inckley fox

It was the most predictable promotion in the entire history of the division. The highest wage bill. A set of players who'd done well in the PL if you went back over a season. He inherited Ndidi, KDH, the younger Pereira and the younger Vardy. He got money to spend, and with which to bring in the likes of Hermansen, Fatawu and a fully-motivated Winks. And even then we were barely in top six form for the final quarter of the season. The slump in form which continues to consume us to this day arguably began in that second half of the Maresca campaign. Few if any of his players proved to be truly fine acquisitions (the profit made on Hermansen, whose ability to make the step up to EPL was nonetheless very dubious, may make him the best candidate). And it was always clear that we'd never get away with playing his brand of football if we did go up, thus necessitating a painful and ultimately disastrous transition under his successor. He deserves full credit for earning a promotion, regardless of how likely it was, and how unconvincing at times. But the idea that he would have done better than he was doing towards the end of his reign with no money, no Hermansen, no Vardy, no Ndidi, no KDH, a past-it Pereira, a points deduction (with another possibly on its way) and the most poisonous of atmospheres at every level of the club, is fanciful to say the least. He was a short-term fix to a long-term problem, a shoo-in for success who delivered exactly what he was expected to, but did nothing to address the things that needed addressing. Kidding ourselves otherwise gives the false impression that we need more Enzos, that this board can occasionally get things spot on, or even that these players - with the right boss - could be world-beaters. The sooner we get over all three of these delusions and focus on the glaringly obvious issues at hand, the better.

When people say that I lack respect for Top, I think it's a reasonable response to say that putting down our collapse to incompetence rather than sabotage is kind. Not because I believe he's doing this on purpose - not for one second - but because it's so, so bad, that it kind of looks that way. It's like people who looked at the questions asked of Trump's closeness to Putin a decade ago, wondering whether he'd do everything he could to embolden his supposed enemy. Now he has apparently done exactly that, there are three camps. Those who say that this is because he's in Putin's pocket, those who say he isn't but it looks like he is, and those who say that there's nothing whatsoever to see here. You can debate two of those viewpoints, and the third is hysterically removed from reality. This almost mirrors where we are with the Top debate. It's silly to say that he's done this on purpose, even if it damn well looks like it. But if he hasn't, which would of course be malevolent beyond words on his part, then the only other logical explanation is that he's an incompetent of historical proportions. This is, of course, the overwhelmingly logical conclusion, and way easier to arrive at than it would be to laugh off the possibility of any murky kompromat which explains DJT's foreign policy. The only truly, truly dumb way of looking at things; the third option, and akin to those who actually defend Trump's presidency, is the mad idea that our owners have been anything other than diabolical. Their failures and the culture they have nurtured in the post-Pearson era has led us here. The entire thing is rotten and impossible to thrive in. We're detestable because we've allowed ourselves to become detestable. I genuinely find it scary that only one of our last four managers has really put his finger on why we are where we are, and that was the utterly unqualified Ruud, who grew hoarse moaning about our low standards and lousy culture. At some point the whole club and, hopefully, a better manager than Ruud, needs to address this.

The officials were poor, and we were unlucky with one or two big calls, but I do actually think the referee could make a case for his decision not to give a red. And as others have pointed out, both sides were error prone. Our goals came from mistakes too. We came very close to nicking it and, given Preston's decision to go defensive, they could hardly have complained if we'd taken the points. But I don't think that our performance truly constituted deserving the win. I still think that we're not always doing the dirty work in games. And it's frequently our better performers who are culpable. Today Mukasa had a really decent game, but he's averse at times to putting the boot in, closing players down, making it hard for defenders. And it's unfair to single him out because you could say the same about so many others. Fatawu. Mavididi. One minute they'll do it, then the next they won't. It's so undisciplined, and while I appreciate that Rowett has made some improvements, he still hasn't improved this. So we never truly deserve to win games for me. We never get to dominate because there's a whole half of the game that we tend to neglect.

Has been, I think. Or did I dream it?

I understand, but he'll know those words already, it's a case of whether he uses them or not. Telling him he won't get to go to the football if he does would create less of a taboo than kicking up a fuss. We can't shut kids' ears off to the world, and if we try it tends to backfire pretty quickly. Mind you, if the consequence of him saying the word 'cxnt' is that he doesn't get to see Leicester anymore, you may find he turns into Ray Winstone overnight.

I think this begs three obvious questions: 'Why not?' 'What makes you think it affects morale?' And, as regards your last comment, 'What do you propose we do about it then?' There are, as I see it, five possible futures for the club, all of which are to my mind equally feasible. In the first, we stay up and struggle on with KP for a few years - maybe next season is a little better, maybe a little worse, and maybe at some point things start to even out again - but it'll be tough. In the second, we stay up and they either find an unlikely buyer or go into administration in this division, and we get new owners. Either of these could signal our revival, our stagnation or an ultimately irrelevant delay to our demise. In the third scenario, we go down and go bust. There are no new buyers, and we restart in non-league football. In the fourth, it's much the same, but we're rescued at the death. And in the fifth we go down, KP keep us afloat for a period of time, and we gradually, painfully rebuild from wherever. Or don't. When these are the likeliest scenarios, I have to wonder - if you're contenting yourself with a quiet 'tut-tut' - whether anything could ever make you see the need for a little more than a roll of the eyeballs. But some of these polite eye-rollers are, in spite of what we may think, actually capable of outrage. Okay, Ginetta was more outraged by Pearson selling Sol Bamba a decade or so ago than by Top's catastrophic tenure, and most of the ire of the KP apologists has been directed at everyone who's said 'Hang on a minute, we might have to pipe up about this', but at least that's proof that they're capable of getting annoyed. And at some point I suspect you'll all need to get annoyed again, just instinctively, as a reaction to watching the whole thing fall apart once and for all. It might make more sense to speak up before that though and, given that this freefall began when everyone was still keeping their seats warm and nicely minding their Ps and Qs, I wouldn't worry too much about prompting our downfall if you do choose to do so. Protest has sparked positive change at this club and others. In time, it may do the same again. We're getting towards the stage where it may be our best hope and, if we do lose on Friday, I doubt the real reason will be a smattering of placards on the terraces. Regardless of whether or not that's the narrative the Supporters Club and co are going to be spinning from now on. And I should really add that the things we're moaning out aren't matters for debate. Years ago O'Neill said, of poor old Barrie Pierpoint, that his 14 year-old daughter could do a better job. That was maybe a tad harsh, but what we've seen under Top truly is startling incompetence. You really would have expected a teenager to show more sense, and interest for that matter. It's indefensible and the only argument in favour of keeping quiet is an emotional bond to a member of the owner's family. As much as I share that bond, I don't think it should come first, and I don't think judgements based on emotion (including, for the sake of balance, those of some protesters) are always the best. This is very much a 'use your noggin' kind of a moment!

I live abroad these days so I'm in no position to be saying 'you should do this' or 'that won't work'. I'm really grateful for the effort and, as all meaningful defences of KP are gradually dismantled and blown away, think the larger numbers will come. If the protests are a fixture, in time they'll be seen as something people can easily join when the moment seems right to them. I honestly think it's all about persistence. I do think there has been some unfortunate timing. One protest before a new boss's first home game, when all eyes were on what he might be able to change. Another on the back of our first win in ages, when there was more optimism than we'd known in a long while. People shouldn't be distracted by such minor pleasures, but they will be. Having seen all of these recollections of protests I attended in the Shipman era and beyond (not the O'Neill one, I should smugly add!), it struck me that these were both impromptu and post, rather than pre-match. So having a regular event which people feel they can join on the spur of a moment will at some point be effective. Could there be anything similarly fixed which could take place after a game? You may well see more people drawn to that, when all shreds of optimism have been freshly obliterated. Either way, this is vital stuff. Whatever you choose to do, I'm behind it and - as the existential nature of the argument becomes ever clearer - so will the wider strength of feeling. When someone feels they can conveniently and easily say, '**** it, I'm gonna join them this time', and the right (or, depending on your viewpoint, wrong) timing coincides, it'll take off. Easy for me to say, but I believe the tide is turning. And let's be honest, if we are right in what we're saying, at some stage the pro-KP argument will simply seem so flimsy and borderline non-existent that the fanbase will become increasingly united. Granted, we could be at the brink of extinction by then, and there'll still be smatterings of silly sods banging the KP drum, but it'll come.

You weren't necessarily right on all that though. Soyuncu being frozen out was understandable. He wanted to leave and the coaches felt he wasn't training well. When he played, he was poor. I, among many others, argued that Rodgers should never have been appointed in the first place. So you weren't exactly a prophet on that score either. When he was, he shouldn't have been fired early on at all, he should have been fired in the summer/autumn of 2022. El Khannous was the glue for this side? THIS side? That's no badge of honour. Skipp was indeed a poor signing, for the pricetag at least, but El Khanouss will hardly soar above him in the annals of Leicester City lore. That side was relegated without the merest whimper, Bilal was mostly crap, and then squealed until he was allowed to bugger off. What a signing that was. At least we'll make a tidy profit though... And Cooper? Cifuentes? As if they had anything to do with our demise. But you say Maresca, who built nothing and won the easiest promotion in history, was one of your picks. Where did that leave us? It was fantastic for Maresca, evidently. It didn't help Leicester City a great deal. Plenty of posters on here (though not you, clearly!) saw that one coming. And there were people on here calling the ownership out a whole decade before you, if 2021 was your Road to Damascus moment. So I'm guessing either a large amount of cognac, or confirmation bias, has gone down in some of your comments. I'm an absolute amateur at this 'being right' business. The posts are still here, 1000 pages back, where I said Kasper was sh*t, Vardy was a waste of money, Pearson should be fired, Ranieri was a lousy appointment. All of it wrong. But I remember this and try to learn from it. And when I do get something right, which isn't too often, I don't exaggerate its importance and complain about getting no credit for it! It'd be nice if everyone could separate their minds from their emotions for a bit. Whether in the depth of your soul you knew this was wrong, that was right - just like those who feel we should be loyal to the family, we should show Top some respect - perhaps we should let our heads rule our hearts for once. If we all park our personal convictions and allegiances to one side, and actually look soberly at what's happening, it's terrifying. That matters more than whether or not I was right about Danny Drinkwater being a bit crap in March 2012, or whether I'm annoyed that no-one lauded my foresight for saying we shouldn't appoint, I don't know, pretty much most of our managers over the past decade.

I never realised Syd Barrett was still alive.

We were alright in 1972, weren't we? Jimmy Bloomfield, 12th in the top flight...

Was it something like... Jakub Stolarczyk persisted, His bosses, too cautious, resisted, To drop such a dud, though it did us no good, Till at last the halfwit was listed. I am very, very bored, and a bit grumpy. Apologies.

If it's going to go, let it go quickly. Unite behind the phoenix club and, whatever tier it is, we'll have a club which is more Leicester City than this one is five years from now. Fosse was wound up in 1919. In time, it'd be seen as no more significant than that to us. In the meanwhile, the political impact on the game as a whole would be seismic, and possibly very positive. You even get to inherit the trophies if there's consensus on the successor club. As I see it, that club might get back to the PL in 12-15 years, whereas this one might need longer than that. My only fear is that you end up with a situation like Hinckley AFC / Hinckley Leicester Road, with the KPFC lot disputing which is the 'real' new LCFC, instead of just admitting they were wrong and ****ing off.

Maybe. He'll have to motivate himself better for games and work harder than that. And yes, when you're in a battle, the last thing you need is a chap strolling about with a fancy flick here and there. We already have 'flair' players that we carry for games on end just so they can add a fifteen second clip to their highlights reel once or twice a month. You saw something I didn't. Pedestrian would be kind. And the youth thing is irrelevant. We have nothing to gain from nurturing his talent and even if we did there are no consolation points for fielding children who aren't up to it yet. Of course, youth is something of an excuse for him, but it can't be for us. I agree that we shouldn't pile in on him. We should give him a bollocking and, if he's too 'elite' to take notice, drop him. Too true. Not that any of Mavididi's 'moments' actually amounted to anything. He was relatively alright, which doesn't say much. Not the kind of benchmark a promising teenager with designs on elite level football should be measuring himself again. If Mukasa wants to make it, then he shouldn't be measuring himself against some of the worst performers in our history. Even the ones who show flashes here and there are at the heart of the cultural problem which, above anything else, is responsible for the most dramatic decline we've ever suffered in a 140+ year history. If Mukasa were a top talent, you'd hope you weren't, regardless of his age, lumping him in with the very lowest of the low. More than anything, as a player he needs to show he can motivate himself properly. Some of it is down to him bedding in, but more often than not it takes him 30-40 minutes to settle into matches. Even in the Stoke game, when he had a good second half, he was asleep for the first half. It looks to me as if, along with Richards, we've added players with questionable application to a squad whose main problem is questionable application.

I was Sunday league and occasionally played CB. And, by the way, when I played CB I wasn't very good, and was always aware of the shortfalls - at CB or LB, my natural position - that meant I'd never be a professional, nor anywhere near. But I see Nelson make some mistakes and can hear the echoes of bollockings I got when I was 16 or 17 for failing to deal with very, very similar situations. It's not only Ben, but I'm amazed to see so many of these errors - which would still be costly for park footballers - taking place. I know this happens from time to time at the bottom end of the FLC, or occasionally even the PL - they're only human, after all - but it's 2-3 times per game for some of these. Non-league level stuff, if you're kind. It might well be the worst, and it's certainly the most despicable, Leicester side I've ever known. And I remember David Pleat who, to be fair, had one of the lowest wage bills in the second tier. These guys are astounding in their laziness (Ayew etc.), selfishness (Fatawu etc.), unprofessionalism (Nelson, for that first goal, and many others game-in game-out) and lack of guts or backbone. If I were cherry-picking from relegated FLC clubs, I wouldn't go anywhere near any of these. James aside - but Fatawu very much included - I don't see top tier players in them. And it's by far the laziest, least invested Leicester side I've ever known. I'm not a very hateful person as a rule, but I genuinely detest this team. I saw the emphasis switch, post-Pearson, from hard-working, honest individuals to people who lacked the same, to coin a Harry Bassett term, moral fibre. I always felt it'd end badly. But never did I envisage it ending this badly, and there being such a historical absence of that so-called moral fibre. Almost to a man, they're spineless gimps.

I suppose that's a succinct summary of my mini-essay. I'd put more emphasis on the 'tinpot club' part than the 'tinpot manager', but I think there are literally thousands out there who could have managed that game better than he did today. There were easy, easy decisions to make in that game. But such is the sheer weight of faecal matter that we're burdened with, it might not have been enough anyway. Ben Nelson may well end up being a competent footballer, but far too often he's looked as if he lacks even the most basic professional prerequisites. He and the keeper may well be young, as Stolarczyk pointed out on Tuesday, but there are no bonus points for being young. And then there's Fatawu's staggering greediness, Mukasa's inability to play for his first 30 minutes on the pitch, Ayew, Hamza, Winks, Reid, Thomas... We could go on.

Completely. We have to stick with it. If we do, one day the thousand will be there. This regime has to go.

Some of them, in spite of what people tell themselves, weren't/aren't actually bad managers. And some of our 'good' managers (e.g. Rodgers, Maresca) haven't helped any long-term evolution of the club either. That's not to devalue Enzo's achievement either, but he was never a workable long-term project. But either way, it is abundantly clear that it's a disgracefully run club, with a criminally unprofessional culture at the heart of it. The club itself are indefensible, and anyone attempting to defend it (e.g. NextPlease) either loses their argument miserably or changes the subject as soon as they're shown up, and knows they're pursuing an unwinnable argument. Fatawu is my number one example of this cultural issue. We have to play him, because he's our best technical player. But he's playing entirely for himself and his highlights reel. You're playing with ten men for two, three games at a time just for that one magical moment. Much like Maddison and Tielemans a few years back; he's among our better players, but the embodiment of everything wrong with the club's culture. But there are so many other places to look - Vestergard one minute, Winks the next, Mavididi (alright though he may have been today) after that, Ayew, even Mukasa who clearly struggles to wake up for the first 30 minutes or more - that you can't single Abdul out. And then there are the incompetents: Thomas, Nelson, Hamza, Stolarczyk, Okoli. Some of them would be shown up in the fourth tier. I mean, how could you ever defend a manager who didn't take one or two from Nelson/Mukasa/Ayew off at half-time in that game? A child could have told you that Nelson was going to cost us that match, and Ayew was never going to claw it back. I was literally yelling at the boss's passivity when I saw them come back out. I knew, we all knew, how that would pan out. How the hell doesn't he?

He's just never ready to receive the ball. He anticipates nothing. An experienced player whose experience counts for nothing. In general, we got too negative on the ball after we scored. Too many players - Fatawu, Mukasa, Ayew, even Choudhury on one occasion, found themselves right side of a defending player and failed to attack the game. The commentators on Foxeshub sound stunned, as if we were always in total control. I don't know about you, but I thought the attacking four were, for all their dangerous moments, not actually creating much, and QPR were having sniffs. You know how that ends with this team.

He hasn't got out of bed today, has he? To be honest the front four have flattered to deceive a bit. Moments of danger from Mavididi especially, but no end product at all. For all the promise, their contributions have ended with us having to defend, with very few exceptions. For the most part, we managed to do that defending. But we know full well that if we're made to defend, those players will screw up eventually. Unbelievably unprofessional from Nelson to have switched off like that, but it isn't the first time.

I've heard it from one of the title winners, that I promised never to name, that he was by far the best man-manager and motivator he'd ever known, but a lousy, lousy tactician who struggled to communicate ideas. He depended hugely on Shakespeare to 'interpret' often baffling instructions. It surprised me at the time because the narrative was always that he, not Pearson, was the tactician. That conversation ended up being a very detailed breakdown - of tactical changes with no prior preparation hours before kick off, of him becoming gradually more insistent on ideas that had been previously negotiable - which I had no reason to question too much, given what I'd seen. I have no first hand knowledge of the meetings that took place before Claudio was fired, but I'm pretty sure the Vardy-Kasper-Morgan thing was debunked years ago by those players, other players, and Ranieri himself. I imagine concerns were mentioned, rather than raised as points of contention. In the end the results spoke for themselves, in that reigning champions can't be 17th in the table in February, and in that impulse signings made in the post-Walsh vacuum hadn't worked out, and he was fired. Rightly, it turns out, regardless of how much I love him. Leo Ulloa, though, is someone else I respect greatly, and whose place in history will always exclusively be his role in that team. What a shame that he's shown he was one of the reasons, along with Mahrez, for our post-title decline. Have a little pride in what you will always stand for, and some humility that that achievement is pretty much the limit of your meaningfulness in the game. Show some class.

It's nice to see some optimism, even if I feel it's unfounded! Mandaric, as has been pointed out, took charge of a club already in a relegation scrap in 2006/07. There was investment the following summer - Clemence and Campbell were both fairly high profile acquisitions - it was just poor recruitment. You're wrong to say that Mandaric wasn't criticised by the fans, but it wasn't for limited recruitment so much as for the chaotic merry-go-round of managers. That's what got us relegated. But the comparison falls apart when you consider that we were, what, 16th or 17th in the second tier when Mandaric took charge, versus 5th when KP came in. As for Top, he initially led the takeover, made a mess of it, and when he took the reins after Vichai's passing we were a top half PL side which had won the EPL a few years prior. So the tumble down to a second tier relegation dogfight is a hell of a lot worse than the collapse under Mandaric who did, after all, oversee a return to us pushing for top flight promotion thereafter. I think a lot of fans remember this, and feel that Top fares quite poorly out of that comparison, for all of Mandaric's many, many flaws. There are also plenty on here who remember our near-extinction post-Elsom, the Shipman era before that, and - in some cases I'm sure - his dad before that (even if I wasn't around). If you think Top's getting a rough ride, you should ask these fans how kind they were to Terry Shipman, a Leicester fan from birth who helped run the club for decades - including periods of prolonged success when his Dad was above him on the board as chairman, much like Top. A period when we once broke the UK transfer record. Fast-forward to the second tier survival battle under Terry in 1990/91 and there were planes. Protests. Stay-aways. Bricks thrown through the boardroom window. So again, I don't think the 'short memories' line serves your line of argument well. It also looks a bit like you're stalling for time when you say we need to give the restructuring a year to see whether it works or not. Had it been done two-and-a-half years ago, when it was clear that it was necessary, you might have a point. But, thanks to Top, it wasn't. And now we potentially don't have a year to see how things go, because it's quite possible that - one year from now - the club's position will be terminal, or worse. Of course there is always going to be misguided speculation, as you say, when people don't have access to our wage bill. But one thing which hasn't been misreported is that, owing to the incompetence of people who remain in the key roles at the club, there is a real prospect of our overheads outweighing the club's value within the time frame in which - you say - we should be sitting tight and waiting to see what happens. Do you think we can afford to show that sort of loyalty and patience now?

That'll also go for whoever gets the job.

Well, it's as likely to work as anything else! I understand the temptation to have three at the back. Wing backs, CFs... Not so sure.

Who are the two CFs in a 3-5-2? And do you want to see Mavididi as a LWB if Thomas is dropped? I'm not sure on either score.

If Ipswich had focused more on winning the game than flinging themselves over every time one of our players was remotely in the vicinity, they'd have had us. We gave ourselves no outlet in the second half, and needed to shift that attacking midfield around way sooner than we did. Mukasa seems to need a bit of time to get into games, occasionally. I'm not sure he's an impact sub.