leicesterseddon

Leaving it too late to make changes again

And if I remember correctly, the 5-year timeframe was at the request of the club (I think it’s normally 3).

Because our revenues aren’t enough to justify our wage bill, which has come down since relegation but still high. Our wage bill was 7th highest in the country last year! We’re not “broke” (arguably) - we just don’t have the income to support the our relatively high wage bill. For better or ill, this is ultimately the point of the rules - to link wages to revenue.

Aaand there it is, after just 4m39s “duh duh duh, football in a library”

How the hell have we conspired to lose that. To be honest I was actually quite impressed with the performance, apart from the shambles of the last 15. Still think we are a better team than them. And now back to the Sky studio for more analysis of how brilliant the atmosphere is at Elland Road when they win.

It’s natural for fans calibrate their expectations according to recent performance rather than historical norms. Does it make us “entitled”? Maybe but that’s human nature I’m afraid. Show me a fan who gets relegated and says “I’m actually really happy because we’re still over performing against our historical average over our 130-year history”. This season was always going to be a damp squib after a decade in the PL. A promotion push would feel completely different after a decade in the Championship. Having said all that I do think it will get more exciting as the season ends.

I realise in the absence of hard data we are all going off anecdotal experience. Just going off what I’m familiar with, I thought the biggest reason for a lack of sellout was STHs not turning up. I would also say though that 28K isn’t actually that bad for a 4th round tie against a team in the Championship. It’s an earlier round, but if you look at the 3rd round attendances for Championship clubs they were appalling.

This is why the question of how big the area should be is crucial. As soon as you have a standing section, the rest of the ground becomes the "sit the **** down" section.

I’d estimate currently we only have around 1K people standing consistently in front of seats - around 4% of our 29K home end. Probably one of the lowest % among decent-sized clubs in England, from my experience at other grounds. Even in an expanded 37K home end, around 4% standing would be an area less than 1.5k. Of course, the number of people wanting to stand would increase if the club allowed it in a proper area. But you’d need an overall standing rate of around 12% to fill a stand behind one of the goals - would we do that?

Yes I think from memory it was mainly conferences they were looking at (also Indian weddings during the summer months). I don't think they are banking on bringing Beyonce to Leicester or anything like that. Has the club ever specified how they intend to finance this? Are they looking to get a loan from a bank? Would they get a loan from King Power? Obviously that's a key question, because I imagine a bank would want to see a pretty robust business case before handing over the loan you'd need for this sort of project. I also wonder about the business model for the arena/hotel. But as others have said, they must have looked into it pretty extensively by this stage.

It's good news on the planning side, obviously (although it's only outline planning permission for the additional buildings). But the reference to "market dynamics", as well as saying the Eon site could also be factored in, is a pretty clear signal this isn't happening any time soon.

Can’t remember who it was but I have a vague memory of someone at FIFA arguing that in the smartphone era, 90 mins is too long for a football game because everyone’s attention spans have been shredded. Thought it was cobblers at the time but maybe there’s something in it? Mind you, other clubs seem to be able to keep people in the ground at 4-0 up.

Won’t comment on the noise aspect because that debate just goes round in circles. I would like to say though that I think the leaving early thing is awful and definitely worse than last time we were in the Championship (when the atmosphere was also shit). The number of people left in the stadium at 4-0 up is more like you’d expect at 4-0 down. It’s just so poor. What can be done? The club spends a lot of time on the pre-match offering, maybe it’s time to think about a post-match offering, especially for the sort of families who seem to be the ones buggering off at 85mins literally every week?

Would quite like to see a bit more urgency in the first 30mins or so. Been quite a lot of similar home games when we've looked extremely comfortable early doors, not really conceding any chances, but not really doing much ourselves. Would feel better if we took control of games more, rather than the current tactic which seems to revolve around waiting for the opposition to tire.

I prefer no VAR at all, because I value the enjoyment of watching the game over the perfectibility of the decision-making. As opposed to professional TV pundits, who value having something else to talk about at half-time.

The family “stand” could be shrunk to an area and moved to the south stand. Then have a go at creating a proper end in the north stand with rail seating. It would be quite disruptive though, so can only really see it happening in the context of an expansion (which seems to be pretty much off the cards itself)

Been rubbish second half Need Casadei off ASAP

This is so true. All of the most vocal fanbases are in the Premier League, apart from Leeds with an honourable mention to Sheffield Wednesday (away only)

Most have followed a bit of a pattern. An early burst of enthusiasm, swiftly followed by that tedious “duh duh duh football in a library” chant that every fanbase in this division seems to sing. Then 70+ minutes of mostly nothing, as we take control of the game and keep the ball. Then a second wind at end of the game, from a losing position, to demonstrate the incredible nature of their passionate support in the face of adversity, etc.

Will every team sing “duh, duh, duh, football in a library” at ours this season? Hull City could barely contain themselves today and only made it until the 6th minute before cracking it out. Every team that does it has 25% empty seats at home and zero atmosphere. Becoming tedious already

This is bullshit. We weren’t “levels above” them at all and we didn’t lose because we were “wasteful”. We lost because they scored a goal from a moment of poor goalkeeping/defending and we created nothing.

Couldn’t really work out why we had 3 mins extra time given in similar games this season we’ve had 9. Other than that I thought the ref was fine to be honest. Nothing to complain about.

Was poor really, as we have been all season despite the wins. How many shots on target have we had across the 5 games? We have to hope the evangelist football hipsters among us are right, and it will all improve once they’ve played together for a bit longer. If not, we’re ****ed really. We’re no threat from set pieces or on the counter-attack. Where are the goals?

It’s a 6/10 for me, so far at least. Sold our best players below market value. Winks has been a decent addition, Coady who knows tbh. Mavididi I think has been OK. The loan signings have been decent but then again, they are just loans. We’ll still have a lot of overpaid dross on the books, but was probably unrealistic to expect to get rid of them all in one go. It’s been quite a cautious approach where the priority has been not to overcommit after the disasters of the last few windows

Others have highlighted this, but when you think of the wages they’re on you can pretty much rule out selling any of them to a Championship club, or even most top-tier clubs in European leagues. So that leaves you with a PL club, a really good European club, maybe a Saudi club as potential buyers. To be honest I think we’ll struggle to get rid of more than 1 or 2, and even that might be a stretch.