Foxy-Lady

19 years old when we recruited him from Villa as a free out-of-contract player. Developed in Sweden and then 3 years at AVFC academy Already a well developed GK before we signed him due to personal ties to Ben Petty from his Villa coaching days.

Thanks for the personal comment.....which just shows you for what you are. there are very few examples of players who have developed late on after 18-20 in the academy system as they would normally have been released long before that stage if they had not developed. Those who develop that late have normally come into the game from "outside" the academy system due to real life playing experience. I agree that good coaches try to keep players motivated.....but good coaches also work on continually developing players.....but my post was NOT referring to good coaches....it was referring to inadequate coaches which is why LCFC have a poor record of developing GKs. Is it really just coincidence that the county of Leicestershire has been unable to produce a single professional Goalkeeper in 20 years?? In the real world, if you failed to demonstrate any level of success/competence for a prolonged period, your employers would start to question your capability....not seemingly so with the U23 GK coaches at LCFC Academy which produces international GKs at U16 level.....but nothing beyond that! From memory, The last decent professional GK that came from leicestershire was Chris Kirkland....and he was never at LCFC! I'll let you do the Maths on that one... And if you are correct in your assumption that "no one knows how a player will develope"......what would make any coach better qualified than me or you to make a call on which players should be released and which should be retained?

Highly regarded by WHO?? I've seen several young GKs coming through the Youth system, all of whom were told they were highly rated....but none of them developed beyond 18 as the GK coaching and opportunities beyond that point were very poor (ie Stowell, Thompson, Beaglehole etc...) Sometimes people give kids/parents "false hope" just to keep them motivated and working hard without really knowing how they will develop.....ow worse still, knowing that they have no future beyond 18-20 Varnam, Bramley, Yates, French, Bosworth all went down this same line (and im sure many others too?) and NONE of them are playing at professional level today despite being awarded Pro contracts by LCFC at 18 Jakob Stolarczyk is the only one who may potentially break the mould....but Iversen, who was an outstanding shot-stopper when we signed hi at 18yrs must be pretty p**sed off that Beaglehole just told him to "boot it long" in the 3 years while he played "hoof-ball" for the U23s....and no-one ever worked on improving his distribution and/or foot-skills as it was deemed irrelevant which is the flaw in his game that has now been exposed at the highest level! LCFCs U18-23 Goalkeeping development is very poor....and has been for a very long time! (PS from the age of 12-16, the Academy GK coaches seem to be very good from what ive witnessed!)

Like you, i dont think Rudkin is solely to blame for all the mistakes of the past few seasons.....but he is certainly a big part of it! To say that NOTHING would improve at the club by getting rid of Rudkin is a very naive statement. He is a big part of the problem at many levels so its pretty certain that SOME THINGS would improve if we got rid of him and had a better qualified DoF.. If getting rid of underperforming or inadequate individuals doesn't improve ANYTHING, why would firms ever get rid of people...?!?

personally, i thought we would only have 2 points max at this stage so having 3 is better than i was expecting...! Aside from Spurs (where we could easily have been beaten by H-T!), i haven't seen us play this season so not as well placed as others to comment on quality of play, tactics etc BUT..... with the current group of players we have at our disposal, does anyone really think that we should have any realistic expectations beyond simply managing to stay up??? Avoiding relegation this season will be an achievement for any manager regardless of whether we sack Cooper or not...?

you sense wrong...again.

People who s*** on others dont tend to s*** on the ones who they know can do something for them.....its not rocket science.

Wow....so all the detail in the published accounts, the huge player wage bills, the poor signings and the appointment and failure to act on managers who got us relegated NEVER actually happened??? Phew....thank god you've told me that.....such a relief to know that it must all just have been a really bad dream i was having

Thats very true......but Rudkin was disliked by most people long before he ever reached the top

If ever there was a comment designed to make people panic, this DONT panic warning is it....!!

100% this...!!! I know from my experiences he was universally disliked within the club....with the exception of those who were his mates and he kept in a job so they could "watch his back" (ie Beaglehole, Crawley etc...) he is an ego-maniac and a master manipulator who somehow got himself elevated to a position he is woefully under-qualified for by throwing a lot of other people "under the bus".....and he doesn't ever appear to be in the firing line no matter how badly he does his job! There are a lot of people who i know in football who shake their heads at how this man is still somehow employed as DoF by LCFC......he would have been fired at the end of last season by any other club!

Youre probably right.....and if people want to make subjective comments about a players footballing ability and performances then that's ok with me as its all about opinions and that's what a football forum is about. Not seen anyone claiming to say they "know KDH more"....i was simply correcting one poster for calling him "an arrogant bellend" when hes NOT. In your opinion, "you couldnt care less" which is up to you.....but just because football is more important in life to you than how people behave and treat others it doesn't mean that's the most important thing in everyone else's life. Personally i dont judge people by how good they are at football....i judge them by how they treat others which is the only reason i corrected the poster who called him "an arrogant bellend".

Hes actually NOT....ive known him for years and hes a thoroughly likeable, respectful and humble lad..

Wow...Soumare must have been pretty disappointed he only managed to get x5 on his existing wages when we usually offer x10 to everyone else as a minimum...!

To gamble and lose the first time could be considered unlucky.......to gamble AGAIN on the back of such a disastrous "loss" should be considered as either incompetent or worse still, negligent dependent on how generous you want to be! either way, repetitive "gambling" is largely based on luck and/or favourable winds.....and you would NOT expect competent and experienced senior executives to run a business that way.

Sadly, what we're now looking at IS the "what if scenario" that doesn't seem to have been considered. Standard business practice to have Risk contingency plans and start implementing them ahead of time as and when the risk becomes apparent/real ....but not sure if the clowns who run our club have the experience of doing that?

I get your logic and you make some valid points BUT..... If Hamza is on £40k/week (which i understand to be accurate..), that's the last 4 years of £40k/week which equates to £8m in wages....not £2m as you state based on one single year. Its all well and good showing as a £5-6m asset on the balance sheet but in our P&L trading statement, we have way too many players on similarly inflated wages which is why our wages/revenue % ratio is unsustainable If we sell him for £8m now, it improves our immediate financial position in terms of transfer income and reduced wage costs but.....we've already paid him £8m in wages and we are now showing a significant financial debt in our accounts.... and we stil have to find someone to replace him at a lower salary.

I was there that day in Main stand enclosure.......still one of the greatest games ive ever seen.. Sometimes im not sure if its just my fading memory over-embelleshing how good that day was.......but then i read this post and i realise that i am not alone in my thoughts and it was every bit as good as i remember!! One thing you dont mention is that it was absolutely p***ing down with rain and everyone in MSE got absolutely soaked as it was completely uncovered.....but i doubt anyone cared!! Also remember there being about 40,000 fans in the main stand enclosure that day (at least, it felt that way!!)......it was pre-Hillsborough days and we could barely move and every time we scored, you just got "swept away" off your feet and ended up about 20 yards further away from where you started. All added to the fun at that time.....but could never happen again now due to H&S following the terrible events that followed at Hillsborough.

This aged pretty well...?!? You still having the same thoughts now about bouncing straight back?

He should have got that job at leicester years ago.....but they wanted him to work under Beaglehole and he refused to do that! Absolutely superb coach....watched him for years and he was instrumental in the development of so many of the our current first team academy graduates.

Ian Cawley is effectively Jon Rudkins messenger which is probably why he was promoted so quickly to that position so JR could maintain proxy-control. To my knowledge, Cawley has zero footballing background.....why wouldn't you put him in charge of a £100m state of the art footballing academy facility..?!?.

Bit of wishful thinking but, out of interest, does this mean we have "finally" seen the back of Mike Stowell as i havent seen anything communicated on this...? Keeping my fingers crossed ive missed something...!

I have.....an egotistical empire builder who was over promoted way beyond his capability and who has treated those who ever challenged him with utter contempt. Protected those who were inadequate but loyal to him rather than accepted the contrary views of those who were better qualified. The classic trait of an ego-maniac who only wants to listen to the voices of those who praise them Vile person in my eyes who lived on the back of the timing of his appointment that just so happened to coincide with all the foundations that Pearson and Walsh had put in pace. Been saying for years on this forum that one day he would come unstuck and sadly for us all.....today is that day! Rudkin the ego-maniac saw LCFC as HIS club rather than OUR club Not surprised in the slightest that he is already "briefing" against Whelan in order to take the spotlight away from his own failings as Rudkin is a man who always seeks to deflect blame to others to protect his own skin. Always happy to take the praise for any success...never happy to take any responsibility for the failures. I pray that if one good thing comes out of this absolute debacle.....it is that this is the end of Rudkin and that we can start again with a proper DoF.

He played for Beagleholes U23s for 2 years before he went out on loan and his instructions were always to kick it long.....no emphasis ever on footskill and technique development.

Hes been at the club now for 6-7 years under the GK tutelage of Stowell and Thomson. if they haven't taught him to kick in the last 7 years, do you really think they're going to manage to do that in the next 3 months? And if they can manage to do that in such a short-timeframe, how come they haven't done anything about it in the last 6 years? Iversen is a great shot-stopper so the solution is simple for me.....get some proper coaches in who can improve his footskills and teach him to kick OR accept the fact that Iversen's footskills and kicking are beyond coaching.