What percentage of blame do you apply to those responsible for our demise?

[HybridFox]

16 hours ago, murphy said:

Apart from the obvious, I blame The World Cup,  We had just started to turn the corner and do well until that came along.

 

We don't do well with enforced breaks as covid showed.

These issues affect every team though. We're simply not good enough

[Foxy-Lady]

16 hours ago, Tom12345 said:

Look, with our success, the Club gambled financially to take us to the next level (your criticism is just a spur of the moment feeling; at the relevant times a few years ago, were you also happy with the money we spent on new players? were you screaming at the club to try to crystallize the unique success we had by putting in more money?). They trusted Rodgers, but they trusted him for far too long. He should have been sacked after our first choke. We had a good squad, and the Club trusted Rodgers by giving him funds to buy more players - but he keep making the club pay millions for players he did not use: Praet, Perez, Vesty, Soumare, Daka (to a large extent). That is already a lot for our Club but as mentioned the Club gambled. Had Rodgers not talked down on the players, instilled a loser mentality into the team, and choked, we may have just succeeded with CL qualification and the gamble would have paid off.

 

Then we choked the second time.

 

Then before last season, the Club gambled further by not selling any of our stars. But besides Rodgers, we also suffered bad luck with injuries (still questionable whether they were due to Rodgers’ mismanagement). But one bad luck was Fofana breaking his leg. I still remember how good our team was with Fofana. Again, if not for the bad luck, we could have had a chance at top 6 finish again (remember we were not too far off in the end), though if had achieved it it would have been paper over cracks left behind by Rodgers’ poison.

 

The Club then realized last summer that we need to wind back on the gamble but never could they imagine with our squad we could actually be relegated. Even the pessimistic fans would not have thought so summer of 2022.

 

The thing is, the Club gambled but they trusted the wrong guy in Rodgers. So the gamble hasn’t paid off, and now they realize what a mess Rodgers has left them. I still believe we are too good to go down with this squad - same squad that we had finish 5ths and 8th, but the long term loser mentality Rodger instilled is just too much to overcome in a short time. 

 

 

 

I dont disagree with a single thing you've said about BR and i think all the resentment among the fan base for him is 100% justified.

 

As for the gamble we took, i think the example of Leeds Utd under the stewardship of Peter Ridsdale in the 1990s should have set a precedent and a warning to all that "gambling" on CL football can have very serious and long-lasting financial consequences should the gamble prove to be unsuccessful and there is no Plan B

Were we right to do it?   

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but i think with a Plan B and the right people steering the ship, any failure would have been mitigated more successfully with a more solid foundation in place. As it is, we appear to have absolutely NO foundations in place that will enable us to recover.....as is proved by the point that we would still be in a complete financial mess even if we weren't relegated this season...! 

 

Leaving the culpability of BR aside, there are checks and balances in successful businesses for a reason so as to minimise risk/exposure and prevent "individuals" being able to make key decisions unilaterally and without challenge.

In this case, if you are right about BR, the key questions should be.....who was allowing all that to happen & why as that points to a serious failing in governance, management and financial mismanagement?

After all, it wasnt BR who signed the cheques and negotiated the contracts......and it wasnt BR who allowed the contracts of players to run-down so they leave on a FREE.

 

The problem with deflecting all the blame on to Rodgers is that he is only ultimately responsible for the playing side and the results on the pitch....for which I agree there is absolutely no excusing him!

But there are others who remain entrenched in the senior hierarchy at our club who are equally responsible for their off-pitch failings and had they had the same foresight as all the thousands of LCFC fans and onlookers, they would have seen the mistakes that were being made and put in place corrective actions.

 

-  How come they failed to see what everyone else could plainly see?

-  If they did, Why did they fail to act?   

-  Why were they blind-sided by a "salesman" and persuaded to pay such huge sums for a crop of inadequate players?

-  why were there no checks and balances in place to ensure that we were not financially over-committing ourselves?   (ie wages to revenue ratio = 85%.....one of the highest in Europe!)

 

If it were my business, i certainly wouldn't want any of them to be involved in any key decisions relating to finance, contracts and recruitment as they have proved their judgement and knowledge proved to be flawed when it comes to misplaced trust, identifying mistakes and implementing corrective actions.

 

Blame BR all you want......but he is not alone in his mis-management and I dont have any faith that ANY of the people who got us into this mess will be capable of getting us out of it! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Tom12345]

1 hour ago, Foxy-Lady said:

I dont disagree with a single thing you've said about BR and i think all the resentment among the fan base for him is 100% justified.

 

As for the gamble we took, i think the example of Leeds Utd under the stewardship of Peter Ridsdale in the 1990s should have set a precedent and a warning to all that "gambling" on CL football can have very serious and long-lasting financial consequences should the gamble prove to be unsuccessful and there is no Plan B

Were we right to do it?   

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but i think with a Plan B and the right people steering the ship, any failure would have been mitigated more successfully with a more solid foundation in place. As it is, we appear to have absolutely NO foundations in place that will enable us to recover.....as is proved by the point that we would still be in a complete financial mess even if we weren't relegated this season...! 

 

Leaving the culpability of BR aside, there are checks and balances in successful businesses for a reason so as to minimise risk/exposure and prevent "individuals" being able to make key decisions unilaterally and without challenge.

In this case, if you are right about BR, the key questions should be.....who was allowing all that to happen & why as that points to a serious failing in governance, management and financial mismanagement?

After all, it wasnt BR who signed the cheques and negotiated the contracts......and it wasnt BR who allowed the contracts of players to run-down so they leave on a FREE.

 

The problem with deflecting all the blame on to Rodgers is that he is only ultimately responsible for the playing side and the results on the pitch....for which I agree there is absolutely no excusing him!

But there are others who remain entrenched in the senior hierarchy at our club who are equally responsible for their off-pitch failings and had they had the same foresight as all the thousands of LCFC fans and onlookers, they would have seen the mistakes that were being made and put in place corrective actions.

 

-  How come they failed to see what everyone else could plainly see?

-  If they did, Why did they fail to act?   

-  Why were they blind-sided by a "salesman" and persuaded to pay such huge sums for a crop of inadequate players?

-  why were there no checks and balances in place to ensure that we were not financially over-committing ourselves?   (ie wages to revenue ratio = 85%.....one of the highest in Europe!)

 

If it were my business, i certainly wouldn't want any of them to be involved in any key decisions relating to finance, contracts and recruitment as they have proved their judgement and knowledge proved to be flawed when it comes to misplaced trust, identifying mistakes and implementing corrective actions.

 

Blame BR all you want......but he is not alone in his mis-management and I dont have any faith that ANY of the people who got us into this mess will be capable of getting us out of it! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You have good points, and certainly very valid points for any regular business.

 

I would say though, like the airlines business but even more so in football, it is not as straight forward given: (1) the involvement of quasi government funding and mega rich billionaires im clubs like Chelsea, Man City and more recently Newcastle and Villa; (2) the inherent more than unpredictable nature of football.  I think the Club took a calculated gamble. It was really “now or never” then - and we were not spending crazy; but still very big for a club of our size.  The gamble included assuming that we will not be relegated - and with any business you need to take risks and the risk was partly that we won’t be relegated but shxt happens.  The Club also tried to mitigate by building a bigger stadium and expanding the complex so we can earn more revenue. The Club knew that we cannot wait til all that is completed before the last of the PL winners retire (Vardy is 36 already).

 

To your point thought, there is also mismanagement involved. In my mind, these include: (1) handing out big contracts to useless players like Vesty and Bertrand (but if I am the contracts guy at the Club, or even Top, don’t I trust Brendan’s judgement? If he tells me he he needs these players, and they are critical, I get them if the budget then allows. Why would I know that they would then not play for 90% of the times; (2) failing to renew key contracts (like Soyuncu, but again this is partly Brendan); (3) failing to sell Tielemans - hindsight in 20/20, but even his performance this season and him now setting the pathway for the rest of the squad to just run down the contract, he should have been sold last summer regardless. I think this was a particularly bad decision if you ask me; (4) failing to buy Lookman for 12m - low risk bargain lost.

 

So yes some mismanagement but I still think a lot do to with Brendan.

 

Obviously Covid, which was not expected, didn’t help either.

[Tom12345]

Unrelated I know, but since we changed our shirt sponsor, we have been going downhill.

[murphy]

I said at the time of Rodgers' appointment that it would all end in tears.  There's just something about that ego and self-interest that always unsettled me. 

 

I never expected this though.

[Mickyblueeyes]

6 hours ago, Tom12345 said:

Unrelated I know, but since we changed our shirt sponsor, we have been going downhill.

Do you remember when we went from Walkers to LG. Same thing. Something about the sponsors….

[sacreblueits442]

On 16/05/2023 at 08:56, murphy said:

Apart from the obvious, I blame The World Cup,  We had just started to turn the corner and do well until that came along.

 

We don't do well with enforced breaks as covid showed.

...what does that say about the mentality of this team!!!

  It is the same for everyone,  why are we the ones unable to perform in the manner previous to the enforced break.

  It seems that our resident psychologist would need a team, working 24/7, in order to meet the club's needs.