options. The manager's game-management, like the predictability and inflexibility of his system, was bordering on unforgivable.

No, but their wages might be a terrible starting point!

I'm not sure, with laws and rules in general, that it's much of a defence to say that you didn't go along with them in the first place. It's not an argument which springs to mind when someone is caught with an ounce of hash. I don't personally approve of FFP in its current incarnation, and the accusation of hypocrisy - which to me seemed a valid one until I learnt that we possibly opposed these regulations - appears wide of the mark. On the other hand, as Ric says, it doesn't look like we ever pushed for change, so it's hard to convincingly get on board with the idea that our plight is something that should inspire widespread backing from others across the game. My point, though, is that we don't know enough about what has been said and done away from the public eye to be able to form an argument one way or the other regarding how valiant or culpable we might have been when it comes to the acceptance of the norms. It's plain to see that The Telegraph's argument is as unfounded as the one which says we're on morally sound footings. To me, the only argument that even the most well-informed journos or ITKs can convincingly sustain, concerns whether or not the club has been run competently enough to succeed within whatever the existing rules are. The argument about the rights and wrongs of FFP, and the argument about whether our board has presided over a disaster in its alleged failure to comply, are two quite separate things. Whether pot should be legal and whether someone who's been caught selling it can be deemed to have screwed up are also, to me, separate things. I'm not sure how much pride there is to be had from banging a drum from a prison cell, with your future in tatters all around you. Bearing in mind that the only success we're ever going to enjoy, or ever have enjoyed, has been from operating within the norms, it seems like a useless distraction to look at the mess we're in and say 'well, before worrying about how we should go about things differently, let's spend some time complaining about how unfair this all is.'

Some brilliant points. But, if we knew all along that we had to sell in order to be compliant, why did we stop doing that in 2021? And then not make it abundantly clear to the manager that losses would have to be recouped a year later if we fell short? Any way I look at it, the situation reflects horribly on those in charge. Everything else is just moaning about something we'd rarely seen fit to moan about while it suited us not to.

Regarding the line about how vital it is for us to go up: If we're to have a 10 point fine and face the need to sell all of our assets, I do wonder which would be the best division for us to rebuild in. If we can become an equitable club at EFL level, rather than divebombing out of the EPL and kicking it all down the line for a year, is there an argument that this might provide a more solid foundation in the long-term, and a better experience for the fans? Or is the situation so desperate that we simply need those EPL dollars? And is there any risk of an EPL points deduction which hangs over us for multiple years (in other words, meaning we could go up a decade later and still be effectively relegated without kicking a ball)? Or is that just some weird unfounded fear of mine?

While I share the same frustrations about the unfairness of the whole thing, te problem here is that this argument also ignores the hefty spending which came from those cut-price sales. We weren't fishing in the smaller ponds, picking up Max Bird or Jason Knight for 1-2m apiece. We spent 4 times the amount those guys went for on Harry Winks, with wages that will also dwarf those combined amounts. We didn't settle for the two international keepers we had, or Stolarczyk, we had to buy a fourth for a multi-million fee, because we'd opted for a manager with a one-dimensional outlook on the game who simply couldn't get by with that option. And when we thought we might only have one striker available for 4 or 5 mid-season games, instead of saying 'hey, but we have four very good CFs on our books' we said 'let's splash out 8m or 9m on a guy with a broken back whom we'll barely play'. When we looked at our four or five very valid CB options, we chose to part with the sort of sum which most FLC sides can only dream of, in order for CB#6 to simply sit on the bench all season long. This was not a club cutting its cloth accordingly. And we gained very little, Winks aside, from that particular bout of profligacy. It remains to be seen whether the end-product is even promotion-worthy. I love the club and think it's worth people having a sense of balance before they call for Top to go. Okay, I've always felt that KP's role has been hugely overstated, and that it"s easier to align our success with the impact of NP, his backroom staff and players than it is with the board - but even so, they have tended to act in very good faith (even if that turns out not to be the case this time) and they allowed us to thrive where previous boards of ours wouldn't have. But some of the arguments on here are extremely thin, and at times veer into persecution-complex territory. It might surprise some fans that mismanagement over the course of many years may finally have got us into serious trouble. For others, it won't shock them at all, and they may well appreciate why some clubs - and not only Leeds or Southampton - are a bit miffed by the advantage we've supposedly tried to gain. If people had their eyes open to this sort of mismanagement, and how the only person who any club can be sure is responsible is the owner (instead of Top, think Mel Morris, who was equally lauded at Derby), then the owner in question might put a little more effort into doing his job properly. I hope we ask the right questions in the weeks and months to come.

I honestly wouldn't read into it too much one way or the other. The shortcomings we manifested have also been apparent in the FLC, so we can't say 'ah, well, what did you expect against a PL side?' And the only reason we didn't get a pasting was that Chelsea contrived to invite us back into the game instead of pressing on. We had flashes which showed some of our players can compete (principally a player who's likely to be off whether we go up or not), but no new ideas were tried out - understandably - and all we saw was a reminder that things which cost us against lower level opposition will also cost us at a higher level. I'm not sure what else you can glean from it.

Yes. By that measure if you co-operate wonderfully and don't break any rules, they should give you two points for free.

It does seem odd, in some respects, that we're playing three CBs right now (one out of position) and two of them are likely to be gone next year. Vestergard has been good, but he's old, his contract will soon be up, and he was very poor for us at the higher level. Doyle is a loanee. Faes was also very poor at the higher level (and often this level too!). Coady, Souttar, Nelson look - on paper at least - like very valid alternatives for the longer-term. I totally get why Enzo, especially given his preferred style and the form of Jannik, or the poor form of Justin on the left, has gone with those options. But we could freshen a malfunctioning back-line in the short term with those alternatives, and provide ourselves with serious options for the road ahead. I mean, it's not as if Coady's skill-set excludes him from playing at a higher level, is it?

If you accept that there is such a thing as a side becoming predictable, then you have to imagine that playing roughly the same eleven in exactly the same shape and with exactly the same build-up play throughout a season would leave you vulnerable to it. This was always my concern with Enzo, but on the other hand you could say that he was tasked with doing just that. It's possible that the board felt too many compromises on their preferred approach had been made over time, with us turning back to Pearson, then Shakespeare in 2017. Or Ranieri/Rodgers initially being tasked to play 'hybrid' systems which evolved towards more possession-based approaches, as opposed to an abrupt introduction, and frequently adding players, even later on, (Daka, Souttar etc.) who fitted our old, not our preferred new identity. Then you have us lurching back for Shakespeare all over again at the death. Perhaps they felt that we needed to be unflinching in our approach this time round, if we were ever to convincingly rebrand ourselves. In that case, you have to say that Enzo has shown he can do pretty well with that remit, even if the logic behind it is questionable. But it just seems too easy to set up against. If you lob the ball down one flank there won't be a RB. Down the other, you have a slow LB. Down the middle, you'll have a high line with two slow CBs and not too much pace from the DCM either. I accept fully that there a whole load of other things going on. Poor decisions. Poor defending as a team; not closing down quickly enough or, perhaps, not winning enough of our 50-50s. Missed chances. Injuries. Background noise at the club and so on. I also accept that you can have the sort of build-up play that Enzo favours and be successful, even in trying to come up from this level. However, would it really hurt to at least address the aspects of our shape which sides are exploiting game-in-out? Do you always need the inverted RB? Couldn't you try rejigging things, given that we have a disproportionate number of our best options at CB and CF? I mean, we play four wide players, and only really have 5-6 options in those roles that Enzo is willing to explore. We play two 8s, and there are only two credible options. On the other hand we play two CBs despite six very credible options, and one CF with four. Is there a chance that our insistence on one set-up is depriving us of the options to keep things fresh? Or are these guys warming the bench just overrated and crap? I also understand that there are a whole load of nuances in Enzo's plan A which are inventive and interesting. Yet a master tactician, for me, isn't someone who does precisely the same thing come what may. He's done a fine job up to now within those limits, but I just don't see much of a future for it. If Enzo becomes a great manager - and he may well - he'll have more strings to his bow by that point than he does currently.

What did he stand to gain from not writing it off, I wonder? I read it as one of those things where he wasn't likely to actually see any of that money again, and I'm sure I read someone speculating at the time that it could even smooth the path for a sale. Not that that's happened, but even so.

Very, very poor team selection. Mavididi has been a question mark for ages, as has Faes and Justin. Yunus seldom justifies his inclusion. Doyle, Coady, Souttar, Albrighton must be wondering. 50% of the substitutions involved removing our best player. A clear example of a manager getting it wrong and failing to promptly address the issues.