The "do they mean us?" thread pt 4

[AKCJ]

56 minutes ago, ParkerPen said:

who's gonna tell him... ?

I get the joke but on paper this team has no business not getting 100+ points in this league.

[ParkerPen]

19 minutes ago, AKCJ said:

I get the joke but on paper this team has no business not getting 100+ points in this league.

Sorry, couldn't resist - but yes we should have enough ability to be at the right end of the table

[LCFCCKEANO]

17 minutes ago, AKCJ said:

I get the joke but on paper this team has no business not getting 100+ points in this league.

Agreed, think what is frustrating me the most about the recent media circus is people saying the squad isn’t very good and pointing at a 36yo keeper and a young squad.
 

The youngsters have pretty much all been tipped to play at higher levels and have been the players who look like they could win a league, and I’m pretty sure other promoted clubs hire old keepers for L1, Brum did, Wednesday have Lumley in goal who was behind McCarthy in the pecking order at Southampton. We are where we are because we started the season with half a squad including a lot of players who did not care, and have brought in a new squad, and also have a manager who plays the highest risk lowest reward(at present) football I’ve maybe ever seen, any other reporting is lazy in my opinion

[Foxmeister]

5 minutes ago, LCFCCKEANO said:

Agreed, think what is frustrating me the most about the recent media circus is people saying the squad isn’t very good and pointing at a 36yo keeper and a young squad.
 

The youngsters have pretty much all been tipped to play at higher levels and have been the players who look like they could win a league, and I’m pretty sure other promoted clubs hire old keepers for L1, Brum did, Wednesday have Lumley in goal who was behind McCarthy in the pecking order at Southampton. We are where we are because we started the season with half a squad including a lot of players who did not care, and have brought in a new squad, and also have a manager who plays the highest risk lowest reward(at present) football I’ve maybe ever seen, any other reporting is lazy in my opinion

Way too many young players being relied on, we can’t be playing 7 or so over the course of a game in front of extremely frustrated fans. Recipe for disaster, perfectly cooked up by Martin.

 

 

[honeybradger]

 

 

 

[Grebfromgrebland]

1 minute ago, honeybradger said:

 

 

 

This is insane like the club thought winning the league and fa cup was down to them and not the players.

[Sol thewall Bamba]

9 minutes ago, honeybradger said:

 

 

 

Unfortunately Marc the culture was on a steep decline whilst you were still here pal.

[cat lady]

It just shows what idiots they are and that's being polite 🙄 

[fox_favourite]

The only way things will improve is with new ownership. Ex players coming in won't fix the culture issue. 

[urban.spaceman]

3 minutes ago, fox_favourite said:

The only way things will improve is with new ownership. Ex players coming in won't fix the culture issue. 

Would be an easy W for a new owner tho. "We've brought in Wasilewski to glare at Thomas until he stops doing brain farts"

 

[LCFCJohn]

On 07/09/2026 at 19:46, davieG said:

https://footballleagueworld.co.uk/charlie-austin-launches-brutal-russell-martin-rant-after-leicester-city-lose-to-oxford/

 

Charlie Austin launches brutal Russell Martin rant after Leicester City lose to Oxford
Charlie Austin Russell Martin

Adam Elliott
Published Sep 7, 2026, 3:38 PM GMT+1
Adam is an EFL journalist for Football League World.

 

Charlie Austin has launched a rant about Russell Martin following Leicester City's 4-0 defeat to Oxford United at the King Power Stadium.

 

It's been a disastrous start to the campaign for Leicester City in the 2026/27 League One season, with home defeats to Oxford United and Burton Albion joined by draws away to Notts County and MK Dons in the first five fixtures.

Leicester's one and only league victory was against Plymouth Argyle, but they are also out of the League Cup after losing to Ipswich Town. There has been a major overhaul of the squad, but that does not excuse their horrific start after relegation from the Championship.

Charlie Austin lays into Leicester City boss Russell Martin

Following their back-to-back relegations, fan patience is at an all-time low at Leicester. However, pundits and neutrals have been weighing in on the situation and vindicating the thoughts of many supporters currently.

Speaking on Chaz Kicks Off via the Charlie Austin Football Channel on YouTube, he said: "I just go back to my time. Listen, you wanted to play all the time. I remember, I go back to the 13/14 season and up until January, I played every game. I played every game. I was fit and

I played.

"It was a Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday. You don't train anyway because you're on recovery and players want to play games, so that's part and parcel. Russell Martin, wind your neck in, mate. You've actually got nothing to say.

"I have seen he's won three games out of his last God knows how many. He was at Saints, relegation, got binned off. Got the Rangers job, somehow got chased out of there because he was a shambles. He's now gone to Leicester in League One and, once again, what we have seen, he's playing the same old nonsense s--- football.

"One dimensional, and he's got Leicester City, ex-Premier League champions, 17th who have just got stuffed 4-0 against Oxford at home. He should be ashamed of himself and he's lucky he's in the job.

"So, for him to come out and start saying, 'oh about training, there's games here, there's too many games'. You're not the only one. You've

managed in the EFL the majority of your career.

"So just get on with it and maybe just look at that man in the mirror, the one that's reflecting back. Maybe he's got the issue."

Russell Martin's last few managerial roles have not gone well

Martin’s career increasingly raises the question of whether his football simply has a ceiling at certain levels. His possession-heavy philosophy can be hugely effective when he has the players capable of executing it, as Southampton showed when they won promotion to the Premier League.

But it can become a problem when opponents have greater quality, or when his squad is expected to dominate every week. His Premier League spell exposed that, while his time at Rangers also suggested he struggled when the pressure to deliver immediately became overwhelming.

Love this!

 

I think ‘wind your neck in, you’ve nothing to say’ is a good one to quote back at KP defenders!

[DennisNedry]

Very interesting post match interview by McNulty (Stockport manager).

 

He essentially said that he believed the best way to beat Leicester was to sit in, concede the ball, and look to break on the counter. He said he'd watched the Oxford game and considered doing the same, but that he wasn't happy to play that way at home and wanted to go toe-to-toe. 

[Ric Flair]

4 minutes ago, DennisNedry said:

Very interesting post match interview by McNulty (Stockport manager).

 

He essentially said that he believed the best way to beat Leicester was to sit in, concede the ball, and look to break on the counter. He said he'd watched the Oxford game and considered doing the same, but that he wasn't happy to play that way at home and wanted to go toe-to-toe. 

And proved they should have comfortably beaten us going toe to toe to by about 8-4.

 

 

[davieG]

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream

 

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream
Story by Amie Wilson 

 

It was 10 years this week since Leicester City’s memorable trip to take on Club Brugge in the Champions League. Marc Albrighton’s goal, and him wheeling away in celebration will live long in the memory.

A decade on, City sit in 13th place in the League One table. While a 4-3 away win over Stockport County on Saturday lightened the mood, it’s still a far cry away from where the club were.

The question of where it went wrong over the last five or so years has been asked countless times, and in truth, there are so many different factors. There has been chronic mismanagement from the top. Amid the talk of a takeover, it feels like the best solution all around.

 

Speaking on The Football Boardroom Podcast, former Aston Villa CEO Christian Purslow gave his thoughts on where it has gone wrong for City. “I think it’s a cautionary tale, people and personalities aside, this is Icarus flying too close to the sun,” he said.

“They're a cautionary tale of a club that dared to dream, that the closer they got to being one of the big boys, spent more and more. Rules forced them to balance the books and selling your best players and replacing them with less good players on similar wages, often ends badly.

“This is an extreme example, but not the first example of challenging clubs ultimately being defeated by the process of forced selling of best players, just how hard it is in the end to keep replacing your best players.”

There’s no doubt that the Premier League’s financial rules have had a big impact on City’s situation. Brendan Rodgers spoke about the need for a refresh in the summer of 2022, but City were restricted with what they could spend due to the Profitability and Sustainability Rules.

City had finished in eighth place in the table the previous season. It followed two fifth-place finishes and an FA Cup win.

City wanted to kick on, but the financial rules meant they couldn't. Ultimately, a poor transfer window the previous summer came back to bite them.

Unlike previous windows, the club decided to keep hold of their key players, such as Youri Tielemans, and spent out on additions including Patson Daka, Boubakary Soumare and Jannik Vestergaaard.

This is where the fairness of the rules comes into question for me. Yes, the City hierarchy should be questioned for a lot of their decisions, and they should have seen the situation coming sooner and planned ahead for what could happen.

But one poor transfer window created a domino effect, which has ultimately led to the club now being in League One. City had to take a risk to try to take the next step, and it simply didn't pay off.

If you look at Chelsea, for example, a poor transfer window means that they try to fix it by just spending hundreds of millions more in the next window, without breaking the rules. They don't have to take the risk that clubs like City do; how is that fair to clubs trying to compete?

 

Aston Villa are one of the clubs having to cope with the disparity of breaking into the upper echelons of the table, and the financial gulf between clubs. Sales of Tielemans, Morgan Rogers, Ezri Konsa and Ollie Watkins among others in the transfer window has seen a massive overhaul in the squad, all while trying to compete in the Champions League as well as the Premier League. The club currently sit in 19th place in the table, having got one point from their opening four games.

If they have to cash in, even with the Champions League money coming in, just to comply with the rules, how are clubs with aspirations of breaking into the competition meant to do it?

City should have been cleverer and planned much better for the scenario that was quickly heading their way. Ultimately, that’s why I believe now is the right time for a change of ownership as they look to rebuild again.

But the unfair Premier League rules played a massive part in the club’s downfall. It’s something that other clubs now in a similar situation could easily fall foul of too.

[Tommy Fresh]

Charlie Adam saying what Taylor-Fletcher has said before that Blackpool didn't fancy playing us in the Playoff final and were chuffed Cardiff beat us

[urban.spaceman]

4 hours ago, davieG said:

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream

 

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream
Story by Amie Wilson 

 

It was 10 years this week since Leicester City’s memorable trip to take on Club Brugge in the Champions League. Marc Albrighton’s goal, and him wheeling away in celebration will live long in the memory.

A decade on, City sit in 13th place in the League One table. While a 4-3 away win over Stockport County on Saturday lightened the mood, it’s still a far cry away from where the club were.

The question of where it went wrong over the last five or so years has been asked countless times, and in truth, there are so many different factors. There has been chronic mismanagement from the top. Amid the talk of a takeover, it feels like the best solution all around.

 

Speaking on The Football Boardroom Podcast, former Aston Villa CEO Christian Purslow gave his thoughts on where it has gone wrong for City. “I think it’s a cautionary tale, people and personalities aside, this is Icarus flying too close to the sun,” he said.

“They're a cautionary tale of a club that dared to dream, that the closer they got to being one of the big boys, spent more and more. Rules forced them to balance the books and selling your best players and replacing them with less good players on similar wages, often ends badly.

“This is an extreme example, but not the first example of challenging clubs ultimately being defeated by the process of forced selling of best players, just how hard it is in the end to keep replacing your best players.”

There’s no doubt that the Premier League’s financial rules have had a big impact on City’s situation. Brendan Rodgers spoke about the need for a refresh in the summer of 2022, but City were restricted with what they could spend due to the Profitability and Sustainability Rules.

City had finished in eighth place in the table the previous season. It followed two fifth-place finishes and an FA Cup win.

City wanted to kick on, but the financial rules meant they couldn't. Ultimately, a poor transfer window the previous summer came back to bite them.

Unlike previous windows, the club decided to keep hold of their key players, such as Youri Tielemans, and spent out on additions including Patson Daka, Boubakary Soumare and Jannik Vestergaaard.

This is where the fairness of the rules comes into question for me. Yes, the City hierarchy should be questioned for a lot of their decisions, and they should have seen the situation coming sooner and planned ahead for what could happen.

But one poor transfer window created a domino effect, which has ultimately led to the club now being in League One. City had to take a risk to try to take the next step, and it simply didn't pay off.

If you look at Chelsea, for example, a poor transfer window means that they try to fix it by just spending hundreds of millions more in the next window, without breaking the rules. They don't have to take the risk that clubs like City do; how is that fair to clubs trying to compete?

 

Aston Villa are one of the clubs having to cope with the disparity of breaking into the upper echelons of the table, and the financial gulf between clubs. Sales of Tielemans, Morgan Rogers, Ezri Konsa and Ollie Watkins among others in the transfer window has seen a massive overhaul in the squad, all while trying to compete in the Champions League as well as the Premier League. The club currently sit in 19th place in the table, having got one point from their opening four games.

If they have to cash in, even with the Champions League money coming in, just to comply with the rules, how are clubs with aspirations of breaking into the competition meant to do it?

City should have been cleverer and planned much better for the scenario that was quickly heading their way. Ultimately, that’s why I believe now is the right time for a change of ownership as they look to rebuild again.

But the unfair Premier League rules played a massive part in the club’s downfall. It’s something that other clubs now in a similar situation could easily fall foul of too.

Glad this is getting some honest reporting for once. The rules are bad enough, the Premier League's behaviour has been utterly shameful. Surprised more people aren't angry about it. 

[Big_Nige]

47 minutes ago, urban.spaceman said:

Glad this is getting some honest reporting for once. The rules are bad enough, the Premier League's behaviour has been utterly shameful. Surprised more people aren't angry about it. 

The rules are horrendously bad, and put in place to protect the cartel.
 

I agree to a point about a bad transfer window, and how hard it is to recover. But the rules didn’t stop us paying Ryan Bertrand £120k a week. It was never the transfer fees it was the ludicrously high wages we were paying either unproven, or past it, footballers, which we found nigh on impossible to then shift. We should have been smarter, it’s easy to blame the rules, and I did at first, but the more you scratch the surface of financial mess this club has gotten itself into, it’s all on Top and Rudkin for me

Edited Tuesday at 18:35 by Big_Nige

[filbertway]

The rules stopped us being an even bigger mess than we're currently in

 

We'd have had a squad of about 40 bang average players on 80k+ a week if Rudders had the chance

 

[Stadt]

We never spent a too much on transfer fees relatively - it was our stupid wage management that killed us, we flew in the face of the rules anyway so they’re not the reason for our downfall. If we’d stuck by them we might still be a PL club.

[Trav Le Bleu]

5 minutes ago, Stadt said:

We never spent a too much on transfer fees relatively - it was our stupid wage management that killed us, we flew in the face of the rules anyway so they’re not the reason for our downfall. If we’d stuck by them we might still be a PL club.

It was, but because of how we were perceived (plucky little Leicester), you've got to both gamble on finding a star everyone else had overlooked and pay over the odds to do it.

 

Any idiot knows who the best players are on the world stage and if you've got enough money, you just go and buy them. No need to take a risk on a wonderkid from Moldova or a has-been veteran who just might have one good season left.

Edited Tuesday at 20:46 by Trav Le Bleu

[ParkerPen]

Our club has been managed disgustingly. Literally everyone with a pulse knows this. My dog knows this. 

[Stadt]

4 minutes ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

It was, but because of how we were perceived (plucky little Leicester), you've got to both gamble on finding a star everyone else had overlooked and pay over the odds to do it.

 

Any idiot knows who the best players are on the world stage and if you've got enough money, you just go and buy them. No need to take a risk on a wonderkid from Moldova or a has-been veteran who just might have one good season left.

We bought dross like Vestergaard - it was neither a punt or a just going and buying a proven plug and play upgrade. 
 

Lazily recruiting Martyn Glover because our DoF is literally the bottom 1/x exacerbated this, not riding our winners again in recruiting from Ligue 1 or 2 but stupidly going down the the PL route like with the Perez deal was the problem.

 

We could have signed upwardly mobile players, it’s easy to say in hindsight now (but would have been sensible then) we didn’t about £5m more on Ghezzal the summer after Raphinha scored ~15 goals for Vitoria Guimaraes. We were just dumb, we chose this because our eminence grise doesn’t know his arse from his elbow across Top and Vichai’s tenure.

 

We just stopped making sensible transfer decisions after Macia left 

[CL Fox]

37 minutes ago, Stadt said:

We bought dross like Vestergaard - it was neither a punt or a just going and buying a proven plug and play upgrade. 
 

Lazily recruiting Martyn Glover because our DoF is literally the bottom 1/x exacerbated this, not riding our winners again in recruiting from Ligue 1 or 2 but stupidly going down the the PL route like with the Perez deal was the problem.

 

We could have signed upwardly mobile players, it’s easy to say in hindsight now (but would have been sensible then) we didn’t about £5m more on Ghezzal the summer after Raphinha scored ~15 goals for Vitoria Guimaraes. We were just dumb, we chose this because our eminence grise doesn’t know his arse from his elbow across Top and Vichai’s tenure.

 

We just stopped making sensible transfer decisions after Macia left 

Every club buys shit players, the issue is our inability to get rid of them.

[Spudulike]

8 hours ago, davieG said:

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream

 

Christian Purslow has nailed Leicester City truth - Premier League rules killed the dream
Story by Amie Wilson 

 

It was 10 years this week since Leicester City’s memorable trip to take on Club Brugge in the Champions League. Marc Albrighton’s goal, and him wheeling away in celebration will live long in the memory.

A decade on, City sit in 13th place in the League One table. While a 4-3 away win over Stockport County on Saturday lightened the mood, it’s still a far cry away from where the club were.

The question of where it went wrong over the last five or so years has been asked countless times, and in truth, there are so many different factors. There has been chronic mismanagement from the top. Amid the talk of a takeover, it feels like the best solution all around.

 

Speaking on The Football Boardroom Podcast, former Aston Villa CEO Christian Purslow gave his thoughts on where it has gone wrong for City. “I think it’s a cautionary tale, people and personalities aside, this is Icarus flying too close to the sun,” he said.

“They're a cautionary tale of a club that dared to dream, that the closer they got to being one of the big boys, spent more and more. Rules forced them to balance the books and selling your best players and replacing them with less good players on similar wages, often ends badly.

“This is an extreme example, but not the first example of challenging clubs ultimately being defeated by the process of forced selling of best players, just how hard it is in the end to keep replacing your best players.”

There’s no doubt that the Premier League’s financial rules have had a big impact on City’s situation. Brendan Rodgers spoke about the need for a refresh in the summer of 2022, but City were restricted with what they could spend due to the Profitability and Sustainability Rules.

City had finished in eighth place in the table the previous season. It followed two fifth-place finishes and an FA Cup win.

City wanted to kick on, but the financial rules meant they couldn't. Ultimately, a poor transfer window the previous summer came back to bite them.

Unlike previous windows, the club decided to keep hold of their key players, such as Youri Tielemans, and spent out on additions including Patson Daka, Boubakary Soumare and Jannik Vestergaaard.

This is where the fairness of the rules comes into question for me. Yes, the City hierarchy should be questioned for a lot of their decisions, and they should have seen the situation coming sooner and planned ahead for what could happen.

But one poor transfer window created a domino effect, which has ultimately led to the club now being in League One. City had to take a risk to try to take the next step, and it simply didn't pay off.

If you look at Chelsea, for example, a poor transfer window means that they try to fix it by just spending hundreds of millions more in the next window, without breaking the rules. They don't have to take the risk that clubs like City do; how is that fair to clubs trying to compete?

 

Aston Villa are one of the clubs having to cope with the disparity of breaking into the upper echelons of the table, and the financial gulf between clubs. Sales of Tielemans, Morgan Rogers, Ezri Konsa and Ollie Watkins among others in the transfer window has seen a massive overhaul in the squad, all while trying to compete in the Champions League as well as the Premier League. The club currently sit in 19th place in the table, having got one point from their opening four games.

If they have to cash in, even with the Champions League money coming in, just to comply with the rules, how are clubs with aspirations of breaking into the competition meant to do it?

City should have been cleverer and planned much better for the scenario that was quickly heading their way. Ultimately, that’s why I believe now is the right time for a change of ownership as they look to rebuild again.

But the unfair Premier League rules played a massive part in the club’s downfall. It’s something that other clubs now in a similar situation could easily fall foul of too.

"We don't want too many Leicester City's"

[urban.spaceman]

4 hours ago, Big_Nige said:

The rules are horrendously bad, and put in place to protect the cartel.
 

I agree to a point about a bad transfer window, and how hard it is to recover.

Quadruple Jeopardy:

Quote

 

Martin Samuel writing in today’s Sunday Times, June 2025:

 

Leicester victims of PSR quadruple jeopardy

 

Leicester City would like to make a managerial change; that much seems obvious. Ruud van Nistelrooy won four league matches in his tenure, two of which came after relegation, against teams that, like Leicester, were already down. They cannot move, however, because of Profitability and Sustainability Rules (PSR). Leicester already fear a vindictive 12-point deduction in the Championship next season, and paying off Van Nistelrooy would make their financial predicament worse. Any player who may be considered an asset, such as goalkeeper Mads Hermansen, will have to be sold, weakening them further. Russell Martin, considered a managerial target, has now taken the job at Rangers, and there is a worry that two other candidates, Danny Röhl, of Sheffield Wednesday, and Sean Dyche, may be lost to them too.

 

Leicester erred with Van Nistelrooy, and that’s what PSR does — it cements mistakes in place, with no second chances. So Leicester will be relegated, suffer a points deduction in the league below and conduct a fire sale of what little talent the club do possess, while being stuck with a manager who has shown little aptitude for the job. No one is arguing the club have not been run poorly, but PSR ensures they get no opportunity to change course. This isn’t double jeopardy, it’s quadruple jeopardy. It is almost as if the Premier League won’t rest until it kills a club, just to show it can.

 

 

4 hours ago, Big_Nige said:

 

But the rules didn’t stop us paying Ryan Bertrand £120k a week. It was never the transfer fees it was the ludicrously high wages we were paying either unproven, or past it, footballers, which we found nigh on impossible to then shift. We should have been smarter, it’s easy to blame the rules, and I did at first, but the more you scratch the surface of financial mess this club has gotten itself into, it’s all on Top and Rudkin for me

I'm not disputing the shocking management. I'm saying that the rules themselves, the inconsistent implementation of them, the disproportionate sanctioning and the disordered temporal mess of consequences also contributed to our downfall. I would also say it was accelerated by the Premier League and EFL's determined campaign to sanction us, repeatedly breaking their own rules before changing them to find us retroactively guilty, when they've been considerably more relaxed and lenient with other clubs who have actively broken the rules repeatedly even when there have been clear consequence for us. 

 

None of this excuses the ownership of anything. Both exist at the same time. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited Tuesday at 22:56 by urban.spaceman